Are you seriously not getting that making an argument out of a comparison between two parameters that are neither correlated nor dependent on each other is completely meaningless and a tool of propaganda at best? This has nothing to do with the safety of nuclear systems at all, this has everything to do with intellectual honesty and the quality of debate.
I completely agree that coal is bad. This is what I mean, actually - you made a valid comparison. That's something you can discuss rationally. I still think that nuclear is only a transitory solution on the way off coal. There are alternatives that are more sustainable and more safe. I am just sick and tired of the nuclear proponents on this site who don't even remotely engage in rational debate but use propagandist tricks like the comparison above - all while accusing the other side of being reigned by irrational fear and propaganda.
I find it interesting that you take any ethical component out of the concept of a natural right. Within your definition of the concept, that's perfectly fine - you have to assume, however, that positive rights, laid down by the social contract, can override these natural rights. After all, society does not recognize your natural right to kill someone. Usually the opponents of legal positivism come from the exactly opposite direction - warning of moral relativism that must arise when laws are viewed as a purely societal construct, and pointing to absolute natural rights as the cure, the protection against arbitrary laws. As for your definition of "self evident" - we just differ in the acknowledgment of an ethical consideration there - of course it is self evident that I have the ability to hit someone. I just don't view it as self-evident that I do have the right to do so.
You are seriously saying that Chernobyl caused less deaths than last months E. coli outbreak in Germany? Because that's what I have to read into his first quote, if I assume he did not exclude Chernobyl. If that is the case, we don't need to discuss further. On the topic of comparisons - yours are still meaningless. You can compare deaths by nuclear to deaths by windpower. That makes sense, because they are alternatives. Comparing deaths by nuclear with death by contaminated sprouts is meaningless, as they happen completely independent of each other. And that is nonsensical and pure propaganda. It's got the same quality of thought like saying "To put things into perspective: Car accidents cause more deaths than unprotected sex, so it is fine to fuck random strangers without a condom."
He did state "of the last quarter century" in his comparison with the organic sprouts. But if he includes Chernobly in the comparison with the latest E. Coli outbreak in Germany, he is blatantly lying - even if you take the highly biased IAEA numbers as a basis.
Didn't you get the memo? Editorial bias is peachy, as long as it is pro-nuke. I find the whole debate of this year fascinating actually - as soon as nuclear power gets questioned, even the most die-hard Gore-hater starts to acknowledge global warming and starts to rant about the environmental impact of coal. Now this is the logical conclusion - the "live free or die"-crowd finally shows colors and takes any chance to question democracy, because it sometimes leads to results they don't like.
Oh, great. This is a lovely talking point of the right lately - the made up idea that the US are no democracy - even from the beginning. Well, that's how you guys would like it, isn't it? In reality (you know, the thing rational people perceive), "republic" and "democracy" are orthogonal axes. You can have a republic without democracy - and that is why the right loves this talking point so much. To finally get rid of those pesky voters and install that feudal system with your corporate masters at the top and everyone else at serf level, wouldn't that be great?
Nice statistics. So you deliberately exclude Chernobyl and assess Fukushima knowingly way before any long-term effects could have set in. Why don't you just roll some dice instead? Your argument boils down to "The random number i just rolled up is larger than the number of victims of the largest nuclear disaster of the last quarter century". And what, by the way, is the point of comparing two completely unrelated causes of death, anyway? Not like the decision to go with or to abandon nuclear power has any effect on E. coli infections. I find it quite telling that the proponents of nuclear energy have to resort to such blatantly nonsensical comparisons. But hey, good enough for "insightful" mods on slashdot, so go ahead.
Ok, I wasn't implying you were a Randroid. I see your point, and it is obviously arguable - it just is way off what "natural rights" usually mean in legal theory. You seem to consider the whole concept as wholly neutral - there is no distinction between capability and right in your theory. Which raises the question what the concept of right even means there. As I see it, the classic definition of a natural right is that it is self-evident and unalienable. That would include things like the right to life, but I would be hard pressed to consider the the "natural right" to hit somebody to be self-evident and unalienable.
Who says I deny all such postulates? The naturalistic fallacy is about deriving an "ought" from an "is". It basically says that just because something is in a certain way by nature, you can't derive from that that it ought to be that way.
Teach a man to fish... and he'll always pay you license fees to partake in the fishing rights you thoughtfully secured for yourself beforehand. Set a man on fire, though... and he surely will be warm for the rest of his life. Any more pointless sayings?
Yeah, that's my point. You are a pure legal positivist that does not recognize any "natural" rights. Basically my position. It's a societal construct - where else would it come from.
Here we go, was about time that this developed into a paranoid rant on the gubmint being out for you. Rights are completely meaningless on the level of the individual. The isolated man does not need rights. Rights develop as soon as a society of more than one develops - and therefor a government. And please, absent a government, they would have all those things in relation to their ability to defend them? Yes, a truism. Which translates into "they would not have them at all, because they'd find themselves slaves of the local warlord/strongman within the year".
How exactly is German case law relevant here? It's not even highly relevant for Germany, not being a common law system. You are aware that patents are already granted on a European scope by the European Patent Office under the articles of the European Patent Agreement? The relevant case law is the case law of the boards of appeal of the EPO. All the Unitary patent would change is that litigation gets moved from the national courts to additional boards of the EPO or a similar, yet to be created organization. As to your last point, why should a software engineer be privileged over an electrical engineer, who indeed has to check the patented state of the art before developing anything?
If you can understand the technical merits of the LZW compression patent, you are obviously not against software patents per se, but rather against the granting practice of the patent offices. There you have a point, in particular when looking at the US. I completely agree that stuff along the lines of 1-click should be not patentable. Not because it is basically software, but because it is trivial. However, an algorithm of sufficient complexity is completely patent-worthy in my opinion.
But that is getting to the core of the matter - you do not have the right to live simply by being alive. At least not granted by nature - nature will take this ability from you in a heartbeat. Same with the right to think - tell the Alzheimer patient that he has a natural right to think. Nature doesn't care. In fact, civilization values those rights higher - as we fight natural causes of death and loss of mind. It's a matter of the naturalistic fallacy anyway - you can't derive an "ought" from an "is". As for your last part, I find the logic highly dubious - if you stop considering someone who infringes on the natural rights of other "people", don't you alienate is natural rights in the highest extreme yourself? In the end, I am way more comfortable around legal positivists. People thinking in absolutes are dangerous.
And your creator sent you that list of "natural rights" when? And how? Per Fedex? Or does he do his business with UPS? Besides, the whole debate is a technicality. I am pretty sure all those guys who died in the Gulag, the Concentration Camps, in the Killing Fields and wherever would be thrilled to know that their "natural rights" could not be taken from them, only infringed upon. Imagine how much worse it would have been if rights were positive.
In other words, as long as I get by, please, go ahead and reduce everyone else to serf or slave-status. Paying people a living wage would infringe on my god given right to maximize my personal profits. Remember, kids, minimal wages are SOCIALISM. Better avoid that hellish trap and make it perfectly legal to employ 10-year olds for a nickel a day.
What's with the right wing obsession with natural rights lately? The legal positivism debate has been done to death. Where do you think your "natural rights" come from? Nowhere but from a societal agreement what a natural right actually is. Defining a right as natural or positive doesn't change the slightest bit the ease of it being taken away. Are you invoking some kind of magic here?
The whole summary is epic trolling by the usual anti-IP zealots. Someone please explain to me how the Unitary patent is a push towards software patents? It's basically meant to fix that fact that today, after applying for an European patent, you end up having a bundle of national patents for each member state, which all have to be litigated separately if it comes to that. Oh, and while you are at it, explain to me why software patents are a bad thing. Or IP in general. Bring rational facts, would be a change to the last 10 years of discussion here.
Dude, you can have my FORTRAN compiler when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands. Now where did I leave those punchcards for the latest project again?? AND GET OFF MY LAWN!
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Are you seriously not getting that making an argument out of a comparison between two parameters that are neither correlated nor dependent on each other is completely meaningless and a tool of propaganda at best? This has nothing to do with the safety of nuclear systems at all, this has everything to do with intellectual honesty and the quality of debate.
I completely agree that coal is bad. This is what I mean, actually - you made a valid comparison. That's something you can discuss rationally. I still think that nuclear is only a transitory solution on the way off coal. There are alternatives that are more sustainable and more safe. I am just sick and tired of the nuclear proponents on this site who don't even remotely engage in rational debate but use propagandist tricks like the comparison above - all while accusing the other side of being reigned by irrational fear and propaganda.
I find it interesting that you take any ethical component out of the concept of a natural right. Within your definition of the concept, that's perfectly fine - you have to assume, however, that positive rights, laid down by the social contract, can override these natural rights. After all, society does not recognize your natural right to kill someone. Usually the opponents of legal positivism come from the exactly opposite direction - warning of moral relativism that must arise when laws are viewed as a purely societal construct, and pointing to absolute natural rights as the cure, the protection against arbitrary laws. As for your definition of "self evident" - we just differ in the acknowledgment of an ethical consideration there - of course it is self evident that I have the ability to hit someone. I just don't view it as self-evident that I do have the right to do so.
How's the persecution complex, mate? Even more minorities out to get you this week?
You are seriously saying that Chernobyl caused less deaths than last months E. coli outbreak in Germany? Because that's what I have to read into his first quote, if I assume he did not exclude Chernobyl. If that is the case, we don't need to discuss further. On the topic of comparisons - yours are still meaningless. You can compare deaths by nuclear to deaths by windpower. That makes sense, because they are alternatives. Comparing deaths by nuclear with death by contaminated sprouts is meaningless, as they happen completely independent of each other. And that is nonsensical and pure propaganda. It's got the same quality of thought like saying "To put things into perspective: Car accidents cause more deaths than unprotected sex, so it is fine to fuck random strangers without a condom."
He did state "of the last quarter century" in his comparison with the organic sprouts. But if he includes Chernobly in the comparison with the latest E. Coli outbreak in Germany, he is blatantly lying - even if you take the highly biased IAEA numbers as a basis.
Didn't you get the memo? Editorial bias is peachy, as long as it is pro-nuke. I find the whole debate of this year fascinating actually - as soon as nuclear power gets questioned, even the most die-hard Gore-hater starts to acknowledge global warming and starts to rant about the environmental impact of coal. Now this is the logical conclusion - the "live free or die"-crowd finally shows colors and takes any chance to question democracy, because it sometimes leads to results they don't like.
Oh, great. This is a lovely talking point of the right lately - the made up idea that the US are no democracy - even from the beginning. Well, that's how you guys would like it, isn't it? In reality (you know, the thing rational people perceive), "republic" and "democracy" are orthogonal axes. You can have a republic without democracy - and that is why the right loves this talking point so much. To finally get rid of those pesky voters and install that feudal system with your corporate masters at the top and everyone else at serf level, wouldn't that be great?
Nice statistics. So you deliberately exclude Chernobyl and assess Fukushima knowingly way before any long-term effects could have set in. Why don't you just roll some dice instead? Your argument boils down to "The random number i just rolled up is larger than the number of victims of the largest nuclear disaster of the last quarter century". And what, by the way, is the point of comparing two completely unrelated causes of death, anyway? Not like the decision to go with or to abandon nuclear power has any effect on E. coli infections. I find it quite telling that the proponents of nuclear energy have to resort to such blatantly nonsensical comparisons. But hey, good enough for "insightful" mods on slashdot, so go ahead.
Ok, I wasn't implying you were a Randroid. I see your point, and it is obviously arguable - it just is way off what "natural rights" usually mean in legal theory. You seem to consider the whole concept as wholly neutral - there is no distinction between capability and right in your theory. Which raises the question what the concept of right even means there. As I see it, the classic definition of a natural right is that it is self-evident and unalienable. That would include things like the right to life, but I would be hard pressed to consider the the "natural right" to hit somebody to be self-evident and unalienable.
Who says I deny all such postulates? The naturalistic fallacy is about deriving an "ought" from an "is". It basically says that just because something is in a certain way by nature, you can't derive from that that it ought to be that way.
Teach a man to fish... and he'll always pay you license fees to partake in the fishing rights you thoughtfully secured for yourself beforehand. Set a man on fire, though... and he surely will be warm for the rest of his life. Any more pointless sayings?
Yeah, that's my point. You are a pure legal positivist that does not recognize any "natural" rights. Basically my position. It's a societal construct - where else would it come from.
You are confusing "is" and "ought" again - the good old naturalistic fallacy. You list abilities as rights?
Here we go, was about time that this developed into a paranoid rant on the gubmint being out for you. Rights are completely meaningless on the level of the individual. The isolated man does not need rights. Rights develop as soon as a society of more than one develops - and therefor a government. And please, absent a government, they would have all those things in relation to their ability to defend them? Yes, a truism. Which translates into "they would not have them at all, because they'd find themselves slaves of the local warlord/strongman within the year".
How exactly is German case law relevant here? It's not even highly relevant for Germany, not being a common law system. You are aware that patents are already granted on a European scope by the European Patent Office under the articles of the European Patent Agreement? The relevant case law is the case law of the boards of appeal of the EPO. All the Unitary patent would change is that litigation gets moved from the national courts to additional boards of the EPO or a similar, yet to be created organization. As to your last point, why should a software engineer be privileged over an electrical engineer, who indeed has to check the patented state of the art before developing anything?
If you can understand the technical merits of the LZW compression patent, you are obviously not against software patents per se, but rather against the granting practice of the patent offices. There you have a point, in particular when looking at the US. I completely agree that stuff along the lines of 1-click should be not patentable. Not because it is basically software, but because it is trivial. However, an algorithm of sufficient complexity is completely patent-worthy in my opinion.
But that is getting to the core of the matter - you do not have the right to live simply by being alive. At least not granted by nature - nature will take this ability from you in a heartbeat. Same with the right to think - tell the Alzheimer patient that he has a natural right to think. Nature doesn't care. In fact, civilization values those rights higher - as we fight natural causes of death and loss of mind. It's a matter of the naturalistic fallacy anyway - you can't derive an "ought" from an "is". As for your last part, I find the logic highly dubious - if you stop considering someone who infringes on the natural rights of other "people", don't you alienate is natural rights in the highest extreme yourself? In the end, I am way more comfortable around legal positivists. People thinking in absolutes are dangerous.
Again, you posit a certain list of rights as "natural". Where do they come from? Why those? I didn't get any memo.
And your creator sent you that list of "natural rights" when? And how? Per Fedex? Or does he do his business with UPS? Besides, the whole debate is a technicality. I am pretty sure all those guys who died in the Gulag, the Concentration Camps, in the Killing Fields and wherever would be thrilled to know that their "natural rights" could not be taken from them, only infringed upon. Imagine how much worse it would have been if rights were positive.
In other words, as long as I get by, please, go ahead and reduce everyone else to serf or slave-status. Paying people a living wage would infringe on my god given right to maximize my personal profits. Remember, kids, minimal wages are SOCIALISM. Better avoid that hellish trap and make it perfectly legal to employ 10-year olds for a nickel a day.
So, let them rot in the gutters? No shortage of that "resource" anyway. I like your dehumanizing style, Stalin would be proud of you, son.
What's with the right wing obsession with natural rights lately? The legal positivism debate has been done to death. Where do you think your "natural rights" come from? Nowhere but from a societal agreement what a natural right actually is. Defining a right as natural or positive doesn't change the slightest bit the ease of it being taken away. Are you invoking some kind of magic here?
The whole summary is epic trolling by the usual anti-IP zealots. Someone please explain to me how the Unitary patent is a push towards software patents? It's basically meant to fix that fact that today, after applying for an European patent, you end up having a bundle of national patents for each member state, which all have to be litigated separately if it comes to that. Oh, and while you are at it, explain to me why software patents are a bad thing. Or IP in general. Bring rational facts, would be a change to the last 10 years of discussion here.
Dude, you can have my FORTRAN compiler when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands. Now where did I leave those punchcards for the latest project again?? AND GET OFF MY LAWN!