What's the lightest, fastest desktop environment for someone who couldn't care less about aesthetics?

maloney7 · 2012-05-26T08:58:03.442081+00:00

He said desktop environment, not window manager.

brblol · 2012-05-25T16:28:54.185070+00:00

Well I somewhat agree, but then oppose the economic framework, not the science.

But it's not just about having "enough" food, GM also helps to reduce the need for pesticides. I don't see why you'd be opposed to using a useful tool, many things in life are "unnecessary" but make things much easier.

fastparticles · 1 day

Ah, that's interesting.

I haven't started working properly yet, as I am still studying my integrated Masters' course in Physics in England. But I'll be working with a psychology department in Germany, assisting a PhD student as part of the DAAD RISE programme (if you live in the US, Canada or Britain, definitely take a look at it, I worked on the programme last year as well, making data analysis software for a photovoltaics lab).

But I will be working on this research - so regarding the dimensionality of the perceptual space of achromatic vision. This paper explains the basic ideas quite well, note there's a lot of it that I still don't know properly yet (mainly Fechnerian Scaling). It was mostly chance that I got this project really, as you choose a few, and I was chosen for this because of my programming experience (something you might want to keep in mind).

I'm not entirely sure which part I'll work on exactly (I'm there for 3 months so probably a fair amount), but it will probably be either programming the light controls with python (to ensure the walls of the testing room are the same colours as the fields used in the tests, though I think this is mostly finished now), programming experiments for the monitors (I think it'd be interesting to do 3D scenes, to see if that will create a third perceptual dimension, as you can see that it affects size constancy), and analysing data with R (which I've never really done before but want to learn as it's useful for data mining programming, etc. too).

Do you live in the US or elsewhere? As in Britain you cannot change what you choose to study easily, and it's difficult to take electives, so I'd be careful of choosing physics in that respect (I even partly regret it compared to Comp. Sci. and Maths).

That said, one of my friends was in a similar position to yourself, and eventually chose to study physics, and now greatly enjoys astrophysics, and didn't enjoy psychology when she did an elective module, so its' really hard to say for any person or place in particular.

I'm not sure how much the physics background will really help, but I can't really say beforehand.

brblol · 1 day

If I remember rightly, they opposed GM foods.

I think that's like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Sure, there are problems with them being patented, etc. but those are problems of the economic system, not the science.

It did well to expose the cruelty in some parts of farming, but I don't think their solution of just buying "organic" is much of a solution at all. It seemed like it was more interested in pandering to its middle class viewers than solving the problems shown.

Ultimately I think we need greater use of scientific methods, not less, to overcome the problems in the agricultural industry. GM is definitely a useful tool, as ultimately we need to maintain the growth in output after the Green Revolution if we are to avoid famines.

Many of the other issues raised are ultimately tied to energy production rather than the agricultural processes themselves. And that's another big issue really, but I think again, we shouldn't try to abandon what we have gained, but use the time we have to invest in Nuclear Fusion (and in the meantime build wind farms, dams, nuclear reactors when necessary).

brblol · 1 day

What makes them "not documentaries"? I didn't like Gasland or Food Inc. but they're still documentaries, this is literally a No True Scotsman thing.

Yeah, but I'm pretty sure the aim of this post was to get the mods to start banning "conspiracy" documentaries.

brblol · 1 day

Have Addendum and Moving Forward been "debunked"? I wouldn't tar them all with the same brush.

brblol · 1 day

Why? The later films are good, and some of the best political documentaries made nowadays.

The first film is terrible I agree, but what gives you the right to just ban it?

fastparticles · 1 day

Haha, well this paper was on the theoretical side. But my point was that it's not just like sociology or economics where it's just an opinion.

There are many tests in quantitative psychology, like this for example, on deducing the dimensionality of the perceptual space of achromatic colours. Where the perceptual space is the number of dimensions (i.e. properties) we use to distinguish the stimulus (in this case, greyscale colours).

So we know from previous experiments that we can relate the probability of discrimination to the distance in perceptual space. And then from a matrix of the magnitudes of the distances between points, one can deduce the dimensionality of the space.

This paper is more straightforward, where they demonstrate that achromatic colour perception must be at least 2D, as subjects are unable to match the grayscale colours by changing just one variable (due to the way the eye interprets the borders as significant to the colour perception - like the Cornsweet illusion, remember that the colour you perceive can be very different to the wavelength of the light itself).

acurrie · 1 day

But anarchism isn't just "remove all the regulations". Anarchists oppose private property as well, and hierarchy, so there would be no corporations in the current sense of the word.

Look at Republican Spain for an example.

fastparticles · 1 day

It's like the difference between a biologist and a doctor.

fastparticles · 1 day

Psychology can be a pretty hard science, look at this paper for example (PDF): http://www.staff.uni-oldenburg.de/hans.colonius/download/Basics.pdf

Regarding Fechnerian scaling, and the dimensionality of perceptual spaces.

fastparticles · 1 day

Heh, I'm a physics Masters student working on a psychophysics project this summer, and yeah, it's way more scientific than I'd previously thought. There's more topology (regarding perceptual spaces) than in Physics :/

acurrie · 1 day

Which goes for corporations also, they also have to rent or buy machinery. Open Source does not mean that the workers control something.

I don't understand what you mean. In the physical world, you cannot just start producing goods, as other people have claimed all the Earth's land and resources with force. The same applies to the tools of labour - you are reliant on using the machinery at a factory, etc., all owned by someone else, and so the worker is put in a position of great vulnerability, as you are completely reliant on what work you can find.

In the digital world this is no longer true, as any computer is capable of producing source code (thanks to Free Software). (Though obviously this requires that you have a computer to even access it)

So the whole argument of "workers control" is pretty moot in terms of FOSS.

Second, if they want to distribute means without government they just abuse the word socialism and can't be taken seriously.

But even Marx and revolutionary socialists wouldn't "distribute means via government", they aim to overthrow the government. The idea of government regulation hasn't really got a lot to do with socialism. Look at the Paris Commune, etc.

I don't know what you mean by Anarchism being the first step to corporatism.

There's a lot of individual profit motives in Open Source.

Sure, in Open Source I don't doubt that. There are many people that are just interested in it as a means to make more money by saving the need to repeat others' labour. But that is not the aim of the GNU project or the Free Software foundation for a good reason.

How can capitalism ever work together with socialism? The former is based on the privatisation of the Earth's resources, and the latter on their communalisation. It seems largely irreconcilable, even if some features like markets may have a place in some strange ideas like mutualism.

ajqkqz · 1 day

Source: http://www.nerfnow.com/comic/532

seeellayewhy · 1 day

Oops, it seems you are right. I must have confused it since he wrote it in London, using English sources and mostly concerning the English economy. Well, at least that somewhat excuses the complexity of the writing.

Also, I had no idea it was Marx who coined the phrase "first as tragedy, then as farce".

acurrie · 2 days

Yeah, you are absolutely right. It seems the author has some Americanised "Big Gubment" definition of socialism :/

And I actually respect Stallman more, for always standing by his beliefs - he could certainly have made much more money just developing proprietary software after finishing at MIT, but he didn't. That's what real strength is, choosing the right decision despite having other tempting choices - be it Marx choosing to work on political economy in poverty rather than just becoming a lawyer, Einstein continuing to work in science whilst a patent clerk, or Stallman deciding to found the GNU project rather than just getting a well-paid job like everyone else.

acurrie · 2 days

No, the workers does not hold the means of production in open-source, it's available to everyone.

Well, that's the point, it's not like you have to rent machinery from a landlord, etc. like you would in physical industry.

Yes, the government has to be involved in socialism.

Not really, look at anarchism and libertarian socialism.

Software or development models cannot be socialistic but on the other side, who cares.

Well, I somewhat agree, technology takes no sides. But the models of development can certainly take characteristics from one side or the other, for example, the reliance on the individual profit motive or not, the equal access to all people, etc.

chris1710 · 2 days

Well, that was stupid, but it was still only the choice between AV and FPTP.

I'm not saying that many people aren't politically ignorant but it's more complicated than just blaming it on the voters - the lack of any ability to change anything itself discourages participation in politics (look at the Pirate Parties in Europe vs. here for example), the media also has a big part too.

At the moment ignoring politics is just rational ignorance, because you never can change anything anyway. The only people who will ever be elected are those shuttled in from public schools and Oxford/Cambridge for the Party lists.

I think if people felt they actually had any power (and had the time to do so), then they would find it worth partaking in. But at the moment it's as irrelevant as the peasants wondering about the intricacies of the royal court.

chris1710 · 2 days

The electoral system.

chris1710 · 2 days

Ultimately the electorate gets what it deserves.

I don't believe this, we have only a choice between 3 major parties, all much the same, and 70% of the time your vote is useless due to safe seats anyway.

seeellayewhy · 2 days

~~Capital was originally written in English, not German.~~

EDIT: Incorrect, see below.

priyankasetty · 2 days

Part 1 was batshit enough - saying Darwin had no scientific basis, etc.

priyankasetty · 2 days

No, the 20th Century wasn't the bloodiest in history. The level of violence (i.e. chance of a violent death) has actually been decreasing - see: http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_on_the_myth_of_violence.html .

This is propaganda, not a documentary.

xylon · 2 days

But you don't remove democratic government, but instead remove the ability of people to bribe it, by stopping excess property ownership, etc.

Natefil · 3 days

Well in socialism, I believe that communal force will be necessary to stop the establishment of private force in re-establishing private monopolies of the Earth's resources, etc.

But I don't think there is much wrong with this, just as there is nothing wrong with using force to stop a murderer, or anyone who would harm the community for their own gain.

jamesmcm

TROPHY CASE

Four-Year Club	reddit mold
Verified Email

jamesmcm

TROPHY CASE

you'll need to login or register to do that

create a new account

login