Recent Posts
xkcd basically closed the case on this. : )-TaoPhoenix (January 11, 2014, 06:54 AM)
and just give you my own personal take on it:
Huh - now I don't even get an "Order now" button. The Free Raspberry Pi option is completely missing from the colocation ordering page now.-mwb1100 (January 10, 2014, 09:41 AM)
I don't think supporting evil really ever works out very well.-Renegade (January 09, 2014, 06:16 PM)
Very intriguing. Thanks for sharing.
You don't happen to have the source(s) for those James Madison quotes, do you?-Deozaan (January 09, 2014, 04:46 PM)
==================================================================================
George Orwell Explains in a Revealing 1944 Letter Why He’d Write 1984
Posted: 09 Jan 2014 04:45 AM PST
Most of the twentieth century’s notable men of letters — i.e., writers of books, of essays, of reportage — seem also to have, literally, written a great deal of letters. Sometimes their correspondence reflects and shapes their “real” written work; sometimes it appears collected in book form itself. Both hold true in the case of George Orwell, a volume of whose letters, edited by Peter Davison, came out last year. In it we find this missive, also published in full at The Daily Beast, sent in 1944 to one Noel Willmett, who had asked “whether totalitarianism, leader-worship etc. are really on the up-grade” given “that they are not apparently growing in [England] and the USA”:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I must say I believe, or fear, that taking the world as a whole these things are on the increase. Hitler, no doubt, will soon disappear, but only at the expense of strengthening (a) Stalin, (b) the Anglo-American millionaires and (c) all sorts of petty fuhrers of the type of de Gaulle. All the national movements everywhere, even those that originate in resistance to German domination, seem to take non-democratic forms, to group themselves round some superhuman fuhrer (Hitler, Stalin, Salazar, Franco, Gandhi, De Valera are all varying examples) and to adopt the theory that the end justifies the means. Everywhere the world movement seems to be in the direction of centralised economies which can be made to ‘work’ in an economic sense but which are not democratically organised and which tend to establish a caste system. With this go the horrors of emotional nationalism and a tendency to disbelieve in the existence of objective truth because all the facts have to fit in with the words and prophecies of some infallible fuhrer. Already history has in a sense ceased to exist, ie. there is no such thing as a history of our own times which could be universally accepted, and the exact sciences are endangered as soon as military necessity ceases to keep people up to the mark. Hitler can say that the Jews started the war, and if he survives that will become official history. He can’t say that two and two are five, because for the purposes of, say, ballistics they have to make four. But if the sort of world that I am afraid of arrives, a world of two or three great superstates which are unable to conquer one another, two and two could become five if the fuhrer wished it. That, so far as I can see, is the direction in which we are actually moving, though, of course, the process is reversible.
As to the comparative immunity of Britain and the USA. Whatever the pacifists etc. may say, we have not gone totalitarian yet and this is a very hopeful symptom. I believe very deeply, as I explained in my book The Lion and the Unicorn, in the English people and in their capacity to centralise their economy without destroying freedom in doing so. But one must remember that Britain and the USA haven’t been really tried, they haven’t known defeat or severe suffering, and there are some bad symptoms to balance the good ones. To begin with there is the general indifference to the decay of democracy. Do you realise, for instance, that no one in England under 26 now has a vote and that so far as one can see the great mass of people of that age don’t give a damn for this? Secondly there is the fact that the intellectuals are more totalitarian in outlook than the common people. On the whole the English intelligentsia have opposed Hitler, but only at the price of accepting Stalin. Most of them are perfectly ready for dictatorial methods, secret police, systematic falsification of history etc. so long as they feel that it is on ‘our’ side. Indeed the statement that we haven’t a Fascist movement in England largely means that the young, at this moment, look for their fuhrer elsewhere. One can’t be sure that that won’t change, nor can one be sure that the common people won’t think ten years hence as the intellectuals do now. I hope they won’t, I even trust they won’t, but if so it will be at the cost of a struggle. If one simply proclaims that all is for the best and doesn’t point to the sinister symptoms, one is merely helping to bring totalitarianism nearer.
You also ask, if I think the world tendency is towards Fascism, why do I support the war. It is a choice of evils—I fancy nearly every war is that. I know enough of British imperialism not to like it, but I would support it against Nazism or Japanese imperialism, as the lesser evil. Similarly I would support the USSR against Germany because I think the USSR cannot altogether escape its past and retains enough of the original ideas of the Revolution to make it a more hopeful phenomenon than Nazi Germany. I think, and have thought ever since the war began, in 1936 or thereabouts, that our cause is the better, but we have to keep on making it the better, which involves constant criticism."
Yours sincerely,
Geo. Orwell
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Three years later, Orwell would write 1984. Two years after that, it would see publication and go on to generations of attention as perhaps the most eloquent fictional statement against a world reduced to superstates, saturated with “emotional nationalism,” acquiescent to “dictatorial methods, secret police,” and the systematic falsification of history,” and shot through by the willingness to “disbelieve in the existence of objective truth because all the facts have to fit in with the words and prophecies of some infallible fuhrer.” Now that you feel like reading the novel again, or even for the first time, do browse our collection of 1984-related resources, which includes the eBook, the audio book, reviews, and even radio drama and comic book adaptations of Orwell’s work.
==================================================================================
Colin Marshall hosts and produces Notebook on Cities and Culture and writes essays on cities, Asia, film, literature, and aesthetics. He’s at work on a book about Los Angeles, A Los Angeles Primer. Follow him on Twitter at @colinmarshall or on his brand new Facebook page
"In time of actual war, great discretionary powers are constantly given to the Executive Magistrate. Constant apprehension of War, has the same tendency to render the head too large for the body. A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defence against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people."
"Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments, the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the constituents."
"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended; its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force, of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war, and in the degeneracy of manners and of morals engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
"If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy."
Latest Trolling? The Linux Kernel In Perl
Posted by Michael Larabel in Linux Kernel on 05 January 2014 04:02 AM EST
For those in need of some light reading this weekend, the latest comical proposal hitting the Linux kernel mailing list is to have a new project writing portions of the kernel in the Perl programming language.
An alleged university student is interested in writing code for the Linux kernel in Perl over the commonly-used C or even Assembly. The thread author, Antti Heikkinen, wants to explore writing an operating system in Perl as he's taken a beginner course into the language and he likes the language a lot. He notes, "Very impressive ability to make many thing work, interpret or can compile also."
According to his classmates and professors, "they say LINUX kernel is too big and bloat, run poor with too many developer. And too much quick decision from leader with ego is too big and bloat too, kekeke."
This beginner Perl programmer doesn't want the whole Linux kernel written in the language, just certain portions. Those wanting to continue this read can head over to the Indiana kernel mailing list.
A kernel in Perl is rather silly given it's a high-level and interpreted language, etc. At least it makes for some light-hearted weekend reading just past the holidays and entertaining yet technical discussions within the forums. Then again, we've seen Lua scripting added to the NetBSD kernel. Lua in NetBSD is mostly being used for debugging and the prototyping of new features.
Propose for LINUX kernel and PERL
From: Antti Heikkinen
Date: Sun Jan 05 2014 - 00:46:28 EST
To Dear Perl and LINUX kernel development community:
My propose to you at your list: is possible to write operate system in
PERL? I am student in university, looked for interest project to
conclude my study on LINUX kernel.
This semester, I take beginner PERL course and learn power of
procedural language. I automate many daily task with use of it. Very
impressive ability to make many thing work, interpret or can compile
also.
Also about LINUX, I talk to much fellow students and professors, and
take a operate system course use FreeBSD and LINUX. FreeBSD okay, but
they say LINUX kernel is too big and bloat, run poor with too many
developer. And too much quick decision from leader with ego is too big
and bloat too, kekeke.
LINUX kernel can perform more good if written in not C and C++ but
Perl? Just certain portion of LINUX kernel to rewrite? For instant,
schedule or support of multithread? If so, should use Perl5 or Perl6,
focus to x86 or x86-64? Can you want to join me this my project? But
to hear your expertise.
Am excited to learn and begin study project. Can you want to join this
my project? Please direct reply of email to myself.
Much thank to you,
Antti Heikkinen
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.o.../majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
)40hz, I am mostly just trying to get my business records functionally secure and all team members to see and work on documentation for the same clients so we all know what is going on. We are in the US, where the Hipaa laws wreak havoc with ordinary communication and electronic storage. I actually argue with the people who monitor my security. It is OK to send information by snail mail, but anyone can steal a letter, copy a letter, send it to someone else. A letter can get lost in the US postal service. Same for faxes. Who knows who else is in the office with the fax machine? So to me, the fact that someone can "break into" the data and steal it, it just more of the same. However, no one asks my opinion.
Erica-ericalynne (January 04, 2014, 08:07 AM)
I'm running Win7 32bit on an AMD machine; which download should I choose?-bit (January 03, 2014, 05:40 PM)
Handbrake-eleman (January 03, 2014, 01:55 PM)
I'm also open to suggestions whether I should consider .mov or .avi format instead of mp4,-bit (January 03, 2014, 01:51 PM)
