TUTORIAL IT

Americans actually live in Russia although they think they live in Sweden And they would like to live on a kibbutz

In "The Lottery Mentality," a 2011 editorial in The New York Times, Chrystia Freeland explains that "Americans are mistaken about income inequality because of national self-confidence and the lottery effect."

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/03/21/rising-wealth-inequality-should-we-care/the-lottery-mentality

Americans actually live in Russia, although they think they live in Sweden. And they would like to live on a kibbutz. This isn’t the set-up for some sort of politically incorrect Catskills stand-up joke circa 1960. It is the takeaway from a remarkable study by Michael Norton and Dan Ariely on how Americans think about income inequality.

The right likes to argue that income inequality as an issue doesn’t win elections because Americans don’t begrudge the rich so much as they want to join them. The Norton and Ariely study suggests otherwise. Given a choice, the authors find, Americans would prefer to live in a society more equal than even highly egalitarian Sweden.

Another popular view is that income inequality isn’t experienced as acutely by most Americans as the numbers suggest because of how much can be “consumed” by the lower rungs of the nation’s socioeconomic ladder. No less a figure than Alan Greenspan, the maestro himself, once made this case at the Federal Reserve’s annual Jackson Hole conference, presenting data on the consumption of dishwashers, microwaves and clothes dryers showing that if measured by the possession of these goods – as opposed to the huge and growing income divide -- inequality was decreasing.

That interpretation is not without merit. But it turned out that allowing Americans to prosper by using their homes as A.T.M.s and maxing out on their credit cards was maybe not such a great idea.

Personally, I lean toward two other theories. Americans are mistaken about income inequality because of national self-confidence and the lottery effect.

By national self-confidence, I mean the widespread conviction that the American way is probably right because all those other ways don’t seem to work out so well. This is a wonderful national quality and one of the reasons America has such resilience. But confidence in the American way can make it hard for the country as a whole to recognize when things aren’t working.

Take, for instance, the health care debate, when a politically effective criticism of what has come to be known as Obamacare was to argue that it would destroy the “best” health care system in the world. Mary Meeker, a Silicon Valley guru of impeccably capitalist and American credentials debunked that idea in her recent USA, Inc. presentation, in which she pointed out that “U.S.A. per capita health care spending is 3x OECD average, yet the average life expectancy and a variety of health indicators in the U.S. fall below average. But if you spend way more than everyone else, shouldn’t your results (a.k.a. performance) be better than everyone else’s, or at least near the top?”

Aside from faith in American national excellence, the other main reason Americans seem so unperturbed by the widening chasm between the rich and everyone else is what I like to call the lottery effect. Buying lottery tickets is clearly an irrational act -- the odds are hugely stacked against us. But many millions of us do, because we see the powerful evidence that an ordinary person, someone just like us whose only qualifying act was to buy a ticket, wins our favorite lottery every week.

For many Americans, the nation’s rowdy form of capitalism is a lottery that has similarly bestowed fabulous rewards on the Everyman. The current leading exemplar of self-made billions is Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, and he may soon be outstripped by the even more instant cyber-star Andrew Mason, the founder of Groupon.

But the problem with lotteries is that there are only a few winners. That is the story the numbers tell us about American capitalism today -- and unless that underlying reality changes, at some point all those folks who think they already live in Sweden will realize they live in a winner-take-all society, and that most of us aren’t winning.

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Andrew McGonigal on Eflins Epistemic Presuppositions and their Consequences the question of heirarchy

I am glad I’m not paid to keep score in the essay-debate between Juli Eflin and Andrew McGonigal found in Moral and Epistemic Virtues (2003). I would give up somewhere around the point where Andrew McGonigal (in his criticism of Eflin’s essay “Epistemic Presuppositions and Their Consequences”) offers the following brief and biting criticism of Eflin’s project:

“…given that Eflin seems to hold that a combination of rules and procedures and virtue theory can provide the relevant explanations, it is difficult to see why her own theory is not both hierarchian and complete, contrary to advertisement—it looks to me as if she just takes a broader range of conceptually basic elements as necessary to provide complete explanations of problems within the epistemological domain.” (73)

Some background, after which McGonigal’s claim will become more clear…

Eflin’s position, begins with a criticism of “traditional epistemology” (her characterization of which is doubted by McGonigal) along several lines, which include that TE is “heirarchial” and “complete.” What do these terms mean? Eflin defines them as follows:

“For a theory to be heirarchial, some set of notions is taken as basic and other dlements in the theory are derived from or reduced to these basic elements” (p. 50). Also, Eflin claims that, if a theory posits self-justifying elements which explain other elements, then the theory is heirarchial. (50).

Completeness: “For a theory to be complete, everything in a theory’s domain is accounted for in terms of the basic concepts.”

Some examples of theories that are “heirarchial and complete”, according to Eflin, include Coherentism (i.e. BonJourian), as well as virtue theories such as Zagzebski’s, the latter of which, Eflin claims, posits the virtues as basic concepts from which other concepts are derivable (hence “heirarchial”) and committed to virtue as a “success term” (hence, Eflin thinks, complete).

An aside: I am skeptical of her characterization of Zagzebski’s position as heirarchial and complete. It is more clear that foundationalism and Coherentism would be candidates, though.

Anyhow—Eflin, after demarcating “traditional epistemology” as branded by being heirarchial and complete (among other criticisms, such as requiring the supposition of ideal knowers, etc.), she presents her own account—which has the virtues as well as rules as primary (central, ,but not such that other concepts can be derivable from them), but not basic—and which she thinks is not heirarchial and complete, and which has added benefits of not being “context-stripping” or stipulating ideal knowers. She describes her account as a pluralistic virtue-centered epistemology. She uses the term “virtue centered” rather than “virtue theory” because, on her view, the latter description would imply that virtue is taken as basic within the theory. Eflin’s account avoids taking virtue as basic by using what she calls a teleological position, in which understanding is identified as the end of human life (or, an end). However, says Eflin:

“We can say ‘understanding’ in the abstract, and we can discuss the various virtues on which an inquirer needs to draw to produce it, but ‘understanding’ simpliciter cannot be given an account, nor can an inquirer have it. I can only achieve particular understanding from where I am, that is, from my context. It has to be an understanding needed by an individual, achievable from her present understanding and through her epistemic virtues, or from ones she can develop.”

The problem that I saw, and which I think McGonigal (in the quote I presented initially) finds problematic here is that Eflin seems to be trading one basic concept for another. Rather than to have a basic concept of virtue from which all other concepts are derivable, she has understanding as such a concept. It seems to me that, although she doesn’t say this clearly, she thinks that because understanding simpliciter remains vacuous on her account (so that she can avoid “context-stripping”), that therefore, understanding is disqualified from being a basic concept from which other concepts are being derived, and a fortiori, she has not committed the sin of hierarchy. This seems to me a dubious inference. As McGonigal suspects of her, “it looks to me as if she just takes a broader range of conceptually basic elements as necessary to provide complete explanations of problems within the epistemological domain.”

Is that what she’s doing?

There are at least a couple questions which at this point need to be answered if we are to attempt to “deobfuscate” the issue of whether her theory avoids the charge of being heirarchial (which, to reiterate, she insists it is not).

(1) From what premises does Eflin get to the conclusion that her theory is not heirarchial, given the definition she presents for a theory’s being heirarchial.
(2) How are we to go about determining whether “understanding” fits the bill of a basic concept in her view. Additionally, what is the relationship between a concept’s being un-analyzable simpliciter and that concept’s qualifying as basic within a theory?

Without answers to these (and perhaps some more) questions, I’m inclined to think that McGonigal’s criticism is on target. Her pluralistic virtue-centered epistemology is simply invoking a broader range of concepts, and using a concept (understanding, relativized to a particular knower, in her own context) as basic.

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All You Need to Know About Vivien Leigh on Her 99th Birthday

The 5th of November is usually a day where people go and buy some sticks of colourful delight and light them of fire so they can look up at the sky being ignited for about five seconds. Since Ive never really relished in seeing fireworks go off in the sky (it hurts my neck and ears...I prefer to watch from a distance), Guy Fawkes might as well mean something else for me. On this day in 1913, my favourite actress, and generally my favourite person who ever walked this Earth, Vivien Leigh was born in Darjeeling, India.

If youve seen either Gone with the Wind or A Streetcar Named Desire, youll know just how amazing she was. If you havent seen either of them, do Vivien a favour on what would have been your 99th birthday: get out from under your rock and see what youve been missing. While youre at it, check out Waterloo Bridge, one of my absolute favourite films, which you can find on YouTube. Honestly, youll love me forever.

I thought that I may as well dedicate an entire post to my love for Vivien Leigh, which started when I was a mere 12 years old. Because I had the tendency to get over obsessed with things back then, I read around five biographies on her, and then wrote my own (honestly, it was just one of the biographies condensed down...all of the quotes and everything were from one of those biographies that Id read). Since I cant share the entire thing with you - and nor do I want to, I was an awful writer at age 13 - I thought Id just throw together a random birthday appreciation post, filled with lots of facts that you likely didnt know. I dedicated a whole period of my life to this woman, so hopefully you will find some interest in it. Alas, here we go:

-Viviens real name was Vivian Mary Hartley. The last name in her stage name is the first name of her first husband Leigh Holman, who she married in 1932 at the age of 19. They had a child, Suzanne, in 1933. Vivien divorced Holman in 1940 so she could marry Laurence Olivier, whom she met in 1935 when they starred together in a season of Romeo and Juliet on stage. At that time, Olivier was married to Jill Esmond, who was also pregnant with their son, Tarquin. Both Holman and Esmond granted their respective spouses a divorce in 1940 and Vivien and Laurence married. They would divorce in 1960, due to both Viviens mental illness and the fact that Laurence was having an affair with Joan Plowright.

-When she was at school, future actress Maureen OSullivan (probably best known for her involvement in the Tarzan films) asked Vivien what she wanted to be when she grew up. Vivien replied "an actress...a great actress."


-It is all because of Laurence Olivier that she got the role of Scarlett OHara in Gone with the Wind. As you probably know, producer David O. Selznick poured about $50,000 into his three year search for his perfect Scarlett. Vivien literally came in at the last minute. Originally, Vivien had wanted to star opposite Laurence in Wuthering Heights as Cathy, but the producers were set on Merle Oberon. They offered Vivien the role of Isabella, but she declined it. When it came time for Laurence to shoot it, Vivien missed Laurence terribly so she went to America to be with him.
In the lead up to finding his Scarlett, David O. Selznick asked the public to vote for their ideal Scarlett. The most votes went to people like Bette Davis, Katharine Hepburn and Barbara Stanwyck, but one guy from New Zealand sent in a vote for Vivien. Yeah, us NZers have good taste.
That lone NZ vote didnt exactly do wonders, and Selznick said himself that he had "no interest in Vivien Leigh" when her name was put forward again in 1938. When Vivien came to America, Bette Davis had dropped out of contention as she played a similar character in 1938s Jezebel (which also won her an Oscar), and Paulette Godard was the main contender.
Vivien signed with Laurences boss, Myron Selznick, who was also David Selznicks brother. He took her onto the set of Gone with the Wind, where they were already filming the Burning of Atlanta scene (using stunt double for the unnamed Scarlett and Clark Gable as Rhett) on December 10th. Myron introduced Vivien to his brother by saying "Hey Genius. Meet your Scarlett OHara". She was instantly given a screen test.
The only actresses left in the race were Vivien, Joan Bennett, Jean Arthur and Paulette Godard. Bennett and Arthur were denied, leaving Godard and Leigh. They were given Technicolour screen tests, which sealed the deal for Vivien. Another factor in Godards failure to get the role was about her relationship with Charlie Chaplin, as no-one was really sure about how that was going down. Vivien was given the part on Christmas day, which was a great shock to her, as she thought that Katharine Hepburn had got the part.

-Waterloo Bridge was her favourite film that shed done.

-In 1944, Vivien started filming Caesar and Cleopatra. She was also pregnant at the time. While filming, she slipped and fell heavily, resulting in a miscarriage two days later. It was here when she contracted tuberculosis and her manic-depression started developing.

-One of the reasons I love Vivien so much is because she loved NZ. In her own words: "This must be the most subdued place in the world. The quiet is unearthly...Nevertheless much more couth and better mannered all round than the Australians and a much better audience."


-In 1949, she was introduced to the role of Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire, as she took the role for a London stage production. The show ran for 326 performances, and clearly took its toll on Vivien as shed often be seen shaking and distraught at the end of it, but she received rave reviews for her performance. It wasnt too long before a film adaptation was in the works. Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter and Karl Malden were all a part of the stage production in New York, with Jessica Tandy playing Blanche. Kazan and writer Tennessee Williams favoured Vivien, so she was ultimately cast in the role. The role won her a second Oscar.

-She was going to star in Elephant Walk, which sent her to Ceylon, India. There, she started an affair with her co-star Peter Finch. She also suffered a mental breakdown, which resulted in her losing the role and being sent home. In one episode, she began reciting lines from A Streetcar Named Desire, and became so involved with that role again that when a nurse tried to calm her by saying "I know who you are, youre Scarlett OHara", she replied "Im not Scarlett OHara! Im Blanche DuBois!" She was deemed unfit to go back and finish Elephant Walk, so Elizabeth Taylor took the role.

-Vivien suffered another miscarriage in 1960. This had a clear effect on her relationship with Laurence, and they divorced that year.

-In 1963, Vivien won a Tony award for her performance in Tovarich. This was quite a remarkable feat as Vivien had never needed to sing before, and her voice was failing because of her tuberculosis.

-Vivien died on Friday July 7th, 1967, aged 53. She died of a severe tuberculosis attack. Many years later, Laurence Olivier was found watching one of Viviens old films on TV. He had tears in his eyes, and he said "This, this was love. This was the real thing."

Vivien Leigh had a pretty tough life, which is why her story is so fascinating. Seriously, if you ever want to know any more about her (this was a pretty brief overview), I know just about everything there is to know. But for now, a huge Happy Birthday to the most beautiful, interesting, talented woman who ever lived (in my opinion). May she go on in our hearts forever.

What do you think of Vivien Leigh? Got any favourite films/performances from her?

Available link for download

AntiX 8 5 Full install on Asus EEEPC 900

Disclaimer: Do at your own risk.
All below procedures are done with the understanding that the user backs up all critical data. This site and author is not responsible for any mistakes or problems encountered. I will try to make this as simple and painless as possible. Any novice should be able to hopefully follow the below steps.

This time I am going to show how I installed the New AntiX 8.5 to my internal Solid State Drives.
4gig SSD and 16gig SSD, I had Xandros 4 on this Netbook previously. To read up on New Features and to download AntiX. You can go to Here

There are numerous ways to make a boot able Live USB. I used Unetbootin to make mine like I did in My Previous AntiX tutorial.

It was also pointed out you can make a live USB using the antiX2usb installer via the AntiX Control Center. Below link will show you how.

Link



If using Xandros to make Unetbootin work. All I can say is to make sure mtools and p7zip is installed in Xandros also.Otherwise the Linux Version of Unetbootin wont work (wont start).
There will be no swap partition made with this install. Swap partitions can be harmful for SSD drives.

Insert your bootable live USB of AntiX 8.5. Power up and hit Esc key and pick your pendrive as first boot device. When grub Menu comes up pick Netbook boot from the grub menu. Now from here on. These were my steps on how I installed AntiX 8.5 (my way).

After getting to a Desktop. I went to the taskbar with the crossed wrenches icon and opened up AntiX Control Center and left clicked on the Network Tab.



I have connected my Asus EEEPC 900 using Ceni also. Ceni picks up my wireless and Cable interface just fine as wlan0 and eth0. I just prefer wicd but Ceni will work for you also.

Ceni

I picked Connect Wirelessly with Wicd. On the next window that opens. I go to the preferences tab and left click it. In the empty Connect Wireless Box I type in wlan0.



Then I left click on External Programs and switch from Automatic to dhclient. I then left click on the refresh tab and my router shows up and I connect via wireless to my router. A safer way to go about installing is if you have a land line. Use it instead if worried about dropping a connection. I just wanted to show I enabled wireless on my EEEPC 900.

Ok, Now on to the install. Left click on Menu Tab on far left of taskbar. Pick the AntiX Installer 3rd up on the Menu.



Left click and next window asks for password. The password is

root

When Next Window opens you tick on the box agree to terms



Next window make sure sda is showing. Tick on Install to custom partitions. Then Left click on Gparted Button.



When parted Opens. You will see sda1, sda2, sda3, and sda4. DO NOT TOUCH sda3 OR sda4. The only partitions you wish to delete are sda1 and sda2.. So right click on sda1 and select delete. Do the same also for sda2. Below I show sda1.



Below I show sda2



We will now move on to sdb drive which is the 16 gig secondary drive on my Asus EEEPC 900. I proceed to delete that partition also. In gparted in the top r/h corner hit the drop down arrow and select /dev/sdb. Then delete sdb like you did the 2 partitions on sda.



Ok. If you followed everything correctly so far your gparted window should look like mine below.
Check out that the assigned tasks you have given gparted (like delete sda1,sda2,and sdb) show in the bottom of gparted window.



If everything looks good. Hit the apply button and let gparted do its job.You will be greeted by one last final warning. Say yes and you are off to starting on your AntiX install. Xandros will be no more. Not even the recovery you had when you used the F9 option on the Asus 900. This is a one way trip.



After you get the completed successful operations window. Hit the close button.



Now go back to the top r/h corner of gparted and select /dev/sda with the drop down arrow.



Left click on unallocated partition on sda and select new



Make it a primary partition. I picked ext2 file system because I have read that journaling file systems like ext3,reiserfs, etc.... are harmful for SSD drives. Better safe than sorry says I.
Label it as root (/).



Now after setting that up. Go to the top r/h corner again and select /dev/sdb



Again right click on the 16gig unallocated and select new



I made mine a primary partition, ext2 file system, labeled as /home.




Again. Double check the bottom of gparted window before saying apply operations.



Below is the next window you should see after hitting apply button.



When done. Take a look at sdb and see if yours looks like mine.



Now go back to sda and we are going to flag sda as bootable. Just right click and select Manage flags. Then tick on the boot box and hit apply.





After hitting apply your line for /dev/sda1 should look like mine.



Ok. You can close gparted now. You are done setting up your SSD drives for the installation process.
Now. To avoid some confusion. The Mepis Installer that AntiX 8.5 uses can not install /home to the secondary 16gig drive you formatted. It is a limitation because IMO the installer was made for platter ide and sata drives which are usually only one drive per laptop. I will show you later on how I moved the home folder to sdb 16gig SSD in as simple of procedures as I know how.
I have successfully done this procedure and am writing this tutorial on my Asus EEEPC 900 and all things I save to home now go on to my /home drive on sdb.

Now. Make sure sda1 is where the root partition is going. No swap. And home is also going to root for now. Make sure and tick on the box that says "preserve data in /home (if upgrading) so as to not overwrite your ext2 partition. If you dont click that box. /home will be formatted as ext3 during the install process. So to preserve my ext2 file system. I tick on that box also.



Select yes on the last minstall that pops up. You are ready to install AntiX 8.5 now.



The install process is fast. This is your next window. I read the messages while installing.



When done. We are on to installing grub. Make yours match my screenshot below for installing grub



You will be asked if it is ok.Say Yes.



Confirmation grub installed OK is Next.



After hitting OK. The next window is for startup services in case you need dial up or printing services. I just leave the defaults for me and select next.



Next window is network names



Next is localization Window. I am a Texan so I pick English. I ticked the GMT box (personal preference).



Next is user name and passwords.



Dont freak out if you get a warning pop up saying something about not being able to name user folder. I got that pop up. Just say OK and hit finish when you are done.




Next Window. You are done for now. Reboot and pull your live Pendrive when netbook shuts down. You are done with it.



Reboot to your new AntiX install. Just pick the top option in grubs menu. Slim is the login manager for AntiX. The Splash screen is by my good buddy Sakasa. If you wish to have wicd monitor show up on taskbar so as to see if you are connected. What I did was go to the crossed wrenches in toolbar and when AntiX control Center Opens I selected "Edit Icewm Settings and below window opens. I select startup tab on taskbar and uncomment the
"sleep 2 && wicd-client &" . Hit save on taskbar and exit.



Next hit the red button on taskbar and log out and back in again. You should have a moniter on bottom r/h of taskbar



Now. The easiest way I know how to show you how I moved my home folder in / to /home on sdb is to provide a link to the thread I made at AntiX Forums. Thanks to SilverBear, dolphin_oracle,secipolla, and anticapitalista. I was successful in moving home on / of sda to
/home on sdb,

Link

Any questions you may have or comments. You can make at the AntiX section at Mepis Lovers or the AntiX Forum.

I am going to just provide some screenshots below to show how my edited /etc/fstab looks now. Always back up your /etc/fstab or any other file that you are going to make changes to

I do this by making a backup folder in home and inserting stock unchanged files in there and renaming them fstabbackup as a example.


First shot shows how rox should appear after moving home to /home to sdb and symlinking /home on sdb to / on sda. The symlink is needed to move saved changes to the new home on sdb. My thread should pretty well explain how I went about doing this and has screenshots. If you get stuck. Ask and someone will answer in the AntiX forum or at Mepis Lovers.



My current /etc/fstab as it now stands. Also after moving home to /home on sdb. Make sure home has file permissions so as user can make changes. I did this by opening a terminal. Typed in

gksu pcmanfm

entered my password and pcmanfm opened as root user. Then went to my /home drive and right clicked on home folder and selected properties. Then selected permissions and made my user able to read and write to folder and all sub directories. My Modified /etc/fstab below



Update: Limiting writes to SSD on EEEPC. I made this thread at AntiX Forum and another at Mepis Lovers. If interested

Link

There might be better ways to write and do this kind of install and tutorial. But I am just a regular Home User trying to help out the Linux community for all the help given me. Happy Trails, Rok

Available link for download