Even better strategy: leave the book lying around, and tell him that it's not for kids his age and he's not allowed to read it. He'll pick it up for sure.
An additional part of this argument: if they allow us to see/hear their content, they have to send either sound waves and/or light waves to our eyes and ears. Which means they have to put those sounds and light in meatspace, where they can be recorded by readily available sound recorders and cameras.
They're fighting a battle they cannot win without breaking the laws of physics or rewiring everybody's brain.
The flaw in your logic, in addition to the "fact != fiction, fact != opinion, opinion is true => fiction is true" argument, is that opinion is not the opposite of fact.
This is quite easily demonstrated: "The sky is green." is not opinion (because it's an objective statement), and it's not a fact (because it isn't true). "The sky should be green." is the opinion which can't be wrong, only stupid or silly.
Also fun, of course, is "Socrates is mortal. A cat is mortal. Ergo, Socrates is a cat."
Churning out young Liberal/Progressives who are taught what to think, not how to think, and leaving them without critical thinking abilities is a feature, not a bug, as far as government is concerned.
So is your contention, based on your post and your sig, that all ideas of liberalism are basically the result of brainwashing by public schools?
I went through an American public school system, and the ideas I was taught there that could be construed as politically controversial amounted to (a) well-documented facts that conservatives have continued to deny, like evolution, (b) a lot of flag-waving patriotism, not along the lines of "government is good" but more "USA is better than everyone else", which isn't exactly liberalism, and (c) some subjective judgements suggesting that minorities and women had contributed to the history and culture of the United States. Never did I get anything along the lines of an expectation that I would adhere to politically liberal ideas.
Good, kind-hearted government isn't releasing this information to benefit the consumer by embarrassing companies (beliefs of low-level government functionaries, AKA "useful idiots", aside).
When it comes to government (or business, for that matter) actions, I don't really care about motivations, I care about effects. It really makes no difference why the CFPB released the information - they did, and it helps me and most other Americans, so I'm going to applaud it.
Among other things, this makes it harder to sway me with emotional appeals: "BP cares about the environment", for instance, doesn't factor into my judgment that they had an atrocious record and did some really risky things on the Deepwater Horizon rig.
I hate being called a consumer. The article is about modern day debt-serfs anyway, not consumers.
I do too, but in this case I understand why: 1. The phrase "consumer finance" does in fact refer to the kinds of things the CFPB is supposed to be dealing with: bank accounts, credit cards, and personal loans. 2. From the point of view of the banking industry, loans, accounts, cards, etc are their products, which you are purchasing with fees and/or interest payments.
The last thing the larger financial companies want is clear documentation of exactly how they screw their customers. Just by sharing this kind of information, they start making the market compete better - now that customers are basically talking to each other, they know that Capital One is a bad deal, which will hurt Capital One in the marketplace.
Of course, I know that there are some who's head will explode when they encounter a government program that is quite cheap, effective, mostly non-coercive, and improves market functioning, but that's what this is.
The President doesn't run the show himself, but because he's commander-in-chief, the President can and does regularly order in the troops without any declaration of war from Congress. For example, the USAF was ordered into Libya even though Congress didn't provide any funding or authorization for that mission.
The last time Congress formally declared war was in 1942.
The source of that entire argument is Eric Holder, who serves at the pleasure of the man we're accusing. It would be sort of like asking Tom Hagan if Michael Corleone had killed anybody.
Here's the counterargument: "No person shall... be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law;"
You're right that Obama should be impeached for killing 2 American citizens without making the slightest attempt at due process. Anwar al-Awlaki was arguably a Bad Person, but his son Abdulrahman was also targeted and killed 2 weeks later for what I can only assume was the sole crime of being the son of Anwar.
Dick Cheney should also have been impeached and tried for war crimes: The United States declared that ordering waterboarding was a crime against humanity back in 1945-6, and Dick Cheney proudly proclaimed that he had ordered waterboarding on national television.
Basically, top officials of the US are now above the law, and know it.
One that was popularized was Lorenzo's oil as a treatment for adrenoleukodystrophy in 1985. The treatment is not entirely proven, but it does seem to be useful in many cases.
Hobbyist science has always been part of the mix, sometimes an important part of the mix. Some examples: * Isaac Newton was actually an alchemist by trade - the physics and math were basically just fun side projects. * Albert Einstein published some of his most important stuff while working as a patent clerk. * Grote Reber was one of the key pioneers in radio astronomy working with a telescope he'd built in his backyard.
Now, I'll grant you that often amateur science is, well, amateurish, but occasionally an amateur scientist strikes gold, and I see no reason to discourage people from messing with it. They aren't going to be as good at it as the professionals, but at worst they accomplish nothing except have a little fun, and at best they add something to the scientific knowledge of humanity. Another way of looking at the argument: 100 pros could perhaps come up with 15 useful results a year, while 10000 amateurs could perhaps come up with 2. The pros are obviously much better than the amateurs, but we're all better off with 17 useful results than 15 useful results.
Well, by that definition the US military is by far the biggest terrorist organization on the planet. Of course, the US military's official definition of "terrorist" is "Any male person between the ages of about 14 and 50 that we just killed in a drone strike."
So, if they don't hate us for our freedoms (I'm with you on this point - that's the whitewashed, political reason), what do they hate us for? Is it our economic policies? Our military strategies?
The biggest reason they hate us right now, according to surveys and writings from people in the region, is that US drones are rountinely blowing up civilians with no involvement in terrorism. In addition, if you show up at the funeral of a person killed in a drone strike, you're now on the suspect list. I mean, imagine you're a typical Yemeni man who goes to work, does some shopping, heads home to your family, and finds that instead of a home and your wife and kids, you have a pile of rubble and a bunch of bodies (and the US reporters will say that a bunch of "militants" were killed). I think it's fair to say that you and everyone who cares about you would probably have nothing but complete hatred of the group of people who did that to you.
Other things that are definitely not helping are complete inaction on Syria slaughtering its own people, doing nothing to stop Israeli settlement building (which appears to have the goal of complete takeover of the West Bank), having allied governments attack protesters with equipment made in the USA, killing hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq, quite probably working with Israel to blow up Iranian physicists (and anyone who happens to be standing near them), and supporting oppressive and corrupt dictatorships throughout the region.
We don't even have a voice in the UN Assembly to make our objections be heard.
The UN Assembly can maybe decide what condiments are allowed on the Secretary-General's sandwich without the approval of the Security Council. The Security Council can't lift a finger unless the US (which, based on your subject I'm assuming you're based in) government allows it to happen. So yes, your country's objections will be heard.
If you don't think your interests are represented by the US government, then that's a different sort of problem. But the US government can pretty much tell the UN to go to hell any time it wants to.
People complain about Monsanto's use of terminator seeds, patents, lawsuits, etc. only because it is so difficult to compete without using Monsanto's products.... And Brazilian farmers could have used their existing seeds, but they did not.
Actually, a major part of the controversy around Monsanto and the food supply is precisely about how Monsanto uses its patents and lawsuits to force farmers who have had no business dealings at all with Monsanto to either pay them a bunch for patent infringement or buy seeds from them. For instance, Monsanto v Schmeiser in Canada, in which a farmer was taken to court not for buying seeds from Monsanto but for having some seeds with the gene in his field from his neighbors' crops' pollen.
All general statements are false. In this case, it depends a great deal on what the modifications do.
GM plants needing less pesticide: Good. GM plants that don't produce a viable seed for the sole purpose of increasing Monsanto's profits at the expense of poor farmers in Brazil, India, and a lot of other places: Evil. And using GM patents to force all farmers in the world to buy your product: Obviously very evil.
In a perfect world, research on GM would have been publicly funded research with no patent protection and the option of any private seed manufacturer to get in the game of producing the seeds with these modifications. That would have given us the pesticide benefits and such that you speak of, but without all the BS from Monsanto.
His customers aren't being charged. What the FDA is doing here is saying that you can't sell a 64 oz Coke laced with arsenic and claim it's just a 64 oz Coke.
(And I'm with you on the soft drinks in New York thing)
I can think of several reasons people would do this: 1. Some people are stupid. 2. People are often on a very very limited budget, and the online option may appear at least to be cheaper than the drugstore. 3. (Corollary to 1) Some people will diagnose themselves with illnesses that the doctor doesn't think they have, so they'll go and buy the treatment through channels that don't involve official doctors and prescriptions. 4. People who abuse prescription drugs would likely find this a very convenient option.
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I've got the body of a Greek God.
I did too, once, but when the police came by ...
Even better strategy: leave the book lying around, and tell him that it's not for kids his age and he's not allowed to read it. He'll pick it up for sure.
An additional part of this argument: if they allow us to see/hear their content, they have to send either sound waves and/or light waves to our eyes and ears. Which means they have to put those sounds and light in meatspace, where they can be recorded by readily available sound recorders and cameras.
They're fighting a battle they cannot win without breaking the laws of physics or rewiring everybody's brain.
If they don't change their ways, they may get another strongly worded letter about it!
The flaw in your logic, in addition to the "fact != fiction, fact != opinion, opinion is true => fiction is true" argument, is that opinion is not the opposite of fact.
This is quite easily demonstrated: "The sky is green." is not opinion (because it's an objective statement), and it's not a fact (because it isn't true). "The sky should be green." is the opinion which can't be wrong, only stupid or silly.
Also fun, of course, is "Socrates is mortal. A cat is mortal. Ergo, Socrates is a cat."
Churning out young Liberal/Progressives who are taught what to think, not how to think, and leaving them without critical thinking abilities is a feature, not a bug, as far as government is concerned.
So is your contention, based on your post and your sig, that all ideas of liberalism are basically the result of brainwashing by public schools?
I went through an American public school system, and the ideas I was taught there that could be construed as politically controversial amounted to (a) well-documented facts that conservatives have continued to deny, like evolution, (b) a lot of flag-waving patriotism, not along the lines of "government is good" but more "USA is better than everyone else", which isn't exactly liberalism, and (c) some subjective judgements suggesting that minorities and women had contributed to the history and culture of the United States. Never did I get anything along the lines of an expectation that I would adhere to politically liberal ideas.
Good, kind-hearted government isn't releasing this information to benefit the consumer by embarrassing companies (beliefs of low-level government functionaries, AKA "useful idiots", aside).
When it comes to government (or business, for that matter) actions, I don't really care about motivations, I care about effects. It really makes no difference why the CFPB released the information - they did, and it helps me and most other Americans, so I'm going to applaud it.
Among other things, this makes it harder to sway me with emotional appeals: "BP cares about the environment", for instance, doesn't factor into my judgment that they had an atrocious record and did some really risky things on the Deepwater Horizon rig.
Otherwise, how the heck did they come up with an infinitely long tape?
I hate being called a consumer. The article is about modern day debt-serfs anyway, not consumers.
I do too, but in this case I understand why:
1. The phrase "consumer finance" does in fact refer to the kinds of things the CFPB is supposed to be dealing with: bank accounts, credit cards, and personal loans.
2. From the point of view of the banking industry, loans, accounts, cards, etc are their products, which you are purchasing with fees and/or interest payments.
The last thing the larger financial companies want is clear documentation of exactly how they screw their customers. Just by sharing this kind of information, they start making the market compete better - now that customers are basically talking to each other, they know that Capital One is a bad deal, which will hurt Capital One in the marketplace.
Of course, I know that there are some who's head will explode when they encounter a government program that is quite cheap, effective, mostly non-coercive, and improves market functioning, but that's what this is.
The President doesn't run the show himself, but because he's commander-in-chief, the President can and does regularly order in the troops without any declaration of war from Congress. For example, the USAF was ordered into Libya even though Congress didn't provide any funding or authorization for that mission.
The last time Congress formally declared war was in 1942.
The source of that entire argument is Eric Holder, who serves at the pleasure of the man we're accusing. It would be sort of like asking Tom Hagan if Michael Corleone had killed anybody.
Here's the counterargument: ... be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law;"
"No person shall
You're right that Obama should be impeached for killing 2 American citizens without making the slightest attempt at due process. Anwar al-Awlaki was arguably a Bad Person, but his son Abdulrahman was also targeted and killed 2 weeks later for what I can only assume was the sole crime of being the son of Anwar.
Dick Cheney should also have been impeached and tried for war crimes: The United States declared that ordering waterboarding was a crime against humanity back in 1945-6, and Dick Cheney proudly proclaimed that he had ordered waterboarding on national television.
Basically, top officials of the US are now above the law, and know it.
Are you saying this is a virtual "death by snu-snu"?
One that was popularized was Lorenzo's oil as a treatment for adrenoleukodystrophy in 1985. The treatment is not entirely proven, but it does seem to be useful in many cases.
Hobbyist science has always been part of the mix, sometimes an important part of the mix. Some examples:
* Isaac Newton was actually an alchemist by trade - the physics and math were basically just fun side projects.
* Albert Einstein published some of his most important stuff while working as a patent clerk.
* Grote Reber was one of the key pioneers in radio astronomy working with a telescope he'd built in his backyard.
Now, I'll grant you that often amateur science is, well, amateurish, but occasionally an amateur scientist strikes gold, and I see no reason to discourage people from messing with it. They aren't going to be as good at it as the professionals, but at worst they accomplish nothing except have a little fun, and at best they add something to the scientific knowledge of humanity. Another way of looking at the argument: 100 pros could perhaps come up with 15 useful results a year, while 10000 amateurs could perhaps come up with 2. The pros are obviously much better than the amateurs, but we're all better off with 17 useful results than 15 useful results.
Terrorist: Blows up buildings and transportation.
Well, by that definition the US military is by far the biggest terrorist organization on the planet. Of course, the US military's official definition of "terrorist" is "Any male person between the ages of about 14 and 50 that we just killed in a drone strike."
So, if they don't hate us for our freedoms (I'm with you on this point - that's the whitewashed, political reason), what do they hate us for? Is it our economic policies? Our military strategies?
The biggest reason they hate us right now, according to surveys and writings from people in the region, is that US drones are rountinely blowing up civilians with no involvement in terrorism. In addition, if you show up at the funeral of a person killed in a drone strike, you're now on the suspect list. I mean, imagine you're a typical Yemeni man who goes to work, does some shopping, heads home to your family, and finds that instead of a home and your wife and kids, you have a pile of rubble and a bunch of bodies (and the US reporters will say that a bunch of "militants" were killed). I think it's fair to say that you and everyone who cares about you would probably have nothing but complete hatred of the group of people who did that to you.
Other things that are definitely not helping are complete inaction on Syria slaughtering its own people, doing nothing to stop Israeli settlement building (which appears to have the goal of complete takeover of the West Bank), having allied governments attack protesters with equipment made in the USA, killing hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq, quite probably working with Israel to blow up Iranian physicists (and anyone who happens to be standing near them), and supporting oppressive and corrupt dictatorships throughout the region.
We don't even have a voice in the UN Assembly to make our objections be heard.
The UN Assembly can maybe decide what condiments are allowed on the Secretary-General's sandwich without the approval of the Security Council. The Security Council can't lift a finger unless the US (which, based on your subject I'm assuming you're based in) government allows it to happen. So yes, your country's objections will be heard.
If you don't think your interests are represented by the US government, then that's a different sort of problem. But the US government can pretty much tell the UN to go to hell any time it wants to.
When I was a kid, I had to walk over a mile to school. Uphill. Through foot-deep snow.
(Really)
People complain about Monsanto's use of terminator seeds, patents, lawsuits, etc. only because it is so difficult to compete without using Monsanto's products. ... And Brazilian farmers could have used their existing seeds, but they did not.
Actually, a major part of the controversy around Monsanto and the food supply is precisely about how Monsanto uses its patents and lawsuits to force farmers who have had no business dealings at all with Monsanto to either pay them a bunch for patent infringement or buy seeds from them. For instance, Monsanto v Schmeiser in Canada, in which a farmer was taken to court not for buying seeds from Monsanto but for having some seeds with the gene in his field from his neighbors' crops' pollen.
In short, GM foods are great.
All general statements are false. In this case, it depends a great deal on what the modifications do.
GM plants needing less pesticide: Good. GM plants that don't produce a viable seed for the sole purpose of increasing Monsanto's profits at the expense of poor farmers in Brazil, India, and a lot of other places: Evil. And using GM patents to force all farmers in the world to buy your product: Obviously very evil.
In a perfect world, research on GM would have been publicly funded research with no patent protection and the option of any private seed manufacturer to get in the game of producing the seeds with these modifications. That would have given us the pesticide benefits and such that you speak of, but without all the BS from Monsanto.
Of course, by your own argument, you should be locked up immediately!
His customers aren't being charged. What the FDA is doing here is saying that you can't sell a 64 oz Coke laced with arsenic and claim it's just a 64 oz Coke.
(And I'm with you on the soft drinks in New York thing)
I can think of several reasons people would do this:
1. Some people are stupid.
2. People are often on a very very limited budget, and the online option may appear at least to be cheaper than the drugstore.
3. (Corollary to 1) Some people will diagnose themselves with illnesses that the doctor doesn't think they have, so they'll go and buy the treatment through channels that don't involve official doctors and prescriptions.
4. People who abuse prescription drugs would likely find this a very convenient option.