How much of the Ron Paul support on the internet was organized by the campaign itself though(I don't know...)? If it was mostly his supporters doing the organizing, it's a bit of a stretch to give him and his campaign credit for having internet savvy(and the sheer volume of Ron Paul stuff compared to other candidates doesn't really do anything to demonstrate savvy to me, just effort).
Obama's organization has certainly done a better job engaging people over the internet than Clinton or McCain.
Energy isn't all that much more expensive than it was in 1958. Compare the(inflation adjusted) price of oil, gasoline and electricity at the wall between then and now. Gas prices over the last 4 years are as high as they have ever been, but up until 2004, they didn't change all that much(OPEC embargo and so forth had a huge impact, but prices were still between $1.50 and $2.50 for most years).
People would either be dead or breeding frantically. The low fertility rates of developed nations are related to the relative lack of risk raising a child, and people really don't work along the lines of a 'general malaise', they work along the lines of getting to tomorrow, whatever it may bring(no really, look at history). There are always people who are disappointed when things aren't as good as they imagine they could be, but there are also always plenty of people working to make things better than they are.
The problems with Walmart have nothing to do with charging people too much money.
They are actually a deflationary force in the economy, which is good for the consumer. The problem is that they market so much utter crap that saves $0.25 at the store and ends up costing you a couple of dollars when you inevitably need to replace it.
What it amounts to is that is isn't any worse for consumers. The satellite radio companies don't have a whole lot of pricing power. Running a 400 channel studio and multiple satellites means that they have tremendous fixed costs that they have to cover, which means having a certain minimum number of subscribers or going out of business. This means that they can't push prices above whatever the last several thousand customers will pay, or they go out of business.
The combined company may well be able to raise prices to become more profitable, but the way I see it, it is just as likely that they are able to cut prices(because their fixed costs will be more distributed) to become more profitable, or that the merger allows them to continue operating, where they would go out of business if operating separately(this is quite a lot better for anybody who owns a satellite radio).
I think fondly of the oil companies every time my furnace kicks on, and every time I fill up the gas tank in my car.
Well, not really, but I appreciate that there needs to be some sort of organization that deals with other governments and arranges shipping of petroleum and processes it into products that I can use, and I don't really see how I can be their customer and also loudly proclaim to hate their processes(some of which I don't like and would rather not be complicit with, but I haven't figured out how just yet).
It's more than that. Democracy only implies a particular type of freedom. A democratic rule that you can only wear pink t-shirts is quite a bit less free than an autocratic decree that you can wear whatever you want.
(there are bound to be decisions that are both controversial and have negative impacts for some people, so lets not focus on the fact that we are talking about t-shirts or that they are pink)
Sort of. You would have a lot more to worry about if it wasn't news that some Americans believe in intelligent design and evolution as a theory. That it is news is a pretty good sign that it *is not* the status quo and that a whole bunch of people over here are scratching their heads just as much as you are.
I've talked to a Polish(essentially fundamentalist Catholic) ecologist who didn't believe in speciation, so willful ignorance isn't something that only occurs in certain parts of North America.
People are raising the specter of going into a covenant with the company and having them kill you; if there is a market for organs(even a black market...), what's to stop somebody who hasn't bothered to ask you if they can use your organs from killing you?
I guess it becomes a question of whether a regulated market where most people get treated fairly will be better than trying to stifle a completely unregulated market where people get killed for their tissues. The existence of the regulated market could suppress the black market(hopefully it would be cheaper to get a organ with provenance than it would be to risk the black market), so there might be enough reason to reconsider whether it is actually immoral, or just repugnant(So if you believe that laws should address things that are actually wrong or harmful rather than simply distasteful...).
If you are walking across icy ground(so not water with ice of varying thickness), the key is to move at a constant pace that keeps you in the static friction regime. If you go too fast, you will start sliding, and if you go too slow, you spend all day going two feet, but if you keep a medium pace, you can make decent progress without losing your balance.
Yeah, but in a world where organs are easy to move, what's to stop some meat head medical school dropout with a pistol?
(the solution is to focus on preventing the use of illegitimate organs in general rather than worry about exactly who is fetching them, I guess by making it very hard for somebody who does something sketchy to continue to operate, regardless of how big an organization they are)
Stem cell research will happen somewhere, at a medium pace. The market for organs and other such treatments is way too big to keep money out of it, so even if top scientists have to be moved to Luxembourg(or whatever...) to find a suitable legal environment, it will happen, at a medium pace.
(and the drug trade comparison is interesting, but the logistics of implanting a kidney are at least as complicated as the logistics of traveling to India, whereas the logistics of smoking some pot are a little less complicated than the logistics of flying to the Netherlands, so creating a black market under the ban is less likely than creating a gray market outside the ban -- imagine cruise hospitals in international waters(which is actually sort of interesting on its own) and such)
Slashdot Mirror
How much of the Ron Paul support on the internet was organized by the campaign itself though(I don't know...)? If it was mostly his supporters doing the organizing, it's a bit of a stretch to give him and his campaign credit for having internet savvy(and the sheer volume of Ron Paul stuff compared to other candidates doesn't really do anything to demonstrate savvy to me, just effort).
Obama's organization has certainly done a better job engaging people over the internet than Clinton or McCain.
Energy isn't all that much more expensive than it was in 1958. Compare the(inflation adjusted) price of oil, gasoline and electricity at the wall between then and now. Gas prices over the last 4 years are as high as they have ever been, but up until 2004, they didn't change all that much(OPEC embargo and so forth had a huge impact, but prices were still between $1.50 and $2.50 for most years).
I bet you've had some ribs removed.
People would either be dead or breeding frantically. The low fertility rates of developed nations are related to the relative lack of risk raising a child, and people really don't work along the lines of a 'general malaise', they work along the lines of getting to tomorrow, whatever it may bring(no really, look at history). There are always people who are disappointed when things aren't as good as they imagine they could be, but there are also always plenty of people working to make things better than they are.
I'm sure the maximum pay speed will go up as Jello->Human technology matures.
I would bet at least a nickel that there are current patents for switch mechanisms, let alone expired patents for switch mechanisms.
The idea of developing software that people want to use makes you barf? Geez.
The problems with Walmart have nothing to do with charging people too much money.
They are actually a deflationary force in the economy, which is good for the consumer. The problem is that they market so much utter crap that saves $0.25 at the store and ends up costing you a couple of dollars when you inevitably need to replace it.
So a rock, biscuit, tree or cat would do a better job as your boss?
If so, that would seem like a decent reason to be looking for a new job...
What it amounts to is that is isn't any worse for consumers. The satellite radio companies don't have a whole lot of pricing power. Running a 400 channel studio and multiple satellites means that they have tremendous fixed costs that they have to cover, which means having a certain minimum number of subscribers or going out of business. This means that they can't push prices above whatever the last several thousand customers will pay, or they go out of business.
The combined company may well be able to raise prices to become more profitable, but the way I see it, it is just as likely that they are able to cut prices(because their fixed costs will be more distributed) to become more profitable, or that the merger allows them to continue operating, where they would go out of business if operating separately(this is quite a lot better for anybody who owns a satellite radio).
I think fondly of the oil companies every time my furnace kicks on, and every time I fill up the gas tank in my car.
Well, not really, but I appreciate that there needs to be some sort of organization that deals with other governments and arranges shipping of petroleum and processes it into products that I can use, and I don't really see how I can be their customer and also loudly proclaim to hate their processes(some of which I don't like and would rather not be complicit with, but I haven't figured out how just yet).
It's more than that. Democracy only implies a particular type of freedom. A democratic rule that you can only wear pink t-shirts is quite a bit less free than an autocratic decree that you can wear whatever you want.
(there are bound to be decisions that are both controversial and have negative impacts for some people, so lets not focus on the fact that we are talking about t-shirts or that they are pink)
It would have been a lot funnier to have said 'graphite' there.
Mozilla has a project underway to make a plug-in run javascript 2.0 inside of IE:
http://wiki.mozilla.org/Tamarin:ScreamingMonkey
At the very least, not until you have actually done it.
Sort of. You would have a lot more to worry about if it wasn't news that some Americans believe in intelligent design and evolution as a theory. That it is news is a pretty good sign that it *is not* the status quo and that a whole bunch of people over here are scratching their heads just as much as you are.
I've talked to a Polish(essentially fundamentalist Catholic) ecologist who didn't believe in speciation, so willful ignorance isn't something that only occurs in certain parts of North America.
It's a haircut. You might call it "hockey hair".
Oh, we noticed, it's just that we don't think women with mullets are "awesome". Neither are moose.
Ask his bank.
Better me than Joe Undertaker.
People are raising the specter of going into a covenant with the company and having them kill you; if there is a market for organs(even a black market...), what's to stop somebody who hasn't bothered to ask you if they can use your organs from killing you?
I guess it becomes a question of whether a regulated market where most people get treated fairly will be better than trying to stifle a completely unregulated market where people get killed for their tissues. The existence of the regulated market could suppress the black market(hopefully it would be cheaper to get a organ with provenance than it would be to risk the black market), so there might be enough reason to reconsider whether it is actually immoral, or just repugnant(So if you believe that laws should address things that are actually wrong or harmful rather than simply distasteful...).
Also, it is harder to take two broken livestock and make one working livestock.
If you are walking across icy ground(so not water with ice of varying thickness), the key is to move at a constant pace that keeps you in the static friction regime. If you go too fast, you will start sliding, and if you go too slow, you spend all day going two feet, but if you keep a medium pace, you can make decent progress without losing your balance.
Yeah, but in a world where organs are easy to move, what's to stop some meat head medical school dropout with a pistol?
(the solution is to focus on preventing the use of illegitimate organs in general rather than worry about exactly who is fetching them, I guess by making it very hard for somebody who does something sketchy to continue to operate, regardless of how big an organization they are)
Well, not for the receiver. It might be for the donor, if the technical issues could be worked out.
Stem cell research will happen somewhere, at a medium pace. The market for organs and other such treatments is way too big to keep money out of it, so even if top scientists have to be moved to Luxembourg(or whatever...) to find a suitable legal environment, it will happen, at a medium pace.
(and the drug trade comparison is interesting, but the logistics of implanting a kidney are at least as complicated as the logistics of traveling to India, whereas the logistics of smoking some pot are a little less complicated than the logistics of flying to the Netherlands, so creating a black market under the ban is less likely than creating a gray market outside the ban -- imagine cruise hospitals in international waters(which is actually sort of interesting on its own) and such)