On 2/14/2010 1:54 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sun, 14 Feb 2010 12:29:28 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>
>> Hmm. Prefer being a realist.
>
> Go for it.
>
> I find that using the approach of "what would be the ideal place to be"
> as a starting point works quite well.  Then what you do is you apply
> realism to that ideal position and come up with something that's as close
> to the ideal solution as you can.
>
> Starting from a "realist" position means that you start with a suboptimal
> solution, and then you whittle down from that (who ever starts with a
> "realistic" solution and then says "hey, we could actually go a bit
> further than this"?
>
> IOW, starting with a "realist" position limits one's thinking to a lower
> bar, and there's a very small chance of trying something with a slightly
> *higher* bar because one limits oneself to the thinking that "that'd
> never fly".
>
> So I prefer starting out with the ideal solution, but with the
> understanding that the ideal solution is never going to be implemented
> and there will be some compromise.  I find I tend to come up with better
> solutions that way.
>
> Jim
Never said you *start from* a realist position. Sure, you start with the 
ideal, then work from there. The problem often is that some people are 
prone to start and end there, like gun advocates, for example. Had 
another one of them recently on a blog. They point out that people will 
still be violent, people will still attack other people with other 
things, etc. They then *leap* to the conclusion that more people armed 
will "prevent" the problem. Uh.. Run that by me again, because I think I 
missed something some place, and that is without including, "How do the 
people with the guns know, especially untrained, and undisciplined, who 
to shoot back at, and who is just defending themselves?" The same 
arguments they make for why banning them is a problem - which is that 
crazy, stupid, and violent people will still exist, is the *same* 
argument against making sure that 100% of the people in a room all have 
guns. The only people that won't have them are the people who didn't 
want them, wouldn't use one, and couldn't defend themselves with one 
anyway. **EVERYONE** else is someone that has already learned to shoot, 
one assumes fairly accurately, would use one, quite possibly believes in 
using one as a solution to the threat, and is **willing**, if not 
**intending** to kill someone.

Its like telling people that we would all be safer if everyone had a 
portable nuke. I mean, logically, its simply an extension of the same 
thing, right? And no "rational" person is going to get depressed, angry, 
violent, and/or suddenly snap, and set the thing off to get back at the 
neighbor for not returning their rake, right?

Oh.. And they are always willing to a) assert that their are "a lot" of 
cases where is improved the odds of people not dying, while b) their 
only evidence is situations that involved guns, and where there was no 
way to resolve the situation without more of them. Nothing is ever 
mentioned of the thousands of cases of cops, every year, which manage to 
avoid shooting people, as a solution to talking a hostage taker, or some 
other moron, out of a building, safely, and without people getting shot 
at, usually. Its almost like talking to the morons that think torture is 
"necessary" to get good information from people, despite every scrap of 
evidence to the contrary, including the huge amount that suggest that 
you get *bad* evidence from people, if they don't know anything in the 
first place, so you will stop torturing them. The failure of reality to 
match their assumptions just flat out doesn't register with them.

Anyway, point being, sure, you start with "optimal", then you try to 
work out what works at all. But, sometimes, there just isn't any. 
logically, "optimal" you can aim for.

-- 
void main () {
   If Schrödingers_cat is alive or version > 98 {
     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

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