Re: OT: Re: debian-women obscurity, was: Clarification about krooger's platform

[MJ Ray <mjr@dsl.pipex.com>]

Matthew Palmer <mpalmer@debian.org> wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 07, 2005 at 02:09:26AM +0000, MJ Ray wrote:
> > Arguing in favour of so-called "positive discrimination" is just
> > another case of ignoring present crimes by past-persecuted people.
> > We have to learn from the past and overcome mistakes, not relive it
> > with everyone swapping places each iteration in a vicious circle.
> An overly damped system is just as useless as an underdamped one.

This might be a good analogy. We're trying to reach a known
equilibrium, but we don't know how much damping is required. If
I remember my physics, it can be fiddly to get exactly right
damping and our measuring sucks on this anyway. I don't think we
can measure damping well enough to aim for critical damping.

If we apply too little, then we never reach balance, but
the sum over all time can be zero repeatedly, yet only for
an instant each time.  If we apply too much, then we tend to
balance/zero more quickly but the sum is non-zero.  Which side
you err depends whether you prioritise balancing in the future
or cancelling out the past. I favour balance.