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Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
151–160 of 183 posts
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#152I found the following review of the book interesting. I always like to read the "negative" reviews of something because I find it easier to make a decision whether to read something or buy something (books, software, food, etc...) based on whether I can identify with the negative comments or not. If someone has recommended something to me, and the negative comments are inconsequential to me (or absurd, etc...), I'm m…
What a horrible and ignorant review. The person could have saved everyone time by simply summarizing what they actually mean: "USA, USA, USA!".
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
You are not the first to make the mistake of comparing I.P. with physical property. They are not the same physically, in theory, in practice or in law.
My argument is that the public paying for a thing is not sufficient grounds for claiming that the public should have use of that thing. Since knowledge creation and nuclear weapons are both examples of things which the public pays for, I defend the comment as it stands. The distinction between IP and physical property does not enter into the claim.
My argument is that knowledge can't be stolen from the people or resold to the people at a profit. Immoral and even illegal in my view even if not backed by law.
Nuclear weapons are physical and as such can't be shared with the population but ultimately, assuming for a second that democracy works, american nuclear weapons belong to the american people, even though it is not under direct control of any singular citizen or at least it shouldn't be.
The distinction is fundamental. You can't copy at marginal cost nuclear weapons, but you can copy information indefinitely.
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
It seems likely that you are an imbecile. Thanks for letting everyone know that you agree with everything the review says about Chomsky despite the fact that you haven't actually read Chomsky.
Thanks for letting everyone know that you agree with everything the review says about Chomsky despite the fact that you haven't actually read Chomsky. You're welcome. I think that's the intellectually responsible and honest thing to do. And it gives people a chance to point out what I am misunderstanding and educate me, if they really think I've gotten it wrong. It seems likely that you are an imbecile. I gave an exp…
"And it gives people a chance to point out what I am misunderstanding and educate me, if they really think I've gotten it wrong."
Just a friendly note that this notion will cause you much grief.
I used to think that it was the best way to quickly get to the point and figure out what is what in the matter. What happens instead is that people will call you an imbecile and go off on tangents about subjects they have recently read a story about instead of addressing the core issues, of which they know less about.
In reality most people do not know much about these complex issues and you will not really learn anything by trying to make them educate you. They are not able to.
You will need to investigate the issues yourself, including reading a lot of literature by those you think are wrong. Eventually you will be able to understand where those opposing viewpoints are coming from and if you are lucky you will learn something that can adjust your own views and you will no longer have the "us vs them" feeling and instead think of it as "those who are wrong on this point and those who are wrong on this other point".
Getting to that place is impossible by imploring others to educate you. They will at best try to convert you, which is entirely different.
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your glasses analogy is interesting but I think is misleading, in that it assumes there's a correct way to view things. This approach is one of the major problems I have with Chomsky and other writers like him, i.e. "you have been duped by the (mostly US) media, the military-industrial complex, by the secret powers that may be; here is the real truth about matters". Rather than being presented as the truth, these opi…
Digressing . . . centrifugal force is a non-inertial force. It's roughly equivalent to being in a car which accelerates quickly so that you feel pressure from the seat on your back. The centrifugal force in this case would be the pseudo force that's propelling you backward with respect to the car. The seat's force pushing you forward is analogous to centripetal force. So I would argue it's a full truth with a pedanti…
Thanks! I've long understood that the centrifugal "force" appears due to an accelerating reference frame, but the comparison to an accelerating car makes it much clearer.
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not entirely convincing. I personally prefer Falkenstein as my Chomsky critic: The spread is a debating tactic where you present a set of supporting arguments so wide and particular your opponents are unable to rebut them all because 1) they have day jobs and 2) they have limited space or time to address them in any particular forum. A champion spreader is Noam Chomsky, who selectively recites facts of world history…
Well that's a new one: the evidence he cites is so voluminous and wide-ranging, there must be something wrong with him.
Never read the guy, but this is a real:
Shotgun argumentation - the arguer offers such a large number of arguments for their position that the opponent can't possibly respond to all of them [1]
Gish has been characterized as using a rapid-fire approach during a debate, presenting arguments and changing topics very quickly [2]
Also, this might be relevant (?):
Proof by intimidation (or argumentum verbosium) is a jocular phrase used mainly in mathematics to refer to a style of presenting a purported mathematical proof by giving an argument loaded with jargon and appeal to obscure results, so that the audience is simply obliged to accept it, lest they have to admit their ignorance and lack of understanding. [3]
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
Al Franken describes it best in Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them : "They don't get it. We love America just as much as they do, but in a differenct way. You see, they love America the way a four-year-old loves her mommy. [We] love America like grown-ups. To a four-year-old everything mommy does is wonderful and anyone who criticizes mommy is bad. Grown-up love means understanding what you love, taking the good…
President Obama's war on whistleblowers is generally an attempt to silence the stories that present the US in an unflattering (though true) light. Just mentioning this in case anyone thinks that Franken's quote indicates that the mainstream left actually shares Chomsky's principled stance.
As a 'mainstream lefty', I feel pretty safe in saying that Obama has generally been considered by many of us as right of center.
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
The author is quite explicitly saying that the problem is the volume and variety of information. There is no mention of the 'shallowness' of any one particular reference. The author justifies this by saying no reader can reasonably be expected to be "familiar with" the references Chomsky uses. So what? The references are all there and available for the reader to look up. Once looked up, the reader is familiar with it…
I think it is quite obviously implied that Chomsky's understanding of all his examples is quite shallow and that they are being used mainly to add weight to a predetermined world view. falkenstein's point is that it is almost impossible to understand such a variety of examples in real depth and it is also unlikely that Chomsky himself is using them all correctly. To dismiss this criticism as simply an acceptance of "…
> it is also unlikely that Chomsky himself is using them all correctly.
That's low hanging fruit then, go for it. After all proving Chomsky decisively wrong on a large number of things is something a lot of people would like to be able to do, by reading you I get the impression that this is easy. After all criticizing Yehudi Menuhin does not even require one to be able to play the violin.
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
President Obama's war on whistleblowers is generally an attempt to silence the stories that present the US in an unflattering (though true) light. Just mentioning this in case anyone thinks that Franken's quote indicates that the mainstream left actually shares Chomsky's principled stance.
As a 'mainstream lefty', I feel pretty safe in saying that Obama has generally been considered by many of us as right of center.
Agree. In another time, he would be a moderate Republican, in the time when the Republican party allowed moderates.
Re: Aaron Swartz: The Book That Changed My Life
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
President Obama's war on whistleblowers is generally an attempt to silence the stories that present the US in an unflattering (though true) light. Just mentioning this in case anyone thinks that Franken's quote indicates that the mainstream left actually shares Chomsky's principled stance.
As a 'mainstream lefty', I feel pretty safe in saying that Obama has generally been considered by many of us as right of center.
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