Where is balance? -- Re: Academic priorities
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From: Terje Mathisen on 4 May 2005 05:49 Casper H.S. Dik wrote: > =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan_Vorbr=FCggen?= <jvorbrueggen-not(a)mediasec.de> writes: > > >>>A butter knife can take an eye out. > > >>So can my fingers. How do I leave those at the reception desk? > > > And spoons and forks can too. > > It's that I don't have much of an inclination to mess > with airport security, but whenever I fly KLM I get > a metal knife/fork/spoon. I wonder what would happen if > I take one out of the plane and then try to take it back > on the return trip. Stainless steel cutlery on all international flights to/from the US is of course nice, however it really doesn't matter at all when you consider that all airlines gladly sell you firebomb-making gear while onboard: High-proof Jamaica Rum, plus a regular (linen or cotton) napkin plus a match == Molotov cocktail, right? Besides, who needs a sharp knife when a broken whiskey bottle is handy? Terje PS. Here in Norway they've also made it illegal to carry knifes around downtown, unless they are part of some form of uniform. I.e. when wearing my traditional Telemark costume, the richly decorated knife is OK, and all my scouts can wear their knives as long as they also wear at least the scout's scarf. :-) The strange part here is that traditionally, Norway has been so dependent upon hunting & fishing (only 2.6% of the country is even potentially arable, according to the CIA Fact book), that we never even considered stuff like this to be weapons: Shotguns were unregistered and available to anyone over 16, while all Home Guard members, plus all reserve officers in all service branches would keep their full basic kit, including their AG3 (Heckler & Koch ?) full auto rifle at home. It made Norway to most heavily armed country in the world, alongside Switzerland. About 10-15 years ago several military storage bunkers were broken into and rifles, machine guns and hand grenades etc stolen from them. The knee-jerk reaction was to force almost all Home Guard/Reserve Officer personell to hand over their rifles & ammo, even though theft of military weapons from private residences had never been a problem. :-( -- - <Terje.Mathisen(a)hda.hydro.com> "almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
From: David on 4 May 2005 06:27 On Wed, 04 May 2005 11:49:46 +0200, Terje Mathisen wrote: > Casper H.S. Dik wrote: >> =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan_Vorbr=FCggen?= <jvorbrueggen-not(a)mediasec.de> writes: >> >> >>>>A butter knife can take an eye out. >> >> >>>So can my fingers. How do I leave those at the reception desk? >> >> >> And spoons and forks can too. >> >> It's that I don't have much of an inclination to mess >> with airport security, but whenever I fly KLM I get >> a metal knife/fork/spoon. I wonder what would happen if >> I take one out of the plane and then try to take it back >> on the return trip. > > Stainless steel cutlery on all international flights to/from the US is > of course nice, however it really doesn't matter at all when you > consider that all airlines gladly sell you firebomb-making gear while > onboard: > > High-proof Jamaica Rum, plus a regular (linen or cotton) napkin plus a > match == Molotov cocktail, right? > > Besides, who needs a sharp knife when a broken whiskey bottle is handy? > > Terje > > PS. Here in Norway they've also made it illegal to carry knifes around > downtown, unless they are part of some form of uniform. > It used to be legal to have your skean dhu (small sharp knife work in a kilt sock) on planes, as long as you were wearing a full kilt getup. It is, I believe, legal to have them here in Norway in the same way as it is legal to have the Norwegian knifes with your bunad. I wonder, however, if it is still legal to have a skean dhu with a kilt in Scotland? > I.e. when wearing my traditional Telemark costume, the richly decorated > knife is OK, and all my scouts can wear their knives as long as they > also wear at least the scout's scarf. :-) > > The strange part here is that traditionally, Norway has been so > dependent upon hunting & fishing (only 2.6% of the country is even > potentially arable, according to the CIA Fact book), that we never even > considered stuff like this to be weapons: > I guess in Norway (and Switzerland) there just isn't the same tradition of shooting people as there is in the USA. It happens occasionally, but I don't think the availability of guns (or knives) make any difference to violent crime here. For some reason, it seems to be a different matter in the USA. > Shotguns were unregistered and available to anyone over 16, while all > Home Guard members, plus all reserve officers in all service branches > would keep their full basic kit, including their AG3 (Heckler & Koch ?) > full auto rifle at home. It made Norway to most heavily armed country in > the world, alongside Switzerland. > > About 10-15 years ago several military storage bunkers were broken into > and rifles, machine guns and hand grenades etc stolen from them. The > knee-jerk reaction was to force almost all Home Guard/Reserve Officer > personell to hand over their rifles & ammo, even though theft of > military weapons from private residences had never been a problem. :-(
From: jmfbahciv on 4 May 2005 05:25 In article <IIydneqywLiqMerfRVn-iA(a)rogers.com>, rpl <plinnane3REMOVE(a)NOSPAMyahoo.com> wrote: >jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: >> In article <LO6dnb-vyozPmerfRVn-tA(a)rogers.com>, >> rpl <plinnane3REMOVE(a)NOSPAMyahoo.com> wrote: >> >>>Marco S Hyman wrote: >>> >>>>rpl <plinnane3REMOVE(a)NOSPAMyahoo.com> writes: >> >> <snip> >> >>>>Or do you >>>>think there is a valid lesson in getting kicked out of school because >>>>you carry a pocket knife? >>> >>>nope; don't see any reason why a student should carry one on school >>>grounds, either. >> >> >> You've never been on a farm? Or work? >> <snip> > >yup; you oversnipped: Sorry about that. >|| ? I'm not familiar with what you mean by "zero tolerance", but given >|| a "check-in" procedure, I see no problems. > >If'n I was the "coatcheck" person, I'd be inclined to charge extra for >packages with explosive potential or livestock. There's a difference between the two? /BAH Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.
From: jmfbahciv on 4 May 2005 05:37 In article <1115125770.355052(a)haldjas.folklore.ee>, Sander Vesik <sander(a)haldjas.folklore.ee> wrote: >In comp.arch Marco S Hyman <marc(a)snafu.org> wrote: >> rpl <plinnane3REMOVE(a)NOSPAMyahoo.com> writes: >> >> > > just failing to help solve the problem, they are active contributing to >> > > it. (One example: "zero tolerance") >> > >> > zero tolerance of what? bringing fully automatic weapons onto school >> > grounds? >> >> It wasn't that long ago when it was not uncommon for children from about >> 10 years old and up to bring weapons to school, rifles shotguns that were >> stored in the school gun rack or cloak room during school hours. The > >I'm really glad I never have lived and am never going to live anywhere >where such could happen, never mind be considered the norm. > If you want supper, you either shoot it or hook it. When my Dad was a kid and his father got a hankering for fish, my father would be told to take his pole and get supper. When I was a child, I'd be told to go pick the vegetables Mom wanted for dinner. My brother rarely buys meat from the grocery store because he stocks up his larder with venison, rabbit, and turkey and other birds that happen to fly past the window....all within hunting season...of course. Hunting licenses are getting to be a PITA. /BAH Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.
From: jmfbahciv on 4 May 2005 06:22
In article <asSdnfuDs-N-LerfRVn-pQ(a)rogers.com>, rpl <plinnane3REMOVE(a)NOSPAMyahoo.com> wrote: >jmfbahciv(a)aol.com wrote: > >> >> Nope. Anybody who debugs hard/software uses this rigor. Think >> about it. Isolating the symptom is really based on making an >> assumptions, demonstrating their validity, and slowly eliminating >> facts that don't matter or interfere with exercising the "proof". >> > >That's as close to a formal definition of debugging I've ever heard. [blushing emoticon here] Thanks. Do me a favor. Fix the post so it read well, claim attribution, and .sig it. I'm getting weary of seeing people not know this is how work gets done. > >> Practical applications: Fixing the damned bugs. > >though I think that the "fixin'" part should be the job of the original >writer, so it doesn't reoccur. That would be justice. :-) Sometimes, one does have to do the fixing because having the original coder do the work would never get the bug fixed and introduce more code designed to produce headaches in your head. Have you ever noticed that these types never delete code unless it's a vital body part? /BAH Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail. |