I don't think you can say that China is really founded on ideals of collectivism. More like Confucianism, which teaches subservience to authority. Collectivism is a new thing in China, and the rulers there have never done more than pay lip service to it's ideals.
Patents and copyright are not the same thing. It's a generic rendition of Ave Maria, how much you want to bet it was a work for hire? That's 120 years, man. Even if not, it's 90 years after the death of the author. It's more than likely still under copyright.
Did you even read the research I pointed you at? You are flat out wrong about humans. Have you ever taken one of those personality tests for a job to find out if you are going to steal or whatever? They work not by asking you what you would do, but by asking you what you think others would do. What you think about humans in general actually reflects more of who you are than what humans are really like.
You seem pretty sure of yourself. One question, do you maintain that surety by testing your ideas against every piece of evidence that comes along and creating the strongest framework of ideas you can, or do you maintain it by ignoring every piece of evidence to the contrary? Because it looks like you have done the latter here. Go one, google and read the research and then tell me how people are motivated by selfishness.
Admit it, that's just what you want to believe because it justifies you being that way. Very convenient, hmmm?
I should also point out that caring about justice and not wanting others to pay for my actions are in fact completely selfish behavior. It is in my interest to uphold justice so that others will uphold it for me. And making others pay for my actions breeds anger and also causes me to become lazy and self deluded, which are contrary to my own well being. So I'm not being Robin Hood, I'm being selfish and trying not to let you polluting bastards fuck me over.
So you're some kind of Robin Hood, huh? Seems you're getting a whole lot out of beleiving in global warming already. Does it give you a boner? Nope, I took one look at your mama and now the doctors say I'll never have a boner again.
I could give a fuck about what people think about me. I just don't want you bastards shitting all over the planet I have to live on.
Fair is owning up to the fact that your actions have an impact on the rest of us, and therefore you cannot just do whatever you like. I feel fairly confident about the fact that we are contributing to global warming, but that is irrelevant. There is enough cause for concern that we should not take the default position of business as usual. If it is shown, beyond a shadow of a doubt that we are not, then we can go back to business as usual. Until then, we should act as if we are contributing. Now, that does not mean going back to the stone age and giving up all technology. It just means prioritizing, and starting to do something about the ways in which we are impacting the planet, now. We can do something without completely killing the economy.
Honestly, I think a lot of lay opposition to the idea of global warming comes from conservatives who can't stand the idea of hippies being right.
You of course are absolutely right about science. I'm not referring to scientists, though. I'm referring to the mainstream understanding of things. There is no false dichotomy there, my friend. It is very real.
Their theories of how humans behave are discredited, What theories? And how are they discredited? The only theory of human behavior that has been discredited recently is the free market capitalist theory of the Selfish Actor. People aren't primarily motivated by selfishness, they are more motivated by fairness and reciprocity. Which sounds kind of... socialist, now doesn't it? Google "economic research fairness reciprocity" or look on the wikipedia page about games theory.
I'm sorry, but something really is happening to the climate. That is not politics, that is cold hard reality.
Reading comprehension isn't your strong suit, is it? Of course global warming is about facts. I was talking about motivations. In response to global warming, some people don't want to be inconvenienced, others would rather play fair.
Really? A HUGE industry, all based around preventing global warming? Bigger than the industries that contribute to it? Somehow, I don't think so, by orders of magnitude.
No, it is about negative externalities. We don't want the rest of you fucking up a shared resource, projecting the cost of your actions onto us. Global warming is not about "consensus science," whatever the hell that is supposed to be. Is the theory of gravity "consensus science?" No. Will you be ridiculed for rejecting it? Probably, unless you come up with something better. The global warming deniers haven't come up with better science.
I'm sorry if all that hurts your feelings. Science doesn't care about your feelings. No matter how much you are personally inconvenienced by the truth, it is still true. The fact is, the rancor comes from the global warming deniers, in that type's typical projection of their own motivations onto others. The global warming believers are merely responding in kind.
No one gets anything out of believing in global warming. There are no huge grants. There would be scientific fame, and real world wealth beyond counting for anyone that could prove it wrong. Almost everyone would have to change their lifestyle, yet some of us still care more about justice and not making others pay for our actions.
Anyone who knows me knows I like em big. Thats no insult in my parts, friend! What? You mean you don't like women who look like emaciated teenage boys? What kind of a weirdo heterosexual are you?
Heh. Yup, that's me, the ultrasocialist. Well, socialist anarchist, anyway. So I don't believe in socialism through coercion, but through voluntary association. I'm the one you probably foe'd due to one of my many anti private property rants.
We are talking about opinion. Whether killing in response to crime is valid is a matter of opinion. You can't claim it's a fact that it's okay, just as I can't claim it's a fact that it isn't. I'd love to see you try to come up with an argument that killing in response to a crime is, in FACT good, valid or morally defensible. No appeal to authority, either in the form of so-called natural rights or a supposed deity. No circular arguments either.
As far as crime versus stealing, well, I guess there are situations where capitol punishment is okay. It would need to be a crime of equal significance to the punishment, and there needs to be absolutely NO doubt about two things: the actual guilt of the accused, and the inability to rehabilitate same. If guilt is not certain, capitol punishment is too final. And by certain, I mean dozens of witnesses, a video, or the like. And rehabilitation can't be possible, or society is doing itself a disservice. We could be killing the person who is destined to come up with a cure for cancer. Until we can predict the future with absolute accuracy, capitol punishment hurts society as well.
Finally, capital punishment, by pandering to people's baser revenge instincts, encourages base moral reasoning and absolutism in other situations as well. There is a reason that mercy, compassion, and forgiveness are preached by most world religions. These provide peace of mind and freedom from internal oppression. Judge not lest ye be judged. Judged by yourself, that is.
So that is my argument. It is an argument designed to sway opinion, not to establish fact. This is not a matter of fact, unless you have access to some universal user's manual that I don't
I'm a victim of violent crime, missing one eye due to a mugging and I've forgiven my attackers. I would protest any form of capital punishment for them. I would oppose capitol punishment for much worse crimes than the one perpetrated against me. Two wrongs don't make a right, and a killing for a kidnapping or rape is not justice. It is revenge.
Revenge is a sickness that hurts the perpetrator. Failure to forgive creates a cancer of the mind. The mind becomes obsessed with the perception of wrong, and replays the painful event over and over again, causing the victim additional unnecessary suffering. The lack of perceived justice causes pain. Only through forgiveness is the pain alleviated. People who murder people who have done them wrong do not generally get any long term relief from the act.
Now, killing in self defense is another matter. Failing to kill someone who is going to kill you can make a powerful moral statement, but only if people know about it and know it was on purpose. Otherwise, it's your life or theirs, and they forced the question, so why not theirs? But killing for revenge is wrong on many levels. It hurts the original victim and does not provide real justice. It weakens the rule of law and undermines the trust we all need to place in society. It is bad for the victim, the perpetrator, and society and provides no benefit to anyone.
That's one of the dumber things I've read. How can anyone provide proof that murder in retaliation for theft is inexcusable? What kind of proof would be acceptable? It's a statement of belief! The author did not say "No one can excuse..." He said "It's inexcusable" which anyone with even the most basic reading comprehension skills understands to mean "I could not excuse."
But beyond that idiocy lurks a deeper and more sinister implication. You are implying that you think killing thieves is acceptable. I understand you have a fanatical belief in ultra strong property rights, but isn't that taking things a little far? Really, is that what you are trying to say, that you condone killing a thieves?
In my own personal opinion, that is immoral and you are an immoral person for implying that thieves should be killed. It boils down to theft of choice. Property theft represents a reduction in choices: you can no longer use that property. Murder takes away all choices a person could possibly have made. As such, it is in no way equivalent to property theft.
Well it would turn out that someone I like on Slashdot is in marketing. Sorry. To me the business of marketing is one of those modern endeavors that don't actually seem to contribute much to human happiness. At it's worst it's an evil mind control game, at it's best it provides a service that could be better provided by some kind of neutral review. Well, no, I suppose at its best it also provides some kind of art. But that could be provided without the attempt at coercion.
Don't feel too bad. There are several people here who've given me a hard time for eating meat. They think it's wrong, I don't. So just because I have a thing against marketing doesn't mean I have a thing against you. Despite the tone of my first post, I don't actually put marketing in the same category of employment as, say, professional torturer or used car salesman.
Great, now I'm going to get the used car salesmen after me.
It's black magic voodoo mind control. The purpose is not to tell people what products are available. Word of mouth would suffice, or directories like the yellow pages. If I want to know about a product or service, I will look it up. I don't need a marketer telling me what to buy.
Marketing is about getting people to do something they wouldn't normally do. It's about getting people to think they want things that aren't going to fill any real need. It's about convincing people to pay more for something than they would have normally. Marketer study human psychology to learn every possible lever for motivating people.
Marketers deny all this to the public, but in private when talking amongst themselves or to clients, they are very blunt about what they do. They brainwash people into wanting things they wouldn't normally want, buying things they wouldn't normally buy, and paying more extra money than the cost of marketing itself. It is an evil, immoral practice, and people who engage in advertising, marketing and public relations are morally bankrupt.
Never again will we have to worry about the gooey insides coming out. I thought that was the whole purpose of Stretch. I mean honestly, what could you do with Stretch? Stretch him. How long would that remain entertaining? Less than an hour. What do you do after that? If you were anything like me and my friends, you took a knife to him to see what was inside.
My mind will never experience your fist hitting my face. It would experience sensations of pressure,impact & pain. It would recreate a model inside itself that the common person would call your fist hitting my face, but that is just a model. It's not nonsense at all, it's a matter of definitions. It seems as though you are not comfortable with such principles as emergent properties and multiple levels of meaning, but that is not my problem.
Smarter people than you have stepped to me with that crap, and it go them nowhere either. So don't feel bad.
The councils defined the basics of Christian belief: that God is three-in-one, that Jesus was both completely Divine and completely human, with both a human and Divine will, that Jesus died and was reborn, and that we are forgiven of our sins through his sacrifice. I should point out that I am trying to look at things from the point of view of the church itself, which is what I believe the word "Christianity" refers to. Certainly someone can call themselves a Christian and believe whatever they want. And there are extant churches that claim the name Christian that do not subscribe to any of the beliefs expressed by the councils. Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, & Unitarians don't. The Assyrian and Oriental Orthodox church differ in their beliefs on the nature of Jesus' Divinity.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I tell most Christians that I follow the teachings of Christ, but I don't believe he died and was reborn to save me from my sins, they will say I am not a Christian.
Heck, I don't even know what bi-directional CableCARD 2.0 is, let alone whether it's a good thing. I've now been schooled. Thanks. As I said above, bummer. It could have been a cool technology. Why do I get the feeling that's a phrase I'll be saying over and over again? At least the vultures can't take open source away from us.
That's the beauty of Buddhism. The existence or lack of existence of Gods of any stripe, a personal soul, or an afterlife are completely immaterial to the theory and practice of Buddhism. Buddha wouldn't even answer those questions. When asked by another famous holy man of the time, he simply sat in silence.
Actually, it ALLOWS you to view shows on your computer. It's a spec for doing away with set top boxes and the like. With a Cable Card ready TV, you wouldn't need a set top box, you just plug the card into the TV. They also work with computers and other equipment. Try the Cable Card wiki page for more info.
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I don't think you can say that China is really founded on ideals of collectivism. More like Confucianism, which teaches subservience to authority. Collectivism is a new thing in China, and the rulers there have never done more than pay lip service to it's ideals.
Patents and copyright are not the same thing. It's a generic rendition of Ave Maria, how much you want to bet it was a work for hire? That's 120 years, man. Even if not, it's 90 years after the death of the author. It's more than likely still under copyright.
Did you even read the research I pointed you at? You are flat out wrong about humans. Have you ever taken one of those personality tests for a job to find out if you are going to steal or whatever? They work not by asking you what you would do, but by asking you what you think others would do. What you think about humans in general actually reflects more of who you are than what humans are really like.
You seem pretty sure of yourself. One question, do you maintain that surety by testing your ideas against every piece of evidence that comes along and creating the strongest framework of ideas you can, or do you maintain it by ignoring every piece of evidence to the contrary? Because it looks like you have done the latter here. Go one, google and read the research and then tell me how people are motivated by selfishness.
Admit it, that's just what you want to believe because it justifies you being that way. Very convenient, hmmm?
I should also point out that caring about justice and not wanting others to pay for my actions are in fact completely selfish behavior. It is in my interest to uphold justice so that others will uphold it for me. And making others pay for my actions breeds anger and also causes me to become lazy and self deluded, which are contrary to my own well being. So I'm not being Robin Hood, I'm being selfish and trying not to let you polluting bastards fuck me over.
I could give a fuck about what people think about me. I just don't want you bastards shitting all over the planet I have to live on.
Fair is owning up to the fact that your actions have an impact on the rest of us, and therefore you cannot just do whatever you like. I feel fairly confident about the fact that we are contributing to global warming, but that is irrelevant. There is enough cause for concern that we should not take the default position of business as usual. If it is shown, beyond a shadow of a doubt that we are not, then we can go back to business as usual. Until then, we should act as if we are contributing. Now, that does not mean going back to the stone age and giving up all technology. It just means prioritizing, and starting to do something about the ways in which we are impacting the planet, now. We can do something without completely killing the economy.
Honestly, I think a lot of lay opposition to the idea of global warming comes from conservatives who can't stand the idea of hippies being right.
You of course are absolutely right about science. I'm not referring to scientists, though. I'm referring to the mainstream understanding of things. There is no false dichotomy there, my friend. It is very real.
I'm sorry, but something really is happening to the climate. That is not politics, that is cold hard reality.
Reading comprehension isn't your strong suit, is it? Of course global warming is about facts. I was talking about motivations. In response to global warming, some people don't want to be inconvenienced, others would rather play fair.
Really? A HUGE industry, all based around preventing global warming? Bigger than the industries that contribute to it? Somehow, I don't think so, by orders of magnitude.
No, it is about negative externalities. We don't want the rest of you fucking up a shared resource, projecting the cost of your actions onto us. Global warming is not about "consensus science," whatever the hell that is supposed to be. Is the theory of gravity "consensus science?" No. Will you be ridiculed for rejecting it? Probably, unless you come up with something better. The global warming deniers haven't come up with better science.
I'm sorry if all that hurts your feelings. Science doesn't care about your feelings. No matter how much you are personally inconvenienced by the truth, it is still true. The fact is, the rancor comes from the global warming deniers, in that type's typical projection of their own motivations onto others. The global warming believers are merely responding in kind.
No one gets anything out of believing in global warming. There are no huge grants. There would be scientific fame, and real world wealth beyond counting for anyone that could prove it wrong. Almost everyone would have to change their lifestyle, yet some of us still care more about justice and not making others pay for our actions.
Heh. Yup, that's me, the ultrasocialist. Well, socialist anarchist, anyway. So I don't believe in socialism through coercion, but through voluntary association. I'm the one you probably foe'd due to one of my many anti private property rants.
We are talking about opinion. Whether killing in response to crime is valid is a matter of opinion. You can't claim it's a fact that it's okay, just as I can't claim it's a fact that it isn't. I'd love to see you try to come up with an argument that killing in response to a crime is, in FACT good, valid or morally defensible. No appeal to authority, either in the form of so-called natural rights or a supposed deity. No circular arguments either.
As far as crime versus stealing, well, I guess there are situations where capitol punishment is okay. It would need to be a crime of equal significance to the punishment, and there needs to be absolutely NO doubt about two things: the actual guilt of the accused, and the inability to rehabilitate same. If guilt is not certain, capitol punishment is too final. And by certain, I mean dozens of witnesses, a video, or the like. And rehabilitation can't be possible, or society is doing itself a disservice. We could be killing the person who is destined to come up with a cure for cancer. Until we can predict the future with absolute accuracy, capitol punishment hurts society as well.
Finally, capital punishment, by pandering to people's baser revenge instincts, encourages base moral reasoning and absolutism in other situations as well. There is a reason that mercy, compassion, and forgiveness are preached by most world religions. These provide peace of mind and freedom from internal oppression. Judge not lest ye be judged. Judged by yourself, that is.
So that is my argument. It is an argument designed to sway opinion, not to establish fact. This is not a matter of fact, unless you have access to some universal user's manual that I don't
I'm a victim of violent crime, missing one eye due to a mugging and I've forgiven my attackers. I would protest any form of capital punishment for them. I would oppose capitol punishment for much worse crimes than the one perpetrated against me. Two wrongs don't make a right, and a killing for a kidnapping or rape is not justice. It is revenge.
Revenge is a sickness that hurts the perpetrator. Failure to forgive creates a cancer of the mind. The mind becomes obsessed with the perception of wrong, and replays the painful event over and over again, causing the victim additional unnecessary suffering. The lack of perceived justice causes pain. Only through forgiveness is the pain alleviated. People who murder people who have done them wrong do not generally get any long term relief from the act.
Now, killing in self defense is another matter. Failing to kill someone who is going to kill you can make a powerful moral statement, but only if people know about it and know it was on purpose. Otherwise, it's your life or theirs, and they forced the question, so why not theirs? But killing for revenge is wrong on many levels. It hurts the original victim and does not provide real justice. It weakens the rule of law and undermines the trust we all need to place in society. It is bad for the victim, the perpetrator, and society and provides no benefit to anyone.
That's one of the dumber things I've read. How can anyone provide proof that murder in retaliation for theft is inexcusable? What kind of proof would be acceptable? It's a statement of belief! The author did not say "No one can excuse..." He said "It's inexcusable" which anyone with even the most basic reading comprehension skills understands to mean "I could not excuse."
But beyond that idiocy lurks a deeper and more sinister implication. You are implying that you think killing thieves is acceptable. I understand you have a fanatical belief in ultra strong property rights, but isn't that taking things a little far? Really, is that what you are trying to say, that you condone killing a thieves?
In my own personal opinion, that is immoral and you are an immoral person for implying that thieves should be killed. It boils down to theft of choice. Property theft represents a reduction in choices: you can no longer use that property. Murder takes away all choices a person could possibly have made. As such, it is in no way equivalent to property theft.
Well it would turn out that someone I like on Slashdot is in marketing. Sorry. To me the business of marketing is one of those modern endeavors that don't actually seem to contribute much to human happiness. At it's worst it's an evil mind control game, at it's best it provides a service that could be better provided by some kind of neutral review. Well, no, I suppose at its best it also provides some kind of art. But that could be provided without the attempt at coercion.
Don't feel too bad. There are several people here who've given me a hard time for eating meat. They think it's wrong, I don't. So just because I have a thing against marketing doesn't mean I have a thing against you. Despite the tone of my first post, I don't actually put marketing in the same category of employment as, say, professional torturer or used car salesman.
Great, now I'm going to get the used car salesmen after me.
It's black magic voodoo mind control. The purpose is not to tell people what products are available. Word of mouth would suffice, or directories like the yellow pages. If I want to know about a product or service, I will look it up. I don't need a marketer telling me what to buy.
Marketing is about getting people to do something they wouldn't normally do. It's about getting people to think they want things that aren't going to fill any real need. It's about convincing people to pay more for something than they would have normally. Marketer study human psychology to learn every possible lever for motivating people.
Marketers deny all this to the public, but in private when talking amongst themselves or to clients, they are very blunt about what they do. They brainwash people into wanting things they wouldn't normally want, buying things they wouldn't normally buy, and paying more extra money than the cost of marketing itself. It is an evil, immoral practice, and people who engage in advertising, marketing and public relations are morally bankrupt.
My mind will never experience your fist hitting my face. It would experience sensations of pressure,impact & pain. It would recreate a model inside itself that the common person would call your fist hitting my face, but that is just a model. It's not nonsense at all, it's a matter of definitions. It seems as though you are not comfortable with such principles as emergent properties and multiple levels of meaning, but that is not my problem.
Smarter people than you have stepped to me with that crap, and it go them nowhere either. So don't feel bad.
The councils defined the basics of Christian belief: that God is three-in-one, that Jesus was both completely Divine and completely human, with both a human and Divine will, that Jesus died and was reborn, and that we are forgiven of our sins through his sacrifice. I should point out that I am trying to look at things from the point of view of the church itself, which is what I believe the word "Christianity" refers to. Certainly someone can call themselves a Christian and believe whatever they want. And there are extant churches that claim the name Christian that do not subscribe to any of the beliefs expressed by the councils. Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, & Unitarians don't. The Assyrian and Oriental Orthodox church differ in their beliefs on the nature of Jesus' Divinity.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that if I tell most Christians that I follow the teachings of Christ, but I don't believe he died and was reborn to save me from my sins, they will say I am not a Christian.
That... took me longer than it should have to get. :-)
Heck, I don't even know what bi-directional CableCARD 2.0 is, let alone whether it's a good thing. I've now been schooled. Thanks. As I said above, bummer. It could have been a cool technology. Why do I get the feeling that's a phrase I'll be saying over and over again? At least the vultures can't take open source away from us.
That's the beauty of Buddhism. The existence or lack of existence of Gods of any stripe, a personal soul, or an afterlife are completely immaterial to the theory and practice of Buddhism. Buddha wouldn't even answer those questions. When asked by another famous holy man of the time, he simply sat in silence.
It sounded nice, though. :-(
Actually, it ALLOWS you to view shows on your computer. It's a spec for doing away with set top boxes and the like. With a Cable Card ready TV, you wouldn't need a set top box, you just plug the card into the TV. They also work with computers and other equipment. Try the Cable Card wiki page for more info.