In article <a472f146-2977-db64-5a4e-920bdaea12a7@example.net>,
D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>> On 2024-11-05, D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>>> Let's not forget the future of artificial wombs and mandatory semen banks!
>>
>> Aldous Huxley explored this almost 100 years ago.
>
>Which book?

His most famous one: Brave New World.

--
_/_
/ v \ Scott Alfter (remove the obvious to send mail)
(IIGS( https://alfter.us/ Top-posting!
\_^_/ >What's the most annoying thing on Usenet?

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 14:40:27 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> Transistors were described by a Canadian first, but he never built one.
> They weren't invented in the USA, they were developed there into
> something that worked

Worked at audio frequencies, anyway. It was the Japanese who got them to
operate at up to radio frequencies.

The US-based electronics companies had no interest in such a development.
Can you say “disruptive technology”?

On 05/11/2024 20:24, rbowman wrote:
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 02:38:57 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>
>> On 5 Nov 2024 01:05:16 GMT, rbowman wrote:
>>
>>> Belloc wasn't far off. He also warned in 'The Great Heresies' that
>>> Islam, a Christian heresy was only slumbering and shouldn't be written
>>> off as a threat.
>>
>> This planet ain’t big enough for two religions which both believe their
>> sky fairy is the only true sky fairy, all other sky fairies are
>> heretical falsehoods to be stamped out?
>
> Same sky fairy in this case. It's in the details. Most Christian
> variations are trinitarian. I'll let someone else argue about the Mormons
> and a couple of other minor sects. A triune god is hard to wrap your head
> around. I think many Christians would fall into one of the classic
> heresies trying to explain it in their own words. Mohamed knew his
> audience and dumbed it down to one god. Jesus and Mary get an honorable
> mention.
>

What you call trinitarian does not relate to the God. Well not exactly.

It is part of Jewish mysticism.

And is related to numerology.

A crude explanation is that in order to have an observable world, you
need three things, a world, an observer, and the resultant observation..

Or God the Father, the Holy Spirit, and God the Son.

Today we might call those three things quantum reality, consciousness,
and the material world as we understand it.

The Jewish idea of a god is more a divine and supernatural principle, at
least as far as the mystics went.

Not something you prayed to.

They didn't have our sophistication of language, but they weren't stupid
either. Science is a descendant of their thinking

--
“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere,
diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.”
― Groucho Marx

On 05/11/2024 20:26, rbowman wrote:
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 14:05:29 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>
>> Islam is not a Christian heresy. Though to a devout Catholic it might
>> have seemed so.
>>
>> In its proclaimed form Muhammed and Jesus were simply equivalent
>> prophets in a long line of them.
>>
>> But of course Mohammed, coming later, was deemed 'more correct'
>
> I think Joseph Smith made a similar claim.

Well they all say that.

Moses went yup a mountain and came back with ten stone tablets he had
prepared earlier.

Let's face it, no one believes a prophet, but physical word of god shit
is impressive huh?

Mohammed heard god who came to him in visions.

In the spring of 1820, God the Father and Jesus Christ appeared to
Joseph Smith as he prayed in a grove of trees near his home in western
New York. This event is known as the First Vision.

Yeah. Right.

Actually I rather like Mormons. They are rather innocent not usually
very bright, but very nice to each other.

--
In todays liberal progressive conflict-free education system, everyone
gets full Marx.

On 05/11/2024 20:50, D wrote:
> I'm not personally a fan of the military, but I had a neighbour once who
> was a major in the military. He was always so frustrated by criminal
> youth programs in sweden and that they always fail to produce results.
>
> He used to say, give them a year with me in the military, and we'll
> straighten them out.
>
> Somehow I believe he was 100% correct.

Yes. I echo your sentiments.

But the more I learnt about the military and what it teaches and how it
teaches the more grudging respect I have for it.

The officer training starts with the assumption that the only thing you
know for sure is what you are trying to achieve, and what resources you
have. The rest is a structured program of plan, reconnoitre, understand
the reality of what you learn, modify the plan, and try again.

No politician would dare be that pragmatic.

--
"It is an established fact to 97% confidence limits that left wing
conspirators see right wing conspiracies everywhere"

On 05/11/2024 20:55, rbowman wrote:
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 14:14:21 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>
>> I have long thought that long term unemployed should be made to join a
>> sort of army, where they are separated from their backgrounds, taught
>> self discipline and how to strive, and anything else they are capable of
>> learning - and would in time become extremely valuable as a civil rapid
>> reaction force to deal with the aftermath of floods and hurricanes etc.
>
> During the Depression a Civilian Conservation Corp was formed.
>
> https://www.nps.gov/articles/the-civilian-conservation-corps.htm
>
> There are still ruins of the CCC camp at one of the local ranger
> districts, They build an airstrip, irrigation systems, trails, and other
> worthwhile projects. Today the nations forests are in need of some TLC and
> a modern version gets floated out but it will never happen. Expecting
> people to work and live under some sort of discipline to collect welfare
> is cruel and unusual punishment.
>
Well only in the land of Liberal Wokery.

--
To ban Christmas, simply give turkeys the vote.

On 05/11/2024 20:56, D wrote:
>
>
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

>> Aldous Huxley explored this almost 100 years ago.
>
> Which book?

I think that would be 'Brave new world'

--
To ban Christmas, simply give turkeys the vote.

On 05/11/2024 20:58, D wrote:
>
>
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, rbowman wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 14:40:27 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>
>>
>>> US country music is absolutely an offspring of English folk music from
>>> North country, scotland and Ireland.
>>
>> The roots of country music are complicated. The Piedmont region wasn't as
>> segregated as the deep South so there was a lot of cross pollination
>> between black and white musicians.
>>
>
> This is the story I have heard. Lots of emigrants from europe brought
> their tunes, and africans brought theirs, and it started to mix up.

The Africans had rhythm. The Europeans had tunes.

And harmony.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W05LPtVm5hY

Not a lot of what I would call melody, but fantastic syncopation and rhythm

The fusion of those brought us jazz and rock and of course Gospel and soul

--
To ban Christmas, simply give turkeys the vote.

On 2024-11-05, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 10:27:50 +0100, D wrote:
>
>> This is the truth, and it does not seem to be working. The next logical
>> step is to punish them!
>
> https://www.rt.com/india/607015-uterus-politics-india-population-control/

Where are they going to live? What are they going to eat?
Where will they get medical care? It sounds like there's
going to be a lot of suffering for the sake of some screwed-up
political and economic systems.

On the other hand, a couple of years ago the lieutenant governor of Texas
said that we should be willing to die for The Economy...

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Growth for the sake of
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | growth is the ideology
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | of the cancer cell.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Edward Abbey

On Wed, 6 Nov 2024 00:02:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> The Africans had rhythm. The Europeans had tunes.

John Lee Hooker was from the Mississippi Delta where there wasn't much
interaction between whites and blacks. He said sommething like 'All them
fancy chords don't mean a thing if it ain't got that beat'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7WxBLtGMcc

Gary Davis was from South Carolina and is in the Piedmont blues tradition.
He knew his way around them fancy chords.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6W9PuLcoZMM

Doc Watson picked up quite a bit of the style, as well as bluegrass and
traditional fiddle tunes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VAbrnjdtYw

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 21:50:53 +0100, D wrote:

> I'm not personally a fan of the military, but I had a neighbour once who
> was a major in the military. He was always so frustrated by criminal
> youth programs in sweden and that they always fail to produce results.
>
> He used to say, give them a year with me in the military, and we'll
> straighten them out.
>
> Somehow I believe he was 100% correct.

Worked like a charm for Lee Harvey Oswald.

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 23:48:20 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> They didn't have our sophistication of language, but they weren't stupid
> either. Science is a descendant of their thinking

“Science” is a process; “scientific knowledge” is the product of that
process.

Every human culture has a body of knowledge that it passes down through
the generations. But how that knowledge was acquired was (mostly) never
formalized. The idea of the acquisition of knowledge as a discipline that
you get trained in, is very much what makes up “science”.

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 23:56:33 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> But the more I learnt about the military and what it teaches and how it
> teaches the more grudging respect I have for it.

It trains you to follow orders, not to think for yourself.

> No politician would dare be that pragmatic.

In the rough-and tumble world of politics, military types tend to be seen
as hopelessly naïve. (Look at Erwin Rommel for a classic example.)

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 23:52:15 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> In the spring of 1820, God the Father and Jesus Christ appeared to
> Joseph Smith as he prayed in a grove of trees near his home in western
> New York. This event is known as the First Vision.
>
> Yeah. Right.

Then there were the VR glasses:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urim_and_Thummim_(Latter_Day_Saints)

There must have been something in the water of western New York, possibly
a hallucinogen exposed by digging the Erie Canal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burned-over_district

Most of the theological novelties didn't survive. That's been a lifelong
topic of curiosity for me. Why do some survive while others fail? Smith
and his followers were driven out of New York and Smith was eventually
killed in Illinois. It wasn't an auspicious beginning.

> Actually I rather like Mormons. They are rather innocent not usually
> very bright, but very nice to each other.

Of you want Mitt Romney, you're welcome to him. They do have well
organized social lives. My brother lived in Utah for 20 years. His wife
was the daughter of a Baptist minister and while not exactly a pariah
found little fellowship. She referred to the experience as 'camping out'.

On Wed, 6 Nov 2024 00:02:09 +0000, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

> The Africans had rhythm. The Europeans had tunes.

Where would you say the Portuguese and Brazilians got their rhythms from?
They are very different from, say Spanish ones.

Fun fact: the “Blue Note” that you hear in Blues music originated from the
Touareg people. They were part of the chain of slave traders that
trafficked their victims from Africa to Europe and the New World.
Naturally the slaves they handled picked up a few things from them along
the way ...

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 21:56:12 +0100, D wrote:

> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>
>> On 2024-11-05, D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>>
>>> On Mon, 4 Nov 2024, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>>>
>>>> On 2024-11-04, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On 4 Nov 2024 18:27:56 GMT, rbowman wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Except for the baby mommas that see kids as a source of income...
>>>>>
>>>>> The Government should be paying women to have children.
>>>>
>>>> Some do.
>>>
>>> This is the truth, and it does not seem to be working. The next
>>> logical step is to punish them! ;)
>>>
>>>>> Where else are the children going to come from?
>>>>
>>>> Let's take care of the ones already here before we worry about making
>>>> more.
>>>
>>> Let's not forget the future of artificial wombs and mandatory semen
>>> banks!
>>
>> Aldous Huxley explored this almost 100 years ago.
>
> Which book?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XbQBz8rMW0

Get your new, improved Malthusian Belt TODAY!

On Tue, 05 Nov 2024 20:20:00 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

> I came across a book describing how you can set up cams and linkages to
> perform various mathematical functions. Fascinating in a "lost art"
> sort of way...

Analog computers were sliding into history when I was in school but they
lingered on for a while, even as Heathkits.

https://www.nutsvolts.com/magazine/article/May2016_Heathkit_Restoration

Enough patch cords and you could do anything. Heath was rebooted a couple
of years ago and seems to be hanging on.

https://shop.heathkit.com/

I've got enough problems soldering headers on a Pico with 3X magnifiers so
my kit building days are in the past but I hope they can carry on.

On Wed, 06 Nov 2024 00:25:47 GMT, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

> Where are they going to live? What are they going to eat? Where will
> they get medical care? It sounds like there's going to be a lot of
> suffering for the sake of some screwed-up political and economic
> systems.

"we should encourage people to have more kids so we can get more federal
aid for our already undernourished kids" didn't seem like a well thought
out plan. Then I realized more federal aid has to filter though a bunch of
sticky fingers before the first bag of rice hits the ground.

I'm not picking on India alone; many US dollars mysteriously evaporate
before reaching the nominal recipients. Government corruption is
universal.

On 11/5/24 8:53 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 04/11/2024 22:26, John Ames wrote:
>> On Mon, 4 Nov 2024 13:19:25 +0000
>> The Natural Philosopher <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> But one has to ask what in fact a desktop OS is for these days.
>>
>> Any damn thing you please, no walled gardens needed, thankyouverymuch.
>>
>>> The 'home PC' is now a fondleslab, TV or smartphone.
>>
>> People have been nattering about "the death of the PC" for upwards of
>> twelve years now - and they're still here.
>>
> Yes, but they are no longer the goto for an IT illiterate consumer.
>
> A desktop workstation is in use by people in business, by designers, and
> by hard core realtime 3D gamers.
>
> Everything else has gone touchy-feely-crappy.
>
> That's changed the dynamic of 'what in fact a desktop OS is for these days'
>
> I didn't mean there wasn't a need for one: Just that as desktops move
> into more professional areas, they way they work doesn't need to be so
> 'chrome and tailfin'
>
> Microsoft is keeping the PC market alive by introducing new code that
> wont run on old hardware. Apple is the same.
>
> So the second hand market is flooded with dirt cheap PCS that wont run
> win11 or whatever.
>
> I think this will in the end drive some applications to run on Linux as
> well as windows and OSX
>
> Or windows will as someone else pointed out, be simply a certified WINE
> interface.
>
> The only thing that windows can do, but its a very important thing, is
> to runs specialist 3rd party programs.

You're not entirely wrong.

'PCs' are heavily 'game' oriented now.

With gigabit+ internet in many places MOST ordinary/biz
users can get by with the "thin terminal" model. All the
real work is done "out there" on some corps supercluster.

Back to the 70s !

Which makes them your masters/owners.

But few think about that. Like, what could go wrong ?

Alas this current, defective, paradigm means that
even Linux/Unix servers and workstations get degraded
by another notch in the big scheme of things.

MIGHT be time to push into a "two worlds" paradigm -
"cloud" -vs- "local".

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, rbowman wrote:

> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 02:34:31 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
>
>> Typical passive-aggressive response. Again, your implicit assumption is
>> that the USA is better at everything than anybody else, so if it is
>> doing something badly, there’s no way anybody else could be doing it
>> better.
>
> My version of Godwin's law is the first person to say passive aggressive
> can go fuck themselves. Bye bye, Lawrence.
>

Wise choice... Lawrence already lives happily in my killfile.

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, rbowman wrote:

> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024 10:39:06 +0100, D wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, rbowman wrote:
>>
>>> On Mon, 4 Nov 2024 13:21:09 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:
>>>
>>>> I’m not sure I’d want a Zulu as a slave.
>>>
>>> No, some other populations seem more docile.
>>>
>>>
>> Perhaps I could recommend a swede or norwegian? Very docile! ;)
>
> There is some truth there. Norwegians are often the target of ethnic jokes
> around here. Four Norwegians at a four way stop is seen as a disaster.
> "After you!", "No, I insist, after you!"
>
> A friend told me the local Sons of Norway lodge has been taken over by
> Germans. Why build your own clubhouse when you can move into and existing
> one with little resistance?
>

Haha... brilliant and very true. ;)

On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Scott Alfter wrote:

> In article <a472f146-2977-db64-5a4e-920bdaea12a7@example.net>,
> D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>>> On 2024-11-05, D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>>>> Let's not forget the future of artificial wombs and mandatory semen banks!
>>>
>>> Aldous Huxley explored this almost 100 years ago.
>>
>> Which book?
>
> His most famous one: Brave New World.

Oh, time to read again. Did not remember that.

On 06/11/2024 08:35, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
> MIGHT be time to push into a "two worlds" paradigm -
>   "cloud" -vs- "local".

Ive seen that see-saw go one way and then the other.

In the beginning computers were Very Expensive, and God said
"Lo, let them time share"

The Lo, the microprocessor arrived, and Bill Gates said:

"Let them have computing power on their desktop" and it *was* good.
But the forces of Evil did then invent universal networking, and the
people, being lazy fuckers did cluster to the false Gods of the Clouds
who promised: "Give us all your data, and we shall look after all of it
for you, and ye shall no longer have to worship at the altar of C:\"

But the high priests of the One True God replied, saying 'verily we say
unto ye that the false gods of the Clouds are not your gods, and they
are the spawn of Satan, and ye should instead install the mighty
Penguin, prophet to the True God, and be Free and learn to look after
your own data".

But the people said 'honestly mate, we cant be fucking bothered. We did
exchange a walk on part in a war for a lead rôle in a comfortable cage:
We don't need no stinking desktops anyway. That's for content creators -
we are only consumers of popcorn , coke, and whatever drivel is 'free'
on air and online'

And they voted for the Orange Jesus, because they were simply *bored of*
assholes telling them what to do and treating them like idiots.

"When you follow the [Liberal progressive] herd all you see is assholes."
"Donald may be an asshole, but you said that is what we were anyway, so
he is at least *our* asshole."

Ho hum.

Interesting times

--
"Nature does not give up the winter because people dislike the cold."

― Confucius

On 06/11/2024 10:37, D wrote:
>
>
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Scott Alfter wrote:
>
>> In article <a472f146-2977-db64-5a4e-920bdaea12a7@example.net>,
>> D  <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>>> On Tue, 5 Nov 2024, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>>>> On 2024-11-05, D <nospam@example.net> wrote:
>>>>> Let's not forget the future of artificial wombs and mandatory semen
>>>>> banks!
>>>>
>>>> Aldous Huxley explored this almost 100 years ago.
>>>
>>> Which book?
>>
>> His most famous one: Brave New World.
>
> Oh, time to read again. Did not remember that.

Long time ago, 1950s or 1960s.

Seem to recall babies all in test tubes and bred for slavery, by an elite.

Replace babies with robots or androids, and here we are.

Don't need no revolting peasants any more.

--
"It was a lot more fun being 20 in the 70's that it is being 70 in the 20's"
Joew Walsh

186282@ud0s4.net <186283@ud0s4.net> wrote:
> On 11/5/24 8:53 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>> Yes, but they are no longer the goto for an IT illiterate consumer.
>>
>> A desktop workstation is in use by people in business, by designers,
>> and by hard core realtime 3D gamers.
>>
>> Everything else has gone touchy-feely-crappy.
>
> 'PCs' are heavily 'game' oriented now.
>
> With gigabit+ internet in many places MOST ordinary/biz
> users can get by with the "thin terminal" model. All the
> real work is done "out there" on some corps supercluster.

"Most users" switched to the "thin terminal" model long before gigabit+
internet was available in many places.

Every single cell phone and tablet is a "thin terminal", in two
meanings of "thin":

1) acts as little more than a display for actual computation which is
performed on a central, shared, computer;

2) is "thin" as in "measures a small amount of depth" :)

There are a great many users for whom their *only* computing device is
a cell phone or tablet. Every one of them is already firmly in the
"thin terminal" camp.

The "touchy-feely-crappy" (i.e., cell phone/tablet) (as TNP puts it)
appeals to the IT illiterate because it seems easier to use. And
there's a whole lot more IT illiterate in this world than there are
even moderately IT literate folks.