This is about spending money to get a message out. Publishing and broadcasting ideas tends to require spending money. Companies are now free to engage in this speech and spend their own money distributing and broadcasting it.
The government might shrink to an insignificant size, thereby rendering conspiracy theories ridiculous. Conspiracy theories are a lot easier to believe when the government has this much power and keeps trying to get more.
But there will never be an end to conspiracy theories because conspiracy theories are ultimately about the self-image of their believers. Conspiracy believers' secret knowledge of "what's really going on" sets them apart from their fellows. It makes them feel significant and special. People don't give up things like that until they get something even better to replace it with.
If you don't want to pay the fee, you should avoid it by not signing an agreement with Verizon. If you don't like Verizon's customer service, you should avoid it by not signing an agreement with Verizon. Or sign an agreement and live up to your obligations and avoid the fee that way.
Don't hire the government to force the people at Verizon to do things against their will -- unless the people at Verizon have truly defrauded you, personally, out of a significant amount of money. Because forcing people to do things against their will is (almost always) morally wrong.
How about if I hide my info myself (if I want it hidden) instead of hiring the government to force innocent people to do it against their will for my benefit?
Lots of things are against the law in totalitarian states. Injustice prevails where force dictates action. This case is unjust. If the law supports this case, then the law is unjust.
You must have a different source of news on the vast Iraq war combat operations for US troops. Please post a link to this source. I would like to see the video.
The Iraq war is only 1/15th as expensive as everything else the government does. Someone who only spends 1/15th of their budget on an activity has a hobby, not an addiction.
It's not the cause of the bankruptcy.
Anyway, you can relax. We won the war and the combat troops are coming home. We may keep a (relatively inexpensive) forward force there like we have in Korea and Germany, but the combat is essentially over.
This case shows the ridiculous extremes that "privacy" has come to. Netflix, apparently, has some sort of affirmative obligation to help this woman hide her illicit sexual escapades. The government is going to require Netflix to help cover up for her proclivities.
Lesbian romps are voluntary. Using Netflix is voluntary. Telling Netflix about yourself is voluntary. Netflix voluntarily rents you videos. Every aspect of this case involves people freely engaging in voluntary action. And now we're being asked to get the government involved to force Netflix to hide information against their will, and, by the way, hide it retroactive to several years ago.
Why shouldn't we just say no to people like this? No, we won't help you hide. No, we won't force other people (against their will) to help you hide. No. If you want to hide the things you do, try being more discreet next time.
The thing is, most anti-AGW proponents come off as people not wanting to change anything because it isn't convenient for them. So naturally, denying everything allows things to proceed as they are now, along the current status quo.
Wow. They actually want to keep doing things that, as far as they can tell, make them better off? Those people sound completely rational.
1) The U.S. currently consumes 25% of the world oil. China and India each have about 3 times the population. If China and India scale up and consume oil at the same per-capita rate as the U.S., then they will use 150% of the world's oil. That's probably not going to sit well with the rest of the world, besides being impossible and causing serious economic problems.
Economics explains how populations behave under these pressures. More oil becomes available and/or prices rise and demand drops. I think it's in the first chapter of every elementary Economics book.
Also, the talking point about the US using 25% of resources is a half truth. We're 27% of the world's GDP. We produce things with those resources. You thought we were just hoarding them?
2) The U.S. currently produces around 20 metric tons of CO2 per capita. This is inline with other first world nations and/or oil rich nations. China and India are around 4 and 1 metric tons per capita. Once again, if they scale up to match their first world peers, that's a lot more CO2 pouring into the world's atmosphere.
And? I guess the people of China and India shouldn't want to have better lives? Or shouldn't be allowed to?
So deny global warming all you want... that isn't going to solve the actual problems we're headed towards. Some models indicate temperatures will rise between 1 and 6 degrees C over the next century, and we can probably get along fine at the lower end. But it is more likely that economic distortions and/or all out energy wars will wreak havoc, before the oceans flood have a chance to drown us all.
You'd think a century would give us time to take 10 steps back from the water line. Or build a half meter high sea wall in critical spots. I guess not though.
Sometimes you just have to accept that the other person just might know more about a topic than you.
Other times, you don't.
Peer review is essential. When the science is being used as an excuse to control everyone's life, then everyone is a peer, and we are all entitled to review the findings.
This seems like the point people are missing. Facebook isn't a data vault. It does not exist to protect you from people finding out what city you live in. (Horrors! Someone might find out your current city!!!)
If you can't give up any info about yourself, Facebook isn't for you.
This is yet another example. When businesses decide things, they make choices to maximize financial gain. When governments decide things, they make choices to maximize political gain. Therefore, anyone who trusts the government to act in their interests had better be damn certain they never lose an election or fall out of political favor. If you're not directly in power, you're just "the little people" and that power will be wielded against you. You'd best hope those are limited powers.
BTW, this story is essentially an admission by the Patent Office that they're corrupt. It's just that their mission has been corrupted by an ideology rather than any sort of direct monetary payments. Maybe next week the Patent Office will start putting Mormons or their personal friends or people who donated money to John McCain ahead of everyone else.
I have the option to use energy and pay for it. Using the energy and paying for it will make my life better. That's why I'm willing to pay. If that option is taken away from me, that opportunity to make my life better is also taken away. Even though the improvement from the energy use is worth more to me than the money, I'm stuck with the money and without the improvement. I am artificially poorer, despite having a sum of money (which I can't put to good use because I'm forbidden).
If I can save money and get a better result, I will do this. I will do it whether it saves energy or not. Saving energy is, therefore, an unnecessary motivation when it actually benefits people.
Conservation is artificial poverty when it's not motivated by economic factors. And when it is motivated by economic factors, it has a self-evident value that requires neither advocacy nor government mandate.
---
As more and more opportunities for improvement are taken from people, they start to wonder why they need to produce as much. It's not doing them much good: they can't use their wages to improve their lives. Given the opportunity to produce more or to relax, they'll start to choose leisure. Societal productivity drops.
Technological and social progress slows. Folks start to focus on keeping the wealth they had from before the restrictive conservation measures. They can't improve, so they try to avoid deterioration.
Society continues, but there's less and less to look forward to in the future. Civilization becomes brittle and unable to respond to a crisis.
At some point, some sort of major disaster happens. The weakened civilization fails and crumbles. A dark age begins.
--
I do more with less. But in your world view, being anything less than a glutton is somehow morally wrong.
Forcing people to do things against their will is morally wrong. Threatening innocent people with fines and imprisonment (or violence and possibly death if they resist) is morally wrong. Imposing your ascetic environmental spirituality on people against their will is morally wrong.
You are not a king. You have no authority to rule your fellow men.
I'm not interested. If the book makes a good case in favor of forcing people to lead impoverished lives in some situations, then the clear lesson is to avoid those situations or find a better way out.
Scientific and technical progress is our way out. Increasing productivity is our way out. Getting more for less is our way out. Having a high standard of living so we can afford expensive environmental projects is our way out.
Artificial conservation, artificial impoverishment, Luddite fears of technical progress, NIMBYism, and simple obstruction of progress are a trap that will leave us mired in a world without a future.
It's not relevant whether it's actually not warming or it only seems like it's not warming since 1998. The perception is a big problem for AGW believers.
Also, can you show us something the models produced in 1998 that correctly predicts the 2009 climate? Because I remember hearing about ALARMING warming on the way, not imperceptible warming that seems a lot like cooling.
So there's no reason to advocate green products at all then. Few people deliberately throw away money.
Most of the time, green products are promoted as "green" because they're objectively worse (inferior, less efficient, or more expensive) than the non-"green" alternatives. Green means you're being told to pay more for less, but you'll get some intangible environmental spiritual benefit.
"Buy green and go to environmental heaven."
In the few cases where the "green" product is actually cheaper and better, "green" tends to be mentioned as an afterthought.
"It's cheaper and better. And by the way, it's also green."
Slashdot Mirror
Presumably, we would also see John Edwards arrested for defrauding voters by lying about being that baby's father.
Are you saying that would be a good thing?
I would submit that free speech is better than "recourse". Now "free" means free for everyone, even people performing jobs at for-profit corporations.
This isn't about donating to candidates.
This is about spending money to get a message out. Publishing and broadcasting ideas tends to require spending money. Companies are now free to engage in this speech and spend their own money distributing and broadcasting it.
They're doing such a great job. They deserve a reward.
Sunstein misses one of the most obvious answers:
The government might shrink to an insignificant size, thereby rendering conspiracy theories ridiculous. Conspiracy theories are a lot easier to believe when the government has this much power and keeps trying to get more.
But there will never be an end to conspiracy theories because conspiracy theories are ultimately about the self-image of their believers. Conspiracy believers' secret knowledge of "what's really going on" sets them apart from their fellows. It makes them feel significant and special. People don't give up things like that until they get something even better to replace it with.
Second Life was based on PR and hype. No one needs to hear old news or the same tired Second Life stories again.
If you don't want to pay the fee, you should avoid it by not signing an agreement with Verizon. If you don't like Verizon's customer service, you should avoid it by not signing an agreement with Verizon. Or sign an agreement and live up to your obligations and avoid the fee that way.
Don't hire the government to force the people at Verizon to do things against their will -- unless the people at Verizon have truly defrauded you, personally, out of a significant amount of money. Because forcing people to do things against their will is (almost always) morally wrong.
How about if it were illegal to publish my personal information without my express consent?
That would infringe free speech and freedom of the press in a very obvious way.
How about if I hide my info myself (if I want it hidden) instead of hiring the government to force innocent people to do it against their will for my benefit?
Somehow I don't find that protecting the rights of corporations to do whatever they want with your purchase history to be a noble and just cause.
Somehow I don't find that protecting the rights of [people] to [act freely] with [information that they rightly know] to be a noble and just cause.
Fixed that for you. You are anti-freedom. I am pro-freedom.
I looked at your news posts. No battles. No combat. No troops wounded.
A perfect utopia is not needed for "combat" to be "essentially" over.
I hear there are still Nazi sympathizers in some places. And we still have troops in Germany. I guess WWII is still going on ... ?
Lots of things are against the law in totalitarian states. Injustice prevails where force dictates action. This case is unjust. If the law supports this case, then the law is unjust.
You must have a different source of news on the vast Iraq war combat operations for US troops. Please post a link to this source. I would like to see the video.
Thanks.
The Iraq war is only 1/15th as expensive as everything else the government does. Someone who only spends 1/15th of their budget on an activity has a hobby, not an addiction.
It's not the cause of the bankruptcy.
Anyway, you can relax. We won the war and the combat troops are coming home. We may keep a (relatively inexpensive) forward force there like we have in Korea and Germany, but the combat is essentially over.
The "Iraq war" has been about 1/15th of the Federal budget since the war began. What about the other 14/15ths of the budget?
You obviously don't care about the budget at all and are just repeating anti-war talking-points. You are also off topic.
This case shows the ridiculous extremes that "privacy" has come to. Netflix, apparently, has some sort of affirmative obligation to help this woman hide her illicit sexual escapades. The government is going to require Netflix to help cover up for her proclivities.
Lesbian romps are voluntary. Using Netflix is voluntary. Telling Netflix about yourself is voluntary. Netflix voluntarily rents you videos. Every aspect of this case involves people freely engaging in voluntary action. And now we're being asked to get the government involved to force Netflix to hide information against their will, and, by the way, hide it retroactive to several years ago.
Why shouldn't we just say no to people like this? No, we won't help you hide. No, we won't force other people (against their will) to help you hide. No. If you want to hide the things you do, try being more discreet next time.
The thing is, most anti-AGW proponents come off as people not wanting to change anything because it isn't convenient for them. So naturally, denying everything allows things to proceed as they are now, along the current status quo.
Wow. They actually want to keep doing things that, as far as they can tell, make them better off? Those people sound completely rational.
1) The U.S. currently consumes 25% of the world oil. China and India each have about 3 times the population. If China and India scale up and consume oil at the same per-capita rate as the U.S., then they will use 150% of the world's oil. That's probably not going to sit well with the rest of the world, besides being impossible and causing serious economic problems.
Economics explains how populations behave under these pressures. More oil becomes available and/or prices rise and demand drops. I think it's in the first chapter of every elementary Economics book.
Also, the talking point about the US using 25% of resources is a half truth. We're 27% of the world's GDP. We produce things with those resources. You thought we were just hoarding them?
2) The U.S. currently produces around 20 metric tons of CO2 per capita. This is inline with other first world nations and/or oil rich nations. China and India are around 4 and 1 metric tons per capita. Once again, if they scale up to match their first world peers, that's a lot more CO2 pouring into the world's atmosphere.
And? I guess the people of China and India shouldn't want to have better lives? Or shouldn't be allowed to?
So deny global warming all you want... that isn't going to solve the actual problems we're headed towards. Some models indicate temperatures will rise between 1 and 6 degrees C over the next century, and we can probably get along fine at the lower end. But it is more likely that economic distortions and/or all out energy wars will wreak havoc, before the oceans flood have a chance to drown us all.
You'd think a century would give us time to take 10 steps back from the water line. Or build a half meter high sea wall in critical spots. I guess not though.
Sometimes you just have to accept that the other person just might know more about a topic than you.
Other times, you don't.
Peer review is essential. When the science is being used as an excuse to control everyone's life, then everyone is a peer, and we are all entitled to review the findings.
You've made some good points and one bad one. Note how correcting you on the bad one (Greenland) seems to be a substitute for a genuine rebuttal.
Let me post my exact schedule for this person to follow. Then we'll see who stalks who.
But if you're trying to hide, Facebook continues to be a poor hiding place.
This seems like the point people are missing. Facebook isn't a data vault. It does not exist to protect you from people finding out what city you live in. (Horrors! Someone might find out your current city!!!)
If you can't give up any info about yourself, Facebook isn't for you.
This is yet another example. When businesses decide things, they make choices to maximize financial gain. When governments decide things, they make choices to maximize political gain. Therefore, anyone who trusts the government to act in their interests had better be damn certain they never lose an election or fall out of political favor. If you're not directly in power, you're just "the little people" and that power will be wielded against you. You'd best hope those are limited powers.
BTW, this story is essentially an admission by the Patent Office that they're corrupt. It's just that their mission has been corrupted by an ideology rather than any sort of direct monetary payments. Maybe next week the Patent Office will start putting Mormons or their personal friends or people who donated money to John McCain ahead of everyone else.
How does using less energy make me poorer?
I have the option to use energy and pay for it. Using the energy and paying for it will make my life better. That's why I'm willing to pay. If that option is taken away from me, that opportunity to make my life better is also taken away. Even though the improvement from the energy use is worth more to me than the money, I'm stuck with the money and without the improvement. I am artificially poorer, despite having a sum of money (which I can't put to good use because I'm forbidden).
If I can save money and get a better result, I will do this. I will do it whether it saves energy or not. Saving energy is, therefore, an unnecessary motivation when it actually benefits people.
Conservation is artificial poverty when it's not motivated by economic factors. And when it is motivated by economic factors, it has a self-evident value that requires neither advocacy nor government mandate.
---
As more and more opportunities for improvement are taken from people, they start to wonder why they need to produce as much. It's not doing them much good: they can't use their wages to improve their lives. Given the opportunity to produce more or to relax, they'll start to choose leisure. Societal productivity drops.
Technological and social progress slows. Folks start to focus on keeping the wealth they had from before the restrictive conservation measures. They can't improve, so they try to avoid deterioration.
Society continues, but there's less and less to look forward to in the future. Civilization becomes brittle and unable to respond to a crisis.
At some point, some sort of major disaster happens. The weakened civilization fails and crumbles. A dark age begins.
--
I do more with less. But in your world view, being anything less than a glutton is somehow morally wrong.
Forcing people to do things against their will is morally wrong. Threatening innocent people with fines and imprisonment (or violence and possibly death if they resist) is morally wrong. Imposing your ascetic environmental spirituality on people against their will is morally wrong.
You are not a king. You have no authority to rule your fellow men.
I'm not interested. If the book makes a good case in favor of forcing people to lead impoverished lives in some situations, then the clear lesson is to avoid those situations or find a better way out.
Scientific and technical progress is our way out. Increasing productivity is our way out. Getting more for less is our way out. Having a high standard of living so we can afford expensive environmental projects is our way out.
Artificial conservation, artificial impoverishment, Luddite fears of technical progress, NIMBYism, and simple obstruction of progress are a trap that will leave us mired in a world without a future.
See above where I addressed this.
It's not relevant whether it's actually not warming or it only seems like it's not warming since 1998. The perception is a big problem for AGW believers.
Also, can you show us something the models produced in 1998 that correctly predicts the 2009 climate? Because I remember hearing about ALARMING warming on the way, not imperceptible warming that seems a lot like cooling.
So there's no reason to advocate green products at all then. Few people deliberately throw away money.
Most of the time, green products are promoted as "green" because they're objectively worse (inferior, less efficient, or more expensive) than the non-"green" alternatives. Green means you're being told to pay more for less, but you'll get some intangible environmental spiritual benefit.
"Buy green and go to environmental heaven."
In the few cases where the "green" product is actually cheaper and better, "green" tends to be mentioned as an afterthought.
"It's cheaper and better. And by the way, it's also green."