We are not stupid. And we're learning more about the human genome very rapidly. There is no point to encouraging the preservation of obvious defects. If there is good reason for more human genetic diversity (I think there is) it should be aimed at providing improved human properties, like tetrachromatism or an additional disease fighting mechanism. not preserving Tay-Sachs disease or hemophilia or sickle cell anemia.
You have some objection to eliminating the suffering caused by inherited diseases, by eliminating the genetic defects that cause them?
Natural selection comes about by causing people to fail to reproduce, usually by death or sterility. You like those two things?
Intelligent selection, or better yet direct genetic manipulation, has the potential for producing human improvements that would not otherwise occur for millennia, if ever. Greater intelligence. Resistance to diseases like cancer and heart disease. Greater strength. An end to baldness. No tooth decay. Improved reproductive design, for painless childbirth. Name you favorite SF modification.
It's not scientists that should handle the 'risks' to society (taking into account ethics) - that's a job for politics
NO NO NO NO NO.
It is each and every person's responsibility not to add evil to the world. You cannot hand off your moral decisions to someone else, most particularly not to politicians.
It stands to reason that any increase in food production will lead to an increase in the total human population
Not only does it not stand to reason, it doesn't agree with recent history. Italy isn't starving, and Italy is breeding below replacement rate. The United States is capable of ridiculous food production and wastes a great deal of what it produces, yet they population only grows through immigration.
People can think and act on their thoughts. Many people with access to affordable birth control choose not to have children, because they decide that the benefits aren't worth the costs. They do not mindlessly breed until they starve.
If "overpopulation" is something you wish to prevent without causing increased suffering, then oppose religions and other belief systems that promote huge families, and encourage the sort of civilization rich enough to afford birth control and with enough entertainment that people don't dight out of boredom.
Why is increasing the crop yield necessarily a good thing?
Because high crop yield frees land for other uses including forest, and because it frees labor for leisure or other productive use.
Communities are small scale: neighbors or parts of a town. If you're looking for for a sense of community, then help and activity has to be local. If support comes at federal and state level, community action is undermined and breaks. That leftists like Wilson, the Roosevelts, and Obama talk community but force federal power is the apex of hypocrisy.
There is no nationwide basis for comparison, just areas with moderately good public schools all the way down to areas with bad public schools. The details in just the US are so complicated with magnet schools, vouchers, government and private schools, that it takes more room than is available here to demonstrate superiority.
Instead, I will focus on what is possible to do cheaply. Absent government regulations, teaching grade school is a profession with very low requirements for intelligence and almost none for training. Almost anyone can teach. Let one mother out of every 10 families bring like-aged children into her living room for schooling each day, and she can make an above-average living for half what government schools charge taxpayers per student.
So you think that being extremely good is nonsensical? That if you have something really good, it's best if you damage it some?
Aristotle argued that the mean between two extremes represented good, and never saw that his claim was self-contradictory.
Forty years ago it was popular in conservative circles to add the qualifier "when properly understood" to various claims, because it was so common for positions to be misrepresented so that they could be shown to lead to nasty results.
The test of the validity of an idea is that you must be able to take it to extremes without it resulting in contradictions or disasters, because the enemies of an idea (or those who just want to take dishonest advantage of it) will be sure to take it to the extreme and beyond. If the idea is not defective, it not only can be taken to extremes, it should be.
Your example of free market capitalism contains the hidden assumption that winners can set up barriers to entry in the absence of government force. By what mechanism?
There's a difference between being left in the cold fighting for those things or sharing the cost of having a safety net everybody can use. The latter is much more efficient. (emphasis added)
Note how easy it is to lie. Just put forth a naked claim consisting of false alternatives without any thought toward proof, demonstration, or even a suggestion of mechanism. Not a word about middlemen eating up half the money, perverse incentives, or inherent corruption. No mention of loss of pride, loss of self-confidence. No idea that history is littered with the carcasses of nations that claimed to support those who didn't work.
The government with the power to give, is a government with the power to take away. That applies to everything, including the power to end your life. There is no mechanism, and it is not possible for there to be a mechanism, to restrict a government with too much power, to doing only things which are good.
Your ignorance of economics is complete if you don't understand that the value of a unit of any standard which has a nearly static quantity will settle to a value inversely proportional to that quantity. Whether a ton or a billion tons, either amount could be used as a standard.
Paul's foreign policy relies upon the rationality of our enemies, and is therefor fundamentally flawed.
The U.S. interstate system would never have been built if it were up to him
Private highways were already being built before first state, and then federal, governments took over. If it had been done privately, the main difference would be the private system causing a lot less grief during its construction
There's a lot bad to be said about the religiosity of Republicans, but hyperemotional is an inaccurate generalization: dull and boring is a lot closer to the truth. It isn't Republicans who get worked into a frenzy and riot.
A popularly elected government in a relatively free country cannot maintain the long-term force needed to re-make a recalcitrant opponent, particularly when there is a strong subversive element in the free country.
India is largely Hindu and Buddhist, both of which are passive compared to Christianity. AFAIK neither strongly opposes most of what is truly essential to modern western civilization, so the British control of India was not impossible. There were other aspects of Indian history conducive to good results.
By way of contrast, Afghanistan is tribal and has the warlike, primitivistic Muslim religion. Many Afghans will fight even when the good works of a conqueror are obvious to all. Successful recreation of Afghanistan would require weakening or destroying both Islam and tribalism, which would come at a great cost in human lives. Practically speaking, it's not possible and never has been.
The day may come when the best guy doesn't stand a chance of winning, and of the two who do have a chance of winning, one will eventually put a bullet through your head. That's why it's important to vote for the better of the candidates that can win.
The first $1 is obvious, each dollar in is a dollar out, and is counted as part of the GDP (and the dollar in, since it's stolen from taxpayers, really should be deducted from the GDP.) So each $1 in NIH budget results in an additional $1 to the GDP. That's pathetic. In the business world, that would be called $1 in revenue, not profit. That this is considered good in the world of government shows how dismal government is.
individual cases that are well over 100x (like the Human Genome Project)
Need I remind you how slowly the government-funded HGP was proceeding, and that the breakthrough that allowed comparatively rapid analysis of genomes was a private venture?
Government fanboys are delighted to claim for government what private efforts have produced, and there are over a hundred million dupes who buy the story.
After depleting the battery, drive it into the garage, close the door, and recharge. In a few hours, the garage is full of about 90% oxygen. Light a cigarette, and it'll go off like a flare. In surprise, drop the cigarette onto a pile of sawdust, and KABOOM!
About 50 years ago Mack Reynolds wrote a delightful story about a couple of men with a machine that gave partial mind control. They decided to try to improve the lot of a slum. They broadcast a "be active" signal, and the slum-dwellers rioted. They broadcast a "learn something" signal, and the lowlifes learned to make weapons.
So, your point about people vs. technology is well taken. But if the story were written today by the typical SF author, it would be a great deal nastier and wouldn't end as well as the Reynolds story did.
So you went into academia, which works to destroy the world (hard science excepted); and left it because you can't see that self interest is in the world's best interest, and requires freedom.
Much of science fiction in the 1950s and 1960s was heroic fiction, which is what "new wave" SF sought to destroy. The anti-heroic philosophy is part and parcel of the leftist glorification of failure which deliberately degrades social systems.
with much of western society turning back to Dark Ages-style fundamentalist religion
The major "turn" to fundamentalism is actually an invasion by Islam. The fundamentalist Christians have pretty much always been there; they're just noisier now.
Slashdot Mirror
We are not stupid. And we're learning more about the human genome very rapidly. There is no point to encouraging the preservation of obvious defects. If there is good reason for more human genetic diversity (I think there is) it should be aimed at providing improved human properties, like tetrachromatism or an additional disease fighting mechanism. not preserving Tay-Sachs disease or hemophilia or sickle cell anemia.
Ah yes, the Plumcot Wars, brought on by Luther Burbank.
You have some objection to eliminating the suffering caused by inherited diseases, by eliminating the genetic defects that cause them?
Natural selection comes about by causing people to fail to reproduce, usually by death or sterility. You like those two things?
Intelligent selection, or better yet direct genetic manipulation, has the potential for producing human improvements that would not otherwise occur for millennia, if ever. Greater intelligence. Resistance to diseases like cancer and heart disease. Greater strength. An end to baldness. No tooth decay. Improved reproductive design, for painless childbirth. Name you favorite SF modification.
NO NO NO NO NO.
It is each and every person's responsibility not to add evil to the world. You cannot hand off your moral decisions to someone else, most particularly not to politicians.
The so-called pollution that fertilizers produce in waterways causes growth of aquatic plants. How odd, pollution causes plant growth.
Not only does it not stand to reason, it doesn't agree with recent history. Italy isn't starving, and Italy is breeding below replacement rate. The United States is capable of ridiculous food production and wastes a great deal of what it produces, yet they population only grows through immigration.
People can think and act on their thoughts. Many people with access to affordable birth control choose not to have children, because they decide that the benefits aren't worth the costs. They do not mindlessly breed until they starve.
If "overpopulation" is something you wish to prevent without causing increased suffering, then oppose religions and other belief systems that promote huge families, and encourage the sort of civilization rich enough to afford birth control and with enough entertainment that people don't dight out of boredom.
Because high crop yield frees land for other uses including forest, and because it frees labor for leisure or other productive use.
If 3 hunters go in and 4 come out, there is negative 1 hunter in the forest. If he shoots a dead monkey, it comes back to life.
Communities are small scale: neighbors or parts of a town. If you're looking for for a sense of community, then help and activity has to be local. If support comes at federal and state level, community action is undermined and breaks. That leftists like Wilson, the Roosevelts, and Obama talk community but force federal power is the apex of hypocrisy.
There is no nationwide basis for comparison, just areas with moderately good public schools all the way down to areas with bad public schools. The details in just the US are so complicated with magnet schools, vouchers, government and private schools, that it takes more room than is available here to demonstrate superiority.
Instead, I will focus on what is possible to do cheaply. Absent government regulations, teaching grade school is a profession with very low requirements for intelligence and almost none for training. Almost anyone can teach. Let one mother out of every 10 families bring like-aged children into her living room for schooling each day, and she can make an above-average living for half what government schools charge taxpayers per student.
So you think that being extremely good is nonsensical? That if you have something really good, it's best if you damage it some?
Aristotle argued that the mean between two extremes represented good, and never saw that his claim was self-contradictory.
Forty years ago it was popular in conservative circles to add the qualifier "when properly understood" to various claims, because it was so common for positions to be misrepresented so that they could be shown to lead to nasty results.
The test of the validity of an idea is that you must be able to take it to extremes without it resulting in contradictions or disasters, because the enemies of an idea (or those who just want to take dishonest advantage of it) will be sure to take it to the extreme and beyond. If the idea is not defective, it not only can be taken to extremes, it should be.
Your example of free market capitalism contains the hidden assumption that winners can set up barriers to entry in the absence of government force. By what mechanism?
Note how easy it is to lie. Just put forth a naked claim consisting of false alternatives without any thought toward proof, demonstration, or even a suggestion of mechanism. Not a word about middlemen eating up half the money, perverse incentives, or inherent corruption. No mention of loss of pride, loss of self-confidence. No idea that history is littered with the carcasses of nations that claimed to support those who didn't work.
Slashdot wept.
The government with the power to give, is a government with the power to take away. That applies to everything, including the power to end your life. There is no mechanism, and it is not possible for there to be a mechanism, to restrict a government with too much power, to doing only things which are good.
Your ignorance of economics is complete if you don't understand that the value of a unit of any standard which has a nearly static quantity will settle to a value inversely proportional to that quantity. Whether a ton or a billion tons, either amount could be used as a standard.
Paul's foreign policy relies upon the rationality of our enemies, and is therefor fundamentally flawed.
Private highways were already being built before first state, and then federal, governments took over. If it had been done privately, the main difference would be the private system causing a lot less grief during its construction
There's a lot bad to be said about the religiosity of Republicans, but hyperemotional is an inaccurate generalization: dull and boring is a lot closer to the truth. It isn't Republicans who get worked into a frenzy and riot.
A popularly elected government in a relatively free country cannot maintain the long-term force needed to re-make a recalcitrant opponent, particularly when there is a strong subversive element in the free country.
India is largely Hindu and Buddhist, both of which are passive compared to Christianity. AFAIK neither strongly opposes most of what is truly essential to modern western civilization, so the British control of India was not impossible. There were other aspects of Indian history conducive to good results.
By way of contrast, Afghanistan is tribal and has the warlike, primitivistic Muslim religion. Many Afghans will fight even when the good works of a conqueror are obvious to all. Successful recreation of Afghanistan would require weakening or destroying both Islam and tribalism, which would come at a great cost in human lives. Practically speaking, it's not possible and never has been.
The day may come when the best guy doesn't stand a chance of winning, and of the two who do have a chance of winning, one will eventually put a bullet through your head. That's why it's important to vote for the better of the candidates that can win.
Start several obscure journals.
Sell them for $799 per copy to each "central scientific library"
PROFIT !!!
The first $1 is obvious, each dollar in is a dollar out, and is counted as part of the GDP (and the dollar in, since it's stolen from taxpayers, really should be deducted from the GDP.) So each $1 in NIH budget results in an additional $1 to the GDP. That's pathetic. In the business world, that would be called $1 in revenue, not profit. That this is considered good in the world of government shows how dismal government is.
Need I remind you how slowly the government-funded HGP was proceeding, and that the breakthrough that allowed comparatively rapid analysis of genomes was a private venture?
Government fanboys are delighted to claim for government what private efforts have produced, and there are over a hundred million dupes who buy the story.
After depleting the battery, drive it into the garage, close the door, and recharge. In a few hours, the garage is full of about 90% oxygen. Light a cigarette, and it'll go off like a flare. In surprise, drop the cigarette onto a pile of sawdust, and KABOOM!
About 50 years ago Mack Reynolds wrote a delightful story about a couple of men with a machine that gave partial mind control. They decided to try to improve the lot of a slum. They broadcast a "be active" signal, and the slum-dwellers rioted. They broadcast a "learn something" signal, and the lowlifes learned to make weapons.
So, your point about people vs. technology is well taken. But if the story were written today by the typical SF author, it would be a great deal nastier and wouldn't end as well as the Reynolds story did.
Jules Verne predates H. G. Wells, and Edgar Allen Poe predates Jules Verne.
Please learn the proper use of apostrophes and capitals.
So you went into academia, which works to destroy the world (hard science excepted); and left it because you can't see that self interest is in the world's best interest, and requires freedom.
One of the SF greats (Heinlein? Campbell?) pointed out that linear extrapolation is guaranteed to be wrong.
The major "turn" to fundamentalism is actually an invasion by Islam. The fundamentalist Christians have pretty much always been there; they're just noisier now.