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Survey Says To UK — Repeal Laws of Thermodynamics

Posted by kdawson on from the einstein-is-next-up-against-the-wall dept.

mostxlnt writes "As we noted, the new Tory UK government has launched a website asking its subjects which laws they'd most like repealed. There are proposals up for repeal of the Laws of Thermodynamics: Second, Third, and all (discussion thread on this one closed by a moderator). One comment on the Third [now apparently deleted] elucidated: 'Without the Third Law of Thermodynamics, it would be possible to build machines that would last forever and provide an endless source of cheap energy. thus solving both potential crises in energy supply as well as solving the greenhouse gas problem in one step... simples... eh?'"

3 of 208 comments (clear)

  1. Re:When you open up the floodgates... by Rogerborg · · Score: 0, Troll

    Not idiots, just trolls who want a few lulz.

    Well, sauce for the goose.

    eriously, do you believe that the site is anything other than a way to get post hoc justification for the handful of insignificant repeals that they've already decided on (doubtless while drafting even more repressive legislation to replace them with)? We might as well use it to have a laugh, since that's all the ConDems will be using it for anyway. Come on, let's get our money's worth.

    --
    If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
  2. Re:How will you know? by jasonq · · Score: 1, Troll

    Why is it so hard to believe that a group being voted in

    They weren't voted in!

  3. Re:How will you know? by FuckingNickName · · Score: 0, Troll

    "we will introduce a Freedom Bill to restore the civil liberties that are so precious to the British character"

    And, as always, grammar nazism has its place. In choosing "that" rather than "which", the writer has not meant:

    • Restore civil liberties because civil liberties are so precious to the British people,

    i.e. the classical liberty of freedom of expression (deployed as speech, assembly, photography etc., all coming under the same principle); instead quite specifically aiming to:

    • Restore only those civil liberties which are somehow identified as "precious" to the British people.

    This has further degenerated to:

    • Consider those civil liberties which a small unrepresentative set of Internet lurkers with too much time on their hands (who may not even be eligible British voters) want to babble about.

    And, if current LD coalition behaviour is a model for future LD behaviour, this will become:

    • Selectively pick and reinterpret, proposing instead a compromise which no majority wants.

    If a man with a history of duplicity offers you something which appears too good to be true, you do not say, "Where do I sign?" Instead you ask yourself, "How is he trying to trick me this time?"

    (For a model of past effectiveness, see the Number 10 e-petitions scheme: to reinforce the government's will where in agreement, and to be ignored otherwise.)