From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,e6a2e4a4c0d7d8a6 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-03-02 16:19:57 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!lnsnews.lns.cornell.edu!news.litech.org!eurocyber.net!newsfeed.muc.eurocyber.net!newsfeed.stueberl.de!news-mue1.dfn.de!news-koe1.dfn.de!RRZ.Uni-Koeln.DE!uni-duisburg.de!not-for-mail From: Georg Bauhaus Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: status of PL/I as a viable language Date: Mon, 3 Mar 2003 00:19:56 +0000 (UTC) Organization: GMUGHDU Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: d2-hrz.uni-duisburg.de X-Trace: a1-hrz.uni-duisburg.de 1046650796 8152 134.91.1.15 (3 Mar 2003 00:19:56 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@news.uni-duisburg.de NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 3 Mar 2003 00:19:56 +0000 (UTC) User-Agent: tin/1.5.8-20010221 ("Blue Water") (UNIX) (HP-UX/B.11.00 (9000/831)) Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:34812 Date: 2003-03-03T00:19:56+00:00 List-Id: John R. Strohm wrote: : Meanwhile, some years back, the small town of Kennesaw, it is puzzling to see that people who professionally deal with logic (programmers) start falling for any particular evidence supporting something, despite its logical incompleteness, as long as it is in favour of their views. On either side. - Of course, one has to ask what kind of place Kennesaw is. One has to ask how high the percentage of social cohesion and homogeneity in a town like this is. From what I hear there is no need to force people to get a gun in parts of Los Angeles, however it is not particularly silent there. - One has to ask why it is--again--not seen that the Kennesaw success might as well have had to do with the "Hawthorne experiment" effect. It works in part because everyone gets involved, the emphasis being on getting involved, not on being cretin or not, and not on weapons. - One has to ask whether an average sample town is free of Montagus and Capulets. And for practical purposes the average has to be the modus of towns of this kind, because otherwise it is just one sample that seems to have displayed some characteristics that cannot really be predicted to occur elsewhere, given the same requirements. - One has to assume(!) that there are no cretins in each town to wich this model can be ported, if it can, see above. For otherwise people couldn't trust each other; I guess you haven't missed the "trust discussion" in the USA. Imagine: Every step you make you will have one hand near your weapon. - There is more to add, as to every one-factor-theory. - So, ... - Facing community issues, one has to remember, how, for example, men and women of (protestant christian) god, with no weapons and a very homogeous social life deal with people in their community who chose to obey differing moral rules. Rules which, as moral rules, are o.K. even for the conservative U.S. citizen but not for the chiefs in the community. For (an extreme) example, consider the Hutterer communities: At best, the "disobedient" will have to leave, banned (without any possesions). (Not exactly "fault tolerant social software", these rules.) As far as drawing conclusions from this example is concerned, same thing as in the Kennesaw case: interesting but not near general enough. Certainly "Bowling for Columbine" is biased, but can you explain, using Kennesaw theory, why there are less killings per person in Canada, and why they don't lock their doors in Toronto, apparently? It is almost the same as saying, Ada is The Right Programming Language because in a particular project, some goal had been achieved. Even in a largely complexity-reduced field such as programming, a one factor theory is just not enough, it is detrimental. And, finally, and most importantly, murder doesn't require the murderer to have a gun, and gun owners have been murdered more than once.