Your post highlights the security equivalent of a classic tech support call. Bravo.
"Is it plugged in?"
"Yes".
Two hours goes by, filled with troubleshooting and face-palming, clever and wily efforts to pinpoint an apparent phase of the moon issue, and some very inventive muted swearwords.
"Are you SURE it's plugged in?"
"Uh.... Oh.... Ooops."
"Sir, thank you for helping me realize this is my last day at this job."
We are all so damn terrified (actually... I think it's more that we're TOLD that we're all terrified; I really don't know anybody who actually is) that we're willing to overlook the most obvious truths. All we've done is make it so terrorist organizations can vacation in Bermuda since they no longer have to spend their frequent flier miles on suicide missions.
You're absolutely correct. This is why we are not allowed to drive, since accidents could be exploited by the strapped and/or exploding terrorists. It's also why we're not allowed to have sex (terrorism STDs), eat (terrorism salmonella), use paper (terrorism paper cuts), watch TV (terrorism eye-strain), wear brightly colored clothes (makes you a terrorism target), get paid (money could fund terrorism), grow "middle-eastern" beards (this is like implanting a terrorism RFID tag), or play music (subliminal terrorism is, like, the worst kind (obey!)).
It's potentially a very, very scary world, sir, but there's not enough fingers in existence to plug the real-world firewall. Trying to protect people from highly improbably occurrences is arguably ok, I guess (seems a waste of money to me but whatever; it provides jobs yada yada). When the "protection" stomps our fundamental freedoms, though, it's time to say "No."
Know what's scarier than "terrorists" lurking behind every garbage can and fuselage? The fact that there is probably zero chance of the TSA ever being disbanded.
It's interesting that your post is modded funny since I'm almost certain you meant exactly what you said. It's also funny that the "terrorists" are having a grand old time watching us all be a bunch of pansy dipshits. Just as effective with none of the suicide!!
I often create canvas prints of family photos. Mainstream 3.2 gigapixel pics means I'll be photoshopping another 1.1 gigapixels of zits, fat, and moles OUT, another 1.1 gigapixels of hair, tanned skin, and white teeth IN, and just plain giving up on the remaining gigapixel (meh, it's probably just the dog or grandma anyway).
God it's hard to make people prettier than they are in real life; exponentially so when they're high-rez people. Maybe I'll ONLY make canvas prints out of LSST space photos. Uh.... 3. Profit?
Actually this would work pretty damn well if your AC is central air. The coils would freeze so hard and so fast it'd be off the rest of the summer.
Even if you replace it, you'd probably get a higher efficiency unit anyway. I'm not just joking here, either; an ex girlfriend did exactly your idea, and I ended up dealing with the exactly these results. The cold (ha!) hearted bitch.
I think you nailed it. Personally, I don't think it matters in practice, so sure, outlaw the outlying cases. But, of course, we don't even have members in government with the balls to team up with their "enemies" to solve problems, let alone take stands that risk constituents. Shrug.
I'm not sure why outlawing [late-term abortions] (excepting "life of the mother") would be controversial, but clearly it is.
But is it *actually* controversial, in real life? You know, that place that's outside the media coverage, nutjobs, and political hollering? With very nearly all abortions occurring well within the first trimester*, I really don't think so. It's just another political/ratings weapon that gets pulled out of the scabbard every few years. Late-term abortions are very, very rare, and almost all of THOSE cases exist because of a threat to the mother. Nobody would suffer late-term abortions were outlawed except in the case of danger to the mother, but it also doesn't NEED to be outlawed because it just doesn't happen.
Unless people are actually arguing abortions are bad from the moment of conception, it's all just much ado about nothing. In the case of those arguing "no abortion, period!"... well, I just don't agree with them, any more than I agree with them about contraception. Since it's impossible to even discuss a compromise in that case, it's that's a non-issue too, unless/until Roe v. Wade gets overturned.
*88% of abortions occur in the first 12 weeks, with 98.5% occurring before week 21, according to http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html. Definitions of "late term abortion" vary, but generally it's considered between week 16 and 24. I choose to believe viability determines when it's too late, and that doesn't occur until at the very very earliest 22 weeks.
Agreed. Which is why if an abortion is going to happen, it should be done as early as possible, meaning before it could be considered a person and not just a potential person. Development during pregnancy exponential, not linear, so the sooner the better, by orders of magnitude.
I'm all for limiting abortions to the end of the first trimester, which is about half-way (in terms of time, NOT development) to the very slim chance of a viable birth, which starts around 24 weeks (anything before 30 weeks birth is mindbogglingly risky, though). It's also months before human brain patterns begin, and a little bit before the primitive (sometimes called "reptilian") nervous system really starts to develop.
12 weeks provides *plenty* of time to identify a pregnancy and do something about it, well before the fetus could be considered anything more than a bunch of cells, medically speaking (in fact, at 12 weeks, you've just barely stopped calling it an "embryo"). If you're gonna get pregnant, but don't want to stay pregnant, there should surely be an out for you, but yeah, you should probably be forced to light a fire under your ass to get it handled quickly. It'd be just like saying you can't abort after birth; we're just moving the cutoff forward.
I'm NOT for forcing any person to do anything with their own body, but surely there are compromises that can be made. And now, my trump card: 90% of all abortions are performed prior to the end of the 1st trimester.... so perhaps it's all a great big non-issue, yeah?
For me, it's not a liberal or conservative thing; it's a common sense thing.
are all supporters of Obama... but after reading their bios, I find no reason to believe they're more or less supportive of Obama than your average businessmen or scientists, other than they were selected while Obama was in office. If fact, there's 2 co-chairmen; one's a democrat and the other's a republican. All members seem to be experts in their various fields, specifically marine ecosystems, engineering and oil extraction/spill cleanup (a couple of Exxon Valdez veterans on that list; sounds very useful and logical to me).
Briefly perusing the meeting minutes, it seems they've been up to a lot more than grading Congress and Obama's administration, anyway. If you have a problem with what they're doing, this site's where to go to learn more, and it's surprisingly full of info.
One thing I didn't mention; the "big bad" versus "the little bad". In ethics, it's harder to use tools like analogy to prove your point, simply because every single situation requires its own analysis based on its own merits, and sometimes committing a small bad IS the moral choice over committing a big bad.
You can certainly say "Hitler did not agree that killing Jews was evil, and thus, to him, the claim that killing Jews is evil is completely invalid", and I'll even agree with you 100% (though you do risk a Godwin;). Still, saying that does NOT mean that "I don't agree that stealing food to feed my starving family" is also wrong; the two situations are completely unrelated, and there is no logical disconnect in thinking both "Hitler's was a douche" and "It'll suck for that guy to lose some profit but my kid hasn't eaten in a week so... *yoink*" while still others may think "Ill find another way... I refuse to steal." and ALSO not be wrong logically.
Every single ethical quandary needs to be decided on an individual basis, for weighing "right" versus "wrong" cannot and should not be done via standard recipes. Ethics and logic aren't always buddies. Trying to make it so is just lazy thinking.
I think that if your point was accurate, we'd have no further need for college ethics classes (which teach a wide variety of viewpoints and theories on morality) nor would we need nearly as many cops, jails, and courts.
Like Hitler, most of the bad people in the world are pretty good at justifying to themselves why doing a thing isn't bad. So many people rationalize their own actions away, and morality is a construct of society (albeit a very, very important one).
I can even counter your examples directly (I don't necessarily believe any these positions; just showing that in ethics there is always an opposing viewpoint that someone can contrive, silly as they might be, and this is why ethics are so commonly argued, but 2 + 2 = 4 isn't): Stealing - what if my family's starving to death? Child Abuse - locking a kid up is child abuse, but what if he kills another kid and gets stuck in a cell? Killing defenseless people - what if they are harboring war criminals and refuse to move out of the way? Rape - some cultures initiate marriages this way, and some men systematically rape their women for the duration of the relationship (unless you consider "just plain giving up on life" as the woman's consent).
We think many things others do are wrong, but they think WE are wrong to "allow" our women to be educated or don't wear enough clothing or that we don't wear super long beards or that we value individualism over collectivism or about a trillion other things. Obviously you and I believe certain things, and being in the same culture, most of our morality is likely similar, but yes, other cultures truly believe other things as strongly as we believe ours. If you go to another culture, YOU are in the wrong based on sheer numbers (this is also why I don't go to stupid shitty pig fucker cultures, and I'm comfortable judging the ever living shit out of them, much to my old sociology professor's chagrin).
The point is, you cannot be absolutely "right" or "wrong" in all ethical quandaries, though it's helpful to have a guide, which would only work when stated in absolute terms. So, you can easily state things in general terms, but, as is the norm for sweeping statements, you still have to take an individual situation and decide based on that individual situation's merits, although in ethics, starting from a solid bias can actually be a good thing; it saves shit tons of time, that's for sure.
Generally speaking, there are many schools of thought on how to make ethical decisions and belief systems. You can do the thing that provides the most utility (Utilitarian), provides the greater good to all (Altruism), provides the greatest pleasure with least pain (Hedonism's original form), simply go for pleasure only (Cyrenaicism; what most think of as Hedonism), and about a thousand more; and it's trivially easy to rationalize every single act you commit, good or bad. This is why ethical considerations are very much a societal agreement and don't come from a genetic stamp, and it's why morals in different cultures can vary so much, and also why cultures can change moral views over time (which is also a VERY good thing; ethical considerations tend to need resolution prior to progress).
Stephen Pinker's "The Blank Slate" talks about this, and many other things, far, far better than I could ever attempt to. I strongly recommend it.
I guess I learned a few things about "loving your kids" when I was a child, myself.
If I told you my father used to call me ugly and would hit me when he got angry, you'd call him an abusive prick, right? Or that he gambled all our money away on stocks, would wander around the house in his underwear so often that I was too mortified to bring friends home, and couldn't hold down a full-time job? You'd call him a deadbeat and a loser, yeah? A whole hell of a lot of other people looking in from the outside thought so too, and I used to hate him for it all.
Well, my father also survived 3 brain tumors that left him with the emotional capacity of a 4 year old, and an intellectual capacity that seemed to vary day to day. Something like that Robin Williams movie "Jack" or maybe "Forrest Gump", though the movies don't really portray what it's like to live with an adult that has night terrors or burns himself in the shower. My father died 18 years ago as of March 21st, and it's only in my adulthood that I can recognize the things he'd do to show much he loved us. He'd make sure we got ice cream, and he'd make sure to kiss us goodnight every night. He'd be the one to put bandaids on when we got hurt, and would beg my mom to make sure we'd get to school on time and do all our homework. When he got mad, it was because he worried about us. When he'd lose all his money, it's because some asshole would trick him out of it, and he DID keep a job for nearly 20 years mowing lawns at his best friend's bank branch (this was a long-time friend from before the cancer). He was too embarrassed to tell us since all of our friends' dads had jobs at desks and fixing cars and science-y things, and he couldn't do that.
Before the cancer took his life away from him, which occurred when I was very young, he had graduated from Boise State with a masters' degree, and was teaching. He played and coached soccer and football, and was very respected in his hometown as one of the best public speakers around. His parents' pride and joy. After the tumors, his family disowned us, thinking we (well, my mother, really) couldn't provide the care that they could. It became something of a war, which ended in my dad leaving us after a few years, moving to an apartment his parents paid for. When he died, my "grandparents" buried him before his sons (myself included) arrived. I said goodbye to my father with my mother and 3 brothers, while the undertaker's backhoe was idling 10 feet away, waiting to resume filling the grave back in. That memory is forever burned into my mind. My mother TO THIS DAY pays for his decades-old medical bills, and I visit his grave every year.
Sometimes the people who love us are unable to show us in the standard ways, but that love is no less meaningful. On the other hand, some people who think they are showing love are simply horrible people. Knowing which is which can be very difficult even from inside the situation; those not privy to all of the information are simply not in a position to judge.
I don't see where his "fallacious excuse" was. I also don't see where he said he was "beyond reproach of any non-parent". All I saw him say was most parents are doing the best they can, it's unfair for a non-parent (I think this should say "anyone", actually) to make "if you really loved your kids you'd do X, Y, or Z.... " arguments, and that raising kids is much, much different than you'd think it is prior to actually attempting it.
As for your arguments:
1) "... being able to properly provide for them." According to what standard? I provide the best I can for my kids, and I think I do a good job. You may not think so, others may think I give to much, and still others think any child not getting at least a Yale-level college fund is getting neglected. Your standards are not my standards, and if you want some kids to fit into your worldview go have your own.
2) "Parenting is really hard!". I disagree with both you and the GP. It's not hard - it's easy. The hard part, as with anything worthwhile and long term, is the consistency. If you're consistent with your parenting, everything else tends to fall in line. Maybe I lucked out with awesome kids; or maybe they're awesome because I'm consistent. Either way; I look forward to raising my kids into full adulthood from mid-teenage years, and look back fondly on my successes and failures.
3) "selecting from that pool [of orphans] is the only moral option." I've never understood this argument. I get what you're trying to say; namely "there are enough great kids out there already; why make your own?" but that's kind of a dumb argument when you remove the "starving, lonely kids" aspect. Why make your own furniture when there's plenty of furniture to buy from Ikea (obviously kids are not furniture, but the difference is one of - admittedly vast - scale)? Well, in both cases, because I made them, they come from me directly. There's a huge over-supply of starving kids, for sure, and I'm very sorry, but I don't have the 50 grand to adopt another child, nor would it prevent me from wanting my own child with my own genes if I did. Make those people start taking care of their kids (or stop having them in the first place) before you tell me I can't have kids myself. This may seem an immoral stance to you, but it's the same kind of "immoral" as not sending every penny you earn to the orphans in Africa, or sending your paychecks directly to Sara McLachlin. I help how I'm able, and it's on me, not you, to decide how much I should be helping. Besides, by your logic, YOU are the perfect person to adopt all the children you can afford to, since obviously know how to parent better than other parents do, especially if you are not currently encumbered with your own.
The rest of your post I don't really take issue to, other than a general tone of contempt, to which you are entitled.
Yeah... either I'm not smart enough to follow this story, or Al Perry's comment is just plain nonsense. I doubt the former since I've had my Monday coffee, but I guess you never know.
As far as I know, "monetize" simply means "to convert a thing into currency"*. We just do it so we don't have to barter everything; cash is far more liquid than a fistful of IOUs (which, in a sense, are the grandpappy of today's currency). Saying: "Hey buddy, I got a Pez Dispenser; I'll give you one for 5 cents." would be "monetizing" the Pez. Copyright doesn't provide this "right" (wtf? Is EVERYTHING some sort of "right" these days, simply so dipshits can threaten to revoke them? Is it my "right" to spend my cash, too?)
*Interesting note: I double checked and found that "monetize" can also mean "to coin" (which actually makes complete sense, considering the other definitions). So, I'm going to "monetize" as many phrases as I can, starting with "Don't step in that 'Alperry' over there, brah, you'll stink for days!" Due to the convoluted and unpredictable law of semantics, I shall soon be wealthy beyond my wildest dreams.
Ha! I'm accused of the same damn thing in my corporate e-mails. Apparently 3 sentences is the edge of human comprehension unless your audience knows you as Stephen King. I'm all for being concise and staying on topic, but sometimes there really is a lot of info to relay. Then whaddya do?
Anyway, I don't disagree with anything in your post. I just think we shouldn't hinge infrastructure improvements on the unemployment rate or vice versa. It would be great if one problem solved the other, but it's probably better to tackle them individually on their own merits. Tying them together under one "this'll fix errything!" plan is aiming for an unrealistic target.
You know, I've also read that the vacuum hasn't led to less total housework being done.
I wonder if we truly are staying roughly static (or going backwards) in "waiting" on our computers, if we'll never be satisfied with having to wait at ALL and so perceive the average waiting time to be more or the same as in the past, or if the various vendors precisely how long we're willing to wait and purposely design their wares to provide the acceptable amount of bullshit.
Hmm. I get what you're saying, and I agree that we'll eventually get to the "flippant ease" state for video. On the other hand, there's always going to be something new. Maybe it'll be holographic, adding another dimension to the data/processing required. Maybe it'll be the ability to zoom, rotate, or otherwise manipulate any part of movie. Maybe it'll be the ability to map/record/manipulate all objects in a 3d virtual environment that becomes the new "video". Who knows? The point is, every new revolution in computing brings a new and increased set of requirements with it. I don't know if the requirement increases will start to plateau, but so far, they've increased exponentially.
While you're absolutely correct, the solution is not to re-train developers to "do it right"; it's really not feasible, and isn't a final solution by itself anyway.
Just like has been predicted for years, IPV4 is running out of addresses. We *could* force the A block owners to give up their IPs, we DID kludge in NAT, but the proper solution was to increase the available resources. For bandwidth/processing power issues, we need a multi-pronged approach, including increased resources (infrastructure upgrades), better development (cleaner standards, maybe?), and competing providers. I like hairyfeet's suggestion for this, though I think it's a bit of a stretch to present fiber to the home as a way to solve unemployment, too.
I wasn't aware of that.. very interesting and thank you!
But, yeah, common sense reasons for doing some things (arresting the fire-yeller) have been abused to do different things way out of the scope of the first thing (tossing the fire-yeller's family in Guantanamo) since the Patriot Act.
The officer on scene (Timothy Smith) indicates Zimmerman did have injuries and was treated for them by the SFD, but that was the extent of his involvement; this officer never questioned Zimmerman. That police report just isn't very meaty. It's also VERY interesting that the second officer on scene (Ricardo Ayala) doesn't mention Zimmerman's injuries; not even once. If I take the liberty to speculate on this, like everybody else seems to, it does seem as if they minor enough to go unnoticed, or at least unmentioned, by at least one of the officers arriving upon a homicide crime scene. Makes it seem like they'd be minor enough to not be apparent on film, too.
This does make one wonder, though... since the only weapons Zimmerman had to fear were Martin's hands, how serious did his personal injuries need to be to "prove" his "It was either him or me!" defense? Can I shoot someone for socking me in the mouth once and call it self-defense? Yeah, not so much. But, speculation time is over. I don't know the truth; none of really do.
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Your post highlights the security equivalent of a classic tech support call. Bravo.
"Is it plugged in?"
"Yes".
Two hours goes by, filled with troubleshooting and face-palming, clever and wily efforts to pinpoint an apparent phase of the moon issue, and some very inventive muted swearwords.
"Are you SURE it's plugged in?"
"Uh.... Oh.... Ooops."
"Sir, thank you for helping me realize this is my last day at this job."
We are all so damn terrified (actually... I think it's more that we're TOLD that we're all terrified; I really don't know anybody who actually is) that we're willing to overlook the most obvious truths. All we've done is make it so terrorist organizations can vacation in Bermuda since they no longer have to spend their frequent flier miles on suicide missions.
You're absolutely correct. This is why we are not allowed to drive, since accidents could be exploited by the strapped and/or exploding terrorists. It's also why we're not allowed to have sex (terrorism STDs), eat (terrorism salmonella), use paper (terrorism paper cuts), watch TV (terrorism eye-strain), wear brightly colored clothes (makes you a terrorism target), get paid (money could fund terrorism), grow "middle-eastern" beards (this is like implanting a terrorism RFID tag), or play music (subliminal terrorism is, like, the worst kind (obey!)).
It's potentially a very, very scary world, sir, but there's not enough fingers in existence to plug the real-world firewall. Trying to protect people from highly improbably occurrences is arguably ok, I guess (seems a waste of money to me but whatever; it provides jobs yada yada). When the "protection" stomps our fundamental freedoms, though, it's time to say "No."
Know what's scarier than "terrorists" lurking behind every garbage can and fuselage? The fact that there is probably zero chance of the TSA ever being disbanded.
It's interesting that your post is modded funny since I'm almost certain you meant exactly what you said. It's also funny that the "terrorists" are having a grand old time watching us all be a bunch of pansy dipshits. Just as effective with none of the suicide!!
I often create canvas prints of family photos. Mainstream 3.2 gigapixel pics means I'll be photoshopping another 1.1 gigapixels of zits, fat, and moles OUT, another 1.1 gigapixels of hair, tanned skin, and white teeth IN, and just plain giving up on the remaining gigapixel (meh, it's probably just the dog or grandma anyway).
God it's hard to make people prettier than they are in real life; exponentially so when they're high-rez people. Maybe I'll ONLY make canvas prints out of LSST space photos. Uh.... 3. Profit?
Zettabyte goes north.
Zettabyte goes north.
Zettabyte sees entrance to Cave of Ominous Petabytes.
Zettabyte enters Cave of Ominous Petabytes.
Zettabyte contracts Exabytes! Also, his sword broke!
Actually this would work pretty damn well if your AC is central air. The coils would freeze so hard and so fast it'd be off the rest of the summer.
Even if you replace it, you'd probably get a higher efficiency unit anyway. I'm not just joking here, either; an ex girlfriend did exactly your idea, and I ended up dealing with the exactly these results. The cold (ha!) hearted bitch.
I think you nailed it. Personally, I don't think it matters in practice, so sure, outlaw the outlying cases. But, of course, we don't even have members in government with the balls to team up with their "enemies" to solve problems, let alone take stands that risk constituents. Shrug.
I'm not sure why outlawing [late-term abortions] (excepting "life of the mother") would be controversial, but clearly it is.
But is it *actually* controversial, in real life? You know, that place that's outside the media coverage, nutjobs, and political hollering? With very nearly all abortions occurring well within the first trimester*, I really don't think so. It's just another political/ratings weapon that gets pulled out of the scabbard every few years. Late-term abortions are very, very rare, and almost all of THOSE cases exist because of a threat to the mother. Nobody would suffer late-term abortions were outlawed except in the case of danger to the mother, but it also doesn't NEED to be outlawed because it just doesn't happen.
Unless people are actually arguing abortions are bad from the moment of conception, it's all just much ado about nothing. In the case of those arguing "no abortion, period!"... well, I just don't agree with them, any more than I agree with them about contraception. Since it's impossible to even discuss a compromise in that case, it's that's a non-issue too, unless/until Roe v. Wade gets overturned.
*88% of abortions occur in the first 12 weeks, with 98.5% occurring before week 21, according to http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/fb_induced_abortion.html. Definitions of "late term abortion" vary, but generally it's considered between week 16 and 24. I choose to believe viability determines when it's too late, and that doesn't occur until at the very very earliest 22 weeks.
Agreed. Which is why if an abortion is going to happen, it should be done as early as possible, meaning before it could be considered a person and not just a potential person. Development during pregnancy exponential, not linear, so the sooner the better, by orders of magnitude.
I'm all for limiting abortions to the end of the first trimester, which is about half-way (in terms of time, NOT development) to the very slim chance of a viable birth, which starts around 24 weeks (anything before 30 weeks birth is mindbogglingly risky, though). It's also months before human brain patterns begin, and a little bit before the primitive (sometimes called "reptilian") nervous system really starts to develop.
12 weeks provides *plenty* of time to identify a pregnancy and do something about it, well before the fetus could be considered anything more than a bunch of cells, medically speaking (in fact, at 12 weeks, you've just barely stopped calling it an "embryo"). If you're gonna get pregnant, but don't want to stay pregnant, there should surely be an out for you, but yeah, you should probably be forced to light a fire under your ass to get it handled quickly. It'd be just like saying you can't abort after birth; we're just moving the cutoff forward.
I'm NOT for forcing any person to do anything with their own body, but surely there are compromises that can be made. And now, my trump card: 90% of all abortions are performed prior to the end of the 1st trimester.... so perhaps it's all a great big non-issue, yeah?
For me, it's not a liberal or conservative thing; it's a common sense thing.
No, unicorn farts aren't going to be available someday.
Unicorns are nuclear powered anyway. This is why they went extinct all those years ago; none of the other animals felt comfortable around them.
Japan lost a couple workers at a reprocessing plant that were acting like dumbasses
Man, I'd hate the job of tallying how many total workers die due to "dumbass" every year.... I think even Red Foreman would get tired of saying it.
I dunno... maybe these people:
http://www.oilspillcommission.gov/page/commission-members
are all supporters of Obama... but after reading their bios, I find no reason to believe they're more or less supportive of Obama than your average businessmen or scientists, other than they were selected while Obama was in office. If fact, there's 2 co-chairmen; one's a democrat and the other's a republican. All members seem to be experts in their various fields, specifically marine ecosystems, engineering and oil extraction/spill cleanup (a couple of Exxon Valdez veterans on that list; sounds very useful and logical to me).
Briefly perusing the meeting minutes, it seems they've been up to a lot more than grading Congress and Obama's administration, anyway. If you have a problem with what they're doing, this site's where to go to learn more, and it's surprisingly full of info.
One thing I didn't mention; the "big bad" versus "the little bad". In ethics, it's harder to use tools like analogy to prove your point, simply because every single situation requires its own analysis based on its own merits, and sometimes committing a small bad IS the moral choice over committing a big bad.
;). Still, saying that does NOT mean that "I don't agree that stealing food to feed my starving family" is also wrong; the two situations are completely unrelated, and there is no logical disconnect in thinking both "Hitler's was a douche" and "It'll suck for that guy to lose some profit but my kid hasn't eaten in a week so... *yoink*" while still others may think "Ill find another way... I refuse to steal." and ALSO not be wrong logically.
You can certainly say "Hitler did not agree that killing Jews was evil, and thus, to him, the claim that killing Jews is evil is completely invalid", and I'll even agree with you 100% (though you do risk a Godwin
Every single ethical quandary needs to be decided on an individual basis, for weighing "right" versus "wrong" cannot and should not be done via standard recipes. Ethics and logic aren't always buddies. Trying to make it so is just lazy thinking.
If only someone would write a book about that!
You surprised me cube-mates, making me laugh like that. Gogo Dawkins!
I think that if your point was accurate, we'd have no further need for college ethics classes (which teach a wide variety of viewpoints and theories on morality) nor would we need nearly as many cops, jails, and courts.
Like Hitler, most of the bad people in the world are pretty good at justifying to themselves why doing a thing isn't bad. So many people rationalize their own actions away, and morality is a construct of society (albeit a very, very important one).
I can even counter your examples directly (I don't necessarily believe any these positions; just showing that in ethics there is always an opposing viewpoint that someone can contrive, silly as they might be, and this is why ethics are so commonly argued, but 2 + 2 = 4 isn't): Stealing - what if my family's starving to death? Child Abuse - locking a kid up is child abuse, but what if he kills another kid and gets stuck in a cell? Killing defenseless people - what if they are harboring war criminals and refuse to move out of the way? Rape - some cultures initiate marriages this way, and some men systematically rape their women for the duration of the relationship (unless you consider "just plain giving up on life" as the woman's consent).
We think many things others do are wrong, but they think WE are wrong to "allow" our women to be educated or don't wear enough clothing or that we don't wear super long beards or that we value individualism over collectivism or about a trillion other things. Obviously you and I believe certain things, and being in the same culture, most of our morality is likely similar, but yes, other cultures truly believe other things as strongly as we believe ours. If you go to another culture, YOU are in the wrong based on sheer numbers (this is also why I don't go to stupid shitty pig fucker cultures, and I'm comfortable judging the ever living shit out of them, much to my old sociology professor's chagrin).
The point is, you cannot be absolutely "right" or "wrong" in all ethical quandaries, though it's helpful to have a guide, which would only work when stated in absolute terms. So, you can easily state things in general terms, but, as is the norm for sweeping statements, you still have to take an individual situation and decide based on that individual situation's merits, although in ethics, starting from a solid bias can actually be a good thing; it saves shit tons of time, that's for sure.
Generally speaking, there are many schools of thought on how to make ethical decisions and belief systems. You can do the thing that provides the most utility (Utilitarian), provides the greater good to all (Altruism), provides the greatest pleasure with least pain (Hedonism's original form), simply go for pleasure only (Cyrenaicism; what most think of as Hedonism), and about a thousand more; and it's trivially easy to rationalize every single act you commit, good or bad. This is why ethical considerations are very much a societal agreement and don't come from a genetic stamp, and it's why morals in different cultures can vary so much, and also why cultures can change moral views over time (which is also a VERY good thing; ethical considerations tend to need resolution prior to progress).
Stephen Pinker's "The Blank Slate" talks about this, and many other things, far, far better than I could ever attempt to. I strongly recommend it.
I guess I learned a few things about "loving your kids" when I was a child, myself.
If I told you my father used to call me ugly and would hit me when he got angry, you'd call him an abusive prick, right? Or that he gambled all our money away on stocks, would wander around the house in his underwear so often that I was too mortified to bring friends home, and couldn't hold down a full-time job? You'd call him a deadbeat and a loser, yeah? A whole hell of a lot of other people looking in from the outside thought so too, and I used to hate him for it all.
Well, my father also survived 3 brain tumors that left him with the emotional capacity of a 4 year old, and an intellectual capacity that seemed to vary day to day. Something like that Robin Williams movie "Jack" or maybe "Forrest Gump", though the movies don't really portray what it's like to live with an adult that has night terrors or burns himself in the shower. My father died 18 years ago as of March 21st, and it's only in my adulthood that I can recognize the things he'd do to show much he loved us. He'd make sure we got ice cream, and he'd make sure to kiss us goodnight every night. He'd be the one to put bandaids on when we got hurt, and would beg my mom to make sure we'd get to school on time and do all our homework. When he got mad, it was because he worried about us. When he'd lose all his money, it's because some asshole would trick him out of it, and he DID keep a job for nearly 20 years mowing lawns at his best friend's bank branch (this was a long-time friend from before the cancer). He was too embarrassed to tell us since all of our friends' dads had jobs at desks and fixing cars and science-y things, and he couldn't do that.
Before the cancer took his life away from him, which occurred when I was very young, he had graduated from Boise State with a masters' degree, and was teaching. He played and coached soccer and football, and was very respected in his hometown as one of the best public speakers around. His parents' pride and joy. After the tumors, his family disowned us, thinking we (well, my mother, really) couldn't provide the care that they could. It became something of a war, which ended in my dad leaving us after a few years, moving to an apartment his parents paid for. When he died, my "grandparents" buried him before his sons (myself included) arrived. I said goodbye to my father with my mother and 3 brothers, while the undertaker's backhoe was idling 10 feet away, waiting to resume filling the grave back in. That memory is forever burned into my mind. My mother TO THIS DAY pays for his decades-old medical bills, and I visit his grave every year.
Sometimes the people who love us are unable to show us in the standard ways, but that love is no less meaningful. On the other hand, some people who think they are showing love are simply horrible people. Knowing which is which can be very difficult even from inside the situation; those not privy to all of the information are simply not in a position to judge.
I don't see where his "fallacious excuse" was. I also don't see where he said he was "beyond reproach of any non-parent". All I saw him say was most parents are doing the best they can, it's unfair for a non-parent (I think this should say "anyone", actually) to make "if you really loved your kids you'd do X, Y, or Z.... " arguments, and that raising kids is much, much different than you'd think it is prior to actually attempting it.
As for your arguments:
1) "... being able to properly provide for them." According to what standard? I provide the best I can for my kids, and I think I do a good job. You may not think so, others may think I give to much, and still others think any child not getting at least a Yale-level college fund is getting neglected. Your standards are not my standards, and if you want some kids to fit into your worldview go have your own.
2) "Parenting is really hard!". I disagree with both you and the GP. It's not hard - it's easy. The hard part, as with anything worthwhile and long term, is the consistency. If you're consistent with your parenting, everything else tends to fall in line. Maybe I lucked out with awesome kids; or maybe they're awesome because I'm consistent. Either way; I look forward to raising my kids into full adulthood from mid-teenage years, and look back fondly on my successes and failures.
3) "selecting from that pool [of orphans] is the only moral option." I've never understood this argument. I get what you're trying to say; namely "there are enough great kids out there already; why make your own?" but that's kind of a dumb argument when you remove the "starving, lonely kids" aspect. Why make your own furniture when there's plenty of furniture to buy from Ikea (obviously kids are not furniture, but the difference is one of - admittedly vast - scale)? Well, in both cases, because I made them, they come from me directly. There's a huge over-supply of starving kids, for sure, and I'm very sorry, but I don't have the 50 grand to adopt another child, nor would it prevent me from wanting my own child with my own genes if I did. Make those people start taking care of their kids (or stop having them in the first place) before you tell me I can't have kids myself. This may seem an immoral stance to you, but it's the same kind of "immoral" as not sending every penny you earn to the orphans in Africa, or sending your paychecks directly to Sara McLachlin. I help how I'm able, and it's on me, not you, to decide how much I should be helping. Besides, by your logic, YOU are the perfect person to adopt all the children you can afford to, since obviously know how to parent better than other parents do, especially if you are not currently encumbered with your own.
The rest of your post I don't really take issue to, other than a general tone of contempt, to which you are entitled.
Yeah... either I'm not smart enough to follow this story, or Al Perry's comment is just plain nonsense. I doubt the former since I've had my Monday coffee, but I guess you never know.
As far as I know, "monetize" simply means "to convert a thing into currency"*. We just do it so we don't have to barter everything; cash is far more liquid than a fistful of IOUs (which, in a sense, are the grandpappy of today's currency). Saying: "Hey buddy, I got a Pez Dispenser; I'll give you one for 5 cents." would be "monetizing" the Pez. Copyright doesn't provide this "right" (wtf? Is EVERYTHING some sort of "right" these days, simply so dipshits can threaten to revoke them? Is it my "right" to spend my cash, too?)
*Interesting note: I double checked and found that "monetize" can also mean "to coin" (which actually makes complete sense, considering the other definitions). So, I'm going to "monetize" as many phrases as I can, starting with "Don't step in that 'Alperry' over there, brah, you'll stink for days!" Due to the convoluted and unpredictable law of semantics, I shall soon be wealthy beyond my wildest dreams.
Ha! I'm accused of the same damn thing in my corporate e-mails. Apparently 3 sentences is the edge of human comprehension unless your audience knows you as Stephen King. I'm all for being concise and staying on topic, but sometimes there really is a lot of info to relay. Then whaddya do?
Anyway, I don't disagree with anything in your post. I just think we shouldn't hinge infrastructure improvements on the unemployment rate or vice versa. It would be great if one problem solved the other, but it's probably better to tackle them individually on their own merits. Tying them together under one "this'll fix errything!" plan is aiming for an unrealistic target.
You know, I've also read that the vacuum hasn't led to less total housework being done.
I wonder if we truly are staying roughly static (or going backwards) in "waiting" on our computers, if we'll never be satisfied with having to wait at ALL and so perceive the average waiting time to be more or the same as in the past, or if the various vendors precisely how long we're willing to wait and purposely design their wares to provide the acceptable amount of bullshit.
Hmm. I get what you're saying, and I agree that we'll eventually get to the "flippant ease" state for video. On the other hand, there's always going to be something new. Maybe it'll be holographic, adding another dimension to the data/processing required. Maybe it'll be the ability to zoom, rotate, or otherwise manipulate any part of movie. Maybe it'll be the ability to map/record/manipulate all objects in a 3d virtual environment that becomes the new "video". Who knows? The point is, every new revolution in computing brings a new and increased set of requirements with it. I don't know if the requirement increases will start to plateau, but so far, they've increased exponentially.
My lawn's obsolete! Fix it, you damn kids!
While you're absolutely correct, the solution is not to re-train developers to "do it right"; it's really not feasible, and isn't a final solution by itself anyway.
Just like has been predicted for years, IPV4 is running out of addresses. We *could* force the A block owners to give up their IPs, we DID kludge in NAT, but the proper solution was to increase the available resources. For bandwidth/processing power issues, we need a multi-pronged approach, including increased resources (infrastructure upgrades), better development (cleaner standards, maybe?), and competing providers. I like hairyfeet's suggestion for this, though I think it's a bit of a stretch to present fiber to the home as a way to solve unemployment, too.
I wasn't aware of that.. very interesting and thank you!
But, yeah, common sense reasons for doing some things (arresting the fire-yeller) have been abused to do different things way out of the scope of the first thing (tossing the fire-yeller's family in Guantanamo) since the Patriot Act.
Ah. I did find this:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/86948628/Trayvon-Martin-Police-Report
The officer on scene (Timothy Smith) indicates Zimmerman did have injuries and was treated for them by the SFD, but that was the extent of his involvement; this officer never questioned Zimmerman. That police report just isn't very meaty. It's also VERY interesting that the second officer on scene (Ricardo Ayala) doesn't mention Zimmerman's injuries; not even once. If I take the liberty to speculate on this, like everybody else seems to, it does seem as if they minor enough to go unnoticed, or at least unmentioned, by at least one of the officers arriving upon a homicide crime scene. Makes it seem like they'd be minor enough to not be apparent on film, too.
This does make one wonder, though... since the only weapons Zimmerman had to fear were Martin's hands, how serious did his personal injuries need to be to "prove" his "It was either him or me!" defense? Can I shoot someone for socking me in the mouth once and call it self-defense? Yeah, not so much. But, speculation time is over. I don't know the truth; none of really do.