Solutions For A Woke Dystopia
Solution #1 Go to the source
Round-up every self-identified woke college and university student with a GPA of 2.8 and higher (should be just about everybody anymore).
Tell these folks that since they believe in equality of outcome, it has been decided that they are to donate 35% of their GPA to a deserving student who (for whatever the reason) hasn't been doing so well in school. Who knows, maybe they aren't into it, or they like to sleep a lot, or party a lot? The great thing is, who cares? It's just the right thing to do!
Round-up every self-identified woke college and university student with a GPA of 2.8 and higher (should be just about everybody anymore).
Tell these folks that since they believe in equality of outcome, it has been decided that they are to donate 35% of their GPA to a deserving student who (for whatever the reason) hasn't been doing so well in school. Who knows, maybe they aren't into it, or they like to sleep a lot, or party a lot? The great thing is, who cares? It's just the right thing to do!
Comments (314)
All the racists stop being all racist and stuff.
I suggest the right solve climate change, and deny the left sustainability, used as an anti-capitalist battering ram. The right are in a position to attack this problem from the supply side and defeat it - because they have the investment capital and relationships with business to develop and apply the technological infrastructure to harness the massive heat energy of the earth, producing limitless electrical energy to produce hydrogen fuel, for carbon capture and storage, desalination and irrigation, and recycling, and so support sustainable capitalist growth going forward.
In my opinion, it's the only way it will work long term. It follows from the physics of energy and entropy that we need more energy to spend to strike a balance between human welfare and environmental sustainability. It's a plan more likely to appeal to the right than the left, for the left have identified very strongly with a "limits to growth" approach to sustainability, and seem to be planning a low energy future I don't believe would work long term, because it doesn't solve the problem. It retreats in face of it, while implying authoritarian government acting at odds to the natural interests of the people. Limits to growth is a conclusion, and a fate we should not accept. 200 years of capitalist progress has outpaced Malthus' pessimistic prophesies thus far, via the application of technology, and can continue to do so.
Perhaps capitalists are worried that say, 300 years down the line, civilisation powered by limitless clean energy might achieve some sort of post material equality! There are worse problems one could have!
Rock has a heat capacity of 2000 Joules per kilogram per °C.
Rock weighs 3000 kg per cubic meter.
J=4200000000000
Thomas Malthus has been dead since 1834. Dead as a doornail. His famous book was written in 1798. Why is his old book your favorite touchstone for failed theories? Do you fault him for not thinking of everything that would happen in the future that might undermine his theory?
Quoting counterpunch
And here's your famous idea that may very well become invalidated by unseen developments. Have a little sympathy for old Tom Malthus.
My theory is that there are already too many people, whether they are well-fed or not, and I do not look forward to their being 10 or 12 billion of us.
Quoting counterpunch
This is the flip side of Malthus, the post scarcity society. It may be as vanishing has his proposal.
"Too-cheap-to-meter" low to no carbon energy that you expect to get from hot rocks is a fine idea. But if it is so feasible, how come capitalists have not bored down a ways, installed the necessary equipment, and started generating low-to-no-carbon energy which will cost them little and which they can sell for as much as they can get (like they do with everything else)?
— counterpunch
Quoting Bitter Crank
Malthus is not a failed theory. It has achieved enormous success. Malthus is the philosophical ancestor of limits to growth theory that underlies the West's entire approach to green issues. His Essay on Population suggested people would starve en masse because they breed faster than we can develop land to produce food. (In fact, we invented tractors and now, more people are better fed than ever.) Yet this "Malthusian pessimism" continues as the basis of limits to growth approaches to sustainability - an approach that also makes people the problem, when in fact people devise solutions that multiply resources.
The argument not being made is that capitalism can overcome this problem. I'm not blaming Malthus. I'm pointing out he was wrong, and for obvious reasons the left are blind to the fact, while the right retreat into denial. It's not necessary to hide from the climate and ecological crisis. History suggests we can solve this. The science suggests we can solve this. You tell me, why aren't we solving this?
- Carl Jung, Two Essays in Analytical Psychology
De-fund the higher education complex by eliminating all school loans and all tax subsidies. This would catalyze several outcomes including greatly lowering tuition for regular folks, getting rid of the vast majority of the bureaucrats in colleges and universities that do nothing constructive, and most importantly, substantially raise the quality of education by eliminating worthless subject-matter and returning to merit-based grading, admissions, and certification (via an independent organisation).
Let me see if I understand. You're going to defeat the liberals by giving them what they want. Is that right? Boy, that'll teach 'em a lesson. They'll never know what hit 'em.
Tell the police to stop killing unarmed people.
A solution to climate change is not what the libs want though! Not really! I tried talking to Extinction Rebellion and Greta Thunberg about solving climate change with magma energy, and they were not in the least interested. They protest against climate change, but it's really a cornerstone of that whole politically correct, anti-capitalist, middle class, woke white guilt paradigm they're pushing. I suggest proving the capitalist thesis by solving climate change, exploiting a freely available resource - magma energy, to the utmost extent, and yes, I think that would fundamentally undermine the green neo marxist, anti western platform.
Still seems goofy that the best reason you can think of for dealing with climate change is to stick it to the lefties. And, as I wrote, whatever your reason, let's do it.
Quoting T Clark
Goofy is what we got! Let's work with it! The trick is, the left's approach to sustainability is wrong, and yet they've convinced the right of its validity. The right are in denial of climate change because of what they imagine the implications would be, but in fact, need not be.
By virtue of physical facts, resources are a function of the energy available to create them. The energy is there - beneath our feet, limitless quantities of high grade power. As a consequence, there are no limits to resources, and the way to solve climate change is to power through.
Presumably, it will be easier to convince the right that the left are wrong in their approach to climate change; that we need more energy, not less, and to attack the problem from the supply side by the industrial scale application of technology - than it would be to convince even the greenest of lefties that they are mistaken, and a pro capitalist, prosperous and sustainable future is possible afterall!
Solution # 1 To the real source
Prohibit by law that a person over 50 years of age can hold any political office.
I don't know whether your particular solution to the energy problem is the right one. Actually, I'm pretty sure it isn't the solution. Not that it won't work, I don't know about that. I just think the final solution will be a bunch of different approaches. Unless...
That is the current "plan" - so that's a safe bet. Would you like to go double or nothing on "a bunch of different approaches" actually working to secure a sustainable future?
Wind and solar cannot produce enough energy to meet current demand. The UK alone would need something like 10,000 windmills to meet current demand, plus 5000 more to account for electric cars from 2030, and they would need replacing every 25 years. Only a fraction of those are being built, and so the principal policy consequence of constructing wind and solar is continued dependence on fossil fuels. Secondary to this is a policy of blaming the end consumer, and by extension, over-population. That way madness lies.
We would be far better served by magma energy. I'm sure it can work. The energy is there. We can drill that deep. The source of the energy is easily sufficient to meet current global energy demand, and could exceed that tenfold to capture carbon, desalinate water to irrigate land, recycle, produce hydrogen fuel - whatever is required. Near limitless clean energy would completely change the calculus of the existential equation, and allow for continued capitalist growth. That means, we can 'get there from here' - going forward. And that's the only realistic solution - in my opinion, short of Mr Fusion!
And I suppose you would decide what the "worthless" fields of study are? Grow up Mr/Ms Sophomore.
They've been told. No joy.
Quoting T Clark
Maybe people should arm themselves. If you're going to get shot anyway, might as well be legit. And arming up seems to work for some. It's okay for Billy Bob and Cletus to be sporting guns, but, well, "those people" not so much. We don't see cops engaging insurrectionists in Michigan or D.C., but they are all over BLM. Hmmmm?
There was a difference in ideas between MLK and Robert F. Williams (Negros with Guns) about the pacifist vs the fight-back response to white oppression. Williams made a good case on real life examples.
Little known fact, but Ronald Reagan's CA gun control came about as a result of a fear of black people arming up.
Blacks, as a minority, would need their white compadres to back their hand, but the left seems to walk away from some of their delineated civil liberties (2ndA). Oh well.
Just about all complex problems in a society as big as the US's and the world's get solved using "a bunch of different approaches." Not only that, you have to try a bunch of different ways to find out which ones work. VHS tapes won the battle against several other recording technologies back in the late 70s and early 80s. Your magma geothermal technology is innovative and not fully tested. It makes sense to aim our efforts in more than one direction. It would be irresponsible not to.
First off, I am offering my solutions as responses to Synthesis's intentionally provocative posts. My language was also intentionally provocative.
Second, I really don't think arming people is the right way to go. I think a lot more people will die.
Third, I'm liberal, but I think gun control is a bad sell for Democrats. I know conservative gun owners who have no objection to reasonable gun restrictions, but they won't trust Democrats to take their Second Amendment beliefs seriously. I wonder what the vote count in the presidential election would have been if gun control were taken off the Democratic platform.
I can only continue to suggest that green energy technologies are, perhaps deliberately insufficient to meet our needs going forward. I've run the numbers on wind, and I just don't see the UK building 15,000 windmills every 25 years, at a cost of £200m each, just to keep the lights on.
That so, one must expect continued dependence on fossil fuels, coupled with authoritarian government imposing reductions in quality of life; and that having ongoing implications for democratic politics, that will make it very difficult to maintain a sustainable policy approach long term.
Further, there are international disputes about national responsibility for climate change depending on whether contribution to global emissions is a consequence of population size, or energy consumption per capita; such that international agreements are not legally binding; and as soon as delegates return from COP 26 - the natural national interest is in economic growth, and free riding upon the climate change efforts of others.
Magma energy sidesteps all this by transcending the calculus of limits to growth. Because (I confidently predict that) magma energy is more than sufficient to meet our energy needs, it allows us to attack the problem from the supply side - producing clean energy in abundance, to extract carbon from the atmosphere and desalinate water to irrigate land, rather than blaming industry, and the consumer/voter for the carbon cost of a continued dependence on fossil fuels.
You are correct. Unless and until members of a community learn to take personal responsibility for their own actions, and treat each other with dignity and respect, there would most definitely be a thinning of the herd. I just can't help but think how things would have been different if most of those adult cell phones had been ARs slung politely over the backs of all the onlookers Floyd's murder. No need to brandish because Chauvin wouldn't have been acting up.
In fact, we may not even have to arm up. Close your eyes and imagine this: Illinois and Chicago (I chose them instead of MN because of all the deaths there now) decide to issue state-of-the-art hand-held military shoulder weapons and side arms, along with unlimited ammunition to all men and women who don't have criminal records. Included with the package would be training (starting in early school) in the use thereof. Here are the expected responses from different communities:
White supremacists: "Wait, what?"
Fascists: "Wait, what?"
NRA: "Wait, what?"
Inner city gangbangers: "Wait, what?"
Criminals" "Wait, what?"
Law Enforcement: "Wait, what?"
So, now that everyone agrees we should wait, LOL, we could all pump the breaks and start revisiting those little things like personal responsibility, dignity, respect, and our own actions. If the threat were real, and we'd be training up and arming all the good, law-abiding citizens in the worst areas of Chicago (who, I believe, vastly outnumber everyone else), then there might be a reckoning.
If crime rates did not drop and the foregoing "Wait, what?" communities did not start to mind their Ps and Qs, then yes, we go forward with the program. And yes, there would be a period of blood. But in the end, because good people (currently unarmed) outnumber the bad (currently armed), I think things would settle out to the point where people would stop carrying because it can be inconvenient for some folks, especially when there is no longer a need. We may even end up with Bobby's twirling their night sticks as they whistled down the sidewalk.
I think Europe doesn't deal with these issues because they suffered through two World Wars in thirty years. That, and they don't have the history of independence we have here.
Anyway, I periodically find the truth to be counter-intuitive so I give it thought.
Edited to add: In my fantasy world, the education begins early and is cutting edge and includes a deep steeping in the Liberal Arts, reading, writing, languages, philosophy, logic, civics, history, political science, sociology, phycology, and etc. All, including the guns, voluntary, of course.
I must be digging the right yards!
Why don't we make that "over 20" so we can allow actual children run the country instead of the adult children who are doing such a stellar job.
Provocative? These woke people are complete morons by any yardstick. I am just trying to figure out how anybody could believe this non-sense.
I just read in one of my medical journals (The "Diversity" Issue) how physicians (who have to be the most color-blind folks there are) have to reassess their entire lives by taking into consideration how their white privilege has led to all kinds of bad outcomes.
The fact that this kind of BS has made it into professional journals is a very sad commentary of the state of affairs in the country.
And prove their point?
You see, they know people like you are out there (people who would round others up if they could), and as a result of the natural human inclination toward push-back, they want to make you pay. And, because of your recalcitrance, you should.
We all know better, but we don't always do better, and when we don't do better, someone is getting screwed, and when we are given decades, if not centuries, to un-fuck the mess we created but refuse to do so, then we can expect the pendulum to have a blade attached to it upon return. The way to avoid that, is to do better, and part of doing better is to advocate and legislate for those who are getting screwed.
In short, we made our bed so we can sleep in it. Or, we can wring our hands in consternation and make mountains out of mole hills and complain about boogey men who ain't no thang. So, the next time there is a woke power point presentation or policy change that has all the horrid imposition of a piece of cloth over the face, we just man up, we understand, and we just chill.
Say what you will. Costs for renewable and associated energy technologies; wind, solar, batteries; are approaching or surpassing those for fossil fuels. Most of this improvement has taken place in the last decade. Given the attention they are getting, I would expect things to continue to improve. Elon Musk and similar businessmen are kicking ass. You need to find someone like him to put a few billion down on your magma technology. The market.
Quoting counterpunch
I'm skeptical. Your confidence is not enough to change the course of energy policy. As I wrote before though, I do endorse your "Screw the libs, give them what they want" strategy.
But JR, you seemed like such a nice young man.
Quoting James Riley
This is the pipiest of all pipe dreams.
Quoting James Riley
Agreed. If we're gong to fantasize, we should definitely include education, especially the study of algae.
Quoting T Clark
It is a strange world we live in where the Bill of Rights is a pipe dream and a fantasy. :wink:
I don't doubt your sincerity or your anger. I even agree that a lot of what is called "woke" is destructive and counterproductive. I also think it is likely a temporary phase. Not sure about that.
Be that as it may - it is clear from your language that you intended to raise hackles. I responded in kind.
Come on, you are being intentionally dense. I've said I support 2nd Amendment rights. I won't argue whether your planned gun-owning utopia is legal or constitutional. I'm pretty sure it won't work and that it will make things much, much worse.
Uh, no. Being "pretty sure it won't work" doesn't constitute a response to the merits of my proposition. You brought up the thing about cops shooting unarmed people. Does it sound like a free state that many of our citizens live in? I pointed out MI and I could point out Malheur NWF, the Bundy Ranch and many other situations, including Robert F. William's examples of black people standing up and checking back-water Klan types. Securing a free state takes personal responsibility. It doesn't help when only one "faction" exercises it. In fact, it makes it worse.
I am enjoying your scepticism, given that it is not actual skepticism. I've been beset by the subjectivism industry since I first used science and truth in the same sentence. It's almost as if there were an evil demon - no less genius than powerful, deceiving me to believe, everyone else is nuts!
I do not say what I will. I say what's necessary, but I don't believe Elon Musk would be glad to hear it. Sure, he's making money, but his innovations are not adequate to the problem. Admittedly, he's working in a non-ideal context, and he's making money doing some good, but that's the root cause of the problem; the misapplication of technology for ideological ends. To solve this, we have to apply the right technologies for the right reasons.
Interesting thoughts, but everything you say takes planning, foresight and thought. The right and capitalism are not famous for thought. They like invisible hands and laissez-faire.
If you want long-range strategic planning, you have to go out further than the next quarter returns and a fiduciary duty to wedge your head up shareholder's butts. For that, talk to progressives and the left. The sooner you pull them in to the table, the less push-back there will be and the less chance they will haul out lady razor for the next close shave.
Quoting James Riley
Okay, but I'm not appealing to the right on an ideological level, but the right as those with the money and connections to business, that have the skills, technologies and resources to do what needs to be done. I can boil it down to three words for the money men: infinite opportunity cost.
Imagine the huge prosperity generated by sustainable markets of 10-12 bn people by the year 2100. But then, look to the resources of the solar system, and beyond. The opportunity cost of failing to secure a sustainable future now, is the, quite possibly infinite - wealth that would be generated in future. And stack this against the absolute losses of failing to secure the future!
Quoting James Riley
Obviously, there's a political dimension to adopting a global, supply side approach to solving climate change, but I too am appealing to the shareholders. I want the most environmental and human benefit for the least cost, with the least disruption to the status quo. It's not coincidental, this just happens to be the right answer scientifically speaking. The molten interior of the earth is the nearest large source of energy available, and harnessing that energy would generate such great wealth, that we could afford sustainability.
But, the rest of the critique against other aspects of "woke culture", is just resistance to change. In this case, positive changes to society concerning racism, sexism and other nasty aspects of human life.
Quoting Manuel
But does it address those issues honestly? I don't think so. It has an hysterical quality that undermines reason. Any attempt to bring facts to the debate is met with accusations of racism, sexism or other nasty insult, and so there's no academic freedom, or peer review, but rather, an hysterical, holier than thou, runaway bandwagon!
Those are the more extreme aspects of it, sure. But is, for example, #MeToo or BLM an aspect that falls under the broad brush "woke culture"? Or in using the term "woke", we refer only to those people who do think that everything is sexist and racist?
Because if it's the latter, then it's true by definition that woke culture is mostly harmful.
If it isn't, then we need to separate the sensible from the irrational. Paying too much attention to the more extreme elements seems to me like adding fuel to the fire.
I do not accept that. For example:
University staff given list of banned 'microinsults' they cannot say to trans people
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/01/university-staff-given-list-banned-microinsults-cannot-say-trans/
The way I see it, your identity is not my problem. I owe you respect as a human being and as an individual. I do not have an obligation to learn 99 pronouns to describe genders you claim exist, in face of all scientific orthodoxy! Further, gender dysphoria is classified as a mental disorder in the DSMV-5; a mental condition the mainstream woke inculcate in primary school aged children!
Furious parents slam primary school after drag queen 'Flowjob' who shares sexually explicit posts on social media read to pupils as young as four during LGBT history month event attended by MSP Mhairi Black.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8038669/Furious-parents-slam-primary-school-drag-queen-Flowjob-read-pupils-young-four.html
This has led to a huge increase in referrals to GIDS:
Child gender identity referrals show huge rise in six years
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-35532491
An organisation from which 30 therapists resigned since 2016, citing politically correct pressure to hand out puberty blockers to children, on the basis of two or three hour long counselling sessions. See Dr Marcus Evans on twitter. Pandering to political correctness to avoid accusations of racism, sexism or whatever, gives mainstream space to extremists. Or do you endorse all this in the name of woke-ism?
How dare you not?
You're proposing a radical change in American federal and state policing and gun policy which you have acknowledged will lead to many deaths. The burden of proof that it will succeed rests with you.
Then you associate all aspects of "woke culture" with the most extreme elements. Under than definition, all of it is extreme.
Quoting counterpunch
This is now a changing aspect of society. Being gay used to be considered a disease too. The British government killed Turing, essentially, for being gay. These views are now considered retrograde, with good reason.
But I do agree that a child is likely too young to know the difference in most cases.
Quoting counterpunch
When did I say I endorsed this? I explicitly called this:
Quoting Manuel
Yeah. Taken to these levels it is extreme. But most people don't take this stuff seriously at all.
Ask anybody what they think of "sapiosexuals" or of "xim" and "xer", they'll think you're talking about Scientology or something. And there's already pushback on this, you already see it. I don't think it's going to doom our society or destroy culture.
There are much more serious threats than this by far.
Well put.
Again, it is a strange world we live in where the Bill of Rights is a pipe dream and a fantasy, and now, where the burden of proof is upon me because federal and state policing and policy has drifted so far from the BoR (infringement) that many deaths may occur if we honor it.
Seems the burden should be on the other side to say "Oops!, how do we get back to where we should be, with the security of a free state?"
Morally, I think it is wrong to discriminate against someone based on arbitrary characteristics like race, sex, sexuality etc. If the core value, and consequence of woke-ism were a non-discriminatory culture, I'd endorse it, but... how can I put this, the burden of responsibilities to achieve a non discriminatory culture are not evenly distributed by an hysterically dictatorial victim-oppressor, identity politics paradigm. It divides people by identity, and creates antagonisms between them to exploit for political advantage.
Mhari Black was delighted those parents objected to Flo Job! She mounted her moral high horse and condemned the parents as bigots, to great political advantage. Flo Job is a victim; but of whom? Cui bono? Mhari Black is the only beneficiary. It's morally wrong. The very fact that you seek to wash your hands of "more extreme elements" even after I've shown them taking hold in the public sector, in education and the NHS, demonstrates the problem. Outraging public sensibilities then condemning those who protest is the modus operandi and nature of woke-ism. Peace, love and harmony is the last thing they want.
I'm good with geo heat. But the part about 10 to 12 billion turns me off. Even if your approach could sate their desires, without the giant sucking sound of Earth into their gaping maw, there is the issue of space. If you could promise to reserve for me some elbow room, like 10k square miles of untrammeled wilderness, every other chunk, then I'd be good with it. Oh, and maximum biodiversity.
:100:
10-12 bn people, peaking around 2100 was the mid range projection of the UN Population Division - when I was looking at population issues, a few years ago. I'm aware of suggestions fertility is declining more quickly than anticipated. But it remains, in my view - a very manageable trajectory given the sheer scale of the heat energy of the Earth.
A very small proportion of land is currently habitable, but clean energy would allow us to desalinate water to irrigate land, not merely creating enormous wealth, but the opportunity to conserve natural habitats and water courses, by developing wastelands. We could make the deserts bloom!
If he gets the opportunity, he's going to F you up. Especially if he perceives you resisted the change. Broaden shoulders, man-up and embrace the change; thanking your lucky stars it's not worse than some weak woke shit. Oh, and respect private property enforcement of woke policy. Go somewhere else if you don't like it. If some tool doesn't have to make a cake for a gay couple, then a private outfit can demand wokeness in their free market sales of goods or services.
So, if you see some group that has been treated like shit for centuries and then the treatment stops, don't expect a "Thank you." Expect a F you. Maybe a little payback. Look around and see what we are doing today that you know damn well we should not be doing, and get on the wagon against it. Be on the right side of history. If you don't, then your offspring down the line, who had nothing to do with it, but nevertheless benefited from it, is going to pay.
But please, don't expect no push back. It's human nature.
Again is Black Lives Matter or #MeToo part of being woke? If it is not, then by definition being woke is extreme and will lead to the divisions you describe. If these movements are part of being woke, then not all of it is extreme, only a small and loud section of (mostly) college students.
Quoting counterpunch
And I said, there are already books being written about the problem, you're seeing pushback in culture too. Pinker, Dawkins, etc. are involved in these things. So are many other intellectuals, podcasters of all stripes, etc.
But of course big corporations and governments are going to side with this type of thinking. It costs them nothing and makes them look good.
But it's a very minor problem compared to, say, how Julian Assange is being treated. If we really cared about free speech, that might be more important than some misguided students.
Quoting counterpunch
Don't develop or plow another square inch, and recognize wastelands as those places like cities. There is no such thing as a natural wasteland. If that is done, I'm all in.
An analogy is good, because then you don't have to talk about real things. It allows you to describe an injustice, and then suppose it demonstration of some actual state of affairs! I don't accept your analogy. It doesn't refer to anything real. A realistic view describes civilisation progressing from less and worse knowledge, toward more and better knowledge over time.
But to the contrary, the woke ignore the fact that slavery was practiced all around the world since the dawn of time until western civilisation developed the philosophy, politics and economics to allow for individual freedom. It is the very same civilisation that the woke attack - relentlessly and in particular, for what was in fact a relatively short lived involvement in the ancient history of slavery. The woke are going backward with regard to knowledge. They stoke grievance with lies. They are a menace, and a false advocate to the identities they are parasitic upon!
An analogy, by definition, is not the thing itself. It is no argument to simply point that out. Rather, it is incumbent upon those who wish to defeat it to draw a distinction with a relevant difference. That, you have failed to do.
Quoting counterpunch
Irrelevant. Let me draw another analogy for you, in an effort to address your concern about the failure of the woke to address the fact that evil was prevalent and woke people got rid of it. In the law, if X steals Z from Y, then Z still belongs to Y. If X has children and passes Z on to them, Z still belongs to Y, even if X's children don't know it. If Y has kids, then Z belongs to them. If X invests Z and grows it, all that growth belongs to Y and/or Y's kids. If X's kids invest Z and grow it, Z and all the growth belong to Y's kids. If all this occurs over generations, where X and all of X's generations hence have risen up on the ill-gotten gains of X, then the generations of X owe. X's generations can't look around and whine like a little bitch when Y and and the woke Xs decide to try to make Y whole. And X's generations can't bitch if Y is a little pissed and flexing when Y get gets his turn.
Now, we have "statutes of limitation", but they aren't designed to protect X or X's generations. They are designed to protect the courts from loss of evidence. In the case of the balls-out theft of labor from blacks, and the theft of land from Indians (and genocide upon them), there is not loss of evidence. In regards to the latter, "Treaties shall be the supreme law of the land" and our violation of them was not merely screwing the Indians, it was a violation of our own law, so we screwed ourselves. And, where a people is a sovereign, then X never died. X still lives, as does Y. And in the case of blacks, the evidence still exists.
:rofl:
Geothermal is geographically limited. The specific conditions in which geothermal heat is close enough to the surface to be reached by drilling are quite rare. The idea is to convert heat energy into electricity, that could then be converted into hydrogen fuel, and shipped around the world. Hydrogen could then be burnt in traditional power stations with minimal modifications, to produce electricity. In this way, we would utilize the larger part of existing national energy infrastructures, converting them to clean energy.
I cannot point you to any research papers you cannot discover yourself via google. Have you read Wilson Clarke's Energy for Survival - alternatives to extinction? The Hydrogen Society by Arno Evers? The Ghia Hypothesis by James Lovelock? I cannot provide a map, blueprints and a business plan, if that's what you're asking, but I am quite well read on the subject!
No!
I can't judge whether such an undertaking could be viable; I doubt anyone can. It might be viable, but it would be a huge risk to treat hydrogen as the sole answer to the problem. In any case, such a thing will never happen, so there's not much point wasting too much thought on it.
:broken: :grin:
:ok:
No. That's precisely what these measures are designed to avoid. There would be infrastructure at isolated geographic locations, and LNG tanker ships, and de-fuelling ports - plus some minor modifications to power stations, and gas station forecourts, but compared to windmills and electric cars, that's not infrastructure intensive.
What many fail to realise is that after you've paid £200m per windmill, you need to be able to store the energy, or back-up those windmills with fossil fuel generating capacity, for when the wind doesn't blow. So that means expensive storage facilities; batteries or pumped storage, or else maintaining a full fossil fuel generating capacity alongside renewable energy infrastructure. Magma energy is the least infrastructure, applied specifically to the reap the greatest benefit. The drawback is distance between production and consumption, but then, the same could be said of oil, and yet somehow we get that from where it's produced to where it's needed.
p.s. liquified hydrogen gas contains 2.5 times more energy than petroleum per kg.
The greatest power to convince as to where the money is will likely win out. Don't forget that if hydrogen is actually viable, then it could be created by wind and solar with far less of the transportation required.
Etc. etc. I get that. I also don't have a problem with your geo heat thing. But cars didn't become what they are today overnight or without subsidy. Pointing at wind/solar/whatever for it's failure to solve overnight and on it's own nickel is not how anything anywhere ever worked, ever. I could be wrong, but I have a feeling Musk, et al, are not stupid and they like money too. If I was them, with their resources, I'd sick the best dogs in the world on the problem. Kind of like I defer to the physicists when push comes to shove because, well, they've put the time in.
Critics say that Musk is riding on the wave of investment. By all accounts Tesla has never gone anywhere near meeting projected production, and yet is worth more than the top few of its conventional motor company competitors combined. People don't always invest sensibly, and Musk will make loads of money even if the whole electric car thing ultimately fails.
He could have found the money in a storm drain for all I know. But people who have that kind of loot usually have a bevvy of brains around trying to keep them from losing it, and then to compound it. Even if it's blind luck, it doesn't take a lot of genius to know one is lucky, and to then hire hands that know what they are doing.
Windmills cost a lot of money to build, they last 25 years, and produce a trickle of power when the wind blows, whereas, magma is a massive source of constant high grade energy.
Quoting Janus
It's not simple. It's hugely complex in all sorts of ways. I'm giving you the headlines, based on some understanding of those complexities. I see a chink of light; a possible opportunity to do something amazing. You say:
Quoting Janus
It's improbable, that's true, but we are headed for extinction by the most probable course. The right answer will necessarily be improbable, so I'm delighted you think so. It shows I'm on the right track!
Be a drag if we screwed up the dynamo.
Musk and SpaceX just won the contract to build a space ship to go back to the moon for $3 billion, although Jeff is making a stink. They just launched astronauts to the space station. In less than 10 years Tesla has revolutionized battery technology. He's doing real stuff. Also, his girlfriend is a famous odd musician.
Chairman Mao's cultural revolution, which is very much like our wokester movement, lasted ten years. Fortunately Joe Biden is no Mao Zedong, and neither is Kamala.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Revolution
Yes. Of course. I agree. The current social justice movement is just exactly like the Cultural Revolution.
Just exactly the same.
In my experience "woke" is primarily a disparaging term used by conservatives which acquires whatever vague right-wing meaning is needed. I guess in this sense it means everything is fine the way it is.
To clarify, I mean that the term is snidely thrown around by right-wingers, moderates, etc. to refer to anything left-of-center that requires thought terminating dismissal (i.e. "whatever vague leftist meaning is needed) detached from the original usage by Black Americans.
Musk's solar/battery approach is sub-optimal to say the least. Battery powered cars, fuelled by a 40-50% fossil fuel dependent electricity grid are not green. Neither are they thermodynamically efficient. Converting energy from one form to another costs energy. When conversion costs are factored in, from fossil fuels burnt to work done, the thermodynamic efficiency of electric vehicles must be worse than a steam train - at 12% thermodynamic efficiency.
Batteries require rare and toxic metals to construct, and are very difficult to recycle. Further though; logically, if battery powered cars were green cars, batteries would be interchangeable. You wouldn't have to wait 12 hours for the car to charge. You'd pull into a petrol station, they'd whip out the old battery, install a fully charged battery, and off you'd go. But no. A full charge gives you a mere 250 miles range, and then you can either wait 12 hours, or fast charging will damage the capacity of the battery to hold a charge, and you'll need a whole new car in five years instead of ten years - because, as mentioned previously, batteries are not interchangeable!
Hydrogen can be burnt in an internal combustion engine. This is the Hydrogen 7 - produced by BMW.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_Hydrogen_7
Hydrogen is the natural storage medium for energy produced from magma, because it's made from electricity and sea water, it's light, compact, and can be transported without transmission loss, to be burnt in power stations, internal combustion engines, and hydrogen fuel cells. Unlike the solar roof, hydrogen fuels cells actually could decentralise electricity grids. It would be possible to get hydrogen delivered to a storage tank, for a fuel cell that would then generate clean electricity on site, for the home or business. Or vehicle! Maybe Musk needs to stop looking up at the stars, and start looking down at the 4000 miles of molten rock beneath his feet. It's like he's planning his getaway!
I misunderstood, but then again, I'll argue with anyone, even people I agree with.
No you won't!
I'm interested in this discussion, but I'm feeling guilty. We're way off subject. Start a thread and I'll participate. You've obviously thought about this more than I have.
I agree.
:rage: . . . . :razz:
Do they really believe that you can accuse an entire race of being racist? This idea can only be enforced at the tip of a bayonet. Other then the sheer idiocy of their ideas, what this has exposed is the weakness in institutional leadership in America...higher education, corporations, everywhere.
If you don't believe that money corrupts now, you never will.
It is in the most important way...self-censorship.
I would accuse you of a lack of perspective, but that does not seem nearly strong enough a statement. You've moved beyond that and are crossing the border into obscenity.
What does that mean?
It's a strongly-worded statement of disagreement.
You don't believe there is self-censorship going-on now? Or that it was the worst part of The Cultural Revolution (being a precursor to what would follow)?
You and I are not going to agree on this. I can't think of any more responses beyond what I've already written.
What's the point of discussing something with somebody you agree with?
Well, by all means, get back to me when you think of something to say.
I feel bad about being so harsh in my response. That's why I decided to stop.
I don't take what anybody says personally. I am just here to chat with interesting folks, particularly ones that have VERY different opinions from me.
I do appreciate your consideration, though!
Sure. That's cool! But let me see if I can get back on topic from where I was. Woke-ism! That should not come as a surprise! There was a parallel, where I sympathised with the sentiment - (were it honest) but not with the approach! But you're right, after that it diverged very quickly, and we never got back to the parallel. Oops! Until anon, over and out!
Quoting James Riley
Musk worked his way up, has raised awareness and done good. I'm not knocking the guy. I am comparing my theoretical constructions to his actual achievements, and find his actual achievements wanting, and that's not a good look, but I'm generally of the view that those with the resources could solve the problem. Musk et al seem to have a corporate interest in the climate and energy question, and so do I. So, low hanging fruit perhaps, but if I had his money, I'd be drilling for magma heat energy, building turbine halls, and electrolysis plants - rather than big batteries in the desert.
Just as Amendment XXII limited the number of terms to avoid a dictator, a new amendment can rid the US of the gerontocracy to which it has been subjected.
There are three ways to learn. Real learning is through direct experience. Next is learning from somebody who has direct experience. The third and least effective method is indirect learning (e.g., reading).
Reality suggests that the folks with the most direct experience are older and that is why older people are generally chosen for positions of the greatest responsibility. Younger people, OTOH, have a tendency to be complete doofuses (take AOC, for example) because they interpolate from indirect learning (which is almost always wrong).
Ha! Us gerontocrats are in charge!! It will never happen. You will need the support of 2/3 of Congress and the legislatures of 38 states, all filled with old guys like me.
Your medical journals? Right, maybe the Annals of Aromatherapy or the Missouri Journal of Wellness?
Otoh, it is a truism in mathematics and physics that if you havent produced anything groundbreaking by the time you’re 30 you never will. Pop music seems to be another arena where the most brilliant work generally seems to be done before the age of 35. I agree that politics is different, but maybe that’s a function of a mellower temperament in older age rather than more insight. Politics is precisely NOT about groundbreaking ideas but consensus building.
You must admit, our generation (baby boomers) have been a complete disaster. Starting out as the philosophical idealists and ending up completely corrupt, obese, the worst parents ever, uber-materialists, with barely a morsel of dignity or a whiff of honor to be found among 75M FRAUDS.
Look at what we are handing our children and theirs...a country so beautiful, so wealthy, so full of promise, turned into a crack-addict/alcoholic passed-out in the gutter.
I’ve always found it interesting that the movers and shakers of the social revolution of the ‘60’s were not baby boomers( Jane Fonda, Allen Ginsberg, Ken Kesey, Tiom Hayden, Paul Krassner, Timothy Leary, Abbie Hoffman) Even John Lennon, Bob Dylan and Jimmu Hendrix technically weren’t baby boomers.
The problem is corruption. I am 66 and the amount I know now as compared as what I knew at thirty is incalculable (both personally and professionally). I have often told younger people that the difference between 30 and 60 is much greater then the difference between 10 and 30.
That is not to say that there aren't folks out there who never learned much of anything, but if you take those who are life-long learners, the experience you gain professionally and from having a family puts you in a place that people without this experience can not even begin to grasp.
Everything of significant value in life you gain through direct experience.
You might think that in light of what's going on in this country that there would be more than just a couple of people with enough courage to stand-up and speak the truth. An entire generation sold-out to McMansions, European luxury sedans/SUVs, and whatever else people find it necessary to rip-out off the common man. Pathetic.
I think that’s true of my favorite pop composers. But the issue isn’t just how much more you know now that 30 years ago, it’s how much younger generations have leapfrogged over your knowledge. Frank Sinatra was undoubtedly wiser at 70 than at 25, but his way of thinking about music became irrelevant to a new generation. Quoting synthesis
Everything of significant value in my life came from sitting in a quiet room and generating ideas out of all variety of experience, both direct and indirect. All ‘direct’ means to me is a set of ideas I generate that link to what I learned from others but goes beyond it.
That was the theme of ‘The Big Chill’. But the premise was kind of silly, because they were all just followers of fashion to begin with. One could argue that BLM protesters are in their own way followers of fashion.
I don't see it that way. I have no longing for the days when men were men and all the negroes stayed on the other side of the tracks where they belonged. I think the main thing wrong with our generation is that there are so many of us.
Any moderators looking in, my comments about negroes are intended as irony.
Quoting synthesis
I don't see it that way either. I've never been a big fan of hell-in-a-handbasket philosophizing.
I'll blame Malthus.
His theories were have been so successful as the intelligentsia took it to heart. Doesn't matter if it hasn't been correct model of what will happen. If the correct circles love it, it's all that matters.
I think the real issue is that the US has really serious socio-economic problems as the middle class isn't growing, and people aren't happy about the corruption both on the left and right. And things obviously are going to get far worse with the selected monetary & fiscal policy. So it's good for the elite to give room for in the end rather silly wokeness and have it divide people in new ways. When the lower classes are deeply divided and hate each other, it's better for the ruling elite. Worst thing would be that someone came and united the medium to low income Americans!
Malthus argument is instructive, even though it's not correct. It's proven false by 200 years of technological progress that now sees more people better fed than ever. That's because people are not just consumers of a fixed quantity of resources. We apply technology to multiply resources. Understanding why Malthus is wrong focuses our attention on application of the technologies necessary to produce sufficient resources sustainably - and those technologies exist. That so, the problem is not over-population, but the application of technology. We can support large population sustainably if we apply the right technologies. We need to step up from the fossil fuels that powered the industrial revolution; not step down. We need more, and cleaner energy - to continue to produce enough resources, and to do so sustainably.
Baby boomers just wanted to (in theory) live purer, more balanced lives, whereas BLM is a political movement (which is always a power/money grab). God only knows what the white liberal protesters are up to or what the etiology of their self-loathing is.
Nobody has any longing for that aspect of history and certainly things have improved. 20% of AAs are doing pretty well now but it is up to the AA's community to fix their families, their schools, and the really negative parts of their culture. Then, the sky's the limit. AAs are great people.
Quoting T Clark
Compare 1960 with today. This country has become an economic basket-case over the past 60 years (trading equity for debt), it's institutions are horribly dys-functional and corrupt, and the culture is downright dystopian.
I am glad you are happy with it, though. I am also doing quite well (personally), but that's not that difficult to accomplish if you are a hard worker and persistent.
Hard to argue with any of that.
At first I wasn't sure if you were being ironic. Donald Trump said "MAGA loves the black people," and "I have a great relationship with the blacks."
Quoting synthesis
We certainly have problems. I don't think things are as dire as you do. I'd say "we'll see," but I won't be around for that. My children will see.
But now you are praising technology and saying that it can be an answer and that doesn't sound nice. It sounds awful. Technology. Boo!!!
No, we have to rip our toga's and sprinkle ash on ourselves, reject our hedonistic materialism and technological imperialism as the sin we indulge in thanks to our privilege. We have to show penance. Then we must chant the newest smart sounding eco-friendly mantra that doesn't go against the Malthusian ideas and still resonates in the correct circles in order to show that we stand with the correct group of people. And there you have it.
Embrace the liturgy!
What does he have to do with me?
Quoting T Clark
What has to happen for things to be "dire" for you? And we have been seeing for decades now.
I don't discount the value of introspection, but actual doing is the way. How do you believe your ideas of what is real can compete with what is actually real?
What do you mean by the elite giving room for wokeness?
Dire? There were people who lived through World War I, the Spanish Flu, the Great Depression, World War II, Smallpox (300 million dead), Korean War, polio epidemics, Vietnam War, Cold War, Cuban Missile Crisis and other bull shit. People talk about how tough it was under certain governments, but war just sucks. I can't imagine what it would be like to be a non-combatant with war raging all around you. Our trials today are a cake walk.
The technologies I refer to are those necessary to sustainability; starting with massive heat energy from magma, limitless clean electricity, carbon capture and storage, desalination and irrigation, hydrogen fuel, and recycling technologies.
Quoting ssu
As a signal of your virtue, that's very helpful. Thank you! As a means to secure a sustainable future, worse than useless, but at least we know that you are morally superior!
I do not consider myself privileged relative to future generations - whom, I hope - will inherit a high energy, prosperous and sustainable future - rather than the low energy, authoritarian, poor and over-populated world that is the natural consequence of a pay more, have less, stop this, tax that - limits to growth approach to sustainability!
We can have more and better, because ultimately, resources are a function of the energy available to create them. From the massive heat energy of magma, we can create limitless clean electricity, to power carbon capture and storage, desalination and irrigation, hydrogen fuel, and recycling, and live well long into the future. So, other than you signalling your virtue, there's no good reason to sail off the edge of the map, flogging ourselves as we go!
I mean that the elite is totally OK with the "woke" agenda and discourse being on the center stage of the public discourse. That corporations and organizations are keen embrace it and not dismiss it and especially not to be against it is what I had in mind when talking about "giving room". The reason is that the woke agenda doesn't actually threaten the corporations or the power elite. Just think about how a tiny minority are transsexual people? Likely the tiny minority group is happy to get heard, but in wider realm these issues of what could be described as part of the "culture wars" are simply a distraction.
And that would be the truly important discussion.
But have you noticed the absence of a down-to-Earth and realistic debate about long term energy policy? Can you define the actual US energy policy since the 70's to the present?
It might be discussed somewhere, but not much about it is heard in the media or the public discourse.
Quoting counterpunch
Isn't that what the new culture is about?
The audience of liberatory, activist groups (like gays et al) are mostly themselves--and politicians. It's gays and all the other minority groups who benefit most from their up-lift, liberatory messaging. General Motors doesn't need up-lift. What the hell would they do with it?
You didn't ask me, but... Here's the policy. Float the economy on a deep pool of cheap oil.
Available, plentiful, cheap energy to fuel industry and drive the economy. Drill, baby drill. Oil and gas have been our preeminent fuel (with coal for electricity generation plus some heavy industries; by the 70s coal was no longer used much for domestic heating or not at all for rail transportation. Gas is replacing coal for generation). In addition to fueling the economy, oil and gas are the primary feed-stock for plastics, chemicals, and fertilizers.
That coal, oil, and gas -- and many of the associated industries (like cars, chemicals, plastics, etc.--have significant and serious downsides (methane, CO2, acid rain, disease, negative effects on soils, etc) was simply not an issue that was or is brought to the fore in any sustained way.
It has always stood to reason that oil and gas were not--and could not be--inexhaustible. Peak Oil is a concept that's been around for a while. The oil industry knows about peak oil and exhaustibility, of course. Wells run dry. In the mean time, keep sucking it up.
While wind and solar have made some progress, and while there are a few electric vehicles on the road, the future of clean, renewable energy is pretty far off, as far as I can tell.
And electric vehicles are not an answer. There are 1.4 billion cars in the world, 99.9% internal combustion. In what universe does it make sense to replace 1.4 billion gas powered vehicles with another 1.4 billion electric vehicles? Only in the auto industry universe! God forbid that people should use electric trains, trolleys, street cars, light rail, and busses to get around.
Granted, per @counterpunch, geo, wind, and solar energy are all pretty green. I don't see a wholesale commitment to green energy outside of groups like Interfaith Power and Light (a faith-based renewable advocacy group) and smart people like Counterpunch.
There are three ways of being. Real being is the idealistic, typical of young people. Next is practical and effective being, for adults. The third and least effective way of being belongs to the old people, dirty and corrupt.
Reality suggests that older people are like vampires: ogres, selfish, interconnected, and willing to hate. Young people are generous and open to love and friendship.
In other words: War is a place where young people, who do not know each other and do not hate each other, kill each other by decision of the dirty old men, who know and hate each other, but do not kill each other. Erich Hartman.
I don't believe wind and solar will ever be sufficient to meet our needs; and it's only a policy of diversification of energy sources since 1973, that's allowed wind and solar to even be considered worth building. Wind can take the edge off carbon emissions, produce some energy, but it's inefficient, insufficient to our current needs; and all thought of sequestering atmospheric carbon, desalinating water to irrigate land, hydrogen fuel and total recycling - is out of the question without sufficient clean energy to power them.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Depends what you mean by pretty green. There's no such thing as "more sustainable." There's sustainable, and there's not sustainable. I want sustainable by design. Not more sustainable, because what 'more sustainable' actually means is, not actually sustainable, but not quite as unsustainable as it might be...you should have seen what we were doing before! lol!
Younger people ALWAYS believe they are living through the most prescient times in the history of mankind, but consider the following...
Look at the breakthroughs that took place in the 19th century and compare them to (y)our own times. Imagine how the triumvirate of electricity (the greatest discovery since fire), the locomotive/automobile, and the telegraph/telephone changed life in that time period. All three discoveries were life-altering.
In the modern period (say the last 75 years), we have radio/television, computers, and perhaps medical science (antibiotics, etc.), but none of these can compare in the least with what happened in the 19th century.
And exactly what do you believe you know that we don't (how to maximally exploit your iphone)?
Off topic, but this reminds me of so many Christians who think the second coming will be during their generation. Everyone thinks they're so damn special. And everything is a sign they are right. :grin:
You've got to be kidding. You went to school, right? The stuff that kids say and do to others kids in and out of school is absolutely brutal.
As anecdotal evidence (other than my entire life experience), I happen to live in a college town that also has a nice mix of young families and older folks. I am out all the time doing yard work and whatnot and have always been a friendly person so I say hello to just about everybody who comes by my house (I live on a street that a lot of people walk). BY FAR, the most friendly people are the older people, followed by moms and dads with younger kids. The college-age kids are 50/50, the high school kids are 25 nice/75 ignore, and the younger kids are oblivious as they obviously have been taught any manners what-so-ever..
There's "dire" and then there's "world war dire."
If you look at what's happened to the majority of people in the U.S. over the past 50 years, I would call it dire. If you had three or four kids and your $20./job was outsourced to China and all you could find to replace it was a $10./hour job (as happened to millions of Americans), you would probably think it was dire.
If you could no longer afford to provide decent health care for you family nor have any chance of sending your kids to college (without incurring life-destroying debt) nor have any retirement savings, you might consider it dire.
My life is a cake-walk (and maybe yours is too) but there are a lot of people whose lives are quite difficult.
Dire is subjective. Some folks would call all that "first world problems." But yeah, if a subjective feeling of dissatisfaction with what is will drive us to be better, then the fight is on over how best to go about achieving that. I say beat some enlightenment back into self-interest. The top likes to throw out "class warfare" as a boogey man. But that war has been on and they are the instigators. They are just running counter-insurgency ops on half the underclass, and it's been working. So far. They best be careful.
Not a good idea for corporations and organizations to be against equal justice and the like, unless they're branding to backwater rednecks, so secret meetings of the elite class in their hidden volcano lairs to reach agreement on methods to distract the poor folk is probably unnecessary.
I get your general meaning though.
Pillows, anyone?
You are so strict! But "sustainable" is not an all or nothing term. As for wind, back in the '90s the small town of Worthington (pop. 10,000 with two agricultural - industrial plants, one an alfalfa dryer and pelletizer) was able to meet its power needs with 6 windmills. The southwestern edge of Minnesota happens to be a prime wind region (flat and windy).
I agree, wind can't / won't power the world. Solar comes closer (so I have read). Geothermal - yes.
But @SSU's point is that there has not been, and there is no sufficient / minimally adequate policy planning for future energy production. If there were, we would see radically different government, industry, and consumer behavior. Once one acknowledges the severity of our situation, one can see the world's elites (economic, political, social, etc.) busy doing pretty much nothing.
Go Geo!
Wind will keep the lights on, maybe - but cannot produce enough energy to extract carbon, produce hydrogen fuel, desalinate water to irrigate land, and recycle. We cannot have a truly sustainable future without those technologies, and cannot power them without magma energy.
A small town becoming energy independent is no bad thing of itself, but it's like me at home, washing out my yoghurt pots for recycling, when elsewhere, lorryloads of trash are being dumped in the ocean. We have the wrong approach. There is no way that a million "more sustainable" but in themselves insufficient measures will ever add up to sustainability. Instead, those million measures will make us poor, and unable to tackle the big picture issues.
Carbon pollution is an externality of capitalist economics - and should be tackled as such; internalised by application of magma energy and carbon sequestration technologies; rather than internalised to the economy.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Thanks for the support, but do you see it? Do you see a world in which sustainability is a one, and not a zero. Not "more one"... but one by design; and achieved by intelligently directing the heat energy of mother earth to sustain life upon its surface. There's something spiritual about that... that completely passes me by because its the consequence of a scientific worldview!
Even with all the electricity the world can use, are 8, 10, or 12 billion or more of us sustainable? Is a non-polluting supply of electricity a magic solution to all of the problems of feeding, housing, clothing, educating, and caring for us, our built and natural environment, the natural systems that provide vital services to us? With all the electricity we could want, does it matter if the rain forests are cut down to grow food?
These are rhetorical issue for me, personally. I won't be around to see whatever denouement develops (unless it happens in the next few years). For the younger and or future populations, the answers to these questions are critical.
I can imagine it; I do not see any significant moves in the direction of geothermal electrical generation. That isn't your fault, of course.
With regard to the forests, I would argue that the ability to desalinate and irrigate would allow cultivation of land previously uninhabitable, land that would suffer less environmental damage - and indeed, benefit from cultivation. We need magma energy to resist desertification through agriculture fed by desalinated water, so that natural water sources and ecological treasures can be conserved.
Quoting Bitter Crank
I think it might be more economically rational and environmentally beneficial to develop wasteland with magma energy and desalinated sea water, to grow crops in future. Hydroponics, aquaponics, there are many possibilities other than burning and clearing forests; which FYI - becomes marginal land after only 3 years fertility. The ability to irrigate land would create value in the land and allow for the cultivation of existing clearances - rather than moving on, burning forest and leaving dustbowl behind. Stay.
Have you thought about just how much water one would need to irrigate the border region between the southern edge of the Sahara Desert and the wetter regions of sub-Saharan Africa (to stabilize and roll back some desertification)? Hearing Carl Sagan intoning "Billions and billions of gallons".
The thing about the Amazon forest ... Even IF (very big IF) one could replace the surface area of the Amazon forest with forest some place else, there would still be the huge species loss (already in progress, as a result of steady on-going slash and burn practices).
"Sustainable" must include the environments and habitats on which other species depend. The world isn't ours alone.
Geothermal power, to be viable, will rely on storage and transportation of energy on an unprecedented scale. You say hydrogen can meet that need; you might be right, but it is as yet unproven, and so remains in the realm of faith or hope. Also if hydrogen proves viable. then a combination of wind, solar, geothermal and perhaps other technologies (wave power, for one example) can be envisaged.
On the other hand, I also agree with @Bitter Crank when he suggests that global warming is only one of a suite of difficult to solve problems; perhaps the greatest being that industrial farming methods are destroying soils, habitats, extinguishing species, draining the aquifers, and polluting the streams, rivers and oceans. The fisheries are polluted with micro-plastics, and by aquatic fish-farming, and are also way over-fished. Countless millions of people have no access to safe water, are under-nourished or downright starving and have nowhere to live.
How did you get the idea I intend to move the Amazon rainforest? I said - that if we have the energy to produce water, we can farm land other than forests. Just in general terms, it would be possible to irrigate, fertilise, cultivate and improve land already cleared, rather than burning forest, and moving on every three years.
Read this:
https://www.retailsoygroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Letter-from-Business-on-Amazon_2021.pdf
This is what few people understand. The soil of the Amazon is actually very poor. All the nutrients are in the forest canopy. After burning the forest, the land is fertilized with potash, and produces crops for two or three years, then farmers have to move on. It's that which is driving continued deforestation. With the energy to produce fresh water, and water to irrigate, land could be improved and burning reduced.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Not me personally, but it's been considered:
"Mackenzie believed this vast region was up to 61 metres (200 ft) below sea level and that flooding it would create an inland sea of 155,400 square kilometres (60,000 sq mi) suited to commercial navigation and even agriculture."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahara_Sea
That's exactly so.
Yet they do give far more than a rat's ass if their wealth and power would be challenged. And hence when the focus is on tiny minorities like the transsexuals, it's perfect! Who wouldn't be against racism? That's easy. But to address the income inequality, that's different.
You're right that geothermal would require storing and transporting energy. The scale is not unprecedented when you consider all the tanker ships moving coal, oil and gas around the world. Hydrogen is not unproven.
Quoting Janus
Hydrogen is viable. Hydrogen is already produced and used for these purposes. Geothermal energy, developed in the particular way, and on the scale I suggest, is unprecedented. But converting heat to electricity, and electricity into hydrogen is a well known process, and with precautions, hydrogen is safe and easy to transport. It can be piped as a gas, or liquified, contains 2.5 times the energy value of petroleum. That being so, I don't see the need for wind and solar. The ability to produce and deliver clean energy as conveniently, and on the same scale as fossil fuel energy, will make wind and solar redundant.
The libertarian might be perhaps happy about this. Let's take the example of how suddenly US became again a major producer of oil.
Was the shale oil & horizontal drilling revolution truly a part of US energy policy?
Was this increase something that happened because of the government?
I think not. It happened from industry itself. And this is where the market-oriented person would be happy, because the US industry can create things new things without any (or very late) government involvement. And basically US production has only replaced falling production in other places. Yet we shouldn't be content with this as
Let's look at US electricity production and how it has developed:
Then compare it with Chinese electricity production:
The US electricity production has leveled and the real change has been the transformation from coal to natural gas, wind and solar. Yet the Chinese production has rapidly grown. Such growth does need a real government policy, it won't happen just with market forces. The current problems with blackouts doesn't show that the electricity production is just fine and especially when we assume how much electricity demand will increase in the future.
The basic fact is that if technological advancement will, as it has in history done, solve the problems of today, that won't happen in a World with less energy production. And that doesn't have to come from fossil fuels, but it has to come from somewhere.
How many, and for how long, have we needed "Manhattan Projects" to do this?
Dale Carnegie wrote a book to make friends. It is a manual of "tactical sociability", of manipulation, which is what you seem to regard as a virtue.
Poets, visual artists and musicians agreed that love and friendship is a thing of youth. Shakespeare did not write "Romeo and Juliet at 80's". Praxiteles did not sculpt old women. Chuck Berry didn't write "Sweet Little Eighty." Aristotle believed that the old men in government were a problem. Their reason is no a entelechy. Greeks and Romans considered that the truth was in the opinion of the drunkards, the madmen... and the children. Nietzsche exalts the condition of the child in front of the lion, the camel and the dragon. Every old man has a big hump of prejudices and spits fire...
Love, friendship and brotherhood are found in youth. If you did not love, have no friends, or experience the feeling of human brotherhood then, you never will. It will be just an old sociopath, someone who will promptly salute others for "tactical sociability."
Humanity will improve the day a virus kills everyone who turns 50. Until then, an amendment could greatly improve the country's government.
I agree. We need more energy - not less. But magma is the only sufficiently large, concentrated source of clean energy available. Consider, that it would take a square of solar panels, covering 225,000 sq miles, to meet current global energy demand. They last 25 years. Before construction was complete, you'd need to replace the first ones you'd installed - and they are very difficult to recycle.
If my estimations are anywhere near accurate, magma could meet global energy demand in 15 years, and double or triple capacity thereafter, to sequester carbon, desalinate, irrigate, recycle. In order to "mitigate and adapt" to the climate crisis successfully, such a quantity, and quality of energy is necessary. We need lots of high grade clean energy, and magma energy is there.
Wary as one may be of the hyperloop salesman - selling white elephants for blank cheques, in face of the projected costs of ignoring climate change, this might be the exception that proves the rule. I certainly think it's worth looking at, and apparently, so does this guy from NZ.
The search widens for hot rocks that provide power
By David Silverberg
"Drilling holes into an extinct volcano might sound like an unusual start to an energy project. But that's what J Michael Palin, a senior lecturer at the University of Otago in New Zealand, is planning to do. His project involves drilling two boreholes to a depth of 500m (1,600ft) and monitoring the rock to see if it is suitable to provide geothermal energy."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-55885086
Tentative start, but it's a step in the right direction, IMO.
Back in the 60's, we thought everybody over 30 was worthless. At least you have extended it to 50.
When you do turn 50, get back to me and let's see if your ideas have changed a bit.
And isn't against your generation's code of honor to be age-ist?
I am sixty-three years old and I know what old men are capable of. I am one of them. We must give way to the new generations.
Well, I am 66 and plan on working for 20 more years if I am able. I am in excellent health and superb physical condition and do everything I did when I was 30 (only better).
After accumulating all of this experience and knowledge, why should I step aside when i still have a great deal to offer?
You know what old men are capable of? What does that mean?
Because you are out of reality, with a step in death. You may think you are better than you were, but it is a delusion of your imagination. If you don't realize that you are no better person than you were in your 20s, then you are just stupid. I retired at 60 and I contemplate the evil that the old do to society, in particular all the hypocritical bandits who have the government imprisoned. Vampyrs.
Well, good luck to you!
To be fair, it could well be that young Synth didn’t do anything terribly physically demanding, in which case old Synth could be a champ in comparison.
I can still do some physically demanding activities that I did as a teen, and in some ways better because I deliberately train for them, but things like stamina, susceptibility to injury, and recovery times are significantly different.
No, I did an incredible amount of work when I was young. I do a great deal now, as well, but have learned how to do it more efficiently. I would think that everybody learns to do things better as they age.
I decided when I 21 that I was going to be in great shape when I turned 50 and started exercising 1 hour per day and have not missed very many days since. You have to take care of your body.
Some folks (I'm not one of them) learn to lead and get the young un's to do all the hard work. :wink: Kind of like the Plutocracy gets the minions to do all the hard work. If they start looking up the ladder, just sew a few seeds of hatred amongst them and that will keep them busy when they are not working.
I recall you mentioning that you’re a physician. I was talking about things more physically demanding than giving a prostate exam or hitting the gym for an hour.
You lead by example. I know that Americans don't seem to like to do much of anything anymore (except eat and watch TV/stare at digital devices), but there was a time when most Americans knew how to take care of themselves. Now, people are massively dependent.
Fear and dependency...the government/corporation's answer to everything.
Quoting synthesis
Quoting synthesis
Sounds like that's not working out.
Thinking you can just coast in life is not such a good strategy.
:100: It's just that leading by example hasn't worked if those who do are out-done by the government/corporations. One way to lead by example is to pay a living wage and then some. God, I wish I had all the wisdom on this point at my finger tips. I'm going to have to start logging it when I see it. Until then, you win.
You have to let the market determine what the correct wage should be. The more distortions you introduce into the economy, the less efficient it becomes. A job's worth is dependent on what value that job produces and the supply/demand factors (of labor and labor output).
I doubt even old Davy Crockett would’ve turned his nose up at indoor plumbing, a new washer/dryer, or KFC chicken fingers.
Quoting synthesis
Why exactly is efficiency so paramount?
In economics, efficiency is EVERYTHING. It's what drives the entire system. The more efficient, the more productive. The more productive, the more profit (which can be used to pay higher wages, invest in technology, or saved for other purposes).
The problem with your analysis is this: If we paid true cost (which free-market capitalism would demand), then the price of every single product and service would shut the markets down. What this means is, if the markets are not shut down, then the price of every single product and service we currently enjoy is subsidized by socialized costs. In other words, labor (not to mention the Earth) currently subsidizes the self-identified capitalist, and not labor itself. So successful has this socialism for the self-identified capitalists (consumers of labor) been, they can actually purchase government to further subsidize them with limitations on liability (read personal responsibility) via the corporation, caps on damages, etc., as well as permitting them tax avoidance and investments in emerging markets overseas. These markets overseas are where the labor supply outstrips the demand due to un-capitalist policies (communism, dictators, etc.). So, the consumer of labor again avails himself of policies and legislation that is anything but capitalist.
The invisible hand is giving a hand job to self-identified capitalists, while screwing the labor supply.
.
It is what it is, but just the same, the less economic distortions, the better.
This is why the main emphasis of everything going on in this country should be about ridding the system of corruption (which must be at one of its all-time highs). Corruption is a drag on everything and is why the 'checks and balances' system was devised/implemented in the first place.
When things gets this out of hand, you must have leadership willing to stand-up to the entrenched players (but not radicals that believe we should do idiotic things). That never ends well.
Right, even so, couldn't an inefficient economy provide for basic needs, and perhaps some of the extras we're so accustom to and dependent on?
Also, if we're all about efficiency and profit, then it's good to outsource labor to where it's cheapest and automate whenever possible, right? Screw the American worker if they can't compete. And let's make higher education as expensive as possible to help keep them down.
To live for profit is a rather meaningless way of life, I'll add.
An inefficient economy will eventually produce no profit and things will spiral down and out of control as happens every time some dufus attempts to implement socialist "solutions."
In theory, you are suppose to care about the folks in your own country. This is why globalism has been a failure each time it has been attempted. Same reason the EU is such a mess. You need the economy and the laws/rules/regulations to be local.
That all depends upon whose economic distortions are the few we let in.
Quoting synthesis
The radicals are the natural and expected "it is what it is" response to things having already gotten out of hand, because the few economic distortions we have allowed in are the self-identified free-market types who left the "enlightened" part of "enlightened self-interest" at the door.
Sum and substance: If you don't roll with capitalists like Elizabeth Warren, then you get to sleep with fascist nationalists like Trump, or socialists like AOC and Sanders. I'll take the latter any day, since their brand seems to work for all first world countries. Anyone who doesn't like it needs to pump the breaks on the delusional self-identifies liars.
Funny you were just praising "a time when most Americans knew how to take care of themselves" (an extremely inefficient time compared to now) and now seem to be claiming that they could never achieve what's most important in life: profit.
Actually, an inefficient economy will produce HUGE profits and things will spiral down and out of control as happens every time some dufus tries trickle down "solutions."
If you want to look back at the "Golden Years" of a thriving American middle class (I know, they were not golden for minorities or women, but they were the years that trickle down types like to look back on with dreamy eyes) you might want to check the marginal tax rates and compare them with today.
And countries with more efficient economies end up being prosperous and those that aren't end up constructing trade barriers that make them even worse off. And even if it's separate companies that nowdays are multinational, people still see it like a competition between countries.
The first thing that needs to happen is to return to an actual debate on things that are real. The Democrats are successfully using their racist narrative to distract people from the absurd public policies they are pushing through, e.g., their border crisis.
Without a public debate (which the left will have nothing to do with because anybody who disagrees with them is racist), you don't have much of anything. The debate is the heart and sole of public policy making.
Elizabeth Warren turned out to be a joke (and AOC is a fool). Sanders is delusional, and Trump, for all his quirks, had some good policy put into place, again, securing the border, trade with China, attempting to get jobs back in the U.S., getting out of foreign wars, etc. I am not sure where you get the fascist stuff from as it has been the left that has shown all kinds of fascist tendencies.
Having said that, all politicians are liars so you give them as little power as is possible.
Look at the 19th century if you want to understand efficiency. Prices were cheaper in 1900 then they were in 1800!
That was caused by an incredibly strong dollar and the rest of the world in shambles (post WWII). The U.S. made just about everything for the world. The tax rate being high eventually worked its magic (creating all kinds of tax havens and cheating).
Conditions for the working class were notoriously bad during that period, with long hours, low wages, hazardous and unhealthy conditions. Child labor wasn't outlawed until 1920. You're a real humanitarian, Synthesis.
Life was really difficult for everybody, not just the working class. But there will ALWAYS be people who are better off. No such thing as equality. Not even close.
The tax rate being high worked it's magic long before the tax shenanigans kicked in in response. The taxes loop holes came along and then we cut taxes on top of that, for a double down for the rich and a double fking for everyone else.
No, the wealthy lived large. Weird that you don't acknowledge that.
Quoting synthesis
There is such a thing. It's just that those with an advantage don't want it.
I find there cannot be reasonable debate unless and until the person I would engage with publicly and sincerely turns their back on Trump and the alleged theft of the election. There is only one real place to have an intelligent, moderated debate on the record. The Republicans pursued that avenue in several different venues and they lost. Donald Trump continues to insist he won. He is a loser, and a bad one at that.
One might ask, why not argue other points? Ask Elizabeth Cheney or any other member of the Republican Party who has not prostrated themselves before Trump. I will argue conservative principles and issues with them all day long. As for anyone else, they must first state: "Donald J. Trump lost, he is a loser, and a bad one at that." Then I will engage.
High taxes kill motivation, innovation, and lastly, economies.
You want money in the hands of private people, NOT the government (who can only make things worse). Remember, it is the government that creates all the laws that favor the wealthy. The best outcome in any society is to increase opportunity to succeed and minimize corruption. The larger the government, the more corruption.
Most people died before they were 40.
Quoting praxis
Oh really. Are you going to make beautiful people average looking? Are you going to make really intelligent people less smart? Are you going to make really nice people not so nice? How about really coordinated people (great athletes)? Make them average?
Whereas you see equality as a utopia, it is in reality the ultimate dystopia
Give people the greatest opportunity to succeed. That's the best any system can do..
I thought it was a pretty good rant. :) I would have had fun with it!
Quoting James Riley
You've got to get over the Trump thing and move on. Look how lame Hillary has been with her blathering about how Trump stole the election from her and he was an illegitimate president.
The biggest mistake people make in their lives is in not being able to leave the past in the past. It's over, time to move forward.
Quoting James Riley
I do not consider myself a political person but I will debate the conservative point of view with you because I believe the Left is incredibly mis-guided.
I'll start. Government is necessary but you must limit government to the smallest size possible. The reasons are multiple...gross economic inefficiencies and the direct relationship between size and corruption levels within government, to name a couple.
The mistake in your reasoning has already been dealt with. It is not the left that can't get over it. It's the right. Hell, they're still whining about Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and Obama. Confess and you will feel better and we can then move on to the debate of the substantive issues.
Quoting synthesis
Again, until you admit Trump lost, is a loser, and a sore loser, we can't debate the real issues. I've already spanked you, un-rebutted, on the issues regarding cost externalization, etc. It is not the left that can't get over it. Ask the Arizona Republican Party, Desantis, and all the people who continue to insist he did not lose, is not a loser, and is not a sore loser. The reason this is so important, and not merely some petulant winner refusing to be magnanimous in victory, is because an assault was laid on the United States of America and the assault continues as long as the blatant lie continues.
Confess your sins of, if not voting for or supporting him (I don't know), then for failing to reject him out loud for the world to see. Go ahead, it will be cathartic.
Until you confess your sins to the public, no reasonable person would teach you how wrong you are on the merits. Your failure to confess has brought this on you. Jefferson Davis may or may not support Day Care, but I wouldn't talk to him about it until he admitted that slavery and racism is an abomination and that he was patently wrong for having aided and abetted it.
The only thing I care about is freedom. Whomever supports the most individual freedom, I am leaning towards that side.
Of course Trump lost. So what?
I have no idea what you are talking about.
I know.
Debate me and I'll show you why.
I've already explained "so what." But since you have no idea what I'm talking about, I'll take another stab at it:
It's important the reasonable people who admit he lost, is a loser, and is a sore loser (Cheney, Romney, etc.), be distinguished from the stupid people who think he won, is a winner and a great winner. The former might be able to be reasoned with. The latter are enemies of the United States. We should confirm their worst Q suspicions of us, round them up, put them on trains, and send them to re-education camps to learn the exalted ways of communism. LOL!
Seriously though: Even Trump may reasonably know he lost, and is a loser. What he is calling being a "victim" of the left (and what all reasonable people call being a sore loser) may be a calculated way to drum up money and base support for 2024, but that is what renders him unworthy of reasonable debate. He is sewing the seeds of an unnecessary civil war. That makes him and his apologists enemies of the United States, ala Jefferson Davis.
You keep raising the ante. Now you must go forth among your kind and preach, like a disciple, the error of the ways of Trump and his spawn.
?James Riley You think you know me? You're incapable of knowing yourself!
Debate me and I'll show you why.
Side bar. Not saying I didn't say it, but can you cite me to where I said that?
My kind? :) Enough with the bullshit. Do you want to debate or not?
Yes, your kind.
I don't want to debate with an unreasonable person. I'm vetting the sincerity of your curiosity. Again, can you show me where I said what you quoted me as saying? I'm not saying I didn't say it, but my limited search skills of page 6 & 7 did not turn it up.
This is an example of how you have difficulties moving on, but I will humor you.
From what you had written, you thought I was a Trump supporter. I didn't vote for Trump. I don't like him or any politician but that doesn't mean I disagree with all of his policies. This is not a black and white world.
Are you saying I said that, or not? If I said it, fine. Show me where I said it. If not, then why should I "move on"? Are you saying I should ignore a lie.
Would you have me move on from an insurrectionist, or any other wrong-doer and just pretend it didn't happen? Can you distinguish between past acts and ongoing acts?
Are you saying I should sit down and discuss the merits of "truth" with Joe Goebbels? Day Care with Jefferson Davis? Making the trains run on time with Mussolini? Military efficiency with Hitler? Sorry, but I won't do that. They and their followers must, at the very least, confess their sins, show contrition and make amends. If the GQP wants to save itself, it must follow leaders like Cheney and Romney, and punish leaders like Trump, Desantis, et al. Until then, don't be surprised if they don't get a seat at the table with the adults and the reasonable people, the debaters and the seekers of truth.
Still denying that the wealthy lived well? That your prerogative I suppose.
Quoting synthesis
From what I understand wokeness is majorly about equal justice and it seems perfectly reasonable to me to get as close to that as possible. Perhaps you wouldn’t be so content with the current state of affairs if you weren’t a white male living in Southern California.
If that's the case, they are not doing a very good job of presenting it. They seem like a bunch of spoiled four year old's.
Life is what it is. Would you feel better if I joined you guys and was completely miserable? You can't help very many people being miserable. You have to see (and enjoy) the good things in life, as well.
I have worked very hard and live a nice but modest life. Remember, most people in SoCal are not wealthy (as a matter of fact, they are struggling as it is not the cheapest place in the world to live...I am here for the weather :)
Look, I just enjoy chatting with people who really believe in something...ANYTHING! If you would like to talk and are ready to descend from your pulpit, that would be great. Otherwise, let's move on.
One other thing...in life, you cannot control what everybody else is doing so, yes, there are many times when bad things happen and that's just the way it goes. If you can't let things go, you will end up being very unhappy (and that won't help anybody).
There are many wonderful things in life. Take some time and enjoy them.
Balance is the way.
I'd feel a better if you took the hyperbole down a notch or two. It's way past tedious.
I'm a white guy living a nice but modest life in S Cali too, and unwoke as well. You don't need to be woke to care about equal rights and the like.
If you can't answer questions, or admit when you are wrong, you might think you are happy (I'm sure Trump does), but it won't help yourself or anybody.
So, did you, or did you not say I said something I did not say? I may have said it. Hell, if I cared enough to think about it, I might have even agreed with the sentiment. But that is not the point. If you are a liar, misquoting people, then, like the RQP that fails to admit Trump lost and is a loser and a sore loser at that, it' would be futile for me to engage on the merits of any issue.
The Right, particularly the alt-Right, seems to be so inclined to excessively criticize any utilization of a popular idiom or ethos on the part of the Left, despite, themselves being completely reliant upon the proliferation of thought-terminating clichés.
While I am willing to admit that there are occasions where the invocation of things like "white privilege" in activist circles can occasionally effectuate the internal policing of the community, the relentless examples that the Right attempts to make out of such instances is nothing but ironically, as this is, perhaps, their favorite talking point, indicative of a complete and total double standard.
I have never known anybody who doesn't care about equal rights. It's part of what being an American is about. The problem is that the Left desires equality of outcome which is impossible (and undesirable). People are diverse in all kinds of ways. This is a political power/money grab as are all organized activities.
Any way you slice it, you have to earn your keep in this world. To expect others to take care of you is the short road to hell. Only the elite seem to get away with it (but eventually, they gets their's, as well).
Your thinking is pre-Kantian. It is normal for you to be anti-Marxist. You remind me of my father. Two days before he died he realized that he had worked his entire existence and had barely enjoyed life. He lived as others used to and he thought that he had made a decision that belonged to others. You boast that you have done a lot of Zen Buddhism (which seems silly to me, it's better to sleep). You should read "Idea for a universal history with a cosmopolitan purpose" by I. Kant. He will do you good.
You have a group of people who have decided that another group of people are all racist.
This will not end well.
I've lived a great life and would do very little differently. People need to tend to their own lives and not be so concerned with others. I just try to introduce different points of view because it might be interesting to chat about with people. Nothing more.
The main problem is those who acquiesce, grovel, and alter the world according to the woke vision, mostly for fear of losing some profits or reputation. This behavior has exacerbated the problem, and if it were to end, the whole scheme would collapse.
Now it's here (in its nascent incarnation) and it's ugly.
So-called cancel culture is pretty much a milquetoast struggle session, so the comparison between the woke and the red guard is apt.
Okay, synth, two can play your stupid game. If the left desires equality of outcome and you're against it that means that you desire inequality of outcome. Why do you want that? Is it because you're successful and want others to be unsucessful so you can feel good about yourself? That demonstrates insecurity. Why are you so insecure?
I can go on painting a silly caricature of you and pretend that I'm having a worthwhile discussion, if you like.
Who have I called a racist? I'm saying that the Right bemoans terms like "woke", all the while relying upon other thought-terminating clichés, thus a double-standard.
People are successful for a lot of reasons outside of hard work. Maybe they are really attractive. Perhaps they are super intelligent, or just incredibly nice people. How about those folks who had successful parents and they made success for them a priority? These attributes significantly help people along the way.
Even if it was preferable, you cannot engineer a society to create equality. The best you can do it try to offer everybody maximum opportunity, and you do that through getting out of the way and allowing people to do their thing. This means limiting the power of the few to control others. Minimize governments, get rid of corporations, so on and so forth. Go small and de-centralize.
“Allowing people to do their thing” by forcing them to “Minimize governments, get rid of corporations, so on and so forth”?
Everybody should be talking about how we can be freer. That is the key to tremendous success in any society. Right, left, up, down, who cares? If you are talking about freedom (especially economic), that's a good thing. If you are talking about controlling others through governments and corporations, that's a bad thing.
Restricting what folks can and can’t do isn’t freedom.
If restricting means limiting the power of governments and corporations, then restrict away. Increase the power of the individual. It's the only way to unleash the productive powers of a society.
Amusing to have this set out explicitly. I would have thought its absurdity obvious, but privilege hides privilege from the privileged.
Individuals would have dominion over governments and corporations in your dream society? If so, which individuals?
An off-topic forum is like a coffee shop. A philosophy forum is about philosophy. The problem is that those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. And I am surprised that your opinions are of an adult, especially since they tell me "Kant in vain... Kant in vain... Kant in vain..." It is something amazing and sad.
You might want to sit down and read the U.S. Constitution. It's about individuals.
Oh yeah, and written by people who owned other people.
Don't you think it's time to move on and make things better, as well? Remember, we've all been through what you are going through now. You are not the first person to discover the history of man. Tremendous improvements have been made with further to go, but these things don't happen overnight.
Believe it or not, most everybody is doing what they can on a personal level. The elite are doing their thing (doing whatever they can to win), the professional and administrative classes have unfortunately sold-out but that will eventually change when leadership arises, and everybody else is trying to get by.
It's not that you get it and nobody else does. Pretty much everybody gets it and is trying to do what they can (believe it or not). You act as if somehow you understand and nobody else does. Again, everybody gets it but you have to live with balance in your life because there are other people who might depend on you keep it together and act like a responsible adult.
Silly me. You should have informed me of this from the start.
Correct. There is also a huge distinction between the past, and ongoing shit. Once the shit is over, we can think about moving on. Until then, we need to flush the toilet.
Boy are you going to be disappointed when you realize it's one shit storm after another after another after...
But that doesn't mean you can't enjoy life because there are wonderful parts that you have to make on your own. A good life is not available on Amazon with free 2-day shipping.
Lost your zen already. :lol:
You have to first accept life as it is and then figure how you fit in. You guys see only the negative (and there is plenty of it) but there also a great deal of good and wonderful. Find the balance between the two and you'll be able to help the most people.
I know that as well, or better than you. But we are not talking about one shit storm after the next. We are talking about the current, ongoing shit storm. The burden of proof is upon the shit to crawl out of the toilet and prove it is not shit. So, did you say I said something I did not say, or not? Are you a liar? Still waiting before engaging on the merits. See, it's not over, and you can't put it in the past just because it's convenient for you.
"The 'you lost, get over it' crowd from 2016 is now obsessivly checking ballots for imaginary bamboo particles because they lost and can't get over it." Jeff Tiedrich
If you don't trust me, that's fine, but my take on lying is that it is a useless tactic. If that's not good enough for you, whatever. Find somebody else to chat with.
So you were lying about the shit? That’s shitty.
How convenient. See how that works? You step on your dick, and rather than take personal responsibility for your own actions, you just want to forget and move on.
Quoting synthesis
You said I said something and even put me in quotes. I searched for it, could not find it, and begged you to show me where I said it. Why should I trust you? It's apparently not a useless tactic if you suck me back into the merits and then pull that shit again. It's par for the course with those who have squandered their credibility.
Quoting synthesis
I wasn't chatting with you. I responded to Praxis. You started chatting with me, and I called you out on your "apparently" disingenuous BS. So, if you don't like getting called out on your BS, and don't want to crawl out of the toilet and meet your burden of proof, re-establishing any credibility you might have, then you find somebody else to chat with.
Might I suggest...
NewNarrativesForFormerLeftists.com ? I hear they've got a great selection of up-beat narratives. :)
I hope you guys can take a joke. You can't be THAT serious.
Yes, after you re-establish credibility.
The fictional character that is synthesis doesn’t require credibility to function. :roll:
:100: Like so many institutions and individuals today. :worry:
Equality of outcome is a lack of diversity. You can't have both equality and diversity. To achieve equality of outcomes, we'd all have to be genetically engineered and raised by the State.
Agreed, time to get rid of the US Constitution
Do you have any other really good ideas?
Can you somehow support the claim that the left wants equality of outcome?
The Left is constantly pushing their "inclusion" meme which I take as meaning that each GROUP needs to be represented according to their percentage in the population. Merit is of secondary importance.
This would be a disaster for all kinds of reasons.
The Left has also seemingly embraced the 'something for nothing' idea and made it a cornerstone of their being. I guess they figure, "why not join the corruption party." The entire 'something for nothing' mentality that has enriched so many for so long needs to be rooted-out, not further and more deeply institutionalized.
Can YOU somehow support the claim that the left wants equality of outcome?
" From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs "
-KM
Technically, it's more than equality, it's...
"You give whatever we tell you to give because we know what's best for everybody."
Queue up the illogical compartmentalization of "left" with communism. LOL! The right is so predictable, because they want slavery based on race and class and dictatorship. They are all fascists.
This by definition is not an equality of outcome. It's material consumption based on individuated needs.
I get that, but it's a similar idea. IOW, you have to somehow justify the transfer of wealth in order to satisfy what others needs are, and that's where equality comes in because what's more fair than that?
Idealists want fairness above all else. Unfortunately, fairness is not the way the natural world works, and like it or not, we are part of the natural world. Why should somebody be born better looking or smarter, or nicer, or with more ambition, or a better athlete, or a million other things? It's just the way it is.
Therefore, you can attempt to change Nature through all kinds of social engineering that always goes really badly, or you can have a society which is geared toward providing everybody with the greatest opportunities to exploit their own strengths.
Most people I know who would identify themselves as "right" are into limited government, small business, personal responsibility, etc.
Equality and fairness are conceptually distinct. It shouldn't take more than several seconds to realize this. Just be an adult and admit that "Equality of Outcome" is not a Leftist goal, particular around asinine things such as athleticism, or looks, etc. which are abstract and subjective anyway. Equity and fairness for Leftists revolve around material conditions.
Perhaps more to the point, all wealth ownership past, present, or hypothetical Leftist distribution is socially engineered. There is no natural wealth distribution.
You speak in absolutes. The bottom-line is that people do much better when there is a system in place that protects body and property. You need a legal system to attempt to distribute the law equally and you do what you can to attenuate the accumulation of power and wealth (e.g., revoke all corporate charters).
You have to allow the gifted to do their thing because it will benefit everybody (even if means that they get to live better than everybody else). I suppose if you work 20 hours a day and come up with something that changes billions of lives for the better, then have a Ferrari and mansion to go with it.
Destroying all that is excellent is not the way to go. Creating the most opportunity for the most people is, and it is what has worked the best so far.
I guess Marx wasn’t woke. :sad:
My conclusion after decades of thinking about this stuff is that our best hope is to set individuals free within a framework of limited government that protects person and property and allow community institutions to gather the resources necessary to help those in need. Every time you go towards centralization (of power and wealth), things go south very quickly.
I'll take that as a no, you can't support the claim that the left wants equality of outcome.
Quoting synthesis
Honestly incredible, it takes an exceptionally unique individual to say that Marx's critique of Capitalism was spot on and yet we must do it anyway.
You can critique everything but that doesn't mean you are going to throw everything away. Capitalism is the only economic system there is. It works really well but has some contradictions that you can minimize but there is no perfect system.
We are talking about human beings so (really) it's quite incredible that we can anything without causing massive chaos!
Except you're not talking about Capitalism tout court you're specifically advocating a vague aperçu of laizze faire Capitalism, in your own words "limited government" that "protects property" while condemning policies that could provide redistributive wealth to those below. I mean at least you could advocate for Keynesianism based on Marxian analyst but you're gleefully throwing that out the door too.
Synthesis is the tortoise in the tortoise and the hare - but its rewritten by Dinesh D'Souza, William Lane Craig, and Dave Rubin.
Sorry: add Karl Marx to the list of authors; just read some of his comments.
Sure, couldn’t be any worse than the Marx quote.
Obviously you all have been very successful in life and have it figured out.
I wish you continued success!
Actually, I have been tremendously unsuccessful according to my own (now changing) standards. And your viewpoint is appreciated, so keep on chugging along.
You fight in vain. Synthesis is a person who has opinions and has read something, but has little idea of philosophy. He works a lot in an occupation that does not interest him, to buy things that he does not need and to impress others who do not matter to him. He is a pre-Kantian sophist. "Idea for a universal history with a cosmopolitan purpose" is his future, but he doesn't know it yet.
What's the difference between "outcome by merit" and "equal outcome"? "Merit" is not the name of a physical law or constant.
Quoting synthesis
Err, what?
The difference is that “outcome by merit” means the most qualified person gets the job (for example), based upon n the merits of their qualifications. “Equal outcome” is not concerned with merit or qualification in this context, but with making sure their is a diverse range of race/gender etc regardless of qualifications/merit.
The point being made I think is that equality of outcome is more problematic because it doesn’t filter out incompetence or any other undesirable traits, where equality of opportunity does while at the same time is an explicit effort to make sure no one is left out do to race/gender etc.
Think of selecting a panel of doctors to save a loved ones life. You want the panel to have the best doctors right? If you gathered the best and it turns out it’s majority black, white, straight, gay or whatever then equality of outcome demands that some of the best doctors be swapped out so that the panel is diverse.
How do we know that "equal outcome" isn't concerned with merit or qualification? Equality is a value judgement. It can and usually does include considerations for qualifications and experience. Is there any mainstream view which espouses a strict quota system based on some form of identity without consideration of merit?
And on the flip side, what is considered "merit" is also a value judgement which, in principle, isn't different from equality.
Quoting DingoJones
I'm very sceptical regarding this claim, as I don't see how it would be possible a priori to know whether a given system actually filters out only "undesirable traits". In my view, the only way to check is by looking at the output and comparing it with other metrics to figure out whether or not the process works. "Equality of opportunity" a judgement of an outcome, the term does not describe any specific method.
Quoting DingoJones
I think you're ascribing a specific goal to equality, based on a political usage of the word, which is not inherent in the term. If you want a panel of the best doctors, then the only reasonable application of the term equality is that people on the panel should have the highest qualification possible, regardless of other factors. In other words all factors except qualification should be considered equal (you don't care about their marital status etc).
That's how equality always operates - you select one or more dimensions of relevance, such as qualification, income, etc. and then the "equal" outcome is the one where those - and only those - dimensions are expressed in the outcome.
Merit purports to do something similar, but merit tends to come with an existing list of which circumstances imply merit and which do not, and that list is politically and ideologically motivated (usually to favour existing elites).
The idea of compounding capital has little, if anything, to do with merit. Especially when the genesis of that capital can be tied to theft or immoral acts (slavery, etc.). All that compounded afterwards is the fruit of a poisonous tree. Food for thought.
In short, when the "right" picks the welfare queen as their undeserving parasite on society, the "left" can always pick the silver spoon slug as another undeserving parasite on society. They, after all, benefit from capital that did not pay in to society.
Conversely, for every so-called hard-working bootstrapper picked by the "right" as the paragon of our ethic, the "left" can pick a million harder-working po folk as not getting out what they put in.
I think efforts toward equality are simply trying to level a playing field that has been tilted to favor some and not others. But bringing it back to level requires a little tilt in the opposite direction from level. You can't fuck a man forever and then expect gratitude when you stop. You gots to pay a little. You say it wasn't your fault? Faults got nothing to do with it. It's a strict liability issue.
Well in the context of race/gender etc I think the idea for some is that the proper metric for a fair group selection is diversity. That idea is about “equality of outcome”, the goal is for the group to have a proper amount of of diversity. A mainstream example would be affirmative action.
Quoting Echarmion
The specific method of “equality of opportunity” is usually about creating a system where everyone has a fair shot, an equal playing field.
I agree with your view and on looking at the output, that’s a good way to check what a systems actually doing but I was more talking about system design. Specifically, whether the idea of “equality of outcome” is better than “equality of opportunity”.
Quoting Echarmion
Well yes, that was what I was making a point about. The political usuals. That’s what the discussion had been about.
Quoting Echarmion
Yes, that was the point I was making. I think we are using terms a bit differently, I’m not sure we are in disagreement about the concepts.
The difference is that in the former, you earn your success, in the later you are given success regardless of what you do.
Quoting Echarmion
Are you aware of another functioning economic system? Is feudalism still in operation? How about slavery?
Socialism is simply a transfer mechanism, and Communism is state capitalism, and communism, a pipe-dream.
Is that why the most successful groups in the U.S. are people of color...Asians. They are successful because they work their asses off.
The unintended consequences of of such thinking is that you may be under the knife one day when your surgeon doesn't quite make the correct decision and your procedure goes poorly, or, your airline pilot doesn't have it together enough to make it through the storm, or a millions other examples.
Consider how this policy has failed is many AA students have been admitted to very high academic standard schools (e.g., Ivy League schools) and failed horribly because they were not qualified whereas they would have done really well at other schools where the rest of us go.
What the left is trying to do now is get rid of the better schools (in LA they want to discontinue all advanced classes). This is crazy. People need to achieve their potential, whatever it is, and whomever they are...black, white, brown, yellow, purple or blue!
Probably shouldn't rely on racial stereotypes.
It's inequality of effort. I live in a area with a lot of Asians and these people work harder than anybody I've ever known.
Why do you think these people are so successful? Luck?
But think of all the liars who succeed! You never know who you can trust when they've lost credibility. Like you. Did you misquote me, or not? I mean, how can I pretend to trash your silly arguments on the merits when, at any time, you might say I said something I did not say? Isn't that the hall mark of a society that isn't based on merit?
Asian income inequality in the US has many factors. The bottom line is that the average Asian American is behind the average non-Asian American. If your racial stereotype were accurate they'd be above the average.
True enough. Capitalism (really just pretense) is simply a free market tool used by socialism to achieve some of it's goals.
Self-identified "capitalists" have their lips indelibly stuck on the socialist government's tit, and would not last a nano-second alone in the wild.
Socialist just know how to treat people. Unlike the self-identified capitalist who would ride a horse to death, get off, eat it and take off on foot in search of another meal.
For a first approximation, that is probably a good strategy though. If, for a given field, you don't think there are any significant biological differences between the groups involved and the sample size is large enough, results should correspond to the makeup of the population in general. If they don't, something else is going on. Now something else is almost always going on, not necessarily something bad. But it's a legitimate cause for concern if the ratio is way off from what it should be given the makeup of the population.
Quoting DingoJones
But what is the actual system design like? My point is exactly that there is no way to design a system for equality of opportunity in the abstract, because you first need to decide what specific outcomes actually represent equality of opportunity, and then you design your system so it gives you the outcomes you want. There is no algorithm you can turn to to avoid having to make the value judgement about what you actually want the system to account for, and what you want it to equalize.
Quoting DingoJones
I consider the dichotomy between equality of outcome and equality of opportunity to be a false one. The terms imply two distinct methods, when in reality it's not a question of method, but of goals.
Quoting synthesis
* citation needed
Quoting synthesis
Neofeudalism arguably exists. But regardless past economic systems did function. The fact that they're no longer operational doesn't change that.
I don’t think the groups will naturally corespondent to the demographics. Certain professions for example attract certain kinds of people. These professions will naturally have more people of that certain kind. Some fields or areas will not have diversity because the interest in that field or area isn’t all that diverse.
Quoting Echarmion
I think you are using those terms idiosyncratically, and that’s why you think it a false dichotomy. Those two things are indeed two methods and they are mutually exclusive.
I think socialism is alive and well in the United States. The problem is, people get hung up on the idea of "pure." However, socialism, like "capitalism" (cough cough) comes in many different shades and colors.
There is no more socialist institution on the planet than the United States Military. It is one of the primary drivers of production (foreign oil) and the protector of the petro-dollar upon which the world engages in exchange; effectively making us the bank that can print money and allow us to run deficits carte blanche without taxation to cover expenses.
And when people back up to taxation of "capitalists" (cough cough) as the funders of the military, their profits come largely from Big Government protection of shareholders from strict, joint and several liability. Without those skirts to hide behind, investors would not venture out from under the fridge to invest. They are only "risk takers" when it comes to what they are willing to venture, and not to the extent of the damages they inflict or the externalized costs.
We could go on to highways, airwaves, rights of way, and the simple fact that the sovereign is, well, sovereign. "We the people" could do a lot that we don't do because we know how to take care of people. The only chink in that armor is when the so-called "capitalists" (cough cough) use their profits to purchase government to protect them, their profits and their foreign adventures in emerging markets or with our "freedom loving democratic" allies in developing countries. When you lose the distinction between the corporation and the state, you have fascism (socialism for the few, rugged individualism for every one else).
I like Smedley Darlington Butler's "War is a Racket" essay. Nothing much has changed in a hundred years. Side note: How many refuges at our border are from our allied countries in Central and South America, vice those from our socialist "enemies" down there? And regarding all the alleged failures of socialist experiments down there, how much of that failure is due to the failure of socialism vice the monkey wrenches that are thrown in by our alphabet agencies?
Again, I am not really sure what you are talking about, but let's talk about lying.
Have you never lied? Are you somewhere above the rest of humanity?
This isn't school.
Quoting Echarmion
Doesn't change what?
We should be happy to live in age where material is abundant. The economic system is what it is. You make it the best you can and move forward (the way you do everything else).
Everybody understands what your complaining about but its like yelling at the moon for keeping you awake at night. Some things are what they are.
On this matter, my friend, we can agree.
There is WAY TOO MUCH socialism in the U.S. ... to the point where it has created grotesque economic distortions via massive systemic corruption, just like in every other socialist paradise.
Japanese, Chinese, Korean,and Indian Americans are all doing very, very well. Do you have statistics that suggest otherwise?
Would you like everybody to be in the top 10%?
You got called out on it at the time, when it was fresh. Rather than admitting you put something I allegedly said, in quotes over my name, or showing me where I said it, you just tried the typical conservative dodge of hoping time would make it go away.
While you did admit Trump lost (that was like pulling teeth, and you still won't acknowledge he's a loser and a sore loser), I was going to get back to spanking you on the merits. But then you pulled that quotation thing.
Now you are pulling another conservative card called "whataboutism." Yeah, I've lied, but not to you (so you don't have standing) and when I have lied, I admitted it and expressed regret to those who had standing.
I suspect your next move will be something like "Well, if I lied, I'm sorry, now can we move on?" BS. There is an element of knowing involved here. Confess your sins, my son. It will be cathartic! Then we can move on. It's hard to earn credibility, easy to lose it, and even harder to get it back. When you are in a hole, first stop digging.
Having trouble reading the graph I posted?
Here’s a tutorial that might be useful to you.
Based on what though? Why would interests just happen to line up with some unrelated demographic grouping? That'd imply precisely that the demographic grouping and the interest are not independent.
Quoting DingoJones
Can you tell me what the methods are, then?
Quoting synthesis
Yeah, sure, economic systems can never be changed (except when they are).
When a better system is possible, people will use it. Why wouldn't they?
The problem with the present system is mostly corruption and this is problem with all systems. The simpler and more transparent systems are, the less chances there are for corruption, so this is why many believe that simplification (decreasing size and complexity) is the way to go.
The larger organizations become, the more inefficient they become (although Amazon seems to be an outlier). Governments are particularly prone to this syndrome as accountability is minimal.
Although capitalism certainly has its issues, there are ways to deal with them so you can end up with as much fairness as is possible (checks and balances combined with a solid legal system). Outside of that, there will be those who achieve a great more than do others for all kinds of reasons that have nothing to do with the system.
People need to be given the opportunity to live whatever kind of life they choose, but they must take responsibility for those choices. In a healthy society, opportunity is plentiful so even if you fail, you can get back up on your horse and try again. If you immediately come to the aid of somebody that has not succeeded, there's a good chance you will be supporting such failure for their entire lives.
It must be quite the burden being the only person in the world who, "gets it."
I will leave you to wallow in your genius while I shall try to make due in my world of not knowing anything at all.
Have a nice day!
Ah, Padawan, the first step in learning is to admit you don't know anything. So, you admitted Trump lost. Now you admit you don't know anything at all. We are making progress. Now, admit you lied (if you did, I'm still willing to acknowledge I may have said what you said I said, but you haven't shown me), admit Trump is a loser, and a sore loser, and then you will be on a path to regaining credibility.
Here would be a good start on the Trump thing: "Liz Cheney has bigger balls, more courage, more wisdom, more honor, more integrity, and is a truer conservative relative to Trump. Trump could not carry the corn in her shit. She should lead the Republican Party and bring it back to it's conservative roots."
Yeah, if you could say that, that's the ticket!
Imagine if I said you said that! I would have no credibility.
Based on the traits of each demographic. There are general trends within demographics. (Cultural, biological etc)
Quoting Echarmion
It would be specific to each case. It’s a question of what you are building the system to do (equality of outcome or equality of opportunity) and which way is better. The exact method used would be whatever is best suited to equality of opportunity
I've already told you that it is impossible to know anything. You are the one who believes he knows.
As I have told you before, Trump is who he is, but you think he is a loser? Well, let's compare your resume to his. What have you accomplished in this life?
There you go again, trying to change the subject. And lying again. I thought you were going to leave me to wallow in my genius?
Because implementing a better system is a question of political power, among other things. According to you, the economic system should always have been the best possible one from the start, but that clearly isn't the case.
Quoting synthesis
The accountability of democratic governments is strictly higher than that of non-democratic coroporations.
Quoting DingoJones
I specifically stated "if you believe there are no biological differences". Cultural differences cannot justify different outcomes as every difference can be framed as "cultural" and consequently no comparison would be possible.
Quoting DingoJones
That's exactly the answer I expected to get. Ok then, give me one specific case and sketch the different methods.
Describe the differences in demographics however you like, makes no difference to my point.
Quoting Echarmion
Why did you ask the question then? And why wouldn’t you just ask for a specific example if that’s what you wanted?
I explained the concept to you, do you not understand it and need an example or are you just asking leading questions so you can play gotcha?
Who knows what James could have accomplished if he inherited nearly half a billion dollars.
:100: That cannot be overstated.
Government, for all it's failings, is (or should be) accountable to more than the next quarter bottom line fiduciary responsibility to shareholders. Some conservatives will actually champion the inefficiency or incompetence of government (Trumpettes) because they believe they will be left alone to pursue their own selfish interests. Then, when government demonstrates inefficiency or incompetence, they say "See!"
Regardless, I'd rather the trains not run on time, than have corporate trains taking us to work on schedule. And there is something insidious about the Plutocracy picking and choosing which government functions they will assume via philanthropy. We end up having to choose sides between the Plutocracy and cartels, whilst leaving government, emasculated, as a punching bag; diverting the anger of the masses away from the Plutocracy and the cartels.
Two lessons I've learned, in contravention of conservative principles:
Government can indeed be the solution;
Trickle down is BS.
(I remember the now-conservative wag, Dennis Miller, once said something to the effect: If 'trickle down' is not fair warning that you are about to get pissed on, I don't know what is.
Your point is that different outcomes mapping to, say, ethnic groups is not a sign of a problem, even if we assume there are no fundamental biological differences between the groups?
Quoting DingoJones
My claim is that "equality of opportunity" and "equality of outcome" describe different judgements of an outcome. You claim that they describe different methods. I obviously don't believe that, so I don't believe you can actually describe any method. So I expected you to not do that, and instead claim that you cannot do so in the abstract. So now I am asking you to do it in the concrete then, though I expect you cannot do that either, because that would prove me wrong, while I think I am right.
Quoting James Riley
Yep, that's exactly the argument againts philantropy I find convincing as well.
There are fundamental biological differences among some groups. I don’t recall agreeing to the assumption there isn’t.
Quoting Echarmion
Those are not mutually exclusive, they can describe both can’t they? Again, I don’t much care what you want to call it.
Quoting Echarmion
It’s generally a good idea to not reach conclusions to questions that haven’t been answered yet, and extra not good to draw conclusions based on questions you haven’t asked yet based on answers you don’t have yet.
Lol, ok, so a game of gotcha it was. Nice to have that confirmed, thanks.
I could use many different examples, but let’s start with something obvious. I want to hire someone to do heavy lifting. I put out the call to whoever in the land can lift the most weight to all demographics. That would be equality of opportunity, everyone gets to try out for the job. All the strongest people from all the demographics show up. If I’m hiring 10 people for the job, it’s going to be men in the top ten position from those demographics because the top ten strongest men are going to be way stronger than the top 10 women. So the demographic for whose doing my heavy lifting job is going to skew to men.
Equality of outcome would be to look at the top 10 strongest and see they are men and then replace a number of men with women so the demographics of the heavy lifting job look more like the demographics of the general population.
There are many such examples, certain demographics skew to certain jobs and career paths. Not just between men and women but between different different cultures, ethnicities, religions and race as well. The degree to which these are factors vary, but that these factors have a statistical trend based on demographics is supported by the data.
I didn't ask you to agree with any such assumption. I posited that in a situation where this is the case, then going "this group has worse outcomes, therefore it's being discriminated against somehow" is a viable first approximation. For reference, we can assume the ethnic groups are french and germans, or New York and Chicago citizens.
Before you criticize other people, consider your own body of work.
Look at how fast people adapt to new technology. When a better system becomes available, it will be adopted (albeit not with some struggle from legacy interests) but this takes place constantly (look at what happened to land-line telephone service/ATT).
Remember, the elite ALWAYS win, so it is in their interest (above everybody else's) to adopt more efficient/effective means. For example, if crypto's do become accepted globally (as a medium of exchange), who do you think is going to end up profiting the most?
Sorry I accidentally hit the post button, there was more to my last comment.
Anyway, worse outcomes=discrimination needs to be backed up with some evidence of discrimination. Sometimes that can be demonstrated, and other times it cannot. If it cannot, then we shouldn’t assume discrimination. That seems pretty straightforward to me.
I did. You still don't have credibility.
He was in a reality TV show, and arguably never ceased that occupation. James strikes me as someone having too much integrity to become POTUS in the same manner as Trump. I think most people do, actually. Aside from that, I imagine it's not too much trouble to buy and bankrupt a casino or two, if you've got enough of daddy's money to burn.
It would help had I been born with a silver spoon in my mouth, if I was a liar, and a narcissist. I read some wag who said Trump is a poor man's idea of a rich man, a weak man's idea of a strong man, and stupid man's idea of a wise man. That wag about nailed it. I might qualify it by saying "some" but he about nailed it.
You’re choosing to play the fool, synth, I’m merely indulging you.