"Ice Age" is a bit of a muddled term. We're in an ice age right now - you can tell, because in a warm earth there's no year-round ice anywhere. I think the right terminology is that we're in an inter-glacial period in the current ice age, but I've never found anything definitive. One thing's for sure: when the glaciers come back, there will be about 2 km of ice on top of where I'm sitting. Somehow that seems scarier to me than a few meters rise in sea level.
"Runaway warming" is a chimera, to be sure, but sudden and dramatic local climate shifts are certainly possible if the climate moves much in either direction, since so much depends on air and especially ocean currents. But then, people who imagine we could somehow keep the world climate from changing at all are just fooling themselves.
Nope. It does really mean that they are undetermined, regardless of our measurements. There is no hidden variables. Quantum world is *really* that strange/uncanny,
The whole "there are no hidden variables" thing is just an quick English phrase standing in for complex math. Don't read to much into it.
The wave function is completely deterministic, forwards and backwards. Real-world observables like position and momentum are not state captured by the wave function - nothing in classical physics is, really. It's the mapping between the wave function and what we can observe that is non-deterministic (well, again, the math is more complex than the English, but it's partly non-deterministic in a complicated way).
The best way to think about this is that intuitive properties like position and momentum are emergent from a complex system. An electron simply isn't a point particle with a specific position - it's not that it's non-deterministic, so much as the idea is just wrong - but at human scale a table still has a defined surface, made up of a bunch of electrons giving the illusion of solidity.
I can't describe how awful that is. Don't they have employment law in Seattle?
Sounds like his in the video game industry. I work 40-45 hours a week most weeks, longer only in the rare crunch time, or when I've been slacking and need to catch up. It's natural to work long hours for your first few years in the industry, since you're trying to both learn the job and do the job, but carrying that habit on further into your career is nuts.
Throughout all of human history we've been struggling with scarcity, maybe if we aren't things will change.
There has been no real scarcity of the goods needed for subsistence living in the US for decades now (yet people will insist today their standard of living is lover now than 30 years ago - post that insistently to social media using their smart phone, then go back to gaming on their HDTV).
Do the wealthy stand out because they clearly eat more food than the poor? Mechanical watches and hand-built cars are status symbols. We socially value scare things, even when we have to artificially impose scarcity on ourselves to make it work. Plus, people have been paying for others to make them fashionable since disposable income existed,
- you couldn't have missed the news on AIs composing music, creating paintings etc
All garbage thus far.
Interior decorating could probably be replaced with a small shellscript and a variables file containing the latest trendy items and colors...OK I'm joking, but only half joking
Well, once we can 3D print everything, maybe so, but that's one transition beyond the current one. Once each of us can 3D print all the basics at home, all current economic systems are obsolete - but that won't be in my lifetime. People will still be complaining about falling standard of living then, though.
Why can't people one-up each other in something other than material goods? Sports, intellectual pursuits, arts, for example?
All of human history suggests otherwise. Oh, sure, you see subcultures here and there that do just that, throughout history, but it has never been mainstream. Plus, automating all skilled labor is Singularity-complete. Anything with even a minimum amount of creativity, e.g. interior decorating, won't be automated any time soon, and plenty of people who can't do technical work are good at jobs requiring just a bit of skill, but just a bit of creativity too. Further, the skilled trades won't e going away in my lifetime - we'll have human electricians, plumbers, welders, construction equipment operators, etc, for my lifetime anyway.
Only post-singularity. Remember, anything that anyone can get and that's nearly free automatically lacks social status. Where's your bling? How are you dressed in a manner more likely to attract a mate than the next guy? If you have leisure time, why would you have your nails done by a machine? Your hair? Surely you want your place decorated nicely in the latest style? Dahling, I wouldn't be caught dead with that handbag, it's made by a machine.
50% employment will create a surging demand for new goods and services, because the fully automated ones are so cheap now. Just like happened with food. Just like happened with tableware. Just like happened with shoes. Just like happened with furniture. Etc etc.
Eventually we'll need to go beyond providing for basic needs as the opportunities for economic mobility become more and more scarce with increasing automation.
At some point there will be just a small handful of opportunities for people to make their own lives better, in terms of resources.
I disagree strongly. People have been claiming this with every generation of utomation, and they've been wrong for 400 years. Sure, the day will come when none of today's non-professional jobs exist, but there's always something more people want from one another. And let's remember that's all the economy is: people wanting things from one another.
Very few people are employed in farming or manufacturing already, and eventually all of the unskilled and low-skills jobs will be automated, but that leaves plenty of room. There's no social status to be had from anything that everyone can afford, after all., and no end to demand for goods and services that increase social status.
At that point everyone's lives need to be good enough (in terms of resources) that they won't feel that their lives need "improvement."
That idea is fundamentally incompatible with human nature. No matter how good life gets (and today we live in a age of wonders), people are mostly concerned with one-upping their neighbors. No system that provides equality can meet that desire, by definition.
That's the thing about laws: the consequences don't care about the intentions. Entire, multigenerational cultures will arise who have never worked, and have no skills needed to work if they wanted to. Of course, the same thing happens at a small scale with US welfare programs, but few enough make that work for them. It's bigger with Chavs, I think.
Eh, it would be worth it IMO if we got rid of all the other systems. The problem is: Social Security and Medicare. If we don't replace those, we're only fiddling with the little things, and the amount those programs cost would be far more than subsistence in your 20s, with no medical problems. Medical care for the elderly is freaking expensive. So, since we're unlikely to replace the other forms of government charity, it doesn't appeal to me.
You forgot to mention that while corruption scandals were in all parties, they affected most of the guys who are impeaching the president.
"The other guy does it too" is a terrible excuse for corruption. Impeach em all, says me.
Still, it's so far a non-violent solution. The last time the US had a strongly anti-corruption president taking actual steps to fix things (Garfield), he was assassinated! The VP (Arthur) was on the other side, and the assassin had hoped this would end the anti-corruption efforts. Fortunately for the US, Arthur went a different way, declaring that assassins wouldn't get to change policy, and enacting Garfield's reforms. (No one believed Arthur at first, but as the years went by he really had changed sides.)
No that I think anyone in power is taking real steps to end corruption in Brazil, mind you. Am I too cynical?
robably not, but there's plenty of dislike in the US for Brazil's leftwing government,
Oh, I have a strong dislike of Brazil's leftwing government, don't get me wrong, it cost me thousands. But (many of) the guys voting to impeach are, from my point of view, just as leftwing. Does anyone think Brazil will suddenly not have a leftwing government after this? I sure don't.
The last time a coup happen in Brazil it was directly supported by the US
Yup - the decision was probably made by Kennedy, but LBJ must have known and not stopped it. Nixon get's all the shit for this sort of thing, but it was never just him.
he's probably just badly informed
Well, I didn't see the overt shift to socialism coming ahead of the election, that's for sure. I probably shouldn't have been surprised by it after the fact.
How about instead, we get in the habit of considering the logic of a post, and checking its facts ourselves (not just checking things we disagree with).
There is a similar group doing the same thing in Brazil to help in the coup against President Dilma. The only difference is that Brazilians trolls are really easy to be identified by the stupidity and nonsense of their comments.
Well played, sir troll.
For those not following Brazilian politics, Brazil has been plagued by corruption scandals and economic woes, leading to not a literal coup, but a supermajority vote by the Brazilian House to impeach President Dilma Rousseff, which means it moves to the Senate for confirmation, then an actual trial. It's an emotionally charged issue (some representatives actually burst into song during the impeachment proceedings), but being resolved peacefully.
If you're a hard-working working class person, you can't afford to save half your income.
Well, it would be rough if you're living alone, but I had a friend doing it as a security guard. I had my spending down to $24k not too many years ago, Though that's still a bit more than half of the take-home (about $50k) for a journeyman tradesman. If you're lucky enough to marry someone with a decent job who doesn't insist on kids right away it's much more practical.
And even if you did, after 20 years you wouldn't get enough income from it to survive without eating into the capital.
Untrue, though we haven't been in the easiest investment environment of late. With even modest returns, saving 20 times a year's expenses, with 20 years of (pro-rated) growth, you're doing fine.
If you're good at investing, you can save 1/3 of your take-home pay for 20 years and end up self-sustaining at the end, but most people aren't good at investing.
As to the child of the rich person, it's not simply example and lesson, it's having the fees for a good private school and college paid. Where they develop a network with other privileged kids, and gain the right accent. With the result that they walk into a very good job at the end of it because of who they know
Well, my admittedly very small sample size (of 2 friends) got none of that. They did, however, learn a bunch about financial discipline. I'm sure you're right about the richest 100 families, and the tiny American upper class, but that's not representative of the 1%. (Most people in the 1% of income only stay there for a year or 2, BTW, and few in the 1% of wealth inherited it.)
I'm afraid you've been sold the American Dream. And it's bullshit.
Well, it worked for me. If you convince yourself it's impossible, obviously it won't for you. But most people simply have other priorities (kids, wanting to live in a particular city instead of following their career, and so on), which is fine - money isn't the only goal - but making a real difference in your life economically requires prioritizing that.
The Protestant Work Ethic is not about work bringing improved circumstances for the self, but work bringing good grace from God and for the community.
That's not a distinction the Pilgrims would have made. A strong work ethic provides both material and spiritual satisfaction, and both are important (even, or perhaps especially, if you believe "spiritual" is a metaphor).
The truth is that by far the biggest determinant of being rich is that you were born of rich parents.
There was an interesting study on this. The correlation is with growing up with rich parents (who presumably set a certain example, or taught some useful lesson), not with inheriting money. IMO, we're back to work ethic here (plus the utter failure of the education system to explain how money works - insert conspiracy theory here).
Even those that do manage rags to riches without a hand up don't do it from working hard, but from some particular talent or from exploiting others. Simply working hard brings a modest income, nothing more.
Depends what you mean by riches, but you need both: hard work and understanding money/wealth. We all have particular talents; most have something others value. However much money you make, live on half of it for 20 years and invest the rest wisely, and you've got that income permanently. Riches enough for me.
Redistribution of wealth solves nothing. Wealth - the means of production - should be owned by those who will make the best decisions on what to produce. (Idealized) Communism and Capitalism differ mostly in the argument over who will make those best decisions: the worker, or the person who has proven himself successful at making that decision in the past. IMO the right answer is the consumer, but until there's a factoryin every home, that's not a useful answer.
The problem IMO is that the richest 100 families aren't usually interesting in anywhere along the Communism-Capitalism spectrum, but instead want a Kleptocracy.
Most people overlook the other side of the equation which is "what is the cost to me for society to contain individuals who don't have basic needs met?" which is not zero. No city is happy with homeless people pissing in the streets, criminals who burgle or engage in other crimes, and a perpetual cycle of poverty which can be difficult to escape.
True, but you have to balance that against "Chav riots". Meeting someone's basic needs without giving them economic mobility only delays violence and unrest. Without a good outlet for people with drive to make their own lives better, it finds a bad outlet, through riot and looting and organized crime.
A basic income is not itself the problem, but it also doesn't solve the problem: the problem is economic mobility.
Being a wage slave does not "better" you. That's the very silly Protestant work ethic.
The Protestant work ethic is pre-industrial revolution. It was never about wage slaves, but about working your farm, where the habit of work beyond the minimum, work that improves your farm in some lasting way, was a very good habit indeed.
And it applies greatly today. We should all be seeking to work harder where that benefits us long term. There's a lot of satisfaction to be had from that, something that the faux-achievement provided by video games etc emulates. It's not about work for work's sake, but about the drive to improve your life and seeing the payoff.
The real problem is people who genuinely believe they're trapped, there's nothing they can do to improve their life through hard work. Whether they're right or wrong, society has failed them badly. I don't worry about the "incentive to be lazy" from a minimum income - that's a distraction at best - I worry that we'll have a minimum income instead of solving the harder problem: providing the opportunity for economic mobility to all.
I htink we were collectively distracted by the poor term "the 1%". The actual 1%, the moderately wealthy, the successful doctors and dentists and lawyers and small business owners, they aren't the issue here. The 1% aren't the people in the Panama Papers.
We should instead be upset at "the richest 100 families", who IMO have been causing so many problems. In some ways, the difference between "ideal capitalism" and "capitalism as practiced in the US" is the difference between the 1% and the richest 100 families.
Why do you think European ideas of freedom involve serving the government or fearing it?
I don't, I think people are OK with the loss of freedom entailed by those things because it's not their first priority.
We actually took the pursuit of happiness bit to heart. That's the main difference.
Yes, that.
Let me put it differently, and see if you agree. The classical American ideal is that freedom comes first, because every man's idea of happiness may be different, and who's to judge? The European ideal (and increasingly America as well) is that happiness is obviously X, Y, and Z, and that freedom shouldn't get in the way of that.
Personally I believe that every adult has the fundamental moral right to walk his own path to happiness, even if I disagree with his definition of happiness, or if I disagree that the chosen path leads to happiness by his definition. (Recognizing this right, BTW, is the current Dalai Lama's definition of "compassion" - far better put then my own attempts.) It's not my place to arrogantly insist that others do things the way I think is best, though I'll argue for it. Sure, sure, the Devil's in the details when one mans happiness comes from harming another, but those are corner cases, not a problem with the principle.
In order to process a card-present transaction with a magstripe card, the terminal must be able to read the CVV1. That's the Card Verification Value #1, which is embedded into the magstripe, but not seen anywhere else. (Note: This is not the CVV2! The CVV2 is a completely different value and is only printed on the card. That value is used to validate card-not-present transactions, not card-present ones.) If you clone the magstripe, you clone the CVV1 with it. Security was not even imagined when this was invented, as many stores still kept carbon-copy impressions of the raised numbers on the card at that time.
That's not quite right. CVV1/2 were security measures, and thoughtful ones for the problem they were created for: fraud originating from carbon copies. Adding data that doesn't show up on the carbon was a clever approach, back in the day, but it's always an arms race.
Chip+sign is secure enough. Chip+PIN is just annoying, inconvenient, and anti-cardholder.
There's nothing wrong with Chip+PIN as a technology, but there's everything wrong with the shift of liability to the cardholder that went with Chip+PIN, on the stupid assumption that the PIN couldn't possibly be cloned (but of course, it has been).
Sounds a lot like a direct contradiction, with a mix of personal insult in there.
You stated that the Republicans have moved from liberal to conservative. I added that the Democrats aren't liberal either, as much as they would like to believe so by calling the GOP "conservative". That the one does not imply the other was sort of my point. But the (mild) personal insult was, of course, intended, regardless of my point.
Slashdot Mirror
"Ice Age" is a bit of a muddled term. We're in an ice age right now - you can tell, because in a warm earth there's no year-round ice anywhere. I think the right terminology is that we're in an inter-glacial period in the current ice age, but I've never found anything definitive. One thing's for sure: when the glaciers come back, there will be about 2 km of ice on top of where I'm sitting. Somehow that seems scarier to me than a few meters rise in sea level.
"Runaway warming" is a chimera, to be sure, but sudden and dramatic local climate shifts are certainly possible if the climate moves much in either direction, since so much depends on air and especially ocean currents. But then, people who imagine we could somehow keep the world climate from changing at all are just fooling themselves.
Nope. It does really mean that they are undetermined, regardless of our measurements. There is no hidden variables. Quantum world is *really* that strange/uncanny,
The whole "there are no hidden variables" thing is just an quick English phrase standing in for complex math. Don't read to much into it.
The wave function is completely deterministic, forwards and backwards. Real-world observables like position and momentum are not state captured by the wave function - nothing in classical physics is, really. It's the mapping between the wave function and what we can observe that is non-deterministic (well, again, the math is more complex than the English, but it's partly non-deterministic in a complicated way).
The best way to think about this is that intuitive properties like position and momentum are emergent from a complex system. An electron simply isn't a point particle with a specific position - it's not that it's non-deterministic, so much as the idea is just wrong - but at human scale a table still has a defined surface, made up of a bunch of electrons giving the illusion of solidity.
I can't describe how awful that is. Don't they have employment law in Seattle?
Sounds like his in the video game industry. I work 40-45 hours a week most weeks, longer only in the rare crunch time, or when I've been slacking and need to catch up. It's natural to work long hours for your first few years in the industry, since you're trying to both learn the job and do the job, but carrying that habit on further into your career is nuts.
Throughout all of human history we've been struggling with scarcity, maybe if we aren't things will change.
There has been no real scarcity of the goods needed for subsistence living in the US for decades now (yet people will insist today their standard of living is lover now than 30 years ago - post that insistently to social media using their smart phone, then go back to gaming on their HDTV).
Do the wealthy stand out because they clearly eat more food than the poor? Mechanical watches and hand-built cars are status symbols. We socially value scare things, even when we have to artificially impose scarcity on ourselves to make it work. Plus, people have been paying for others to make them fashionable since disposable income existed,
- you couldn't have missed the news on AIs composing music, creating paintings etc
All garbage thus far.
Interior decorating could probably be replaced with a small shellscript and a variables file containing the latest trendy items and colors...OK I'm joking, but only half joking
Well, once we can 3D print everything, maybe so, but that's one transition beyond the current one. Once each of us can 3D print all the basics at home, all current economic systems are obsolete - but that won't be in my lifetime. People will still be complaining about falling standard of living then, though.
Translation: "NSA Adds Over 1 Million People To Secret Watch List Each Month"
I don't believe that for a second - that would imply there exists someone not already on that list!
Why can't people one-up each other in something other than material goods? Sports, intellectual pursuits, arts, for example?
All of human history suggests otherwise. Oh, sure, you see subcultures here and there that do just that, throughout history, but it has never been mainstream. Plus, automating all skilled labor is Singularity-complete. Anything with even a minimum amount of creativity, e.g. interior decorating, won't be automated any time soon, and plenty of people who can't do technical work are good at jobs requiring just a bit of skill, but just a bit of creativity too. Further, the skilled trades won't e going away in my lifetime - we'll have human electricians, plumbers, welders, construction equipment operators, etc, for my lifetime anyway.
Only post-singularity. Remember, anything that anyone can get and that's nearly free automatically lacks social status. Where's your bling? How are you dressed in a manner more likely to attract a mate than the next guy? If you have leisure time, why would you have your nails done by a machine? Your hair? Surely you want your place decorated nicely in the latest style? Dahling, I wouldn't be caught dead with that handbag, it's made by a machine.
50% employment will create a surging demand for new goods and services, because the fully automated ones are so cheap now. Just like happened with food. Just like happened with tableware. Just like happened with shoes. Just like happened with furniture. Etc etc.
Now *that* I struggle to believe. I mean, sure, an honest politician is mathematically possible but ...
So, something exactly like the Slashdot karma system then?
Eventually we'll need to go beyond providing for basic needs as the opportunities for economic mobility become more and more scarce with increasing automation.
At some point there will be just a small handful of opportunities for people to make their own lives better, in terms of resources.
I disagree strongly. People have been claiming this with every generation of utomation, and they've been wrong for 400 years. Sure, the day will come when none of today's non-professional jobs exist, but there's always something more people want from one another. And let's remember that's all the economy is: people wanting things from one another.
Very few people are employed in farming or manufacturing already, and eventually all of the unskilled and low-skills jobs will be automated, but that leaves plenty of room. There's no social status to be had from anything that everyone can afford, after all., and no end to demand for goods and services that increase social status.
At that point everyone's lives need to be good enough (in terms of resources) that they won't feel that their lives need "improvement."
That idea is fundamentally incompatible with human nature. No matter how good life gets (and today we live in a age of wonders), people are mostly concerned with one-upping their neighbors. No system that provides equality can meet that desire, by definition.
That's the thing about laws: the consequences don't care about the intentions. Entire, multigenerational cultures will arise who have never worked, and have no skills needed to work if they wanted to. Of course, the same thing happens at a small scale with US welfare programs, but few enough make that work for them. It's bigger with Chavs, I think.
Eh, it would be worth it IMO if we got rid of all the other systems. The problem is: Social Security and Medicare. If we don't replace those, we're only fiddling with the little things, and the amount those programs cost would be far more than subsistence in your 20s, with no medical problems. Medical care for the elderly is freaking expensive. So, since we're unlikely to replace the other forms of government charity, it doesn't appeal to me.
You forgot to mention that while corruption scandals were in all parties, they affected most of the guys who are impeaching the president.
"The other guy does it too" is a terrible excuse for corruption. Impeach em all, says me.
Still, it's so far a non-violent solution. The last time the US had a strongly anti-corruption president taking actual steps to fix things (Garfield), he was assassinated! The VP (Arthur) was on the other side, and the assassin had hoped this would end the anti-corruption efforts. Fortunately for the US, Arthur went a different way, declaring that assassins wouldn't get to change policy, and enacting Garfield's reforms. (No one believed Arthur at first, but as the years went by he really had changed sides.)
No that I think anyone in power is taking real steps to end corruption in Brazil, mind you. Am I too cynical?
robably not, but there's plenty of dislike in the US for Brazil's leftwing government,
Oh, I have a strong dislike of Brazil's leftwing government, don't get me wrong, it cost me thousands. But (many of) the guys voting to impeach are, from my point of view, just as leftwing. Does anyone think Brazil will suddenly not have a leftwing government after this? I sure don't.
The last time a coup happen in Brazil it was directly supported by the US
Yup - the decision was probably made by Kennedy, but LBJ must have known and not stopped it. Nixon get's all the shit for this sort of thing, but it was never just him.
he's probably just badly informed
Well, I didn't see the overt shift to socialism coming ahead of the election, that's for sure. I probably shouldn't have been surprised by it after the fact.
Not the world, just /.. It's too late for social media.
All opinions are biased. Judging the truth of a claim by "which side" the speaker is on is the worst possible habit, and we shouldn't enable it.
That would just lead to more groupthink.
How about instead, we get in the habit of considering the logic of a post, and checking its facts ourselves (not just checking things we disagree with).
There is a similar group doing the same thing in Brazil to help in the coup against President Dilma. The only difference is that Brazilians trolls are really easy to be identified by the stupidity and nonsense of their comments.
Well played, sir troll.
For those not following Brazilian politics, Brazil has been plagued by corruption scandals and economic woes, leading to not a literal coup, but a supermajority vote by the Brazilian House to impeach President Dilma Rousseff, which means it moves to the Senate for confirmation, then an actual trial. It's an emotionally charged issue (some representatives actually burst into song during the impeachment proceedings), but being resolved peacefully.
If you're a hard-working working class person, you can't afford to save half your income.
Well, it would be rough if you're living alone, but I had a friend doing it as a security guard. I had my spending down to $24k not too many years ago, Though that's still a bit more than half of the take-home (about $50k) for a journeyman tradesman. If you're lucky enough to marry someone with a decent job who doesn't insist on kids right away it's much more practical.
And even if you did, after 20 years you wouldn't get enough income from it to survive without eating into the capital.
Untrue, though we haven't been in the easiest investment environment of late. With even modest returns, saving 20 times a year's expenses, with 20 years of (pro-rated) growth, you're doing fine.
If you're good at investing, you can save 1/3 of your take-home pay for 20 years and end up self-sustaining at the end, but most people aren't good at investing.
As to the child of the rich person, it's not simply example and lesson, it's having the fees for a good private school and college paid. Where they develop a network with other privileged kids, and gain the right accent. With the result that they walk into a very good job at the end of it because of who they know
Well, my admittedly very small sample size (of 2 friends) got none of that. They did, however, learn a bunch about financial discipline. I'm sure you're right about the richest 100 families, and the tiny American upper class, but that's not representative of the 1%. (Most people in the 1% of income only stay there for a year or 2, BTW, and few in the 1% of wealth inherited it.)
I'm afraid you've been sold the American Dream. And it's bullshit.
Well, it worked for me. If you convince yourself it's impossible, obviously it won't for you. But most people simply have other priorities (kids, wanting to live in a particular city instead of following their career, and so on), which is fine - money isn't the only goal - but making a real difference in your life economically requires prioritizing that.
The Protestant Work Ethic is not about work bringing improved circumstances for the self, but work bringing good grace from God and for the community.
That's not a distinction the Pilgrims would have made. A strong work ethic provides both material and spiritual satisfaction, and both are important (even, or perhaps especially, if you believe "spiritual" is a metaphor).
The truth is that by far the biggest determinant of being rich is that you were born of rich parents.
There was an interesting study on this. The correlation is with growing up with rich parents (who presumably set a certain example, or taught some useful lesson), not with inheriting money. IMO, we're back to work ethic here (plus the utter failure of the education system to explain how money works - insert conspiracy theory here).
Even those that do manage rags to riches without a hand up don't do it from working hard, but from some particular talent or from exploiting others. Simply working hard brings a modest income, nothing more.
Depends what you mean by riches, but you need both: hard work and understanding money/wealth. We all have particular talents; most have something others value. However much money you make, live on half of it for 20 years and invest the rest wisely, and you've got that income permanently. Riches enough for me.
Redistribution of wealth solves nothing. Wealth - the means of production - should be owned by those who will make the best decisions on what to produce. (Idealized) Communism and Capitalism differ mostly in the argument over who will make those best decisions: the worker, or the person who has proven himself successful at making that decision in the past. IMO the right answer is the consumer, but until there's a factoryin every home, that's not a useful answer.
The problem IMO is that the richest 100 families aren't usually interesting in anywhere along the Communism-Capitalism spectrum, but instead want a Kleptocracy.
Most people overlook the other side of the equation which is "what is the cost to me for society to contain individuals who don't have basic needs met?" which is not zero. No city is happy with homeless people pissing in the streets, criminals who burgle or engage in other crimes, and a perpetual cycle of poverty which can be difficult to escape.
True, but you have to balance that against "Chav riots". Meeting someone's basic needs without giving them economic mobility only delays violence and unrest. Without a good outlet for people with drive to make their own lives better, it finds a bad outlet, through riot and looting and organized crime.
A basic income is not itself the problem, but it also doesn't solve the problem: the problem is economic mobility.
Being a wage slave does not "better" you. That's the very silly Protestant work ethic.
The Protestant work ethic is pre-industrial revolution. It was never about wage slaves, but about working your farm, where the habit of work beyond the minimum, work that improves your farm in some lasting way, was a very good habit indeed.
And it applies greatly today. We should all be seeking to work harder where that benefits us long term. There's a lot of satisfaction to be had from that, something that the faux-achievement provided by video games etc emulates. It's not about work for work's sake, but about the drive to improve your life and seeing the payoff.
The real problem is people who genuinely believe they're trapped, there's nothing they can do to improve their life through hard work. Whether they're right or wrong, society has failed them badly. I don't worry about the "incentive to be lazy" from a minimum income - that's a distraction at best - I worry that we'll have a minimum income instead of solving the harder problem: providing the opportunity for economic mobility to all.
I htink we were collectively distracted by the poor term "the 1%". The actual 1%, the moderately wealthy, the successful doctors and dentists and lawyers and small business owners, they aren't the issue here. The 1% aren't the people in the Panama Papers.
We should instead be upset at "the richest 100 families", who IMO have been causing so many problems. In some ways, the difference between "ideal capitalism" and "capitalism as practiced in the US" is the difference between the 1% and the richest 100 families.
Why do you think European ideas of freedom involve serving the government or fearing it?
I don't, I think people are OK with the loss of freedom entailed by those things because it's not their first priority.
We actually took the pursuit of happiness bit to heart. That's the main difference.
Yes, that.
Let me put it differently, and see if you agree. The classical American ideal is that freedom comes first, because every man's idea of happiness may be different, and who's to judge? The European ideal (and increasingly America as well) is that happiness is obviously X, Y, and Z, and that freedom shouldn't get in the way of that.
Personally I believe that every adult has the fundamental moral right to walk his own path to happiness, even if I disagree with his definition of happiness, or if I disagree that the chosen path leads to happiness by his definition. (Recognizing this right, BTW, is the current Dalai Lama's definition of "compassion" - far better put then my own attempts.) It's not my place to arrogantly insist that others do things the way I think is best, though I'll argue for it. Sure, sure, the Devil's in the details when one mans happiness comes from harming another, but those are corner cases, not a problem with the principle.
In order to process a card-present transaction with a magstripe card, the terminal must be able to read the CVV1. That's the Card Verification Value #1, which is embedded into the magstripe, but not seen anywhere else. (Note: This is not the CVV2! The CVV2 is a completely different value and is only printed on the card. That value is used to validate card-not-present transactions, not card-present ones.) If you clone the magstripe, you clone the CVV1 with it. Security was not even imagined when this was invented, as many stores still kept carbon-copy impressions of the raised numbers on the card at that time.
That's not quite right. CVV1/2 were security measures, and thoughtful ones for the problem they were created for: fraud originating from carbon copies. Adding data that doesn't show up on the carbon was a clever approach, back in the day, but it's always an arms race.
Chip+sign is secure enough. Chip+PIN is just annoying, inconvenient, and anti-cardholder.
There's nothing wrong with Chip+PIN as a technology, but there's everything wrong with the shift of liability to the cardholder that went with Chip+PIN, on the stupid assumption that the PIN couldn't possibly be cloned (but of course, it has been).
Sounds a lot like a direct contradiction, with a mix of personal insult in there.
You stated that the Republicans have moved from liberal to conservative. I added that the Democrats aren't liberal either, as much as they would like to believe so by calling the GOP "conservative". That the one does not imply the other was sort of my point. But the (mild) personal insult was, of course, intended, regardless of my point.