Funny how the government can break the constitution--which is the highest law of the land--as it pleases, but people who seek to reveal that the government is doing so must be punished for violated petty contracts that ultimately mean nothing.
And no - aside from reasonable bans on fully automatic weapons and other heavy military hardware
How are those reasonable? Once you've accepted that the 2nd amendment protects people's right to own modern weaponry, why is certain weaponry off-limits? As far as I'm concerned, all gun control is a violation of the 2nd. To fix this, if you believe it needs to be fixed, you'd need to amend the constitution, not just ignore it and call the bans "reasonable."
Discretion is not automatically corruption. If you think there's a problem with corruption, then go after that, but don't eliminate discretion entirely.
You're illogical. Attacking someone does not mean you "lose," and there is really no way to "lose" an argument to begin with, as they are not games with well-defined objectives. About the only way you, as an individual in an argument, can "lose" is if you are convinced by your opponent, but that's it.
I'm not sure what the point of your post was, but it surely wasn't logical. Personal attacks are perfectly valid, though they do nothing to discredit your opponents' arguments.
What can be done beyond criticizing? Assuming "education", and further assuming that ineffective, does it make sense to work within the limits of operation? Or strive for the ideal you will never achieve?
I'd rather strive for an ideal than give up.
I prefer to accept the limits until they can be changed, which means no stat based arguments.
I prefer not to use statistics when arguing about such things. Why? Because doing so makes it seem as though you'd change your position if the statistics weren't on your side. I prefer to take the position that freedom is simply more important than safety, and even if the NSA and its buddies keep us safe, we need to stop their unconstitutional activities because they infringe upon our freedoms.
cold fjord had a good rebuttal to a terrible argument, including pointing out obvious internal inconsistencies. I did not see an argument for a particular side, and if you read it again you might see the same.
And in the statistics department, what internal inconsistencies did he point out? In order to point out internal inconsistencies, you'd have to full understand what the other personal actually believes, but I'm pretty sure he didn't.
If you're not talking about his attempted rebuttal of the statistics argument, then I don't care, because that is what I'm talking about at the moment.
Because an attack has to come from the opposition, never friendly fire, right?
Where are you getting this? Because I attacked cold fjord? cold fjord is well known around here for his authoritarian views and has come out in support of the NSA and its ilk many times, hiding behind links to articles about terrorist attacks. I simply said that attacking people like him is perfectly okay.
Homework assignment: In what way did cold fjord take a pro NSA side?
Read his post history and your question will be answered.
Screw it. It's getting boring toying with you. Argue with me using your imagination from now on, because I'm done; that's all you've been doing, anyway.
Reply to me again and all you'll get is a copied and pasted version of this reply, just to further obliterate your drone-like mind.'
Screw it. It's getting boring toying with you. Argue with me using your imagination from now on, because I'm done; that's all you've been doing, anyway.
Reply to me again and all you'll get is a copied and pasted version of this reply, just to further obliterate your drone-like mind.
One person's idea of a problem is a good thing to someone else. Describing behaviors and states of mind isn't the problem to me, but saying that these things are bad is subjective.
Given the sheer number of beings and species who lived from the down on life in this world, the very limited number of evidences we found about evolution, and the time since when we started to pay attention at it, you should be reluctant in believing this theory too, for example.
We have *lots* of evidence for evolution, not just ignorance.
You claimed you didn't deny that it was possible, and in that case, you actually agree with me, even though you keep making comments that seem as if they're attacking my position.
Oh, you did, and since the beginning. The fallacy is on your part, by trying to argue that because some theory may be untrue it is untrue.
Actually, that's all a straw man on your part. If my position wasn't clear then, it should be 100% clear now. Stop trying to save face.
Fortunately, the Constitution doesn't give you or other commenters the authority to make that decision. The consitution has given the Judicial branch the authority to make that decision.
When something is unconstitutional, that just means it doesn't comply with the constitution. Anyone with an opinion can decide if they think so. The difference between normal people and judges is, of course, that normal people don't have that bit of power necessary to make change with their opinions.
Being in the judicial branch does not automatically mean that one's interpretation of the constitution is correct. Judges can and have been wrong. The Supreme Court has overruled itself in the past, and if the judges' opinions were automatically right, that just leads to a paradox.
The founding fathers did not want people to worship authority figures. The judicial branch is merely the best solution we have. That doesn't mean the judges' interpretations are automatically correct, though. If the judicial branch says that the NSA spying is constitutional, all it means is that they are complicit in the crimes against freedom and the American people.
I know it's hard for most Slashdotters to hear this and I usually get marked -1 troll
Given how often your stupid points and authority worship have been debunked and how often I and others have had to make similar comments debunking them, I'm not even surprised that your comments tend to get modded down.
I learned about this process in grade school and most of you should have, too.
Everyone knows about the process. The difference is, other people don't worship authority figures like you seem to. Why not get opinions of your own and come back to us?
I'd think the same thing I thought on 9/11: "Great, this is going to be used as an excuse for the government to take away our freedoms in the name of safety, even though people in the US should believe that freedom is more important than safety to begin with."
cold fjord certainly isn't, as all he does is make claims about how terrorists might get us and try to scare people into surrendering their freedom and privacy for safety.
Actually, he'd fit right in with most debate teams.
People are not machines, and not always rational in the face of terrorism acts.
Why must you point out the obvious? Yes, they aren't rational, and that's the problem! That's exactly what people are criticizing.
It is doubtful that he is part of whatever conspiracy theory you are claiming.
He doesn't really need to be part of any sort of grand conspiracy to have a small part in subverting the principles countries like the US claim to stand for.
In fact, you sound a fair bit crazy to me with the level of abuse and rant you're willing to dish out on the drop of a argument that you dont like.
People with cold fjord's mentality are the cause of the TSA, the NSA spying, the numerous wars we've been fighting, free speech zones, unfettered border searches, stop-and-frisk, constitution-free zones, DUI checkpoints, and the host of other policies that violate our freedom in the name of safety. People like him, who ruin countries with their authoritarian mentalities, deserve to be ridiculed in every way imaginable. It's just a shame that the general public is either apathetic or in opposition to having principles or freedom when they want to feel safe.
But it's funny that you call someone else "crazy" and then criticize them for insulting others, I guess.
In this case you just have to provide a single example of someone that managed to live in total isolation for a few decades without ending with serious psychiatric problems.
What is and is not a problem is completely subjective. Those "psychiatric problems" of which you speak are nothing more than us passing judgement on people with different thought patterns, or describing them, because we believe them to be harmful.
With that said, that isn't even what I was talking about. I've been talking about the possibility of being a complete loner, not the possibility of being a complete loner that ends up as normal as every other human. I don't really care about the latter.
I will stick with the best explanation given the evidence we have, that evidence being that all cases of people that lived in isolation for long periods of time ended with very serious psychiatric problems
Given the sheer number of people who lived throughout history, the sheer number of people who live now that we don't pay attention to, and the fact that we really only started paying attention to this sort of thing not much more than a century ago, I'm more hesitant to say that it is extremely unlikely that someone, at some point, had the mentality of a complete loner.
Saying that it is wrong without any evidence to support, just because it may be wrong, like you are trying to do, is pure ignorance on how Science works, on the other hand.
Actually, I didn't say it is wrong, just that the possibility is there. That's a mere straw man.
Why should they resent you, rather than the ones who cause the problem to begin with (bosses, etc.)? Yeah, everyone should just be as miserable as everyone else; that'll change everything for the better!
Psychology is mostly pseudoscience to begin with, as the testing is often subjective, subject to bias, and not nearly as rigorous and repeatable as, say physics.
Oh, I do have evidence and a scientific theory on my side.
You have evidence that shows it's impossible for someone is be a complete loner? Do tell. Either that, you make an attempt to understand my position.
You on the other hand have only wishful thinking and ignorance at your side.
Such as? Are you so opposed to accepting that the possibility is there? What exactly do you think my position is that you would call it "wishful thinking" and "ignorance"? Explain.
Of course instinct plays a huge role in mating. But couples can and do decide to have no kids even though they are mating.
Even if they decide not to have kids, there are unseen factors at work that make them take that path. Again, the point is that marriage has nothing to do with any of this, but what does matter is the mentality of the people who decide/don't decide to have children.
However, the current culture places a lot of value in marriage (though that may be changing).
People who mindlessly follow what others are doing are themselves mindless. Again, I see no evidence that people who place high value in marriage are anything more than magical thinkers.
Anyone who doesn't see that isn't really applying critical thinking.
In this case, there are no worthwhile benefits to me. Furthermore, since I have principles and find marriage disgusting, it isn't something I'd ever consider to begin with.
Look at it another way: Ask any gay couple in a state that doesn't allow gay marriage whether marriage is important or not. You will quickly find out that it's more than just a title.
Actually, no. No matter what individuals feel about it, it will always be a mere title. Asking gay couples would change literally nothing.
There are practical ramifications for remaining unmarried.
Which you've yet to name. I believe one of them would be hospital visitation rights, but it's absolutely ridiculous that our society is so primitive that that can't be solved in other ways at this point in time (Or can it?).
And there are also practical ramifications to getting married.
Oh I do have quite a lot of evidence supporting my position. my friend. No one exists in recorded history that disprove this theory and all cases of forced isolation produced results that further corroborates it.
Ignorance is not the same as evidence.
Sure it may be wrong as any scientific theory
You have no scientific theory; just ignorance of the answer, same as me. All I did was say that it was possible for someone to have such a mentality, not that I know it happened. If you keep opposing this in such a desperate fashion, I'll start thinking you're a religious fundamentalist.
it is common sense and one of the basic principles of Science.
"common sense" is often garbage, so please don't mention that tripe. Whether something is common is irrelevant. All that matters is whether it makes sense, and only you can decide that for yourself.
Slashdot Mirror
Where's that implication? I don't see it anywhere. It is possible to insult the president without promoting the people who ran against them.
As for me, voting for either party would make me want to vomit, so I never do.
Funny how the government can break the constitution--which is the highest law of the land--as it pleases, but people who seek to reveal that the government is doing so must be punished for violated petty contracts that ultimately mean nothing.
And no - aside from reasonable bans on fully automatic weapons and other heavy military hardware
How are those reasonable? Once you've accepted that the 2nd amendment protects people's right to own modern weaponry, why is certain weaponry off-limits? As far as I'm concerned, all gun control is a violation of the 2nd. To fix this, if you believe it needs to be fixed, you'd need to amend the constitution, not just ignore it and call the bans "reasonable."
Discretion is not automatically corruption. If you think there's a problem with corruption, then go after that, but don't eliminate discretion entirely.
All that means is that we need to combat racism and sexism, not that discretion is bad.
1 + 1 = 2, and anyone who says otherwise is a fucking moron.
Whoops. I may have insulted someone, so my conclusions and arguments are invalid.
Truly?
You're illogical. Attacking someone does not mean you "lose," and there is really no way to "lose" an argument to begin with, as they are not games with well-defined objectives. About the only way you, as an individual in an argument, can "lose" is if you are convinced by your opponent, but that's it.
I'm not sure what the point of your post was, but it surely wasn't logical. Personal attacks are perfectly valid, though they do nothing to discredit your opponents' arguments.
What can be done beyond criticizing? Assuming "education", and further assuming that ineffective, does it make sense to work within the limits of operation? Or strive for the ideal you will never achieve?
I'd rather strive for an ideal than give up.
I prefer to accept the limits until they can be changed, which means no stat based arguments.
I prefer not to use statistics when arguing about such things. Why? Because doing so makes it seem as though you'd change your position if the statistics weren't on your side. I prefer to take the position that freedom is simply more important than safety, and even if the NSA and its buddies keep us safe, we need to stop their unconstitutional activities because they infringe upon our freedoms.
cold fjord had a good rebuttal to a terrible argument, including pointing out obvious internal inconsistencies. I did not see an argument for a particular side, and if you read it again you might see the same.
And in the statistics department, what internal inconsistencies did he point out? In order to point out internal inconsistencies, you'd have to full understand what the other personal actually believes, but I'm pretty sure he didn't.
If you're not talking about his attempted rebuttal of the statistics argument, then I don't care, because that is what I'm talking about at the moment.
Because an attack has to come from the opposition, never friendly fire, right?
Where are you getting this? Because I attacked cold fjord? cold fjord is well known around here for his authoritarian views and has come out in support of the NSA and its ilk many times, hiding behind links to articles about terrorist attacks. I simply said that attacking people like him is perfectly okay.
Homework assignment: In what way did cold fjord take a pro NSA side?
Read his post history and your question will be answered.
Screw it. It's getting boring toying with you. Argue with me using your imagination from now on, because I'm done; that's all you've been doing, anyway.
Reply to me again and all you'll get is a copied and pasted version of this reply, just to further obliterate your drone-like mind.'
Screw it. It's getting boring toying with you. Argue with me using your imagination from now on, because I'm done; that's all you've been doing, anyway.
Reply to me again and all you'll get is a copied and pasted version of this reply, just to further obliterate your drone-like mind.
No it is not.
One person's idea of a problem is a good thing to someone else. Describing behaviors and states of mind isn't the problem to me, but saying that these things are bad is subjective.
Given the sheer number of beings and species who lived from the down on life in this world, the very limited number of evidences we found about evolution, and the time since when we started to pay attention at it, you should be reluctant in believing this theory too, for example.
We have *lots* of evidence for evolution, not just ignorance.
You claimed you didn't deny that it was possible, and in that case, you actually agree with me, even though you keep making comments that seem as if they're attacking my position.
Oh, you did, and since the beginning. The fallacy is on your part, by trying to argue that because some theory may be untrue it is untrue.
Actually, that's all a straw man on your part. If my position wasn't clear then, it should be 100% clear now. Stop trying to save face.
Fortunately, the Constitution doesn't give you or other commenters the authority to make that decision. The consitution has given the Judicial branch the authority to make that decision.
When something is unconstitutional, that just means it doesn't comply with the constitution. Anyone with an opinion can decide if they think so. The difference between normal people and judges is, of course, that normal people don't have that bit of power necessary to make change with their opinions.
Being in the judicial branch does not automatically mean that one's interpretation of the constitution is correct. Judges can and have been wrong. The Supreme Court has overruled itself in the past, and if the judges' opinions were automatically right, that just leads to a paradox.
The founding fathers did not want people to worship authority figures. The judicial branch is merely the best solution we have. That doesn't mean the judges' interpretations are automatically correct, though. If the judicial branch says that the NSA spying is constitutional, all it means is that they are complicit in the crimes against freedom and the American people.
I know it's hard for most Slashdotters to hear this and I usually get marked -1 troll
Given how often your stupid points and authority worship have been debunked and how often I and others have had to make similar comments debunking them, I'm not even surprised that your comments tend to get modded down.
I learned about this process in grade school and most of you should have, too.
Everyone knows about the process. The difference is, other people don't worship authority figures like you seem to. Why not get opinions of your own and come back to us?
I'd think the same thing I thought on 9/11: "Great, this is going to be used as an excuse for the government to take away our freedoms in the name of safety, even though people in the US should believe that freedom is more important than safety to begin with."
cold fjord certainly isn't, as all he does is make claims about how terrorists might get us and try to scare people into surrendering their freedom and privacy for safety.
Actually, he'd fit right in with most debate teams.
People are not machines, and not always rational in the face of terrorism acts.
Why must you point out the obvious? Yes, they aren't rational, and that's the problem! That's exactly what people are criticizing.
It is doubtful that he is part of whatever conspiracy theory you are claiming.
He doesn't really need to be part of any sort of grand conspiracy to have a small part in subverting the principles countries like the US claim to stand for.
In fact, you sound a fair bit crazy to me with the level of abuse and rant you're willing to dish out on the drop of a argument that you dont like.
People with cold fjord's mentality are the cause of the TSA, the NSA spying, the numerous wars we've been fighting, free speech zones, unfettered border searches, stop-and-frisk, constitution-free zones, DUI checkpoints, and the host of other policies that violate our freedom in the name of safety. People like him, who ruin countries with their authoritarian mentalities, deserve to be ridiculed in every way imaginable. It's just a shame that the general public is either apathetic or in opposition to having principles or freedom when they want to feel safe.
But it's funny that you call someone else "crazy" and then criticize them for insulting others, I guess.
In this case you just have to provide a single example of someone that managed to live in total isolation for a few decades without ending with serious psychiatric problems.
What is and is not a problem is completely subjective. Those "psychiatric problems" of which you speak are nothing more than us passing judgement on people with different thought patterns, or describing them, because we believe them to be harmful.
With that said, that isn't even what I was talking about. I've been talking about the possibility of being a complete loner, not the possibility of being a complete loner that ends up as normal as every other human. I don't really care about the latter.
I will stick with the best explanation given the evidence we have, that evidence being that all cases of people that lived in isolation for long periods of time ended with very serious psychiatric problems
Given the sheer number of people who lived throughout history, the sheer number of people who live now that we don't pay attention to, and the fact that we really only started paying attention to this sort of thing not much more than a century ago, I'm more hesitant to say that it is extremely unlikely that someone, at some point, had the mentality of a complete loner.
Saying that it is wrong without any evidence to support, just because it may be wrong, like you are trying to do, is pure ignorance on how Science works, on the other hand.
Actually, I didn't say it is wrong, just that the possibility is there. That's a mere straw man.
In other news, 1 + 1 = 2. Irrelevant? You bet.
If you only move with the tide, you're not a human being; you may as well be an automaton.
Why should they resent you, rather than the ones who cause the problem to begin with (bosses, etc.)? Yeah, everyone should just be as miserable as everyone else; that'll change everything for the better!
Sure, it will always be subjective, but that's a good baseline idea, which is much more specific than "I don't like it."
Not really. The fact that these things are so utterly subjective is exactly why I can't take studies like this seriously.
This is why there is an education crises in this country as an example.
Aside from the fact that the quality of education is abysmal, and many teachers don't even understand education? A little.
Psychology is mostly pseudoscience to begin with, as the testing is often subjective, subject to bias, and not nearly as rigorous and repeatable as, say physics.
Oh, I do have evidence and a scientific theory on my side.
You have evidence that shows it's impossible for someone is be a complete loner? Do tell. Either that, you make an attempt to understand my position.
You on the other hand have only wishful thinking and ignorance at your side.
Such as? Are you so opposed to accepting that the possibility is there? What exactly do you think my position is that you would call it "wishful thinking" and "ignorance"? Explain.
Of course instinct plays a huge role in mating. But couples can and do decide to have no kids even though they are mating.
Even if they decide not to have kids, there are unseen factors at work that make them take that path. Again, the point is that marriage has nothing to do with any of this, but what does matter is the mentality of the people who decide/don't decide to have children.
However, the current culture places a lot of value in marriage (though that may be changing).
People who mindlessly follow what others are doing are themselves mindless. Again, I see no evidence that people who place high value in marriage are anything more than magical thinkers.
Anyone who doesn't see that isn't really applying critical thinking.
In this case, there are no worthwhile benefits to me. Furthermore, since I have principles and find marriage disgusting, it isn't something I'd ever consider to begin with.
Look at it another way: Ask any gay couple in a state that doesn't allow gay marriage whether marriage is important or not. You will quickly find out that it's more than just a title.
Actually, no. No matter what individuals feel about it, it will always be a mere title. Asking gay couples would change literally nothing.
There are practical ramifications for remaining unmarried.
Which you've yet to name. I believe one of them would be hospital visitation rights, but it's absolutely ridiculous that our society is so primitive that that can't be solved in other ways at this point in time (Or can it?).
And there are also practical ramifications to getting married.
Oh I do have quite a lot of evidence supporting my position. my friend. No one exists in recorded history that disprove this theory and all cases of forced isolation produced results that further corroborates it.
Ignorance is not the same as evidence.
Sure it may be wrong as any scientific theory
You have no scientific theory; just ignorance of the answer, same as me. All I did was say that it was possible for someone to have such a mentality, not that I know it happened. If you keep opposing this in such a desperate fashion, I'll start thinking you're a religious fundamentalist.
it is common sense and one of the basic principles of Science.
"common sense" is often garbage, so please don't mention that tripe. Whether something is common is irrelevant. All that matters is whether it makes sense, and only you can decide that for yourself.