Ubuntu: time to get rid of the sense of entitlement

> Everything does have an explanation ... There are always rational explanations for everything, especially for why people do what they do.

Keep on believing that T.A. Personally, I think the Bard said it best in Hamlet.

> But love does not demand a reward.

They'll simply say love is it's own reward, gus3. I've seen this discussion too many times. There's no way for either side to convince the other.

Quoting: Everything does have an explanation, all one needs is the right information. There are always rational explanations for everything, especially for why people do what they do, all one [n]eeds is the information necessary to make he rational explanation.

Were you, by any chance ;-) an Economist in a previous life?

Love is it's own reward, because ultimately love is selfish.

@Bernard, no but I was Cleoptra's hand maiden, the one that found her dead, King Henry's serving wench. I was almost famous right through out history. Sorry I thought we were doing past life regression. When we do that someone else always gets the famous people first, so I have to make do with the not famous ones.

Question: what happens when more than 1 person remembers being someone famous? does that mean the famous person had multiple personality didsorder?

Time-share? "And this is the soul of Napoleon as a young man."

Quoting:Everything does have an explanation ... There are always rational explanations for everything, especially for why people do what they do.

People have to think about a motive to have one before taking an action. But, how do you explain actions taken by people to save lives in a split second moment when they didn't have time think of a motive?

Many people often take dangerous actions on the spare of a moment. And when asked why they did it, the reply almost always the same, "I wasn't thinking".

"Many people often take dangerous actions on the spare of a moment. And when asked why they did it, the reply almost always the same, "I wasn't thinking".

And many more don't have the opportunity to answer because they died saving people they either didn't know, or comrades who would die without some heroic act.

I think it's fair to say that the realm of true heroism...and I'm talking about selfless, instantaneous and life-threatening heroism needs to be separated from the conversation.

There is no "payback" for the individual in this instance and any inference that there is will be speculation, not fact. No one can know a person's true motive in cases like this.

"There is always payback for a human being. That's why people do good to others."

So we've come full circle. An absolute statement cannot be applied here because motive in such actions cannot be known or quantified.

i believe that no one can know a person's true motive in any case unless they state it outright themselves. related to this discussion is the issue with freeloaders. a freeloader supposedly takes advantage of something for free without giving anything back. however, what most people miss when they complain about freeloaders is that they do not know what the supposed freeloader does otherwise.

helios for example could fit that picture. he is writing about linux. he is complaining about ubuntu and the gimp, and he is not giving back anything to either project. if i closed my eyes and ignore what else he is doing then i could call him a selfish freeloader. but just because i'd see it that way, doesn't make it the truth. and because i can not know what the true motivation for any act is, i have no right to call anyone a freeloader or selfish.

greetings, eMBee.

Quoting:but just because i'd see it that way, doesn't make it the truth.

True, very true. Just because we can think up a reason, it is not enough to make it a fact of why some one does a deed.

I know it's difficult for humans to stomach the fact that everything they do is ultimately selfish. We'd all like to think that at least some of our actions are noble. Jut bear in mind that it does not degrade us in any way to accept this inescapable fact.

Whether we go undertake something with a motive or not is irrelevant. We only do things that are ultimately in our interest. Else, the human race would have died out a long time ago.

Sam

This is to the poster, kikinovak.

I apologise if I offended you; it was not my intention at all.

English is a third language for me, after my mother tongue (Malayalam) and my adopted language (Sinhalese). In these two languages, there are no articles (like in many others.) And these two are phonetic, both having roots in Sanskrit and Pali. I studied French up to the graduate level.

I don't think in English. I think in another language and then translate it. As no doubt you do. There is a lot of scope for mistaking things in such a scenario.

That's why I never leave much to inference when I write. I state what is even the bleeding obvious. If I had meant to say that I am the last word on journalism, I would have said it out straight. What you read into my writing is entirely of your own making, based on the programming of your past.

As to your comment about human actions not being ultimately selfish and your little example - how did you feel after you had built that PC and given it to those kids? Did you feel lousy or was there that glowing feeling that comes when one feels one has done good for the human race at large?

I rest my case.

Sam

> Jut bear in mind that it does not degrade us in any way to accept this inescapable fact.

You have pitiful powers of escape, Sam. Most of us can escape that "fact" with ease.

> Else, the human race would have died out a long time ago.

At least one scientific study says that altruistic behavior does more to preserve the race than selfish behavior, and is therefore a survival trait for the species and bred for accordingly. No, I'm not going to do your research for you. You're the one making the original (unsupported) assertion.

> What you read into my writing is entirely of your own making,

What he read into your writing is the clear meaning of the words. If that's not the meaning you intended, then you're the one at fault, no him.

you miss the point jd, altruism is ultimately selfish.

Nothing we do is selfish -- it's all for the benefit of our genes.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Dawkins or Hitchens yet.

> ...altruism is ultimately selfish.

WAR IS PEACE FREEDOM IS SLAVERY IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.

You've been anticipated, TA.

Altruism is ultimately to the benefit of the group, and therefore the species. That does not make it "selfish".

When your argument devolves to claiming two contradictory definitions are the same thing, it may be time to re-evaluate your position. Not that I have any expectation of that.

You are all mistaken in the belief that we have self-will. Self-will is a prerequisite for non-deterministic behaviour.

Self-will is an illusion. Therefore the motivation for what we do is defined by our environment and our internal state. We don't ultimately have any control over our actions since we are mere automata, carrying out the Universe's predestined "plan" (for want of a better word).

It only remains for us to discuss the biological imperative which is the cause for our effect.

Here endeth the lesson.

@gus3

Doesn't my remark count?

Quoting:Altruism is ultimately to the benefit of the group, and therefore the species. That does not make it "selfish".

But of course it is. Who do you think 'the group consists of' if not also those who are atruistic. Ultimately anything done that benefits the group can and often does benefit the one who is ultruistic.

Quoting:Nothing we do is selfish -- it's all for the benefit of our genes.

but of course. it is not we who are selfish, but our genes, which are programmed for survival, and in turn program us to ensure our genes are passed on to the next generation. That in the end is the point of it all.

@Bernard:

Only to ten. ;-)

I just figured I'd point out the elephant in the room.

Sam, the fact that you not only speak one additional language but another as well is truly impressive and I'm willing to back off a bit on my statements. Hell, most of us Americans do well to speak our own version of English, not to mention fluency in any others. The American language is full of rule contradictions and part time rules...Knowing that English isn't your mother tongue explains much and I now appreciate that fact.

Just sayin'.....

OK, I'm willing to go with this piece. Maybe Ubuntu is not the warm fuzzy "Linux for Human Beings". However, if we are to see Ubuntu as a corporate product and not as a community project, then I reject the notion I need to be grateful.

If Ubuntu is nothing more than a thing peddled to get some money somewhere, I reserve the right to just see it as an Operating System product that doesn't fit my needs and therefore I reject it. If it is just a means to get to my wallet, I don't owe Mark S. a thing. Not even if Linux Mint is built upon it. If Ubuntu is just a product, then Mark S. is just being stupid giving it away or very shrewd. Get people hooked and then exact some form of toll.

So what is it gonna be? A community project? Where we might be inclined to be grateful for a well maintained Distro? Or just another corporate product, designed to extract revenue? In which case it does or doesn't meet the needs of its users and can be adopted or discarded according to what it delivers. Nothing more.

If Shuttleworth thinks he's going to compete directly against Android and iOS and get major device vendors to pre-install his OS, he's sadly deluded. The only way I see of Ubuntu becoming profitable is by Ubuntu users advocating it to their employers, their friends and family, etc., and then making money on support services (esp. with the corporate angle). By pissing off their most competent users, that's not going to happen; if someone asks me what Linux distro to run, for example, I'll probably recommend Mint.

I agree with Sam on every point except 1.

Quoting:It's time to start showing some gratitude for what Ubuntu provides in terms of usability to a very large number of users.

I don't have to be grateful. Canonical provides that usability for purely selfish reasons. My gratitude is unnecessary.

@trayanne I agree with you, which is hardly a surprise because I blogged about this one a long time ago. It's his baby, he can do with it whatever he wants. May be he just chose the wrong name for it, because Ubuntu ("humanity towards others") is a somewhat pretentious title for a commercial product.

Comes with it I never liked the product from the moment I heard about it and the experiences friends had with it (updates that broke a machine down beyond repair) didn't help. Again, in my post at that time I recommended Mint and it seems to have surpassed Ubuntu - hardly a surprise. But personally, I don't run it either.

The beauty of it all, however, is that it proves one HAS a choice. And that is what FOSS is all about. The bazaar simply works.

Quoting:The beauty of it all, however, is that it proves one HAS a choice. And that is what FOSS is all about. The bazaar simply works.

Choice(s), the true gift of Open Source.

Tracyanne,

If Canonical was providing Ubuntu for a price, then nobody would need to be grateful.

Given that it's free, I think it's good to show some gratitude. Remember, they are not the only ones benefitting. The user is too.

Also think of how much you would spend on Windows if you ran it (last time I bought it was $175 Australian) and the attendant headaches which are absent from Ubuntu.

Sam

@linuxwriter,

you wrote: > Given that it's free, I think it's good to show some gratitude. Remember, they are not the only ones benefitting....

Otoh, smelly, rotten garbage/rubbish is ALSO free for the taking. Don't know about you, but all humor aside, I certainly don't see it's good AT ALL to show gratitude for people dumping their smelly, rotten garbage/rubbish on top of ME!!

2c

@fb: Grateful you didn't pay for it?

What is this, Pollyanna?