Because they are afraid, very afraid that the fan films will be better than their own productions.
That is a rather low bar to clear for much of the Star Trek universe. Some genuinely good stuff but way too much really bad writing and the plot holes generally don't get any bigger than they do on Star Trek.
Autopilot still has a far better safety record than human drivers.
There is insufficient data to take that claim seriously at this point. Autopilot features are promising but need a LOT more miles in real world conditions before it is safe to make generalizations like that. I know a lot of people have high hopes for autopilot (myself included) but let's not let our expectations get in the way of scientific evidence.
One thing I do feel comfortable stating is that more people are going to die before autopilot features become truly safe. There are lots of corner cases that we're going to have a hard time predicting and we'll only learn about after some accidents occur. This is the case with any new transportation technology. Airlines are very safe these days but early on they were significantly less so because there were problems we didn't know about yet. Airline windows are rounded because we learned the hard way about stress fractures from sharp cornered windows which wasn't obvious at the time. People had to die to learn that lesson. This won't be the last time someone dies making autopilot safe.
Having the car on autopilot, but requiring the driver to "pay attention" and be ready to take over within seconds is the worst combination possible.
Not in all cases. We've had cruise control for many years which is a crude form of autopilot. It's been my experience that (surprisingly) it doesn't result in paying less attention to the traffic around you. If anything my experience has been the opposite. I tend to actually pay as much or more attention when the cruise control is on. I've spoken with other drivers who have experience the same thing. What you are saying has merit but there is some nuance there too. I don't think it is quite as simple as autopilot = less attention though that will be the case sometimes.
What is the reason one would switch the car to autopilot? Most likely so that they can be less attentive to the road.
Physical comfort for one. I use cruise control because keeping my leg locked in a single position for long periods is physically uncomfortable. I could see someone using greater degrees of automation for similar reasons. Again, you are not wrong but there is nuance here.
Why couldn't it see the tires, undercarriage, and side reflectors?
Probably for reasons similar to why people sometimes don't see such things. Sensors are imperfect just like our eyes. They work very well under some conditions and very poorly under other. It's generally not hard to find a corner case where a given sensor can't see something very well. As long as you can control the conditions that isn't a problem but out driving in the real world you can't control the conditions so it's really hard to get a sensor suite that will cover all the numerous corner cases.
Here's the uncomfortable truth about automating cars to drive themselves. People are going to die. We can't always predict where the corner cases are and the only way to find them will be through cars getting in accidents. There is a saying in the navy that "The rules are written in blood". People had to die to find out what worked and what didn't and to develop the rules they use. You deviate from those rules at your peril. We don't know what the rules for safe automated driverless cars are yet and the only way we are going to find out some of them is for some people to get hurt. Some will die so that many may live.
So the countries don't mean to collect the tax? Then why did they pass the laws to try to collect it? If they want to collect the tax then they need to pass the laws to close the loopholes. If they don't want to collect the tax then they need to repeal the taxes so the companies don't have to deal with the burden of trying to dodge the taxes. Either way it DOES need to be fixed. I don't really give a crap how they fix it so long as we don't have large companies with entire departments whose sole purpose is the avoidance of legally levied taxes. THAT is nothing but a drain on society.
Are you a priest? You're obviously not a lawyer...
What does being a priest have to do with having a sense of ethics? Those are orthogonal concepts. Sounds like you might be lacking a sense of ethics if you think dodging taxes through convoluted legal maneuvering is behavior to encourage.
Then you're in the wrong profession for someone with your temperament and outlook.
Gee thanks for enlightening me that accountants are for some reason not supposed to have a sense of morality. [/sarcasm] How about you leave it to me to decide what might suit my temperament since you know almost nothing about me and you clearly know nothing about accountants in general.
It is NOT a right of government to collect taxes. It is the consent of the governed that provides that authority. It is a limited power (see below) Consent isn't a right. Taking without consent is what we call "Rape".
Ok Captain Pedantic. You want to play rules lawyer with the specific legal meanings of those words. Fine. The supreme law of the land give the government the authority collect taxes. This means our government has the right/authority/legal-basis to collect taxes. Pick the word that suits you but it all means the same thing in practice. Consent of the government has nothing to do with whether or not the government has the legal right to collect tax. Consent of the governed is the theory of where authority comes from, not what the authority actually allows. Instead of governing authority being derived from a diety as was often the case previously, our founding fathers used a justification for government based on philosophy and practicality instead of mythology. It's about our COLLECTIVE consent to the existence of a particular government, not what that government's powers might actually consist of. It has essentially no relevance to your obvious distaste for taxation in spite of the fact that that same taxation is what permits the very rights and lifestyle you cherish so much.
If you're going to refer to an document, and use that to justify taxes, you should also realize that that document limits taxation for only two purposes.
"...to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States". Yes I already pointed that out via a link. General Welfare is a pretty broad notion and probably covers whatever it is that you think you shouldn't be obligated to pay for. It's in the Constitution which means that the government has been granted the power to tax you.
I read it all the time. I actually know what's in it. I use specific words (right, authority, consent etc) on purpose.
Evidently you either don't read it or don't understand it since you seem to persist in this belief that our government has no legal authority to tax you.
Your #1 flaw in your presumption is you assume that the government has a RIGHT to collect taxes. It does not have that right.
They do have a right to collect taxes. It's not even a question. In the US this is enshrined in the Constitution. You might try reading it sometime. Other countries have similar legal frameworks. Your notion that governments have no right to collect taxes is preposterous nonsense. Furthermore it would be impossible to have a functioning civil society without taxation and you can't have taxation in the first place without a legal framework to support it. It's legal, appropriate and necessary. Get over it.
It is a necessary evil that we collect taxes, and everyone, everywhere should do everything in their power to avoid taxes, and keep their own money. I would consider it a duty of the citizen to avoid all taxes as legally possible.
Taxes are the price of civilized society. Don't like taxes? Go live in the woods somewhere off the grid. If you want to be a part of society then shut up, pay your fair share, and enjoy the results. Don't think the amount you are asked to pay is fair? Work to get the tax law reformed but understand that you will need to pay enough to cover the government services that we collectively demand.
Taxes are regressive. All of them.
I don't think you have a clue what the word regressive actually means when it comes to tax.
The seller doesn't want to do the paperwork of collecting the tax. I hardly sympathize. It's the cost of doing business. They can hire another accountant.
Actually the don't even have to hire a new accountant. Just task the one they already have looking for sneaky ways to dodge the taxes to take care of the problem. Wouldn't cost them any extra from a personnel standpoint.
a person familiar with the matter said, barely a month after the internet company had its headquarters in France searched on suspicion of tax evasion.
I don't think there is any doubt that they are evading taxes. The problem is that they appear to be doing so (technically) legally. I'm wondering when countries will wise up and finally start changing the laws to make this sort of tax dodging hard or impossible. I realize to some degree this is playing a game of legal whack-a-mole but it needs to be done.
A spokeswoman for Google said in a brief statement the company complied with fiscal legislation in Spain just as it did in all countries where it operated.
While that is most likely true it also is nothing more than avoiding the question. They know they are avoiding taxes and the fact that they manage to do so in some clever legal fiction doesn't make is any more ethical. Google is hugely profitable and the shell game they are playing to avoid taxes is reprehensible as far as I'm concerned. I'm particularly galled when they act like it is somehow the fault of the lawmakers that they are dodging taxes they really should owe.
Spare me the arguments about "it's legal so it's right" - lots of things are legal but aren't ethical and this is one of them. I'm an accountant and crap like this just infuriates me because I'm the one that would be asked to be "morally flexible" about this.
Maybe not with a '79 Chevy you don't, but with any *modern* car you take it to a good mechanic and run an ECM diagnostic, compression test and look for any broken suspension components or evidence of repair and you'll know really well what kind of condition its in.
Not necessarily true. It's not terribly hard to hide many mechanical problems. And many problems can be "repaired" without leaving a shred of evidence. And even the best mechanic may not find every problem with a vehicle. Sure, some things are obvious but many aren't. Intermittent electrical problems are something I've dealt with on a few VW vehicles I've had but no mechanic would be likely to run into them. I've sold several cars that I considered to be unreliable but you'd never know it even with a fairly detailed inspection.
Let me give you an example I saw about 15 years ago on how problems can be hid. A guy I used to work with had a car that had some cylinders that were making bad noise and showing signs of impending failure. He decided he needed some new wheels so what he did was to get a couple of quarts of motor honey which temporarily hid the problem. Then he drove it straight to the dealer, negotiated for a new vehicle, trade in his "runs great" car, and drove away with a new vehicle. Now the dealer examined the car but they didn't notice the problem and the dealer had their people inspect the vehicle, including mechanics. And I'm not surprised the problem got overlooked. Unless the dealer was willing to do a compression test and a few other tests as well, they wouldn't find the problem nor was there any hint that the vehicle was in bad condition.
Plus with any late model car (1-2 years old) it still carries the bulk of the factory warranty and most dealer-sold cars are certified and carry an extension of the factory bumper to bumper warranty. Unless its a total lemon (unlikely in my experience), there's almost no mechanical risk if you do your homework.
Typically these days the amount of depreciation is more dependent on the brand and model than anything else. Toyota's will depreciate less than Fords as a general proposition. Certain models of car will depreciate barely at all while others lose their value faster than a gallon of milk.
I totally agree, especially in the light of the fact that a dealer can drive your 'new' car around for several hundred miles with no 'depreciation', but the instant the purchaser drives away the car is suddenly worth less ?
The biggest reason for this is the problem of information asymmetry. When the dealer sells you a "new" car, that carries certain warranties and guarantees of condition along with it. You can reasonably assume that the vehicle hasn't been used for drag racing and that even with a few tens of miles on it that it is for all practical purposes is as good as the factory can make it and you cannot find one in meaningfully better condition anywhere. The moment you drive it off the lot as a new owner all that information about how the car has been used is immediately lost. We have no idea how you as the new owner have treated the vehicle or how it has held up or what problems you might have experienced. A new buyer has no idea why you are selling it and even if you tell them they can't be sure you aren't lying. Ergo, the vehicle is worth less than before because of that information asymmetry.
Basically if you are selling a car with 1,000 miles on it, the buyer has to ask why you are selling it with so few miles. Is there something wrong with the car? The buyer can never be sure and so the buyer's willingness to pay will generally be less than it might be for a "new" vehicle.
Explain to me exactly how it benefits you that foreign students should come and take up a slot in one of our universities and then take up a slot in one of our high-paying jobs?
First off, the number of slots in universities and the number of high paying jobs is not fixed. The more smart people we have here the more value they create and the number of jobs actually grows. Apparently you've forgotten that America is actually a country of immigrants. Just 3 generations ago my family members came to this country and you know what? It works out fine. They worked hard, created value and the size of the economic pie grew. We forget that fact at our peril. China and India have 4 people to every one of ours and they are just as smart as we are. We NEED those smart people over here if we want to remain competitive and relevant.
It there is no benefit to you over a US citizen taking up those slots.
First off you are wrong that they are taking a slot away from an American. Second it is very beneficial to me having smart people here creating technology, building businesses, growing our economy. I don't give a crap where they were born. I care what they do while they are here.
So why are you advocating something that's not in your interest?
I'm not. I actually understand what is in my interest. Especially the fact that country of birth has zero relevance to the discussion. If you try to protect what you have by keeping smart people who are willing to work here out you are just cutting your own throat in the long run. I want the smartest, most ambitious, most talented, most hard working people to be here in the US. That will hugely benefit both you and me. Keep them out at your own peril.
We already discourage students from pursuing STEM degrees by allowing companies like Facebook and Microsoft to import cheap labor in the form of H1-B visas
You do realize that there is a LOT more to STEM fields than working for large IT firms right? I have an engineering degree and I work in manufacturing. (and manufacturing in the US is alive and well in spite of claims to the contrary) Most scientists, engineers and mathematicians don't work in Silicon Valley or Seattle. H1B visas are simply Not A Thing among engineers in my industry. They just aren't. I'm not saying they aren't a problem (they are) but they aren't as wide spread or severe a problem as is sometimes claimed. Frankly H1B visas are kind of small potatoes in the challenges presented by global competition.
are we now to add a further disincentive by saying that anybody who can slither under the wire to get accepted to a U.S. university (and graduate) is now your permanent competition inside the United States?
If they work here in the US under a Green Card they aren't going to be paid H1B wages. The company can't deport them and the worker has basically the same rights as a US citizen. Furthermore they are your competition whether or not they are here in the US. Plenty of software and technology is developed outside the US and they don't stop being smart, talented people just because they don't work inside the US. It's actually to your benefit to have as much talent here in the US doing useful things as possible. If they go elsewhere much of their economic benefit goes with them. If there are a lot of smart talented people here then the pool of jobs here grows. If they go elsewhere then they don't create value here and there ends up being fewer jobs. America is a country of immigrants. We only hurt ourselves when we forget that fact.
Policies like this are why the idiots in Britain voted to shoot their country (and themselves, directly) in the foot with a "Brexit" vote--because of the perception that their government serves "outsiders" ahead of them.
Spare me. Many British voters voted for Brexit in large part because of racism and xenophobia. And frankly given Britian's colonial past them complaining about outsiders is hugely ironic. It wasn't that long ago that Britain was a large empire based on screwing over foreigners in places like India.
It's worth considering though - that the odds right now is that Volkswagen will not exist much longer.
Unless the German government decides to let VW fail it will not go anywhere. Yes there will be substantial financial fallout but I doubt a VW liquidation is likely. The government of Lower Saxony owns 20.2% and German law requires an 80% shareholder agreement on any major decisions. As large shareholders they are unlikely to let VW cease to exist.
This is the first penalty - and almost 15 Billion it's a huge one
VW has around $48 Billion in cash an equivalents. Furthermore with the government as a shareholder it potentially can tap into lines of credit. It's going to suck but VW has a pretty strong balance sheet to weather the storm.
The last estimate I saw suggested some 40 people may have died because of the additional NOx pollution, although pollution doesn't work that way
When you are talking about large populations it actually does work that way. They can't tell you which 40 they are and there are some meaningful error bars around that number. But it's not impossibly hard to show how a given source of pollution impacts the health of a population. Doing it right is just a lot of work. You compare the heath outcomes to a control group and control for variables. Typically when they cite these studies they are talking about models rather than retrospective data analysis which is usually where things go off the rails. If they are talking about a computer model which has not been checked against real world data then yes you should be suspicious. But just because there are bad models out there doesn't mean it is impossible to do it correctly.
Because the vehicles produced more NOx, they also consumed less fuel and they produced less soot, HC, and CO2. They went ahead and calculated the additional deaths from NOx, but they didn't subtract the reduced deaths from soot and HC, nor from the reduced impact on climate change.
Just because there might be offsetting deaths doesn't mean the effects of the NOx aren't real. You might (stress might) be right about the fact that the overall mortality rate might not change much but that doesn't mean a specific cause can be ignored. If more people die in car crashes then fewer will die from heart disease. That doesn't mean the car crash problem can be ignored or discounted.
Potentially more abuse prone than the H1B visa. Diploma mills are already a reality in many parts of the world, adding a green card as an incentive and the potential for abuse is immense.
So you limit it to select accredited universities. Problem solved. If someone can graduate from MIT with an engineering degree and wants to stay in the USA, we're idiots to not help them do that. It only becomes a problem if we don't pay any attention to how it's done.
VAG is getting raked over the coals for selling cars that people wanted.
No they are getting raked over the coals for selling cars that they claimed were what people wanted when in fact they fraudulently were not.
There was not even a hint that these cars disappointed even a single owner.
Bull droppings. 20 seconds on Google would clearly establish that there are a lot of owners that are very disappointed in these cars now that they know they are not what they were claimed to be.
And if flashing the firmware was easy, I'm guessing that pretty much every single owner would have installed this code on their own.
Flashing firmware on a car IS easy if you have the right equipment. That doesn't mean people want to do it on their own. First, doing so can void the car's warranty. Second, doing so can result in a vehicle that performs worse or not at all if something goes wrong. Even the car companies don't mess around with the firmware on a production vehicle unless they absolutely have to. Third, just like with PCs, many people are uncomfortable screwing around with the internals even if they are smart enough to do it.
Your car is filled with airbags and seatbelts and crumple zones and all sorts designed to protect you during a crash. Pedestrians have none of that (at least for the time being)
All those safety features are independent of the decision of where to aim the vehicle. You never use them intentionally. They come into play when the decision of where to aim the vehicle goes awry. Pedestrians lacking protection is nothing new and does not change the situation in the slightest when considering whether to put computers in charge of the driving.
The CAR should protect you (using those safety features), the AI should do what drivers are supposed to do - cause the least amount of carnage on the road.
It is unreasonable to expect a driver to protect the lives of others in preference to his own. We don't expect that now and having computers drive the car does not change that calculus. There is no way I would get into a car that was purposely programmed to preferentially kill me as an occupant under any circumstances. I'm willing to get on public transportation only with the understanding that the pilot/engineer shares my sense of self preservation. If I thought that there was any chance that the driver a vehicle (human or not) would not protect my life then there is no chance I board that vehicle.
Sorry but if the choice is you or me then you are going to die. Nothing personal. I would expect the same in reverse. The only people whose lives I value more than my own are immediate family and you aren't a member of that group. Like they say before a boxing match, protect yourself at all times.
For about a century now, artillery has generally been used to kill people the gunners can't see, and in WWII artillery was the main killer
A human still had to make the decision to fire the artillery and in general they had a pretty good idea what they were shooting at and what the consequences might be. Once the decision to fire is made then it is merely mechanics but there still had to be an ethical consideration prior to giving the order to fire. Computers have no sense of ethics or compassion. They should be treated like a part of the weapon but any decision about whether or not to kill should never be abdicated by humans for any reaon.
Once killing is reduced to shooting at coordinates someone else supplies, is it that different from sending in robots?
If you give the robots autonomy to make kill/no-kill decisions then yes it is hugely different. When you fire artillery or drop a bomb, the consideration about whether to kill is made prior to triggering the weapon. If you give kill autonomy to a robot then humans are abdicating that responsibility which is dangerous and unethical. Very different situations.
More importantly no law should ever say I must sacrifice my own life to preserve others.
I think you'll find the Uniform Code of Military Justice has some exceptions to that but in civilian life you are quite right. I cannot imagine getting into a vehicle where it might be programmed to preferentially kill me instead of someone else depending on the circumstances. If I'm the driver of a vehicle and the tragic choice is my life or yours, unless you are my wife or child you are going to die. Sorry about that but there are only a few people whose life I value more than my own. Chances are yours isn't one of them and I would expect the same in reverse. The fact that a computer is driving the car instead of me does not change that calculus in the slightest.
I don't see why this is such a conundrum. Right now we presume the driver of a human operated vehicle will in most cases attempt to save the occupants of the vehicle first since the imperative of the driver will be self preservation. I see no reason why this would need to change. All that has changed is that the driver isn't human but it's reasonable to expect the driver of the vehicle (human or not) to attempt to preserve the life of the occupants of the vehicle first because it fundamentally will have more control over that. People outside the vehicle should be responsible for preserving their own lives because they have more control over that. Basically preserve the status quo. The fact that a machine is driving really doesn't necessitate a change. Yes there will always be some corner cases but that's no different than today either.
No matter what we do there will be some casualties just like with almost any new technology while people get adjusted to it. Fatalities in automobiles, aircraft, trains, etc all were substantially higher when they were new technologies than they are today. Over time it will mature and legal frameworks will be built to deal with the accidents that will inevitably occur.
Wreck It Ralph was not a movie designed from a game. It referenced various games and it was based on a fictional game but there was no Wreck It Ralph game in the real world that existed prior to the movie. QED it doesn't count for purposes of this discussion.
Minecraft is still one of the most-played PC games.
Happy Days was still one of the most watched shows on TV when Fonzie literally jumped the shark with the show that eventually coined the phrase. Plenty of media properties have jumped the shark while still popular. It doesn't mark the end but it usually marks the beginning of the end or at least a slow decline.
Yes, we are a very long way from letting these things operate completely autonomously, but they don't need to.
We should NEVER let these things operated with complete autonomy. Ever. Doing so is both unethical and a bad idea for very practical reasons as well.
The drones can be operated remotely by human operators, then once the decision has been made to engage a target the drone switches over to automatic for the actual combat.
Actual combat isn't a simple thing that you can switch on and off. It's messier than that. Giving complete autonomy to a drone at any point is a highly questionable idea because your ability to retake control may be out of your hands. Once the bullet leaves the chamber it's pretty hard to bring it back. Real combat isn't like a video game where you have nice clean indications of when it starts and when it stops. I cannot see any reasonable non-trivial scenario where it would be ethical or sensible to give complete autonomy to a machine for any longer than absolutely necessary.
Slashdot Mirror
Because they are afraid, very afraid that the fan films will be better than their own productions.
That is a rather low bar to clear for much of the Star Trek universe. Some genuinely good stuff but way too much really bad writing and the plot holes generally don't get any bigger than they do on Star Trek.
Autopilot still has a far better safety record than human drivers.
There is insufficient data to take that claim seriously at this point. Autopilot features are promising but need a LOT more miles in real world conditions before it is safe to make generalizations like that. I know a lot of people have high hopes for autopilot (myself included) but let's not let our expectations get in the way of scientific evidence.
One thing I do feel comfortable stating is that more people are going to die before autopilot features become truly safe. There are lots of corner cases that we're going to have a hard time predicting and we'll only learn about after some accidents occur. This is the case with any new transportation technology. Airlines are very safe these days but early on they were significantly less so because there were problems we didn't know about yet. Airline windows are rounded because we learned the hard way about stress fractures from sharp cornered windows which wasn't obvious at the time. People had to die to learn that lesson. This won't be the last time someone dies making autopilot safe.
Having the car on autopilot, but requiring the driver to "pay attention" and be ready to take over within seconds is the worst combination possible.
Not in all cases. We've had cruise control for many years which is a crude form of autopilot. It's been my experience that (surprisingly) it doesn't result in paying less attention to the traffic around you. If anything my experience has been the opposite. I tend to actually pay as much or more attention when the cruise control is on. I've spoken with other drivers who have experience the same thing. What you are saying has merit but there is some nuance there too. I don't think it is quite as simple as autopilot = less attention though that will be the case sometimes.
What is the reason one would switch the car to autopilot? Most likely so that they can be less attentive to the road.
Physical comfort for one. I use cruise control because keeping my leg locked in a single position for long periods is physically uncomfortable. I could see someone using greater degrees of automation for similar reasons. Again, you are not wrong but there is nuance here.
Why couldn't it see the tires, undercarriage, and side reflectors?
Probably for reasons similar to why people sometimes don't see such things. Sensors are imperfect just like our eyes. They work very well under some conditions and very poorly under other. It's generally not hard to find a corner case where a given sensor can't see something very well. As long as you can control the conditions that isn't a problem but out driving in the real world you can't control the conditions so it's really hard to get a sensor suite that will cover all the numerous corner cases.
Here's the uncomfortable truth about automating cars to drive themselves. People are going to die. We can't always predict where the corner cases are and the only way to find them will be through cars getting in accidents. There is a saying in the navy that "The rules are written in blood". People had to die to find out what worked and what didn't and to develop the rules they use. You deviate from those rules at your peril. We don't know what the rules for safe automated driverless cars are yet and the only way we are going to find out some of them is for some people to get hurt. Some will die so that many may live.
No, it doesn't. It really doesn't.
So the countries don't mean to collect the tax? Then why did they pass the laws to try to collect it? If they want to collect the tax then they need to pass the laws to close the loopholes. If they don't want to collect the tax then they need to repeal the taxes so the companies don't have to deal with the burden of trying to dodge the taxes. Either way it DOES need to be fixed. I don't really give a crap how they fix it so long as we don't have large companies with entire departments whose sole purpose is the avoidance of legally levied taxes. THAT is nothing but a drain on society.
Are you a priest? You're obviously not a lawyer...
What does being a priest have to do with having a sense of ethics? Those are orthogonal concepts. Sounds like you might be lacking a sense of ethics if you think dodging taxes through convoluted legal maneuvering is behavior to encourage.
Then you're in the wrong profession for someone with your temperament and outlook.
Gee thanks for enlightening me that accountants are for some reason not supposed to have a sense of morality. [/sarcasm] How about you leave it to me to decide what might suit my temperament since you know almost nothing about me and you clearly know nothing about accountants in general.
It is NOT a right of government to collect taxes. It is the consent of the governed that provides that authority. It is a limited power (see below) Consent isn't a right. Taking without consent is what we call "Rape".
Ok Captain Pedantic. You want to play rules lawyer with the specific legal meanings of those words. Fine. The supreme law of the land give the government the authority collect taxes. This means our government has the right/authority/legal-basis to collect taxes. Pick the word that suits you but it all means the same thing in practice. Consent of the government has nothing to do with whether or not the government has the legal right to collect tax. Consent of the governed is the theory of where authority comes from, not what the authority actually allows. Instead of governing authority being derived from a diety as was often the case previously, our founding fathers used a justification for government based on philosophy and practicality instead of mythology. It's about our COLLECTIVE consent to the existence of a particular government, not what that government's powers might actually consist of. It has essentially no relevance to your obvious distaste for taxation in spite of the fact that that same taxation is what permits the very rights and lifestyle you cherish so much.
If you're going to refer to an document, and use that to justify taxes, you should also realize that that document limits taxation for only two purposes.
"...to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States". Yes I already pointed that out via a link. General Welfare is a pretty broad notion and probably covers whatever it is that you think you shouldn't be obligated to pay for. It's in the Constitution which means that the government has been granted the power to tax you.
I read it all the time. I actually know what's in it. I use specific words (right, authority, consent etc) on purpose.
Evidently you either don't read it or don't understand it since you seem to persist in this belief that our government has no legal authority to tax you.
Your #1 flaw in your presumption is you assume that the government has a RIGHT to collect taxes. It does not have that right.
They do have a right to collect taxes. It's not even a question. In the US this is enshrined in the Constitution. You might try reading it sometime. Other countries have similar legal frameworks. Your notion that governments have no right to collect taxes is preposterous nonsense. Furthermore it would be impossible to have a functioning civil society without taxation and you can't have taxation in the first place without a legal framework to support it. It's legal, appropriate and necessary. Get over it.
It is a necessary evil that we collect taxes, and everyone, everywhere should do everything in their power to avoid taxes, and keep their own money. I would consider it a duty of the citizen to avoid all taxes as legally possible.
Taxes are the price of civilized society. Don't like taxes? Go live in the woods somewhere off the grid. If you want to be a part of society then shut up, pay your fair share, and enjoy the results. Don't think the amount you are asked to pay is fair? Work to get the tax law reformed but understand that you will need to pay enough to cover the government services that we collectively demand.
Taxes are regressive. All of them.
I don't think you have a clue what the word regressive actually means when it comes to tax.
The seller doesn't want to do the paperwork of collecting the tax. I hardly sympathize. It's the cost of doing business. They can hire another accountant.
Actually the don't even have to hire a new accountant. Just task the one they already have looking for sneaky ways to dodge the taxes to take care of the problem. Wouldn't cost them any extra from a personnel standpoint.
a person familiar with the matter said, barely a month after the internet company had its headquarters in France searched on suspicion of tax evasion.
I don't think there is any doubt that they are evading taxes. The problem is that they appear to be doing so (technically) legally. I'm wondering when countries will wise up and finally start changing the laws to make this sort of tax dodging hard or impossible. I realize to some degree this is playing a game of legal whack-a-mole but it needs to be done.
A spokeswoman for Google said in a brief statement the company complied with fiscal legislation in Spain just as it did in all countries where it operated.
While that is most likely true it also is nothing more than avoiding the question. They know they are avoiding taxes and the fact that they manage to do so in some clever legal fiction doesn't make is any more ethical. Google is hugely profitable and the shell game they are playing to avoid taxes is reprehensible as far as I'm concerned. I'm particularly galled when they act like it is somehow the fault of the lawmakers that they are dodging taxes they really should owe.
Spare me the arguments about "it's legal so it's right" - lots of things are legal but aren't ethical and this is one of them. I'm an accountant and crap like this just infuriates me because I'm the one that would be asked to be "morally flexible" about this.
Maybe not with a '79 Chevy you don't, but with any *modern* car you take it to a good mechanic and run an ECM diagnostic, compression test and look for any broken suspension components or evidence of repair and you'll know really well what kind of condition its in.
Not necessarily true. It's not terribly hard to hide many mechanical problems. And many problems can be "repaired" without leaving a shred of evidence. And even the best mechanic may not find every problem with a vehicle. Sure, some things are obvious but many aren't. Intermittent electrical problems are something I've dealt with on a few VW vehicles I've had but no mechanic would be likely to run into them. I've sold several cars that I considered to be unreliable but you'd never know it even with a fairly detailed inspection.
Let me give you an example I saw about 15 years ago on how problems can be hid. A guy I used to work with had a car that had some cylinders that were making bad noise and showing signs of impending failure. He decided he needed some new wheels so what he did was to get a couple of quarts of motor honey which temporarily hid the problem. Then he drove it straight to the dealer, negotiated for a new vehicle, trade in his "runs great" car, and drove away with a new vehicle. Now the dealer examined the car but they didn't notice the problem and the dealer had their people inspect the vehicle, including mechanics. And I'm not surprised the problem got overlooked. Unless the dealer was willing to do a compression test and a few other tests as well, they wouldn't find the problem nor was there any hint that the vehicle was in bad condition.
Plus with any late model car (1-2 years old) it still carries the bulk of the factory warranty and most dealer-sold cars are certified and carry an extension of the factory bumper to bumper warranty. Unless its a total lemon (unlikely in my experience), there's almost no mechanical risk if you do your homework.
Typically these days the amount of depreciation is more dependent on the brand and model than anything else. Toyota's will depreciate less than Fords as a general proposition. Certain models of car will depreciate barely at all while others lose their value faster than a gallon of milk.
I totally agree, especially in the light of the fact that a dealer can drive your 'new' car around for several hundred miles with no 'depreciation', but the instant the purchaser drives away the car is suddenly worth less ?
The biggest reason for this is the problem of information asymmetry. When the dealer sells you a "new" car, that carries certain warranties and guarantees of condition along with it. You can reasonably assume that the vehicle hasn't been used for drag racing and that even with a few tens of miles on it that it is for all practical purposes is as good as the factory can make it and you cannot find one in meaningfully better condition anywhere. The moment you drive it off the lot as a new owner all that information about how the car has been used is immediately lost. We have no idea how you as the new owner have treated the vehicle or how it has held up or what problems you might have experienced. A new buyer has no idea why you are selling it and even if you tell them they can't be sure you aren't lying. Ergo, the vehicle is worth less than before because of that information asymmetry.
Basically if you are selling a car with 1,000 miles on it, the buyer has to ask why you are selling it with so few miles. Is there something wrong with the car? The buyer can never be sure and so the buyer's willingness to pay will generally be less than it might be for a "new" vehicle.
Explain to me exactly how it benefits you that foreign students should come and take up a slot in one of our universities and then take up a slot in one of our high-paying jobs?
First off, the number of slots in universities and the number of high paying jobs is not fixed. The more smart people we have here the more value they create and the number of jobs actually grows. Apparently you've forgotten that America is actually a country of immigrants. Just 3 generations ago my family members came to this country and you know what? It works out fine. They worked hard, created value and the size of the economic pie grew. We forget that fact at our peril. China and India have 4 people to every one of ours and they are just as smart as we are. We NEED those smart people over here if we want to remain competitive and relevant.
It there is no benefit to you over a US citizen taking up those slots.
First off you are wrong that they are taking a slot away from an American. Second it is very beneficial to me having smart people here creating technology, building businesses, growing our economy. I don't give a crap where they were born. I care what they do while they are here.
So why are you advocating something that's not in your interest?
I'm not. I actually understand what is in my interest. Especially the fact that country of birth has zero relevance to the discussion. If you try to protect what you have by keeping smart people who are willing to work here out you are just cutting your own throat in the long run. I want the smartest, most ambitious, most talented, most hard working people to be here in the US. That will hugely benefit both you and me. Keep them out at your own peril.
We already discourage students from pursuing STEM degrees by allowing companies like Facebook and Microsoft to import cheap labor in the form of H1-B visas
You do realize that there is a LOT more to STEM fields than working for large IT firms right? I have an engineering degree and I work in manufacturing. (and manufacturing in the US is alive and well in spite of claims to the contrary) Most scientists, engineers and mathematicians don't work in Silicon Valley or Seattle. H1B visas are simply Not A Thing among engineers in my industry. They just aren't. I'm not saying they aren't a problem (they are) but they aren't as wide spread or severe a problem as is sometimes claimed. Frankly H1B visas are kind of small potatoes in the challenges presented by global competition.
are we now to add a further disincentive by saying that anybody who can slither under the wire to get accepted to a U.S. university (and graduate) is now your permanent competition inside the United States?
If they work here in the US under a Green Card they aren't going to be paid H1B wages. The company can't deport them and the worker has basically the same rights as a US citizen. Furthermore they are your competition whether or not they are here in the US. Plenty of software and technology is developed outside the US and they don't stop being smart, talented people just because they don't work inside the US. It's actually to your benefit to have as much talent here in the US doing useful things as possible. If they go elsewhere much of their economic benefit goes with them. If there are a lot of smart talented people here then the pool of jobs here grows. If they go elsewhere then they don't create value here and there ends up being fewer jobs. America is a country of immigrants. We only hurt ourselves when we forget that fact.
Policies like this are why the idiots in Britain voted to shoot their country (and themselves, directly) in the foot with a "Brexit" vote--because of the perception that their government serves "outsiders" ahead of them.
Spare me. Many British voters voted for Brexit in large part because of racism and xenophobia. And frankly given Britian's colonial past them complaining about outsiders is hugely ironic. It wasn't that long ago that Britain was a large empire based on screwing over foreigners in places like India.
It's worth considering though - that the odds right now is that Volkswagen will not exist much longer.
Unless the German government decides to let VW fail it will not go anywhere. Yes there will be substantial financial fallout but I doubt a VW liquidation is likely. The government of Lower Saxony owns 20.2% and German law requires an 80% shareholder agreement on any major decisions. As large shareholders they are unlikely to let VW cease to exist.
This is the first penalty - and almost 15 Billion it's a huge one
VW has around $48 Billion in cash an equivalents. Furthermore with the government as a shareholder it potentially can tap into lines of credit. It's going to suck but VW has a pretty strong balance sheet to weather the storm.
The last estimate I saw suggested some 40 people may have died because of the additional NOx pollution, although pollution doesn't work that way
When you are talking about large populations it actually does work that way. They can't tell you which 40 they are and there are some meaningful error bars around that number. But it's not impossibly hard to show how a given source of pollution impacts the health of a population. Doing it right is just a lot of work. You compare the heath outcomes to a control group and control for variables. Typically when they cite these studies they are talking about models rather than retrospective data analysis which is usually where things go off the rails. If they are talking about a computer model which has not been checked against real world data then yes you should be suspicious. But just because there are bad models out there doesn't mean it is impossible to do it correctly.
Because the vehicles produced more NOx, they also consumed less fuel and they produced less soot, HC, and CO2. They went ahead and calculated the additional deaths from NOx, but they didn't subtract the reduced deaths from soot and HC, nor from the reduced impact on climate change.
Just because there might be offsetting deaths doesn't mean the effects of the NOx aren't real. You might (stress might) be right about the fact that the overall mortality rate might not change much but that doesn't mean a specific cause can be ignored. If more people die in car crashes then fewer will die from heart disease. That doesn't mean the car crash problem can be ignored or discounted.
Potentially more abuse prone than the H1B visa. Diploma mills are already a reality in many parts of the world, adding a green card as an incentive and the potential for abuse is immense.
So you limit it to select accredited universities. Problem solved. If someone can graduate from MIT with an engineering degree and wants to stay in the USA, we're idiots to not help them do that. It only becomes a problem if we don't pay any attention to how it's done.
VAG is getting raked over the coals for selling cars that people wanted.
No they are getting raked over the coals for selling cars that they claimed were what people wanted when in fact they fraudulently were not.
There was not even a hint that these cars disappointed even a single owner.
Bull droppings. 20 seconds on Google would clearly establish that there are a lot of owners that are very disappointed in these cars now that they know they are not what they were claimed to be.
And if flashing the firmware was easy, I'm guessing that pretty much every single owner would have installed this code on their own.
Flashing firmware on a car IS easy if you have the right equipment. That doesn't mean people want to do it on their own. First, doing so can void the car's warranty. Second, doing so can result in a vehicle that performs worse or not at all if something goes wrong. Even the car companies don't mess around with the firmware on a production vehicle unless they absolutely have to. Third, just like with PCs, many people are uncomfortable screwing around with the internals even if they are smart enough to do it.
Your car is filled with airbags and seatbelts and crumple zones and all sorts designed to protect you during a crash. Pedestrians have none of that (at least for the time being)
All those safety features are independent of the decision of where to aim the vehicle. You never use them intentionally. They come into play when the decision of where to aim the vehicle goes awry. Pedestrians lacking protection is nothing new and does not change the situation in the slightest when considering whether to put computers in charge of the driving.
The CAR should protect you (using those safety features), the AI should do what drivers are supposed to do - cause the least amount of carnage on the road.
It is unreasonable to expect a driver to protect the lives of others in preference to his own. We don't expect that now and having computers drive the car does not change that calculus. There is no way I would get into a car that was purposely programmed to preferentially kill me as an occupant under any circumstances. I'm willing to get on public transportation only with the understanding that the pilot/engineer shares my sense of self preservation. If I thought that there was any chance that the driver a vehicle (human or not) would not protect my life then there is no chance I board that vehicle.
Sorry but if the choice is you or me then you are going to die. Nothing personal. I would expect the same in reverse. The only people whose lives I value more than my own are immediate family and you aren't a member of that group. Like they say before a boxing match, protect yourself at all times.
For about a century now, artillery has generally been used to kill people the gunners can't see, and in WWII artillery was the main killer
A human still had to make the decision to fire the artillery and in general they had a pretty good idea what they were shooting at and what the consequences might be. Once the decision to fire is made then it is merely mechanics but there still had to be an ethical consideration prior to giving the order to fire. Computers have no sense of ethics or compassion. They should be treated like a part of the weapon but any decision about whether or not to kill should never be abdicated by humans for any reaon.
Once killing is reduced to shooting at coordinates someone else supplies, is it that different from sending in robots?
If you give the robots autonomy to make kill/no-kill decisions then yes it is hugely different. When you fire artillery or drop a bomb, the consideration about whether to kill is made prior to triggering the weapon. If you give kill autonomy to a robot then humans are abdicating that responsibility which is dangerous and unethical. Very different situations.
More importantly no law should ever say I must sacrifice my own life to preserve others.
I think you'll find the Uniform Code of Military Justice has some exceptions to that but in civilian life you are quite right. I cannot imagine getting into a vehicle where it might be programmed to preferentially kill me instead of someone else depending on the circumstances. If I'm the driver of a vehicle and the tragic choice is my life or yours, unless you are my wife or child you are going to die. Sorry about that but there are only a few people whose life I value more than my own. Chances are yours isn't one of them and I would expect the same in reverse. The fact that a computer is driving the car instead of me does not change that calculus in the slightest.
You fail at physics. There's no way that a single man/woman (fat or otherwise) could stop a train.
Really?" You sure about that?
I don't see why this is such a conundrum. Right now we presume the driver of a human operated vehicle will in most cases attempt to save the occupants of the vehicle first since the imperative of the driver will be self preservation. I see no reason why this would need to change. All that has changed is that the driver isn't human but it's reasonable to expect the driver of the vehicle (human or not) to attempt to preserve the life of the occupants of the vehicle first because it fundamentally will have more control over that. People outside the vehicle should be responsible for preserving their own lives because they have more control over that. Basically preserve the status quo. The fact that a machine is driving really doesn't necessitate a change. Yes there will always be some corner cases but that's no different than today either.
No matter what we do there will be some casualties just like with almost any new technology while people get adjusted to it. Fatalities in automobiles, aircraft, trains, etc all were substantially higher when they were new technologies than they are today. Over time it will mature and legal frameworks will be built to deal with the accidents that will inevitably occur.
Wreck It Ralph was not a movie designed from a game. It referenced various games and it was based on a fictional game but there was no Wreck It Ralph game in the real world that existed prior to the movie. QED it doesn't count for purposes of this discussion.
Minecraft is still one of the most-played PC games.
Happy Days was still one of the most watched shows on TV when Fonzie literally jumped the shark with the show that eventually coined the phrase. Plenty of media properties have jumped the shark while still popular. It doesn't mark the end but it usually marks the beginning of the end or at least a slow decline.
Yes, we are a very long way from letting these things operate completely autonomously, but they don't need to.
We should NEVER let these things operated with complete autonomy. Ever. Doing so is both unethical and a bad idea for very practical reasons as well.
The drones can be operated remotely by human operators, then once the decision has been made to engage a target the drone switches over to automatic for the actual combat.
Actual combat isn't a simple thing that you can switch on and off. It's messier than that. Giving complete autonomy to a drone at any point is a highly questionable idea because your ability to retake control may be out of your hands. Once the bullet leaves the chamber it's pretty hard to bring it back. Real combat isn't like a video game where you have nice clean indications of when it starts and when it stops. I cannot see any reasonable non-trivial scenario where it would be ethical or sensible to give complete autonomy to a machine for any longer than absolutely necessary.