Perhaps, but then I think there's a gap between 'bad' and 'genocidal'. Didn't France surrender for example? Would they have put up more of a resistance if they knew the truth?
To invoke Godwin's Law, would you have supported a leak of where all the Jews were hiding in Nazi Germany? Only the Nazis would be to blame for what happens next, right?
Would you have supported a leak of all the killings going on at Auschwitz? The Nazis certainly would have claimed state secrets on that one...
If Iraq was about the oil, I'd like to know why we haven't gone into Sudan, which has lots of oil. Or why once we were in Iraq, we bothered to do anything other than pump oil.
Honestly I think this is only because Sudan has black people in it. I don't mean to be racist about this, but it would 'look very bad' for us to be 'mean to black people'. There's just no two ways of saying that...
Saddam never changed, though. He was an evil, ruthless bastard when we put him in power, we knew how he would act, and we didn't care until he turned against the status quo.
But you know what the real bitch of it is? Poor old Saddam never actually did any of the stuff he wanted us to think he was going to do. There just weren't any WMD's, and really there never were ever going to be any. I think history's final review will show that he was actually the most 'effective' ruler of that province in a very, very long time. Sometimes, like when you're forcing three disparate people to share the wealth of one tiny corner of an otherwise inhospitable province, it really could be that a despot is the best choice.
Because you cannot bring about Democracy by force.
Forgive me if I am wrong, but didn't the USA bring about democracy by force?
Nope. The USA removed a monarchy by force. They could have replaced it with anything, really, but only because they wanted it did Democracy take hold and grow.
Maybe he shouldn't have been a two-faced liar? That would have kept this from happening. Pity integrity is apparently something that happens to other people.
That's quite simply because there's no now answer. We're talking about a systemic issue here. This isn't a 'rip off the bandaid' or 'we MUST solve this NOW' type of scenario. This is a 'consider the value of Wikileaks' type of scenario.
Secrets are less preferable than just about every other solution to just about any given problem. Yet we tend to use them a lot. This is bad.
To your specific example, it seems entirely logical that that girlfriend's only hope is, indeed, witness protection. We do, however, need to reflect on how we have failed her and her entire community by letting it get to that point. Hopefully by the time her children would be eligible to be impacted by such scenarios we will have made measurable progress towards solving the underlying problems.
The alternative is to continue rely on the secrets and simply accept that there are gangs of murderers operating with impunity within our communities. When Wikileaks illustrates how such secrets aren't actually enough, that's a GOOD thing.
So maybe you go argue with the author of the article? You could illustrate how incorrect it is, but that would of course require reading it first.
I'd love to see you produce successful scientists from infants without being allowed to encourage wishes of success or hope about their future. None of that knowledge would exist without the human desire to know it, and desire is an emotion.
Don't be an ass. Read the article and discuss THAT or kindly avoid the 'Reply' button. Either option is fine by me.
Because GP's assertion over the word 'protagonist' is minutia! I could have easily swapped in the word 'good guys' but felt that 'protagonist' would open things for less debate.
Placebos make people feel better too, yet do not do what is described of them. Your belief changes the way you think, congratulations, doesn't provide evidence your belief has any substance.
This is that unfair standard that I was referring to earlier.
If my belief makes me feel better, how can it have no substance? For if it were truly false, and imagined from whole cloth, would I not need to be lying to you about my perceptions? Even at this minute level I can demonstrate how my belief is a benefit to me, and therefore my belief itself exists. Since you have no grounds on which to question my sanity and I can point to discernible benefit, which of us is on more solid ground, exactly? You could try and make claims as to the source of this benefit. Perhaps it is self-fulfilling. Perhaps it is cosmic Karma. Perhaps something else entirely. But you're not doing that. You're flat out claiming that it does not exist. That's not science, that's religion.
You seem to have many fundamental flaws in your understanding of science and reason, and seem to have taken what I have said personally.
People tend to do that under ad hominem attacks. You've taken to insulting me subtly rather than to address even a single point I've raised. Perhaps this is by design, or perhaps you simply cannot understand me.
My preference: The societal environment is such that a gang is not permitted to exist by the populace within it.
What kind of a society do we live in where MS-13 enforcers have girlfriends? Stop and think about that for a minute.
The harder solution I'm imagining is ending organized crime. Witness protection, on the other hand, enables it. We only have to face the problems that are absolutely unavoidable, and can turn a blind eye to all the rest. All we need do is arrest the one guy that the public is forcing us to arrest, and protect that one witness with a weak secret. Easy as pie, done. Never mind dealing with the actual issues enabling the situation. THAT's someone ELSE's problem.
Scoff as you will, ScentCone. I can only assume your K9 nickname signals that you're from a law enforcement background and this is why you're taking it personally. You're permitted, but please understand that I'm looking at the bigger picture here.
No, I am pretending no such thing. As a matter of fact I do think there are constitutional ways to prevent the events you deem unavoidable. That, however, is beside the point, and you seem to know it. Perhaps in this way, you're conceding it.
To sum up, you're saying simply that 'because we have not yet found (or simply cannot imagine) any other way to control crime, secrets are necessary'.
I'm saying that the 'because' therein illustrates a lack of imagination, and would be completely unacceptable in the realm of, say, corporate security. "If we don't tell them the webserver is unpatched, they'll never hack into it." In the real world, the boss asks, "what happens if they find out", but in your world that question is unfair because the answers are too hard to seek out.
Yeah, I'm not going to yield on this point. You're hung up on exploring the gap. I'm conceding that it exists. Please, if you can, illustrate how we're not making a conscious decision to rely on secrecy rather than something different.
Yes, I could. I could dig up links to the actual cables directly on Wikileaks. Or you could just use Google. Something tells me, though, that this is a ruse. You'd like me to offhandedly suggest something here or there so you can reveal a brilliant rebuttal about how that doesn't meet some minutia to your satisfaction. Am I right?
I'll do just one, and we'll see how it goes from there. On 11/09/10 Obama said, in a speech:
In Afghanistan, we continue to work with a coalition of nations to build the capacity of the Afghan government to secure its future. Our shared interest is in building peace in a war-torn land — a peace that provides no safe haven for violent extremists, and that provide hope for the Afghan people.
However, as early as June of this year it was known to the government that one of their tax-funded subsidiaries was sponsoring rape parties for the Afghan security forces.
As a point of fact, the cable says:
Atmar reiterated his insistence that the U.S. try to quash any news article on the incident or circulation of a video connected with it.
Did you see it in the news last June? It seems that I did not.
So what hope, then, are we offering the children of Afghanistan? The hope that when you're butt raped in secret that at least it will be at a well funded party???
That's just ONE. Do some searches. There are more.
Rebut that we aren't simply electing to take the easier path. You can illustrate the gap between the hard way and the easy way as deeply and clearly as you'd like, but you're not yet proving it false.
So in your world the only votes cast are for Presidential elections? There are no States? No local government? Congressmen do not have phones? Really??
Because of the vague nature of the claims it could _never_ be measured.
Oh, no, it can. You could map the corresponding brain waves today, I'm certain. All magic is potentially real. Just as the cave man thought fire was a gift from the gods, just as Galileo had no concept of atoms - we just need to perfect our understanding of what we experience.
To stand atop a pinnacle and proclaim that we know all there is to know is folly. Any true scientist should never, ever allow that to come to pass. I realize that it empowers the antitheist to attack a powerfully established body that has a track record of doing great harm. I get it. I really do. But turning science into a religion by representing that it can prove that God does not exist is the ultimate hubris.
Until you can provide supporting evidence (in substance or in thought) that there is a god, it is assumed false, just like every other thing we don't have evidence to support.
Cram your fingers a little deeper in your ears. I think you might still be able to make out what I'm saying. Close your eyes so you can't read my lips, because here it comes again:
I'm feeling something. You can deny it if you wish, but you have no grounds to do so. The end.
Funnily enough we use reason in science.
Imagine my going to a doctor and saying "it hurts when I do this" and the doctor says "no it doesn't, that's impossible". That's you.
You have evidence that hands in fire directly correlates to pain and hurt. There is still no evidence of this god person/thing.
You're dismissing my testimony out of hand. Therefore, I'm not at all certain why you're continuing to talk to me about my experiences. You're telling me that I have not experienced what I do know that I have experienced. And you're attempting to do so with authority. It's insane.
If you'd like to measure God's impact on my brain, I'd encourage you to do so. You'll find it, if you're brave enough to conduct the study. Something tells me, though, that the greater body of the religion of science will decry it as heresy. It's real none-the-less.
Isn't it odd that the religious become the Illuminati? The scientists dictate what one is allowed to feel, what one is permitted to believe, and persecute those who dissent? How far the mighty have fallen, and how much the children resemble their fathers, eh?
And they're not able to put two and two together without that? How's about that guy in the green mask throwing rocks at your cops? Suppose he's a protester?
You act as if Iran is stupid. Why? Did you miss the story about how they're privy to all the data in and out of their country thanks to collaboration from certain corporations here in the US?
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps, but then I think there's a gap between 'bad' and 'genocidal'. Didn't France surrender for example? Would they have put up more of a resistance if they knew the truth?
Assange is to blame as well.
To invoke Godwin's Law, would you have supported a leak of where all the Jews were hiding in Nazi Germany? Only the Nazis would be to blame for what happens next, right?
Would you have supported a leak of all the killings going on at Auschwitz? The Nazis certainly would have claimed state secrets on that one...
If Iraq was about the oil, I'd like to know why we haven't gone into Sudan, which has lots of oil. Or why once we were in Iraq, we bothered to do anything other than pump oil.
Honestly I think this is only because Sudan has black people in it. I don't mean to be racist about this, but it would 'look very bad' for us to be 'mean to black people'. There's just no two ways of saying that...
Saddam never changed, though. He was an evil, ruthless bastard when we put him in power, we knew how he would act, and we didn't care until he turned against the status quo.
But you know what the real bitch of it is? Poor old Saddam never actually did any of the stuff he wanted us to think he was going to do. There just weren't any WMD's, and really there never were ever going to be any. I think history's final review will show that he was actually the most 'effective' ruler of that province in a very, very long time. Sometimes, like when you're forcing three disparate people to share the wealth of one tiny corner of an otherwise inhospitable province, it really could be that a despot is the best choice.
"
Because you cannot bring about Democracy by force.
Forgive me if I am wrong, but didn't the USA bring about democracy by force?
Nope. The USA removed a monarchy by force. They could have replaced it with anything, really, but only because they wanted it did Democracy take hold and grow.
Maybe he shouldn't have been a two-faced liar? That would have kept this from happening. Pity integrity is apparently something that happens to other people.
This. Very, very this.
He will continue to rule for as long as the people of Zimbabwe do not rise up and thrown the bum out.
And they are far less likely to do that if the only voice of reform is painted as a western puppet and a traitor.
But yeah, you're right, I'm sure wikileaks is completely innocent... they can't *possibly* fuck up.
The only way one could blame this on Wikileaks would be if they made Tsvangirai betray his people. I don't think that this is how it happened...
That's quite simply because there's no now answer. We're talking about a systemic issue here. This isn't a 'rip off the bandaid' or 'we MUST solve this NOW' type of scenario. This is a 'consider the value of Wikileaks' type of scenario.
Secrets are less preferable than just about every other solution to just about any given problem. Yet we tend to use them a lot. This is bad.
To your specific example, it seems entirely logical that that girlfriend's only hope is, indeed, witness protection. We do, however, need to reflect on how we have failed her and her entire community by letting it get to that point. Hopefully by the time her children would be eligible to be impacted by such scenarios we will have made measurable progress towards solving the underlying problems.
The alternative is to continue rely on the secrets and simply accept that there are gangs of murderers operating with impunity within our communities. When Wikileaks illustrates how such secrets aren't actually enough, that's a GOOD thing.
Yeah, no clue. Should've googled it.
So maybe you go argue with the author of the article? You could illustrate how incorrect it is, but that would of course require reading it first.
I'd love to see you produce successful scientists from infants without being allowed to encourage wishes of success or hope about their future. None of that knowledge would exist without the human desire to know it, and desire is an emotion.
Don't be an ass. Read the article and discuss THAT or kindly avoid the 'Reply' button. Either option is fine by me.
Because GP's assertion over the word 'protagonist' is minutia! I could have easily swapped in the word 'good guys' but felt that 'protagonist' would open things for less debate.
FFS!
I'd rather think Christ preferred Dr King's actual method. The one without the guns. Or Gandhi's for that matter. That'd be my point.
Placebos make people feel better too, yet do not do what is described of them. Your belief changes the way you think, congratulations, doesn't provide evidence your belief has any substance.
This is that unfair standard that I was referring to earlier.
If my belief makes me feel better, how can it have no substance? For if it were truly false, and imagined from whole cloth, would I not need to be lying to you about my perceptions? Even at this minute level I can demonstrate how my belief is a benefit to me, and therefore my belief itself exists. Since you have no grounds on which to question my sanity and I can point to discernible benefit, which of us is on more solid ground, exactly? You could try and make claims as to the source of this benefit. Perhaps it is self-fulfilling. Perhaps it is cosmic Karma. Perhaps something else entirely. But you're not doing that. You're flat out claiming that it does not exist. That's not science, that's religion.
You seem to have many fundamental flaws in your understanding of science and reason, and seem to have taken what I have said personally.
People tend to do that under ad hominem attacks. You've taken to insulting me subtly rather than to address even a single point I've raised. Perhaps this is by design, or perhaps you simply cannot understand me.
I no longer care.
Have a nice day.
The scientists in JP were depicted as buffoons by attempting to circumvent nature. Those in Avatar were depicted as empathetic to the natives.
But whatever.
My preference: The societal environment is such that a gang is not permitted to exist by the populace within it.
What kind of a society do we live in where MS-13 enforcers have girlfriends? Stop and think about that for a minute.
The harder solution I'm imagining is ending organized crime. Witness protection, on the other hand, enables it. We only have to face the problems that are absolutely unavoidable, and can turn a blind eye to all the rest. All we need do is arrest the one guy that the public is forcing us to arrest, and protect that one witness with a weak secret. Easy as pie, done. Never mind dealing with the actual issues enabling the situation. THAT's someone ELSE's problem.
Scoff as you will, ScentCone. I can only assume your K9 nickname signals that you're from a law enforcement background and this is why you're taking it personally. You're permitted, but please understand that I'm looking at the bigger picture here.
No, I am pretending no such thing. As a matter of fact I do think there are constitutional ways to prevent the events you deem unavoidable. That, however, is beside the point, and you seem to know it. Perhaps in this way, you're conceding it.
To sum up, you're saying simply that 'because we have not yet found (or simply cannot imagine) any other way to control crime, secrets are necessary'.
I'm saying that the 'because' therein illustrates a lack of imagination, and would be completely unacceptable in the realm of, say, corporate security. "If we don't tell them the webserver is unpatched, they'll never hack into it." In the real world, the boss asks, "what happens if they find out", but in your world that question is unfair because the answers are too hard to seek out.
You left one off the list. The unborn child. In fact, I think that should be the beginning and the ending of the list. Here's a very simple test:
Would the child, if it were able, commit suicide?
Yes? Okay, fine, abort.
No? Then you're murdering it, aren't you?
It really doesn't need to get much more complex than that.
Yeah, I'm not going to yield on this point. You're hung up on exploring the gap. I'm conceding that it exists. Please, if you can, illustrate how we're not making a conscious decision to rely on secrecy rather than something different.
Yes, I could. I could dig up links to the actual cables directly on Wikileaks. Or you could just use Google. Something tells me, though, that this is a ruse. You'd like me to offhandedly suggest something here or there so you can reveal a brilliant rebuttal about how that doesn't meet some minutia to your satisfaction. Am I right?
I'll do just one, and we'll see how it goes from there. On 11/09/10 Obama said, in a speech:
In Afghanistan, we continue to work with a coalition of nations to build the capacity of the Afghan government to secure its future. Our shared interest is in building peace in a war-torn land — a peace that provides no safe haven for violent extremists, and that provide hope for the Afghan people.
However, as early as June of this year it was known to the government that one of their tax-funded subsidiaries was sponsoring rape parties for the Afghan security forces.
As a point of fact, the cable says:
Atmar reiterated his insistence that the U.S. try to quash any news article on the incident or circulation of a video connected with it.
Did you see it in the news last June? It seems that I did not.
So what hope, then, are we offering the children of Afghanistan? The hope that when you're butt raped in secret that at least it will be at a well funded party???
That's just ONE. Do some searches. There are more.
Rebut that we aren't simply electing to take the easier path. You can illustrate the gap between the hard way and the easy way as deeply and clearly as you'd like, but you're not yet proving it false.
So in your world the only votes cast are for Presidential elections? There are no States? No local government? Congressmen do not have phones? Really??
Right, dismissive and ad hominem. Truly the heirlooms of effective discussion, those.
And your rebuttal would be what, exactly?
Because of the vague nature of the claims it could _never_ be measured.
Oh, no, it can. You could map the corresponding brain waves today, I'm certain. All magic is potentially real. Just as the cave man thought fire was a gift from the gods, just as Galileo had no concept of atoms - we just need to perfect our understanding of what we experience.
To stand atop a pinnacle and proclaim that we know all there is to know is folly. Any true scientist should never, ever allow that to come to pass. I realize that it empowers the antitheist to attack a powerfully established body that has a track record of doing great harm. I get it. I really do. But turning science into a religion by representing that it can prove that God does not exist is the ultimate hubris.
Until you can provide supporting evidence (in substance or in thought) that there is a god, it is assumed false, just like every other thing we don't have evidence to support.
Cram your fingers a little deeper in your ears. I think you might still be able to make out what I'm saying. Close your eyes so you can't read my lips, because here it comes again:
I'm feeling something. You can deny it if you wish, but you have no grounds to do so. The end.
Funnily enough we use reason in science.
Imagine my going to a doctor and saying "it hurts when I do this" and the doctor says "no it doesn't, that's impossible". That's you.
You have evidence that hands in fire directly correlates to pain and hurt. There is still no evidence of this god person/thing.
You're dismissing my testimony out of hand. Therefore, I'm not at all certain why you're continuing to talk to me about my experiences. You're telling me that I have not experienced what I do know that I have experienced. And you're attempting to do so with authority. It's insane.
If you'd like to measure God's impact on my brain, I'd encourage you to do so. You'll find it, if you're brave enough to conduct the study. Something tells me, though, that the greater body of the religion of science will decry it as heresy. It's real none-the-less.
Isn't it odd that the religious become the Illuminati? The scientists dictate what one is allowed to feel, what one is permitted to believe, and persecute those who dissent? How far the mighty have fallen, and how much the children resemble their fathers, eh?
And they're not able to put two and two together without that? How's about that guy in the green mask throwing rocks at your cops? Suppose he's a protester?
You act as if Iran is stupid. Why? Did you miss the story about how they're privy to all the data in and out of their country thanks to collaboration from certain corporations here in the US?