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"Exploding" Termite Species Discovered
ananyo writes "A species of termite found in the rainforests of French Guiana takes altruism seriously: aged workers grow sacks of toxic blue liquid that they explode onto their enemies in an act of suicidal self-sacrifice to help their colonies. The 'explosive backpacks' of Neocapritermes taracua grow throughout the lifetimes of the worker termites, filling with blue crystals secreted by a pair of glands on the insects' abdomens. Older workers carry the largest and most toxic backpacks. Those individuals also, not coincidentally, are the least able to forage and tend for the colony: their mandibles become dull and worn as the termites age, because they cannot be sharpened by moulting (abstract)."
Banelings 1.0
Scientists have discovered small crystals embedded in the ants' palms that turn to a different color when the ant's maximum age has been reached. However, in one colony they observed two ants trying to escape this fate by running away from the colony and finding sanctuary. Other ants were tasks with hunting down the two runners and terminating them.
This feels like something Dr. Wondertainment would put in a nature documentary.
I was this close ( > ) to start mocking the submitter about misspelling Thermite. Luckily, for once I did read TFS.
If my comment didn't sound as good in your head as it did in mine, then I guess we all know who's to blame
They swell up, they dribble, explode? I never saw it in the example provided.
we should expect that level of Altrusim from political leaders of all parties - ship em to Afghanistan
"We are the Judean People's Front crack suicide squad! "
Boom goes the termite.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
That's pretty damn cool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DyqPzmox4U
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
Suicide bombers think they're being altruistic too.
A termite bomb.
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy
Master Chief... where are you!
Thermite
"No fear. No envy. No meanness." Liam Clancy
Actually, it's the fucking fascist conservatives trying to eliminate social security so you can die in the street like a dog that you should be worried about.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
"and get off my #@!& lawn!" KABOOOM!
Table-ized A.I.
"Evolutionists" are considered dumb by people who have their heads buried so far up their ass that they don't even begin to have a clue what reality is. My suggestion is try using that brain you think God gave you for once in your life, and actually learn something other that what your preacher tells you while you're n your knees in front of him.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
This kind of suicidal defence using bodily fluids is not unheard of among certain termite species.
Indeed, not a new discovery. Exploding thermite has been well documented in the past.
No, they were made by an exploding god. Better not miss communion there. The last dude who did triggered the Big Bang.
You've been warned: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap030630.html
Table-ized A.I.
I know you're trolling, but some people who read your inane ranting might not know that Bill Gates has given away almost half his net work since 2007. In fact, the amount he's donated is more than the 8th richest man in the world (I think that's the number, Google it) is worth in total.
THAT is how it should work.
ANOTHER HINT: Some of the greatest economic growth in this countries history (The USA) occurred when the top marginal tax rate was over 70%. Rich people accumulating money doesn't drive the economy to any great extent. Regular people with money to spend drives the US's economy which is 70% consumer spending.
Splice this into humans and it'll solve the social security's financial problems AND the war on terror! Bonus: the line at the post office will move faster.
Sounds like these little guys have been watching too much Breaking Bad....
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I have recognized Social Security as threatened since the mid 1980's. And, with mounting deficits the Federal Govt. will have to cut social spending and I fully expect that SS will get the axe before welfare entitlements if for no other reason than SS recipients aren't effective rioters. In the meantime I am subjected to redistributionist taxation to support a feral demographic that has no concept of work ethic while trying to save waaay extra for retirement. I think the majority of Slashdot readership is in the same situation, squeezed between the Communists and the Plutocrats.
Exploding termites have been known about for quite a while. Check out wikipedia's page on the subject: the oldest reference cited is from 1974.
Just because YOU are too mentally limited to see the long chain of steps in the process of natural selection does not mean it cannot happen.
You can't see it happening because you are not as smart as other people, who can.
And people wonder why religious fanatics are considered dumb....
Informative? this is a fucking troll video you asshats.
HINT: If we start confiscating wealth, then nobody will bother accumulating it in the first place. Your plan will work great for all of 6 months and then the entire world will be in the shitter rather than just large parts of it.
Purely as a matter of empirical psychology(I really cannot stomach another tedious " 'communists' vs. 'free marketeers' " flamefest), I have to wonder if that is true...
As you accumulate more of it, the marginal utility of money plummets. There are only so many luxuries one can actually find oneself capable of enjoying. For that reason, I have to speculate that people who end up accumulating enormous amounts of money(especially if they do so over a number of years, rather than becoming wealthy all at once and then quitting) must have a rather weird relationship with wealth. Unless your job is also the hobby you like most in the world(or unless wealth accumulation is essentially a game that you approach with the zeal of a Korean stereotype), what kind of nutjob are you to still be busting ass at work if you've already made a big pile of money?
Given the dubious rationality of accumulating significant wealth for its own sake, it just isn't obvious that a higher effective tax rate would necessarily change much(though, given the dubious rationality, it could also turn out that spite magnifies the effect compared to the hypothetical 'rational man' scenario).
In case you didn't notice, the GP isn't a communist, the GP is a troll.
How could something like this come out of nothing? And people wonder why evolutionists are considered dumb.
The problem for 'natural theologians'(aside from, y'know, this crazy 'science' stuff that the kids are doing these days...) is that a look a nature suggests that its creator is kind of an awful person, if atypically clever by the standards of sociopathic sadists.
Regardless of whether you believe in one or not, you'll bloody well be hoping that the chap responsible for this world doesn't have control over your eternal afterlife after just a semester or so of a decent parasitiology class...
ZERG RUSH!!!
I think this speaks volumes about the amazing power of evolutionary processes, especially on a big planet over millions of years.
If you're impressed, I'd say credit God with setting up such an amazing system.
... banning binary weapons?
I hope you are correct but it seems the politicians are deaf to the electorate on a lot of issues. What I suspect will happen is the demagogues will rant that "seniors are wealthier than younger people" and use that reasoning to cut SS. But seniors should be wealthier having saved their entire working lives.
In addition to the other replies, I found myself wondering who would stop accumulating wealth. I would go to the same job every day, so that wouldn't change. Most everyone I work with probably would, too. The janitors wouldn't quit.
The sociopaths who, despite the decreasing marginal utility of extra money, nevertheless find new ways to extract money, such as complex derivative trading, might find their efforts pointless. They may go into some more productive line of work. After all, some of the most brilliant programming minds are being lured into the high payday world of finance.
People might go back to creating something of value, instead of chasing the big payday. Kinda like when the top tax rate was a lot higher.
Bill Gates was not looking for the big payday, he was selling a product that he created. The business grew beyond a BASIC interpreter, and his fortune came as a result of owning stock in his company. As long term capital gains, that is only 15% tax rate, and the top tier wouldn't kick in. He would have no disincentive for doing exactly what he did The only way to "confiscate" rich peoples' money is to raise the capital gains rate. And then the average investor has no reason to get into the market, with a typical return being 4-6%, and taxes already eat almost 1 of those points. So then you fight over things like alternative minimum, and someone has to define what "rich" means, which differs wildly by locale.
I think the higher tax brackets can be raised without anyone bailing out due to the taxes. I also think there is a way to encourage altruism, we just haven't found the right way. As much money as he has given away, it seems to be a selected bunch of private industry who benefits, and some humanitarian work accidentally gets done along the way. In other words, it looks more like a tax dodge than altruism. As a people, we can do better.
Anybody else think of exploding Bobs?
I don't need welfare. Welfare competes with SS for tax dollars. Welfare provides people with disincentives to join the taxpaying economy. Etc, etc. Social Security isn't a Ponzi scheme, it's an intergenerational contract that works for everyone provided that it survives. Everyone pays in everyone benefits. Provided that it survives.
"THAT is how it should work."
Indeed. I want to give my tax money to stuff _I_ want, when I want it and if I want it too.
Unfortunately that works only for people who strap their dogs to the roof of their cars.
The irony here is that it's the lowly workers sacrificing themselves. And the elderly at that. I notice that the termite queen isn't blowing herself up for anyone and, in fact, is hidden safely away in the colony while others do the hard work. So much for your arguments about the common good.
The problem I've found with those I've encountered who push communistic ideals, both personally and online, is that they tend to look down on the majority of the population as stupid. The masses are too dumb to appreciate the wonders communism will bestow on us all. They seem to maintain this attitude that they're one of the enlightened, one of the elites who will sit above the rest by virtue of pushing communism so fervently.
The sad fact is that the same scumbags screwing us right now would continue to be the ones screwing us if we switched to communism. Nothing changes except that you've institutionalized misery for the masses.
Aha! Now he can write in the shade!
Why on Earth is this tagged "idle"? And why are most of the comments jokes? Well, most likely there's lots of jokes because it's "idle". Are there any actual nerds still here?
You're confusing tax rates with tax receipts. People didn't actually pay those higher rates. The high marginal rate was really nothing more than a subsidy for cities and counties. If you had money to invest you put it in double-tax-free muni bonds so you didn't have to pay any taxes on it. That was the real reason tax receipts went up when the tax rates were lowered - people moved their money out of munis because you could make more money even after taxes.
Not only that, but there were all sorts of ways to shelter your money from taxes that have since been eliminated. Everybody who made any kind of money had controlling interest in an money losing oil well or chinchilla farm or some other BS business. They wrote off the family car and half the house. Also, it was a hell of a lot easier to do cash business. Currency reporting requirements didn't happen until 1985, so a lot of people were completely off the IRS's radar.
In short, those high tax rates didn't hurt the economy because nobody paid them. The Economist had an article about this a few years back (behind a pay wall, unfortunately). It turns out wealthy people all over the world pay at most about 25% tax on their income, even in places with very high marginal rates like Japan and Sweden. As tax rates go higher they change their behavior. They take fewer risks and spend more time dealing with taxes and less time trying to make money. Worst case they move their money out of the country and invest it where tax rates are lower.
Look at corporate taxes. The US now has the highest corporate tax rates in the world. And yet, corporations pay almost nothing in taxes, because they've adjusted their operations to account for the tax code.
The original AC wasn't talking about taxes, he was talking about straight-up taking all of Bill Gates wealth. The two things are quite different.
And of course people accumulating money does drive capitalism (it is very difficult to have capitalism without capitalists). Many of those goods regular people buy wouldn't exist had it not been for the millions or billions of dollars corporations sank into research and development, courtesy of capitalism. Granted, people don't need to be multi-billionaires to do that, but they do need to have enough money that they can afford to sink a significant amount of it into business capital and not every-day needs.
I'm not arguing against high tax rates for the rich, just saying the OP is a bit of an idiot.
"None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
That data point indicate that the much higher rate was associated with a better repartition of wealth. it would be useful to have a second data point to see if there is a correlation, but seeing how the US cut taxes and go into war, you probably aren#t going to have another data point soon, as it would be plitical suicide.
One name... Scrooge McDuck.
I can tell by observing you and me of course, that we're not rich. All my rich friends doesn't concern themselves with luxuries because as you said, there's only so much you can snort. The short-term reasons as you listed out are also valid. Namely doing what you love and money just comes in by accident, and earning it as a number game because all their friends have the Mercedes and the only way to "win" is to have bigger numbers.
Most what I've seen though, is the idea of a rich lineage. This is for both the second gen (born rich) and first gen (made rich) dudes I know. They aren't just concerned with themselves, but with godlike generations after them. It doesn't mean they'll spoil their kids with crazy luxuries. It means that their kids will have a wider range of choices in what to do with their life versus us. And their grand-kids and so on. When your objective is that, you wouldn't mind "more" money really.
In the videos, they neither died nor exploded. Can you say inflammatory post title?
It's not exactly "wealth for its own sake". For a lot of this people, it's what they do for sport. The money isn't about buying things, it's just how they keep score.
Using whose definition of "excess?"
"disincentives to join the taxpaying economy." - yes but only when you are being offered starvation wages anything better is better than welfare.
Welfare has more than one purpose you know?
1. preventing starvation of useful people during depressions
2. suppressing starvation wages as standard
3. suppressing other(physically or sexually) abusive work practices,
4. preventing the formation of a slavery equivalent "indentured worker" class who have signed away their rights because it is (marginally) better than starvation.
5. reducing theft and violent crime, no steal or die situations, and allowing for stricter more punitive punishment as you can always say" you could have taken benefits instead to survive instead of crime"
5. allowing skilled workers to try for suitable jobs with reduced penalty to increase economic efficiency
6. catching people who should have other support but have been lost by the systems meant to protect them
To name just the ones I can think of right now, the indirect benefits are large so think about the knock-on affects before dismissing it
Given the dubious rationality of accumulating significant wealth for its own sake
People accumulate vast wealth (and continue to work) as a measure of success.
What was new about this discovery is that the termites stockpile crystals in their little backpacks that intensify the toxicity of the toxins they excrete from their glands when they detonate. In another article I read, it acknowledged that suicide bomber termites are old news. Using a crystal backpack to intensify the attack is what makes this significant.
by Mike Buddha -- Someday the mountain might get him, but the law never will.
WHAT!?!? *blows up*
Tax receipts (almost) always go up regardless of how you change tax rates because of growth in the economy and inflation. The exception being major recessions like 2008/2009.
One other thing business owners did was to leave the money in the business by investment and raises for workers. Wages and salary for workers tracked productivity very well from WW II up until the 1980s when Reagan dropped the top marginal tax rate from about 74% to under 40%. After that people started living on credit which got easier because all of those suddenly wealthier individuals had gobs of money to invest. That doesn't help the middle class much.
are not a bunch of whiny, self-entitled brats who were not raised properly by their parents and thing the entire world exists for their benefit.
do you actually think that the parasites at the top of the heap would actually be willing to work for a living instead of paying their fair share?
Yes, the OP was out there a bit.
What drives capitalism is demand. Sometimes you can use your capital to create a new product that people didn't have demand for before but that presumes the people you're going to sell it to have enough money to buy it. The health of an economy has more to do with the rate at which money is moving through it than it does with how much wealth any individual accumulates. Right now the vast "consumer" class is holding on to their money or paying down debt if the can or is just barely holding on and not spending any money that they don't absolutely have to.
So theoretically at least if you confiscated Bill Gates wealth and distributed it to everyone ($30 billion/300,000 = $100/person) you would get a short term boost to the economy because at least half of those people would spend it immediately. Not something I advocate either but there it is.
Argh...
s/if the can/if they can/
s\($30 billion/300,000\$30 billion/300 million people\
Ah, be careful. There's a difference between a capitalist who takes their money and spends it on more expansion, workers and research to make more money, and one who guts companies for money to spend at the casino we call "high finance." One of these, idealized as the fabled "Captain of Industry," is an essential component in the success of a nation, the other is a parasite that brings about the destruction of nations.
The original Communists did a good job diagnosing the problems with Capitalism... too bad their cure is worse than the disease.
And a slight nitpick, it wouldn't be the same scumbags screwing us, those would be hanging from the gallows. New sociopathic scumbags-in-waiting from the proletariat fighting to take their place (Stalin vs Trotsky, anyone?) would be the ones screwing us.
>How has India managed to survive without Security Insecurity for the ~4,000 years prior to 1952?
By not caring if most of the people starve in the streets and being a 3rd world hell hole?
Seriously, if your go-to comparision is fucking India, maybe you ought to rethink your comparisions? Or your attitude.
In this case tax receipts went up more than could be explained by growth and inflation. But that's not the point. The point is effective tax rates were never anywhere near 70%, so any argument based on that assertion is suspect.
Yup, its amazing how people center their whole identity around how much money they have, they wont even associate with people who make less than them.... Thats why I am still glad I quit my soulless high-paying job and went with something a lot more honest at a lower(though by no means low) wage. I just HATED dealing with rich people, the rods up their butt have rods up their butts.
Monstar L
Suicide squad of the Neocapritermes taracua liberation army, ATTACK!
more cowbell
Using whose definition of "excess?"
Bad rhetorical question.
Whose definition of "murder" do we use in murder trials? Does this mean that we should legalize murder?
And yet from the late 1940's until Kennedy/Johnson changed it in the 1960's the top marginal tax rate was over 90% on income equivalent to several million dollars today. Then until Reagan changed it in the 1980's it was 74%. The economy managed to survive just fine.
As you accumulate more of it, the marginal utility of money plummets.
That may just mean you end up working harder. The more cocaine you do, the less effectual a given dose becomes. That doesn't mean you give it up. You do more.
Furthermore, you need to account for the fact that as you accumulate more wealth, while each additional dollar gives less of a kick, it also becomes easier to earn. Finally, because wealth distribution is a bell curve, as wealth increases, so does the distance between you and the next guys up on the totem pole. The richer you are, the poorer you are relative to people who are richer than you (up until there's no one left). There was a Wall Street Journal article about this a while ago discussing this phenomenon.
how many pairs of boxer shorts should you own?
I notice that the termite queen isn't blowing herself up for anyone and, in fact, is hidden safely away in the colony while others do the hard work. So much for your arguments about the common good.
The queen is queen in name only. She works all day laying eggs, and gives orders to nobody. "Sacrificing" the queen wouldn't help the "common good" of the colony because that'd kill the colony - she's the only one who can lay eggs, after all. 'sides, she's just too damn fat to be of any use for anything else.
The sad fact is that the same scumbags screwing us right now would continue to be the ones screwing us if we switched to communism.
Communism has no one ruling anyone...
GP, on the other hand, is quite funny. I like him:
the poor with curvilinear CRTs
Oh, the horror! Please tell me they at least have the latest iPhone!
THAT is how it should work
No, we should not have to rely on the whims of a mega-rich individual to do something about malaria. I'm not saying people shouldn't be allowed to become rich but there is a major difference in scale between a rich man and a billionaire. I don't think it's wise for society to collectively invest billions in a handfull of random individuals and then just hope they do the right thing with it.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
The Muslims of the insect world!
It doesn't matter how much the tax changes for the psychologically 'strange' people who accumulate money, it matters what it change for all others.
And there are relatively few people who just accumulate money without altering lifestyle. All others when they get money, switch from a circle to another circle who spends more. Money is never enough, the circles of the very powerful can take today's megalottery winner and return it a beggar in 5 years.
Having said that, in my personal model of reality, money is mainly a mean of control, its effectiveness depends on its scarcity, so it is not important how much money a few people accumulate as long as, on average, most people don't have enough of it. Consider everybody as a prisoner and the rich persons as the kapos who simply got a larger bowl of soup in return for keeping the others in line. That explains perfectly the difference between naive rich people and pro rich people. But ok, just my model. Observe for yourself.
---- MISSING MISCELLANEOUS DATA SEGMENT --- [sigdash] trolololol
So basically what you're saying is, in order to create banelings, they ... require more minerals?
I would have expected that these suicide bomber termites were from Afghanistan, not French Guiana.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
It's a pointless argument though. The headline tax rate means nothing if the actual rate people are paying doesn't change. It's like saying that runners must carry a 50lb weight now but it won't change their speed because they did it 20 years ago and it didn't; while ignoring that 20 years ago no one actually did carry the weight and checks in place now mean they would have to.
I'm not anti-tax, I live in the UK and pay plenty thanks and that's fine. I just want to make sure that discussions about tax policy consider the reality of the situation.
Zerglings and Banelings are defending their colonies!
Hope their not muslim!!
What the fuck does this have to do with exploding termites?
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
In another article I read, it acknowledged that suicide bomber termites are old news. Using a crystal backpack to intensify the attack is what makes this significant.
It acknowledges it in the linked story here too:
" Defensive suicidal rupturing — termed autothysis — has evolved independently in a number of termite species, suggesting that the behaviour is highly adaptive."
Then the story goes on to say:
'N. taracua has added a yet another step, by using a reaction to make its defensive chemical even more toxic. The pouches holding the copper-containing blue crystals are located near to the salivary glands. When the termites are attacked, their enemies bites cause these swollen pouches burst and the crystals mix with salivary secretions, producing the toxic blue liquid.
“It is the two-component chemistry that underlies the exceptional toxicity in this species,” says Hanus.'
Successful troll is successful.
I thought this was blatantly obvious, but others apparently did not... or maybe people really do just come to this site for political yelling matches these days.
I find it quite boring. Once you've read one of these threads, you've read them all.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
What the fuck does this have to do with exploding termites?
Thread has been hijacked. I do, however, quite agree with many of the statements about wealth.
There's always some item that's out of a person's price range, and having enough money to purchase that item is a goal to pursue. If that item is cheap, then acquiring it is worth very little to that person. The value of the item is in the accomplishment of obtaining it.
It's always a matter of the new situation relative to the old situation. If one plays video games all day, then video games all day is normal rather than exciting.
How can one who has enough money for all necessities and luxuries find any sense of victory? More and more money is one answer, but finding other pursuits seems more tenable.
All of that result in something called social peace that is great for both the rich and the poor. That is a lot more enjoyable to be rich in a country that you can actually enjoy fully, with people and employee you can reasonably trust.
Abitions continually expand. Just because you and I can't fathom having hundreds of millions sitting around doesn't mean that someone used to spending wads of money doesn't have plans for it. Some stockpile for their family heritage and want to create a perpetual income for their safety net. Others plan to satisfy past ambitions long given up on, which can be seen in examples like SpaceX and other ambitious frontier companies. Others burn it on major construction projects as their childhood dream of designing their own $5m castle from the ground up. Some are even more ambitious, having goals like the Gates foundation.
If all people were allowed to acquire through work was a basic standard of living, these ambitions wouldn't be possible without seeking political offices or through government corruption.
Interesting,
When human beings strap on a bomb suit to use against their enemies, it's called 'suicide bombing' and 'terrorism' .
When termites do the same thing it's called 'suicidal self sacrifice' and 'altruism' .
I'm tired of all this specie-ism in the news lately.
Away with double standard ! Equal rights for all species !
So the question now is, "What were the ways to avoid paying that high tax rate, and are those practices beneficial for the economy as a whole?" Maybe they didn't actually pay that much in taxes, but were forced to do other things with the money that were actually helping us? I've not seen any actual evidence of whether the wealthy were actually paying those taxes or not, but I'm curious.
just more time
What the fuck does this have to do with exploding termites?
Thread has been hijacked. I do, however, quite agree with many of the statements about wealth.
There's always some item blah blah blah political bullshit blah blah I have to MAKE MY POINT blah blah bullshit blah. Blah blah blah MY POLITICAL VIEWS ARE TEH SUPERIOR blah blah. Blah blah ANYWHERE I CAN CONVERT TEH NONBELIEVARS blah blah blah, blah blah. Blah blah; blah blah blah BLAH BLAH BULLSHIT BLAH
EXPLODING. TERMITES. This article is about EXPLODING TERMITES , which is FUCKING AWESOME, you USELESS POLITICAL FUCKTARD. For the first time in your worthless, win-every-discussion-at-all-costs life, JUST SIT BACK AND FUCKING ADMIRE THE EXPLODING INSECTS ALREADY.
The most underwhelming use of the word explode ever.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
I love how you can just say something really fuzzy like "some of the greatest economic growth" and pretend to conclude facts from it ... another actual fact is that some of the greatest economic growth in this country's history occurred before there was income tax AT ALL. Fact. And another fun fact: Some of the country's worst economic times, like the most recent recession, occurred when taxes were far, far higher than before there was any income tax at all. Your "theory" needs a little refining. You're not supposed to work backwards from your biased agenda-laden conclusion, science doesn't work that way.
Could you please explain in more detail what you're referring to? I don't fully understand - if a company could be "gutted" and its assets sold for MORE than the company's purchase price, then surely its previous owners wouldn't sell it at that price in the first place? Wouldn't that mean they were selling it as much less than its market value? And if they were, how would that be the fault of the purchaser?
I mean, say I own a company with $1 million in assets, and want to sell it. You seem to be claiming that a fabled Captain of Industry could buy my company for $ million and then "gut" it for, say, $1.2 million. But if said Captain could do that, surely I would sell it for $1.2 million in the first place, or else I would "gut" it myself, because surely I could stand to make far more that way?
The money that (honest) rich people have isn't a "collective investment" "by society". Someone like, say, Stephen King is rich, but not because any of "invested" our money in him, but because people bought his books. When you "invest" the money is yours and you "own" the asset. When you buy Stephen King's books, you hand over your money and the money becomes his. Are you suggesting we own rich people? If so, wouldn't that be akin to slavery?
Yep, minerals that come from blue crystals.
Rethinking email
You've missed the point completely.
One of these is running the world's wealthiest charity and giving his money away as fast as he can, and the other is running for president.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
Oh how this made me laugh.
Must be Islamic ants
Yes, you're absolutely correct, every man is a complete and perfect island, nobody needs anybody else, and nobody owes the society they develop in anything.
Both extremes of these ideal are nauseating, and really, something most people really should have transcended before they graduated HS.
And this right here is the problem. Your "Entitlement" attitude. Why should some be forced to pay for the stupidity of others? Yeah, let's rob from Paul to pay for Peter -- except that Paul eventually goes broke from supporting all the free-loader / leeches on society.
Only an idiot would ignore the elephant in the room: "Social Security is *broke*"
We must come up with a *better* system.
Only on /. do you get down-voted for stating the obvious facts:
"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money."