computers continue to grow in features for the same price. it makes absolutely no sense for microsoft to care one bit about how fast the latest operating system runs on old hardware. all microsoft has to deliver with windows 7 on new hardware is the same performance as xp on old hardware
sure, it could just mean more eyecandy and more background process bloat, but so what? as long as it is responsive enough, that's all the end user cares about. yes, there are a few obsessed fetishizing extreme users who care that the start menu loads in 130 ms rather than 13 ms, but i hardly think such people matter in microsoft's decision making process, nor should they
time warner would charge the end users for an "upgrade": a modem with "amazing new features" (translation: security exploit patched). so time warner would eventually make money off of exposing end users to script kiddies and hackers
any media distribution system that takes distributor's concerns into account will fail. distributor's concerns are orthogonal and sometimes hostile to what consumers want. therefore, addressing these sideshow concerns winds up designing a media distribution system that is suboptimal from the only concern that really matters
what concern is that? you determine the media distribution system that will succeed based on... drum roll please... this amazing newfangled metric called GIVE THE CUSTOMER WHAT HE FUCKING WANTS. END OF FUCKING STORY
i swear, is it a job requirement for being a media executive to be tone deaf? pun not intended: these assholes are seriously conceptually tone deaf
perhaps previous job experience such as "grave digger" is germane as well?
there's nothing placebo going on with marijuana's proven ability to stimluate appetite. for many wasting diseases, such as cancer, this is a godsend. and of course marijuana relieves stress, which is an issue for anyone facing a major disease
you're arguing about word definitions. moving around semantics is a not a useful debate. say something conceptual, or say nothing at all, as the sum total of your comment is nothing but a bunch of grammatical legalistic posturing
religion says what truth is in spite of reality, and as a brute act of faith, turns what it believes into reality.
all science tells you is static things: how things react. science never tells you, and can never tell you, about the consequences of the proactive forces of mankind's ambitions. mankind is a creative force, he does not adapt to the environment like other animals, he adapts the environment to him
so what do you create? religion tells you how and what to create of societies and the world. a lot of what current religions say on the subject sucks. but any answer to the question: so what do we make of this thing called life? is an act of religiosity that you are undertaking, regardless of how much you dislike traditional organized religion. in other words, you need to draw a line between your animosity between traditional religiosity and your own religious-type thinking, and realize that they all fall under the same semantic umbrella: you are a religious person. and you can be a religious person, and have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with traditional religions
what does a guy do with his life is a question science can never answer, because science is all about inert, static inanimate phenomena, only about reactions in the natural world. it says nothing, and can forever more say nothing, out of a simple consequence of what the definition of science is, about what mankind should do with his existence. that's where religion comes in: it defines self-emergent phenomena of mankind in groups that in turn eventually shapes the natural world
all greed is is a desire to accumulate to support yourself. sometimes more than you need, but how do you draw the line? often it is the case that one mans reach for more winds up filling the bounty of those who can't or won't reach at all. societal systems that lock people's reach down wind up impoverishing all, not equating everyone at a high equal rate. there is always some natural inequality of accumulation due to merit and ability (and also via nepotism, inheritance, other vile ways) but this society with an inequality of riches is still richer than a society where everyone is artificially locked down to how much they are able to acquire. in other words, you need to accept some amount of inequality because any attempt to equalize people's wants and needs just deflates everyone's income overall
if you have a system which doesn't reward greed, people starve, literally. flesh is flesh: its sustenance is an act of transgression. you can't make a valid moral system that ignores the life-affirming value of greed
if you reject all traditional religion's codes of conduct, that doesn't mean you are nonreligious, it just means you follow your own unique religion. if you claim to follow no code of conduct, this is a religion as well. no, i'm not being lose with my semantics. rather, you are being phobic of a harmless word: "religion". don't be phobic in your conception of what religion really means: relax, its part of human experience, always was, and always will be
of course, you're not alone in your transgression: plenty of religious folk miss the point about science, and think it somehow treads on science's turf
genuine religion answers questions science can never answer. genuine science answers questions religion can never answer. science and religion never meet
you lose when you begin to answer scientific questions with religion, or religious questions with science
how peaceful and prosperous a society is is pretty much directly proportional to how many people get that essential separation about science and religion in their cognition
all of us have an ability to turn off empathy. it does not take a genuine psychological abnormality to do something evil for the sake of greed or other base instinct. it also begins to separate the man from the crime in terms of responsibility: if he's a psychopath, it removes culpability by explaining away some of what someone does wrong as a simple psychological defect, something beyond their control
no, a lot of really heinous crimes in this world are not done by psychopaths. and that actually makes the crimes far worse. we use the word "psychopath" as a quick way to explain away their crimes, of drawing distance between the criminal and us. which is probably necessary for us to do. for to consider that someone like you and me can do vile things makes us feel uncomfortable about ourselves. our potential to do horrible wrong. better to do the quick and easy thing and label the person "psychopath" rather than meditate on the real and ruinous road that takes a psychologically normal person and winds up with them committing evil
1. knew her victim 2. created a sustained longterm effort 3. involved trickery and lying and emotional manipulation 4. was an adult preying on a child 5. knew the child had emotional problems
that's pretty specific
any law crafted after the lori drew case would work fine to punish future lori drews if its language zeroed in on these highlights. anything more broad of course, is avenue for inapplicability
an adult preyed on emotionally disturbed child they knew, for a day? thats not longterm
another child preyed on an emotionally disturbed child they knew in the longterm? it wasn't an adult committing the crime
an adult preyed on an emotionally disturbed child they didn't know over the longterm? they didn't know them
put an order form for a self-published book on your site. the self-publishing business is well-established and straightforward
end of story
no need for a publisher and all that legal cruft
you'll make more money than going the publisher route, even with all the barnes and noble exposure. people are getting information about programming via internet searches, not browsing barnes and noble. hell, people are getting information about composting, travelling to ecuador, whooping cough, and everything else online. you are not giving exposure by not being in barnes and noble
and if you think not getting a toehold in barnes and noble means less income, you are correct. except that free and unfettered access online represents far more exposure than barnes and noble. and you get that exposure by being unbound from all the legal cruft of a publisher. such that anyone choosing to buy a book anyways from you online represents more people than buying it at barnes and noble
lose the publisher, get more exposure and get more cash
freedom from the tyranny of fear, of an unnecessarily dangerous civil society. not all freedom impositions come from above. plenty come from below: poverty, drug abuse, illiteracy... dangerous hotheads with firearms
additionally, all freedoms exist in tension: my right to listen to loud music, your right to get a good nights sleep. my right to get to work on time, your right to not be run off the road. and your right to carry a firearm, and my right not to be shot by a knucklehead. you evaluate where the tensions lie, and maximum freedom is always a compromise which shifts over time. now it is clearly shifting away from firearm ownership
look, i grew up on a rural farm. milked goats, used it on my rice crispies, went out to the henhouse, tried to fry fertilized eggs by mistake... ponies, 10 dogs, 30 cats, a dilapidated barn, only matched by the dilapidated 1850s farm house built by drunk farmers. same house my mom grew up in. nearest neighbor a mile away through a swamp
granddad who i grew up in the same farm house taught me to shoot in said swamp on one of his many decades old family heirloom shotguns. look, my mom could be in the daughters of the american revolution if they weren't such racists awhile back which turned her off from it. my ancestors fought for and created this country with the use of firearms, and depended upon them for their security and livelihood, since the 1600s, when they came to this continent and life without a firearm was suicide. and that time has come and gone, and my ancestors would be proud of me to recognize that fundamental change, and recognize what is best for this country. the usa is not about firearm use, its about principles, that for a long time have come down unanimously on the side of firearm ownership, but now, applied to a changing world, these same principles come down against. its really not that big of a deal in the end
i grew up, and moved to the city, and converted to the anticar religion: i haven't driven since high school, when i was rural, and needed a car to get anywhere. dont need one now: subway or walk
i also converted to this horrible antigun religion
as will your children;-)
change, the only constant
in the end, there are far more important things than guns. they are not the sole earthly manifestation of the highest most important principles of freedom and self-determination. plenty of situations, they are the exact oppposite: the tools of tyranny
it does a good job of that most of the time. occasionally it kills and maims. when it does so, it is accidental, not by design. well, even if it is used to kill on purpose, its obviously off label use. they don't put spikes and flamethrowers on toyotas: the INTENT of a car is not to kill. but when a gun meanwhile puts a projectile into an creature's flesh, it is doing EXACTLY what it was designed for
it would be arrogant of me to ask you to stop using your rifle for 100% valid hunting purposes, correct? i also have no doubt that when you pick up a firearm you do it with 100% responsibility, and you would never harm another person, unless they had the clear intent to harm you. the problem comes in when you observe that not everyone is so well-intentioned and responsible as you, and there is no magic wand to tell you from those who don't deserve a firearm. so why must the clearly vast majority of firearm users be obliged to give up their guns for the sake of a minority of assholes?
because the damage the assholes do is out of proportion to the benefit the majority of firearm users receive from guns
in other words, it might be arrogant for me to tell you to put down your gun, but it is also arrogant for you to support a law that means when i walk through the streets of new york, i am under increased danger of being hit by bullet because of knuckleheads. i am under no illusions of hubris or arrogance or having dirty harry fantasies to think i have a good chance of stopping from being hurt by my own use of a firearm. if only we were omniscient. of course, people DO stop themselves from being victimized by using their handguns. if only this represented the majority of cases
outlawing guns won't stop the seriously intent people from getting guns. but such serious and intent people also have specific and quiet and intelligent reasons for getting one. they aren't going to use the gun with abandon, even if their intent is evil. they don't represent the vast majority of problems from gun use: the CASUAL unserious moron. outlawing guns will stop these casual hotheaded knuckleheads from getting a gun most certainly. not completely, but cutting down their access significantly cuts down on their possession significantly: remember, we're not talking about the seriously committed here. and these casual irresponsible assholes are the root problem with guns in society, they represent the whole problem with guns in the first place. and that observation is what shifts the entire verdict to outlawing them
and so i ask rural people to give up their pasttimes, so that us urban people can suffer less slaughter. currently, a minority of rural folk enjoy their firearms, with the side effect being the slaughter of hundreds of urban innocents every year for the sake of the legal structure that allows you a firearm
i'm asking you to sacrifice that for the clearly obvious superior benefit of significant less human death than the smaller benefit of the pasttimes you enjoy with your gun. go bow hunting for crying out loud if you enjoy the thrill of the hunt. its a more honest challenge, makes you feel even more validated and vigorous. i understand that thrill, it is extremely self-affirming in the most noble of senses. why not outlaw bow hunting too? a guy can kill and maim with a bow right? in fact, that just happened in new york city:
but again, the point is that the technology isn't nearly as potent as handgun: the continuum of acceptable lethality versus unacceptable lethality clearly rules bows as acceptable. one hotheaded asshole can kill maybe one person with a bow with the same time and effort as an equally hotheaded asshole with a handgun can kill ten people. same with knives in england: when that hothead decides to take the world out with himself, he'll slash 3 or 4, rather tha
a sewing needle is built and is intended to sew thread. it is designed to be maximally efficient in this regard. it can be used for many things, but what it is most used for, since it is designed for that use, is sewing
if you stopped making sewing needles, people would use alternate, less maximally efficient tools to get the job of sewing done. sewing ability and quality and quantity of output would go down. swords just don't have the range of a gun, less would be killed. if you got a bunch of award winning engineers and designers together and built a better sewing needle, one that increases the ability of human hands to manipulate thread, sewing output and quality and quantity would increase. gee, that automatic magazine sure comes in handy in getting multiple shots out rapidly
a technology, no technology, is neutral. it has a purpose and an intent for what it is designed for, and you can go all macgyver with the technology if you like (sewing needles can lance boils! guns can announce the start of track meets!) but what it was designed for is what it was designed for is what it was designed for. its simple existence and prevalence and how easy it is to get simply increases the ability to do whatever it is designed to do. it is NOT neutral in this regard
a handgun is intended to make a projectile go through flesh. you can shoot targets, bottles, and discarded washing machines at the dump if you want, but it was designed for someone to pick one up, point it at some, and dislodge a bullet into them. to quibble with this point is the very height of intellectual dishonesty, to attempt to deny the most glaringly obvious. shooting people: this is what a handgun is designed to do. this FACT has MEANING. that INTENT informs the design of the technology and informs its final composition. it is maximized in various qualities in order to most efficiently execute its intended function
the INTENT in the design of a technology most definitely informs us of its moral bearing. a technology is NOT morally neutral. an intellectual exercise for you to bring home the point:
if the simple technology itself is neutral and without moral implication, what's the big deal with an attempt to restrict a technology? why can't i freely purchase and stick bouncing betties in my front yard for good home defense? the technology is as neutral in intent as a garden hose or a kitchen carving knife?
i hope you appreciate the absurdity of denying the simple common sense fact that killing technologies are restricted simply because they imply more needless unnecessary deaths. of course, all killing technology exists on a continuum of lethality, from nunchuks to rocket launchers. where you restrict and where you provide free access is of course a matter of interpretation, but it is my assertion there are currently a number of fools in this country out of willful blindness or outright propagandization who see no problem extending that continuum of free access to lethal technology out and beyond. that the technology is perfectly harmless, that only the user, and not the technology, is the only factor involved in a tool's use. the INTENT of the tool has MEANING and VALUE to outcomes involving the whole range of human conflicts. its simple existence results in outcomes that more tragic and unnecessary, since physical violence is always a recurring response to conflict, and any force which multiplies that physical violence therefore is fair game to consider appropriateness for free access
i see whistleblowing on corporations and where they do evil all the time in western media. the same would be completely covered up and whitewashed in china. do you understand the level of pollution chinese companies get away with in china? if chinese companies tried to pull in the west the kind of crap they get away with routinely in china, the media would start a firestorm. oh, in fact they did: melamine in food, ethylene glycol in medicine, lead in toys...
look at those pictures. this is what companies get away with in china. if you showed such pictures in the west about a western company doing that somewhere to people in the west are you going to tell me they get away with anything near remotely as murderous in the west? i'm not asking for historical examples, i'm asking for the here and now. plenty of western companies pollute outside the west... and chinese companies just as much if not more now. here in the west, western companies are sued and erin brockovitched to death. while in china its carte blanche, standard operating procedure: poison poor chinese with impunity
and deny this:
one of the most influential and deeply historically entrenched american businesses has been systematically dismantled over the last 20 years in the usa. its media edifice hamstrung and turned against itself, all of its entrenched political players and lobbying and propaganda utterly defeated. i'm talking about the tobacco industry. where's this amazing western corporate control of our lives again?
i am very sick of this meme that companies control everything in the west
it is in fact the solid truth that in china, companies have much more influence and arrogant assumed right to pretty much murder, while in the west they are regulated and hounded by the media constantly. no such hounding in a government monopoly media in china, regulations only after they prove embarassing and hurt the bottom line in china
a nuclear bomb pretty much represents the most potent advance mankind has ever made in his long running technological effort to kill faster easier more
its not morally neutral. its not comparable to firebombing with conventional explosives. sure, the allies did worse to dresden than they did to nagasaki, but the tool they used represented a quantum leap (forgive the pun) in mankind's ability to destroy and kill. today, due to this technological advance, we now have the means to pretty much turn the planet into a wasteland, a nuclear winter, and pretty much end civilization as we know it. all that has to be done is a few guys in moscow and a few guys in washington dc press the right buttons, and voila: welcome to the mad max beyond the thunderdome. you can't do this with c4 and tnt, no matter how much you airdrop
as a correlating example, if i set off a few canisters of sarin gas on a city, or i simply open a vial of a strain of ebola that spreads via coughing in an airport, and i kill 10 million either way, pointing out that i can firebomb to death the same number of people with a really massive firebombing effort has no meaning
its not morally neutral. a pistol and a gatling gun can both kill 100 people. but you can kill 10 people a hell of a lot easier with a gatling gun
the actual potency of a killing technology has genuine moral weight. and the more potent, the more evil it is
yes i said evil. technologiy is NOT neutral. well, some technology is neutral: explosives can be used to create an national highway system as sure as it can be used to take out a daycare center. but something like a gun is designed for the specific use of ending a life. sure you can open locks, start a fire, go skeet shooting with a gun, but its PRIMARY purpose gives it moral purpose
a guillotine is just a knife. you can use it to split watermelons. but you are being intellectually honest if you ignore the purpose behind its creation and what it is primarily used for
i repeat: technology is not morally neutral. the intent of the user of a technology is not the sole determinant. what the technology was SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO DO has moral weight and value
Slashdot Mirror
computers continue to grow in features for the same price. it makes absolutely no sense for microsoft to care one bit about how fast the latest operating system runs on old hardware. all microsoft has to deliver with windows 7 on new hardware is the same performance as xp on old hardware
sure, it could just mean more eyecandy and more background process bloat, but so what? as long as it is responsive enough, that's all the end user cares about. yes, there are a few obsessed fetishizing extreme users who care that the start menu loads in 130 ms rather than 13 ms, but i hardly think such people matter in microsoft's decision making process, nor should they
time warner would charge the end users for an "upgrade": a modem with "amazing new features" (translation: security exploit patched). so time warner would eventually make money off of exposing end users to script kiddies and hackers
problem: clueless time warner suit needs to hire a "programmer" to config their modems remotely
solution: his sister's boyfriend is a programmer, a JAVASCRIPT programmer
problem solved. wait, here's an email from a guy in tech support, something about a DOCSIS. delete email...
for wally world's sake
any media distribution system that takes distributor's concerns into account will fail. distributor's concerns are orthogonal and sometimes hostile to what consumers want. therefore, addressing these sideshow concerns winds up designing a media distribution system that is suboptimal from the only concern that really matters
what concern is that? you determine the media distribution system that will succeed based on... drum roll please... this amazing newfangled metric called GIVE THE CUSTOMER WHAT HE FUCKING WANTS. END OF FUCKING STORY
i swear, is it a job requirement for being a media executive to be tone deaf? pun not intended: these assholes are seriously conceptually tone deaf
perhaps previous job experience such as "grave digger" is germane as well?
there's nothing placebo going on with marijuana's proven ability to stimluate appetite. for many wasting diseases, such as cancer, this is a godsend. and of course marijuana relieves stress, which is an issue for anyone facing a major disease
so there aren't any extra unplanned astronauts to arrive on "mars"
right handed versus left handed traffic. solution best decided by vanuatu:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9b/Vanuatu_driving.png
rail gauge. there's european and chinese, standard, but russia uses a broad gauge, which is a serious problem for economic development:
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/business/2008/01/11/138592/Beijing-to.htm
he understood what i said
but he think its more important to debate the defintion of words. stupid
its the mark of small mind: posture about word definitions rather than articulate a concept
still it is a lot better than sniping pointlessly as an anonymous coward
you're arguing about word definitions. moving around semantics is a not a useful debate. say something conceptual, or say nothing at all, as the sum total of your comment is nothing but a bunch of grammatical legalistic posturing
religion says what truth is in spite of reality, and as a brute act of faith, turns what it believes into reality.
all science tells you is static things: how things react. science never tells you, and can never tell you, about the consequences of the proactive forces of mankind's ambitions. mankind is a creative force, he does not adapt to the environment like other animals, he adapts the environment to him
so what do you create? religion tells you how and what to create of societies and the world. a lot of what current religions say on the subject sucks. but any answer to the question: so what do we make of this thing called life? is an act of religiosity that you are undertaking, regardless of how much you dislike traditional organized religion. in other words, you need to draw a line between your animosity between traditional religiosity and your own religious-type thinking, and realize that they all fall under the same semantic umbrella: you are a religious person. and you can be a religious person, and have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with traditional religions
what does a guy do with his life is a question science can never answer, because science is all about inert, static inanimate phenomena, only about reactions in the natural world. it says nothing, and can forever more say nothing, out of a simple consequence of what the definition of science is, about what mankind should do with his existence. that's where religion comes in: it defines self-emergent phenomena of mankind in groups that in turn eventually shapes the natural world
is the source of all evil in the world
all greed is is a desire to accumulate to support yourself. sometimes more than you need, but how do you draw the line? often it is the case that one mans reach for more winds up filling the bounty of those who can't or won't reach at all. societal systems that lock people's reach down wind up impoverishing all, not equating everyone at a high equal rate. there is always some natural inequality of accumulation due to merit and ability (and also via nepotism, inheritance, other vile ways) but this society with an inequality of riches is still richer than a society where everyone is artificially locked down to how much they are able to acquire. in other words, you need to accept some amount of inequality because any attempt to equalize people's wants and needs just deflates everyone's income overall
if you have a system which doesn't reward greed, people starve, literally. flesh is flesh: its sustenance is an act of transgression. you can't make a valid moral system that ignores the life-affirming value of greed
science tells you how
religion tells you why
science tells you how the world works
religion tells you how to live your life
if you reject all traditional religion's codes of conduct, that doesn't mean you are nonreligious, it just means you follow your own unique religion. if you claim to follow no code of conduct, this is a religion as well. no, i'm not being lose with my semantics. rather, you are being phobic of a harmless word: "religion". don't be phobic in your conception of what religion really means: relax, its part of human experience, always was, and always will be
of course, you're not alone in your transgression: plenty of religious folk miss the point about science, and think it somehow treads on science's turf
genuine religion answers questions science can never answer. genuine science answers questions religion can never answer. science and religion never meet
you lose when you begin to answer scientific questions with religion, or religious questions with science
how peaceful and prosperous a society is is pretty much directly proportional to how many people get that essential separation about science and religion in their cognition
all of us have an ability to turn off empathy. it does not take a genuine psychological abnormality to do something evil for the sake of greed or other base instinct. it also begins to separate the man from the crime in terms of responsibility: if he's a psychopath, it removes culpability by explaining away some of what someone does wrong as a simple psychological defect, something beyond their control
no, a lot of really heinous crimes in this world are not done by psychopaths. and that actually makes the crimes far worse. we use the word "psychopath" as a quick way to explain away their crimes, of drawing distance between the criminal and us. which is probably necessary for us to do. for to consider that someone like you and me can do vile things makes us feel uncomfortable about ourselves. our potential to do horrible wrong. better to do the quick and easy thing and label the person "psychopath" rather than meditate on the real and ruinous road that takes a psychologically normal person and winds up with them committing evil
because anyone who has ever made any important contribution to the arts and sciences was paid in advance, and that's way it has to be
zzz
it was nice knowing you
1. knew her victim
2. created a sustained longterm effort
3. involved trickery and lying and emotional manipulation
4. was an adult preying on a child
5. knew the child had emotional problems
that's pretty specific
any law crafted after the lori drew case would work fine to punish future lori drews if its language zeroed in on these highlights. anything more broad of course, is avenue for inapplicability
an adult preyed on emotionally disturbed child they knew, for a day? thats not longterm
another child preyed on an emotionally disturbed child they knew in the longterm? it wasn't an adult committing the crime
an adult preyed on an emotionally disturbed child they didn't know over the longterm? they didn't know them
etc
if the law is specific enough, no problem
put an order form for a self-published book on your site. the self-publishing business is well-established and straightforward
end of story
no need for a publisher and all that legal cruft
you'll make more money than going the publisher route, even with all the barnes and noble exposure. people are getting information about programming via internet searches, not browsing barnes and noble. hell, people are getting information about composting, travelling to ecuador, whooping cough, and everything else online. you are not giving exposure by not being in barnes and noble
and if you think not getting a toehold in barnes and noble means less income, you are correct. except that free and unfettered access online represents far more exposure than barnes and noble. and you get that exposure by being unbound from all the legal cruft of a publisher. such that anyone choosing to buy a book anyways from you online represents more people than buying it at barnes and noble
lose the publisher, get more exposure and get more cash
what kind of latency are you getting?
can you play a fps with mars crew?
can a mars rover host a MMORPG?
freedom from the tyranny of fear, of an unnecessarily dangerous civil society. not all freedom impositions come from above. plenty come from below: poverty, drug abuse, illiteracy... dangerous hotheads with firearms
additionally, all freedoms exist in tension: my right to listen to loud music, your right to get a good nights sleep. my right to get to work on time, your right to not be run off the road. and your right to carry a firearm, and my right not to be shot by a knucklehead. you evaluate where the tensions lie, and maximum freedom is always a compromise which shifts over time. now it is clearly shifting away from firearm ownership
look, i grew up on a rural farm. milked goats, used it on my rice crispies, went out to the henhouse, tried to fry fertilized eggs by mistake... ponies, 10 dogs, 30 cats, a dilapidated barn, only matched by the dilapidated 1850s farm house built by drunk farmers. same house my mom grew up in. nearest neighbor a mile away through a swamp
granddad who i grew up in the same farm house taught me to shoot in said swamp on one of his many decades old family heirloom shotguns. look, my mom could be in the daughters of the american revolution if they weren't such racists awhile back which turned her off from it. my ancestors fought for and created this country with the use of firearms, and depended upon them for their security and livelihood, since the 1600s, when they came to this continent and life without a firearm was suicide. and that time has come and gone, and my ancestors would be proud of me to recognize that fundamental change, and recognize what is best for this country. the usa is not about firearm use, its about principles, that for a long time have come down unanimously on the side of firearm ownership, but now, applied to a changing world, these same principles come down against. its really not that big of a deal in the end
i grew up, and moved to the city, and converted to the anticar religion: i haven't driven since high school, when i was rural, and needed a car to get anywhere. dont need one now: subway or walk
i also converted to this horrible antigun religion
as will your children ;-)
change, the only constant
in the end, there are far more important things than guns. they are not the sole earthly manifestation of the highest most important principles of freedom and self-determination. plenty of situations, they are the exact oppposite: the tools of tyranny
it does a good job of that most of the time. occasionally it kills and maims. when it does so, it is accidental, not by design. well, even if it is used to kill on purpose, its obviously off label use. they don't put spikes and flamethrowers on toyotas: the INTENT of a car is not to kill. but when a gun meanwhile puts a projectile into an creature's flesh, it is doing EXACTLY what it was designed for
it would be arrogant of me to ask you to stop using your rifle for 100% valid hunting purposes, correct? i also have no doubt that when you pick up a firearm you do it with 100% responsibility, and you would never harm another person, unless they had the clear intent to harm you. the problem comes in when you observe that not everyone is so well-intentioned and responsible as you, and there is no magic wand to tell you from those who don't deserve a firearm. so why must the clearly vast majority of firearm users be obliged to give up their guns for the sake of a minority of assholes?
because the damage the assholes do is out of proportion to the benefit the majority of firearm users receive from guns
in other words, it might be arrogant for me to tell you to put down your gun, but it is also arrogant for you to support a law that means when i walk through the streets of new york, i am under increased danger of being hit by bullet because of knuckleheads. i am under no illusions of hubris or arrogance or having dirty harry fantasies to think i have a good chance of stopping from being hurt by my own use of a firearm. if only we were omniscient. of course, people DO stop themselves from being victimized by using their handguns. if only this represented the majority of cases
outlawing guns won't stop the seriously intent people from getting guns. but such serious and intent people also have specific and quiet and intelligent reasons for getting one. they aren't going to use the gun with abandon, even if their intent is evil. they don't represent the vast majority of problems from gun use: the CASUAL unserious moron. outlawing guns will stop these casual hotheaded knuckleheads from getting a gun most certainly. not completely, but cutting down their access significantly cuts down on their possession significantly: remember, we're not talking about the seriously committed here. and these casual irresponsible assholes are the root problem with guns in society, they represent the whole problem with guns in the first place. and that observation is what shifts the entire verdict to outlawing them
and so i ask rural people to give up their pasttimes, so that us urban people can suffer less slaughter. currently, a minority of rural folk enjoy their firearms, with the side effect being the slaughter of hundreds of urban innocents every year for the sake of the legal structure that allows you a firearm
i'm asking you to sacrifice that for the clearly obvious superior benefit of significant less human death than the smaller benefit of the pasttimes you enjoy with your gun. go bow hunting for crying out loud if you enjoy the thrill of the hunt. its a more honest challenge, makes you feel even more validated and vigorous. i understand that thrill, it is extremely self-affirming in the most noble of senses. why not outlaw bow hunting too? a guy can kill and maim with a bow right? in fact, that just happened in new york city:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/2009/03/19/2009-03-19_arrest_in_bronx_bowandarrow_attack.html
but again, the point is that the technology isn't nearly as potent as handgun: the continuum of acceptable lethality versus unacceptable lethality clearly rules bows as acceptable. one hotheaded asshole can kill maybe one person with a bow with the same time and effort as an equally hotheaded asshole with a handgun can kill ten people. same with knives in england: when that hothead decides to take the world out with himself, he'll slash 3 or 4, rather tha
a sewing needle is built and is intended to sew thread. it is designed to be maximally efficient in this regard. it can be used for many things, but what it is most used for, since it is designed for that use, is sewing
if you stopped making sewing needles, people would use alternate, less maximally efficient tools to get the job of sewing done. sewing ability and quality and quantity of output would go down. swords just don't have the range of a gun, less would be killed. if you got a bunch of award winning engineers and designers together and built a better sewing needle, one that increases the ability of human hands to manipulate thread, sewing output and quality and quantity would increase. gee, that automatic magazine sure comes in handy in getting multiple shots out rapidly
a technology, no technology, is neutral. it has a purpose and an intent for what it is designed for, and you can go all macgyver with the technology if you like (sewing needles can lance boils! guns can announce the start of track meets!) but what it was designed for is what it was designed for is what it was designed for. its simple existence and prevalence and how easy it is to get simply increases the ability to do whatever it is designed to do. it is NOT neutral in this regard
a handgun is intended to make a projectile go through flesh. you can shoot targets, bottles, and discarded washing machines at the dump if you want, but it was designed for someone to pick one up, point it at some, and dislodge a bullet into them. to quibble with this point is the very height of intellectual dishonesty, to attempt to deny the most glaringly obvious. shooting people: this is what a handgun is designed to do. this FACT has MEANING. that INTENT informs the design of the technology and informs its final composition. it is maximized in various qualities in order to most efficiently execute its intended function
the INTENT in the design of a technology most definitely informs us of its moral bearing. a technology is NOT morally neutral. an intellectual exercise for you to bring home the point:
please describe the intent of this treaty:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottawa_Treaty
if the simple technology itself is neutral and without moral implication, what's the big deal with an attempt to restrict a technology? why can't i freely purchase and stick bouncing betties in my front yard for good home defense? the technology is as neutral in intent as a garden hose or a kitchen carving knife?
i hope you appreciate the absurdity of denying the simple common sense fact that killing technologies are restricted simply because they imply more needless unnecessary deaths. of course, all killing technology exists on a continuum of lethality, from nunchuks to rocket launchers. where you restrict and where you provide free access is of course a matter of interpretation, but it is my assertion there are currently a number of fools in this country out of willful blindness or outright propagandization who see no problem extending that continuum of free access to lethal technology out and beyond. that the technology is perfectly harmless, that only the user, and not the technology, is the only factor involved in a tool's use. the INTENT of the tool has MEANING and VALUE to outcomes involving the whole range of human conflicts. its simple existence results in outcomes that more tragic and unnecessary, since physical violence is always a recurring response to conflict, and any force which multiplies that physical violence therefore is fair game to consider appropriateness for free access
be intellectually honest, please
and actually believe something that moronic:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1406275&cid=29761913
i see whistleblowing on corporations and where they do evil all the time in western media. the same would be completely covered up and whitewashed in china. do you understand the level of pollution chinese companies get away with in china? if chinese companies tried to pull in the west the kind of crap they get away with routinely in china, the media would start a firestorm. oh, in fact they did: melamine in food, ethylene glycol in medicine, lead in toys...
witness:
http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/14/showcase-65/
look at those pictures. this is what companies get away with in china. if you showed such pictures in the west about a western company doing that somewhere to people in the west are you going to tell me they get away with anything near remotely as murderous in the west? i'm not asking for historical examples, i'm asking for the here and now. plenty of western companies pollute outside the west... and chinese companies just as much if not more now. here in the west, western companies are sued and erin brockovitched to death. while in china its carte blanche, standard operating procedure: poison poor chinese with impunity
and deny this:
one of the most influential and deeply historically entrenched american businesses has been systematically dismantled over the last 20 years in the usa. its media edifice hamstrung and turned against itself, all of its entrenched political players and lobbying and propaganda utterly defeated. i'm talking about the tobacco industry. where's this amazing western corporate control of our lives again?
i am very sick of this meme that companies control everything in the west
it is in fact the solid truth that in china, companies have much more influence and arrogant assumed right to pretty much murder, while in the west they are regulated and hounded by the media constantly. no such hounding in a government monopoly media in china, regulations only after they prove embarassing and hurt the bottom line in china
a nuclear bomb pretty much represents the most potent advance mankind has ever made in his long running technological effort to kill faster easier more
its not morally neutral. its not comparable to firebombing with conventional explosives. sure, the allies did worse to dresden than they did to nagasaki, but the tool they used represented a quantum leap (forgive the pun) in mankind's ability to destroy and kill. today, due to this technological advance, we now have the means to pretty much turn the planet into a wasteland, a nuclear winter, and pretty much end civilization as we know it. all that has to be done is a few guys in moscow and a few guys in washington dc press the right buttons, and voila: welcome to the mad max beyond the thunderdome. you can't do this with c4 and tnt, no matter how much you airdrop
as a correlating example, if i set off a few canisters of sarin gas on a city, or i simply open a vial of a strain of ebola that spreads via coughing in an airport, and i kill 10 million either way, pointing out that i can firebomb to death the same number of people with a really massive firebombing effort has no meaning
its not morally neutral. a pistol and a gatling gun can both kill 100 people. but you can kill 10 people a hell of a lot easier with a gatling gun
the actual potency of a killing technology has genuine moral weight. and the more potent, the more evil it is
yes i said evil. technologiy is NOT neutral. well, some technology is neutral: explosives can be used to create an national highway system as sure as it can be used to take out a daycare center. but something like a gun is designed for the specific use of ending a life. sure you can open locks, start a fire, go skeet shooting with a gun, but its PRIMARY purpose gives it moral purpose
a guillotine is just a knife. you can use it to split watermelons. but you are being intellectually honest if you ignore the purpose behind its creation and what it is primarily used for
i repeat: technology is not morally neutral. the intent of the user of a technology is not the sole determinant. what the technology was SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED TO DO has moral weight and value