No kidding. Although according to comcast tech support they do not block any ports or utilize any form of traffic shaping. But they do monitor for excess outbound traffic on port 25 and throttle problem accounts.
'150 watts incandescent is pretty darn bright for typical room lighting. Most people use 60/75 watt lights.'
That's because they can get by with it. They typically use reading lamps to supplement as well where they are needed. That doesn't mean a 75 watt bulb in a lamp on the table is the best illumination choice available, only that it is good enough and more cost effective. Some people even prefer a homey dim light setting but that is an aesthetic choice.
That is the United States and it also is only looking at natural rainfall.
If you want to grow massive amounts of vegtable matter, why would you do it in the US? Why not do it in a climate that is suitable for growing massive amounts of vegatable matter naturally? I hear there is plenty of space where logging companies have cleared rainforest. The same rains that grow a forest will grow crops and the soil is pretty fertile.
'Just because you are replacing plants with plants doesn't mean that is best for the surrounding areas, or the climate.'
This is probably where a fundemental philosophy difference probably steps in. I have no problem with changing local climates or destroying ecosystems unless those changes is going to negatively impact humans. If humans adapting the way they live alters an ecosystem and destroys the things that live there then that is just evolution at work.
I don't really envision the production of biofuel to be a midwest farmer issue anyway. I see it more as a South American concern. Putting a few midwest sized farms in place of some of the landscape that is being cleared by the logging companies could be just the thing.
'Or unless those chemical fertilizers are destroying the soil, increasing erosion.'
Erosion is a natural process happening all over the world. In some places it is quite annoying actually. I certainly don't see how farm sized scale (farms are pretty tiny compared to earth) are going to make a non-local difference.
'because the people who would be operating the agriculture side of it are HORRIBLE corporations.'
Is there any other kind of corporation? When an for profit entity isn't human then human concerns will always take a backseat to profit.
last I heard we don't have a water shortage here on earth.
'particulates from combustion' you have to completely elminate the things that the greens have declared public enemies. They are only bad for the earth if they rise above what the earth can naturally clean up. Remember, combustion is a natural process and ozone is pretty good at nuking most of these things.
'the loss of native landscape cleared for agriculture'
There isn't really a shortage of native landscape in the world either. The biggest problem with clearing landscape is that the landscape you clear usually had plants that were eating CO2 and producing oxygen. With agriculture you are replacing the plants with other plants.
'the petrochemical fertilizers used in its production'
Unless you are making those fertilizers from biopetro...
'etc'
There will always be an extra. If you are suggesting a process has zero impact on anything 'natural' on earth then I am afraid you are going to be habitually disappointed in life. After all, natural and unnatural does not define good or harm it defines whether the acts were commited by human animal processes or non-human processes. Anything man does, no matter how 'green' is going to be unnatural and EVERYTHING has some kind of impact on the world.
'Until someone produces an economical biofuel grown in salt water in the desert, biofuel production is about the worst thing we could do to our environment.'
Just because some of the processes could potentially be less than perfect does not make biofuel production the worst thing for the environment. The goal is to produce byproducts in amounts that nature can handle, not to produce no byproducts. Unfortunately there will always be a group that likes to identify something that is causing a problem in excess and try to ban it altogether. This is the same mentality that has led to the 'war' on (cheap, unregulated, and/or recreational) drugs; turned millions of innocent people into criminals; and created a black market and powerful networks of criminal enforcers to regulate the trade.
People disregard it but that doesn't always seem to be the case. Also the CFL bulbs are pretty expensive. I find that the light from CFL just never seems to disperse over as large an area. Close to the lamp it will work just as well, but unless the light is up high with a wide reflector on it they just don't light up as large an area.
This is the test I performed. I took a 150w longer life incandescent bulb, a 100w comp cfl, a 60w comp cfl, and 60w incan. The 60w incan was not especially bright but illuminated my desk well enough that I could read (back to the light) without additional illumination (it would strain my eyes); the light felt immersive so there was plenty bouncing off the walls and ceiling. The 60w comp cfl seemed equally bright at the lamp but if you were 6ft away it was light having a flashlight shine on you while you are in the dark and just forget about light bouncing off the wall 20 ft away.
I then put in the 100w comp CFL. This was brighter at the lamp than either of the previous bulbs. Further it was a nice crisp white color instead of the yellow sunset type color you get from the 60w incan. However, again the light certainly did not bounce off the ceiling or the walls that were 10-20ft away from the source so it felt like flashlight illumination. My desk is at the far side of the room and you could not have read a book with your back to the light even with strain.
With the 150w incan the entire room was completely immersed in a crisp white light. Words were clear and there would be no strain regardless of how you were holding the book. Plenty of light was bouncing from every direction so that you no longer needed to pay much attention to how things were positioned relative to the light.
I am not drawing conclusions simply stating observations with the different bulbs. Nobody who wants to defend the physics of the lumen or whatever bother replying to debunk me because I am stating reality and you can't debunk it.
'People are just strange, and do strange things. I have no doubt that their are lots more people out there than you think, scheming up ways to melt down coins.'
No doubt there are nuts out there. I'm just saying that anyone with half a brain must realize that the coins will be readily exchangable at full metal value (probably a little above at any point). No melting will be needed. Government minted rounds are actually highly sought in metal trades. People buy and sell them for their metal content without ever melting them.
For instance, lets say you are going to make a small precious metal investment in silver. You need to choose between bars minted and guaranteed by private mints you have never heard of or you can just buy Canadian coins with a silver content guaranteed by the Canadian government. Which do you consider the safer choice?
There might be idiots who melt these but it is easy to see that either the coins will be discontinued or the composition will be changed. When that happens the coins will quickly be recognized at their metal value rather than face value. Anyone who saves the coins now not only has a safe investment but they will be able to cash in on that investment without ever defacing a government coin.
"I think I read that the average coin lifespan is around 30 years. They could stop producing pennies today I guess, but there's still probalby billions of them out there."
Yes but they didn't pay more than a penny for the raw materials they used in THOSE pennies. Is the issue really that someone other than the mint would gain the profit from the metal price increase of the copper they previously used in coins? Would it be so terrible is the real people who have the actual currency profited instead? If they stop circulation, then the mint doesn't actually lose any money at all. Since the pennies wouldn't be legal currency anymore then metal investors would use them as inexpensive investment pieces. The poor man's Canadian leaf coins if you will.
I also doubt anyone would go through the trouble of melting them. The metal content was measured and guaranteed by the US Mint and that lends no small amount of security in the coin content. Melting would bring question to the purity of the metals and the process would actually add overhead to the process.
"Bullying, on the other hand, is not a jockeying for position with the expectation that, at some point, a reasonable hierarchy will be established with varying degrees of inclusiveness. Bullying is a predatory action that intends to victimize another rather than establish a place for oneself."
I think its not so much the literal definition of bullying we disagree on but the motivation. For you it would seem the motivation is part of the definition; so I realize that fuzzes the distinction.
My definition of bullying would include any action that is undertaken by someone who is stronger to establish their dominance of someone weaker in a fashion that belittles the weaker individual.
When a young boy sticks a firework in a small animal and blows it up he is bullying. He is not doing it to be cruel to the animal and I doubt there are many bullies on the playground who are picking on the weaker one for the sake of being cruel. They are doing so to impress their friends (in schools you have social groups and the one being bullied typically is not part of the social group of the bully) and establish their position. A bully bullies not to harm someone else but to feel powerful and dominant; also to show the peers he is really competing with that he is powerful. It is pretty rare to find someone taking an action with the ultimate motivation being the feelings of another, humans are more self-centered than that. Even when we are doing good things for someone it is usually ultimate because doing so makes US feel good.
School is not for keeping children occupied and off the streets. School is for conveying information to children.
I would also disagree with the association between good behavior and wealth. Before bringing out a stereotype about the poor you are going to have to produce actual study to backup your claims. The studies will of course need to exclude minority ghettos where there is also a culture of discontent, rebellion, and violence that would augment the data.
"Umm... bullshit right back. When the system is altered so that when a child stands up for himself against a known bully and is not treated just the same as the bully (or worse because, after all the bully has known, documented issues), I will be more inclined to agree with you. Until then, don't dare try to convince me that children should be required to stand up to both the bully and the system that is failing those who are bullied. (Well, you can dare - but you won't get very far.)"
That isn't how it works in the real world either. There are consequences to standing up to bullies in the real world as well. Normally the establishment will not side with you. Bullies typically bully from a position of some kind of power. Hell in the real world nothing usually happens to the bully. The real effect of bullying is that the bully will usually back off (not always but predators typically look for easy prey) you will gain respect in the eyes of your peers, and anyone else who gains the chance to bully in the future probably won't see you has the weak link in the first place.
Bullying and being the target of bullying is actually normal male interaction. That is why it happens everywhere in every aspect of life. There are many degrees of bullying but males constantly lock horns on many levels. If you are male, you have bullied before in your life as well. You may have felt justified and it may have been something small but I guarantee there was some point where you smiled that little smile that comes with having the power this time.
Healthy child rearing requires the child dealing with tough issue and making it through. The answer is not to try to put a stop to 'unfairness' or the challenges of life. Some kids won't make it, probably a couple in your graduating class failed to learn these skills. Because a handful out of thousands fail should we make the thousands dysfunctional? Of course not. That is natural selection and evolution at work.
"I'm not saying that it's the schools responsibility to deal with episodes which happen at MacD's but that behviour will, inevitably, be part of a pattern which is repeated in school which is their responsibility, both social, and, in the UK, legal."
That may be their legal responsibility in the UK but it certainly isn't their social responsibility. That task is in the hands of parents. In the case of a bully that task is mostly in the hands of the student themself. Learning to deal with a bully and stand up for yourself is an essential social skill. Individuals need to be taught to rely on their own strength rather than to flee so some social structure to solve their problems for them.
When you leave school you will be in a sorry state if the way you have been taught to deal with bullies is to call the police/your boss/ or what have you. That has the same effect in the real world it does in school; it costs you the respect of your peers and lowers you a dozen notches on the alpha male scale. If you stand up for yourself you will rarely get bullied in the first place. If you do get bullied standing up with might escalate into a single dramatic consequence (like a fight) but then the bully will move on. Predators look for easy prey.
The point is null. It doesn't matter if bullying it occuring at school (unless there are physical results, a fight for instance). Inside a classroom you a disciplined environment where the students are not permitted to speak to one another while teaching occurs. Since the students have no opportunity to communicate or bully one another inside the classroom it will not impact either the bully or the bullied's ability to actually learn.
For pre-school and kindergarden you may have a point. Those grades are baby sitting as much as education. After that it is the teachers responsibility to teach, not to babysit. If a child is trained properly they will behave. Believe me, if they may not start that way but the first time a parent is called out a meeting with their boss to pick up a whining child the problem will end there.
If a child is a continued behavior problem that the parent can't handle then the parent will just have to take that child to private sector school where parents are paying for the service of combined babysitting and education.
Rules do not teach one how to behave. They regulate behavior in order to maintain order. There is a difference. When a teacher requires students to be silent, he is not teaching kids that they should never speak. A teacher requires students to be silent so that his message can be conveyed effectively. Students don't misinterpret this message either, just listen to them the moment the bell rings.
"90% of what you learn in school is about social skills, or 'how to behave'. Most of it you learn from your peers, but teachers, especially the good ones, will be leading the way."
Yes, a lot of social interaction takes place between peers at school. That is a side effect of grouping students together in order to convey knowledge to them. Beyond regulation to maintain order a teacher damn well better not try to teach any child of mine how to behave. Morals and behavior are things a parent teachs, not a school. If the parent does their job well then the child will bring those morals and behavior to the social interactions they have in school. Either way, the presence or lack of morals and appropriate behavior are not the concern of a teacher unless they are impairing the teacher's ability to convey the knowledge they are hired to teach.
To hell if it is. Teaching children how to behave is something that exclusively belongs in the realm of the PARENTS.
Children are sent to school to gain knowledge. Making sure that knowledge (along with any other weapons they aquire) are used for good instead of evil is WAY outside the schools scope.
"They keep breading until competition for the food keeps them thin..."
And humans don't?
"Capture a few squirrels, put them in enclosures with lots of easily reached food, and give vasectimies to all the males, they will get quite fat..."
That would tell you what happens when you put a squirrel in a cage and disrupt its natural diet and excercise pattern. That would tell you what doesn't work (something we already know) but it wouldn't tell you anything about what is working. Cages are fairly sprawl resistant as well.
It is really very simple. Chinese businessman has 40 plants in China and one in Taiwan, he manufacturers 40,000 pairs of shoes in Chinese plants. Then ships them to Taiwan and completes the final step by having the last factory stamp Nike logos, attach made in Taiwan tags and ship to the United States. The whole process bypasses the entire moral point of the embargo but may have even been legal.
That is why big business pushes the idea of 'upholding the law' and the idea that legal and morally right (and the reverse, illegal and morally wrong) have some sort of relation. That way, as long as they adhere to whatever regulations or laws exist they can do anything they want (including bypass the spirit of said laws) without ever doing anything 'wrong' or 'bad'. Couple that with constant lobbying to support a 'free market' where there are as few regulations and laws to 'work around' in the first place and business can basically do anything that turns a profit. Most businesses even stretch their moral concepts to include it being okay to break agreements and laws so long as they are willing to pay the fines and penalties associated with doing so. Microsoft is a good example of this.
I call bullshit right back. First items made in taiwan are stamped that way. Second, it is no secret that Taiwan was used a front to faciliate trade between the Chinese and the US when the government was unwilling to admit to the people that such trade occured.
It is really very simple. Chinese businessman has 40 plants in China and one in Taiwan, he manufacturers 40,000 pairs of shoes in Chinese plants. Then ships them to Taiwan and completes the final step by having the last factory stamp Nike logos, attach made in Taiwan tags and ship to the United States. The whole process bypasses the entire moral point of the embargo but may have even been legal.
That is why big business pushes the idea of 'upholding the law' and the idea that legal and morally right (and the reverse, illegal and morally wrong) have some sort of relation. That way, as long as they adhere to whatever regulations or laws exist they can do anything they want (including bypass the spirit of said laws) without ever doing anything 'wrong' or 'bad'. Couple that with constant lobbying to support a 'free market' where there are as few regulations and laws to 'work around' in the first place and business can basically do anything that turns a profit. Most businesses even stretch their moral concepts to include it being okay to break agreements and laws so long as they are willing to pay the fines and penalties associated with doing so. Microsoft is a good example of this.
I am not a physicist or even a scientist. But my understanding of science as a whole is that no model is ever intended to be the truth or the right answer. All models exist only to give a system by which something can be predicted if the observed behavior to date continues. Any model that explains observed behavior as well the current favorite can be no more less correct.
I'm not sure about the diet side of things. I do know that nutrition is not a science I wouldn't put much faith into it. What is believed to be healthy diet continually changes and often directly contradicts what we 'knew' a few years ago. Remember that documentary about the guy who stopped eating anything but McDonalds for a month? He didn't just cut out the fast food; he cut out excercise at the same time. That sort of eliminates the ability to draw any direct conclusions from his experience.
I do believe that excercise plays a bigger role in practice than diet. Even there, the science needs to catch up with the reality. The science will get you heavily muscled individuals with low fat content or trim ladies with hot bodies but those individuals don't live longer than the rest of us with a small gut and no ribs poking out. There is not just fit and obese. 'Healthy' greens, atheletics, bodybuilders, farmers and ranchers, the average joe with a small gut and no ribs poking out, John Candy, and the gargantuan woman hauling herself around with the motorized cart at Wal-mart are all completely different physical conditions. John Candy and Walmart woman have extremely short lives; farmers and ranchhands typically have long lives; the rest live about the same length of time in practice.
Farmers who work 16hrs a day/7 days a week eat diets filled with bacon, sausage, eggs, and corn. All of it cooked in real animal lard. They live long lives. They are usually physically powerful individuals without any substantial physical definition. Even changes in cholesterol theory don't explain this. The kind of excercise we get in a gym doesn't replicate the results. Just ask all the bodybuilders and runners dying at 65. What is the difference? Hell if I know but it certainly seems to be there.
Also, looking at nature I haven't found animals watching their diets. Other animals don't have any magic diet regulator switch instinct built in that the human animal does not. The natural habitat of most animals is certainly pretty sprawling. lol. I know of some predators that seem to dine almost exclusively on red meat and are quite healthy. The diets of animals in nature are diverse but they seem to have a few things in common. They all get quite a bit of natural, varied, excercise. Animals in nature are capable of storing fat (even if the vegetarians) for winter but otherwise aren't obese.
"That's why cities with high-density office buildings"
Building designed for economy.
"also have high-density residential buildings"
Buildings designed as a last resort because there is no other practical choice.
"of houses"
The ideal dwelling for a human. With a reasonable amount of personal space and all the activities that come with it.
Does anyone actually WANT to live in a high density residential building? A place where you can't bbq, fly a kite, play catch with your kid, engage in your latest and craziest idea like building a teepee?
The idea that having space to move around directly contradicts the fact that the natural habitat for humans is nothing but open space.
The fact that poor people live in the dense population residences (except for a small areas where the residents are extremely wealthy) and those who have a few more dollars in their pockets live in the sprawling suberbs couldn't have anything to do with it eh?
Lets do another study, this time lets only look at poor rural communities that are far more sprawled than any suberb could ever dream of being.
Slashdot Mirror
No kidding. Although according to comcast tech support they do not block any ports or utilize any form of traffic shaping. But they do monitor for excess outbound traffic on port 25 and throttle problem accounts.
'150 watts incandescent is pretty darn bright for typical room lighting. Most people
use 60/75 watt lights.'
That's because they can get by with it. They typically use reading lamps to supplement as well where they are needed. That doesn't mean a 75 watt bulb in a lamp on the table is the best illumination choice available, only that it is good enough and more cost effective. Some people even prefer a homey dim light setting but that is an aesthetic choice.
That is the United States and it also is only looking at natural rainfall.
If you want to grow massive amounts of vegtable matter, why would you do it in the US? Why not do it in a climate that is suitable for growing massive amounts of vegatable matter naturally? I hear there is plenty of space where logging companies have cleared rainforest. The same rains that grow a forest will grow crops and the soil is pretty fertile.
'Just because you are replacing plants with plants doesn't mean that is best for the surrounding areas, or the climate.'
This is probably where a fundemental philosophy difference probably steps in. I have no problem with changing local climates or destroying ecosystems unless those changes is going to negatively impact humans. If humans adapting the way they live alters an ecosystem and destroys the things that live there then that is just evolution at work.
I don't really envision the production of biofuel to be a midwest farmer issue anyway. I see it more as a South American concern. Putting a few midwest sized farms in place of some of the landscape that is being cleared by the logging companies could be just the thing.
'Or unless those chemical fertilizers are destroying the soil, increasing erosion.'
Erosion is a natural process happening all over the world. In some places it is quite annoying actually. I certainly don't see how farm sized scale (farms are pretty tiny compared to earth) are going to make a non-local difference.
'because the people who would be operating the agriculture side of it are HORRIBLE corporations.'
Is there any other kind of corporation? When an for profit entity isn't human then human concerns will always take a backseat to profit.
'fresh water needed for the crops'
last I heard we don't have a water shortage here on earth.
'particulates from combustion' you have to completely elminate the things that the greens have declared public enemies. They are only bad for the earth if they rise above what the earth can naturally clean up. Remember, combustion is a natural process and ozone is pretty good at nuking most of these things.
'the loss of native landscape cleared for agriculture'
There isn't really a shortage of native landscape in the world either. The biggest problem with clearing landscape is that the landscape you clear usually had plants that were eating CO2 and producing oxygen. With agriculture you are replacing the plants with other plants.
'the petrochemical fertilizers used in its production'
Unless you are making those fertilizers from biopetro...
'etc'
There will always be an extra. If you are suggesting a process has zero impact on anything 'natural' on earth then I am afraid you are going to be habitually disappointed in life. After all, natural and unnatural does not define good or harm it defines whether the acts were commited by human animal processes or non-human processes. Anything man does, no matter how 'green' is going to be unnatural and EVERYTHING has some kind of impact on the world.
'Until someone produces an economical biofuel grown in salt water in the desert, biofuel production is about the worst thing we could do to our environment.'
Just because some of the processes could potentially be less than perfect does not make biofuel production the worst thing for the environment. The goal is to produce byproducts in amounts that nature can handle, not to produce no byproducts. Unfortunately there will always be a group that likes to identify something that is causing a problem in excess and try to ban it altogether. This is the same mentality that has led to the 'war' on (cheap, unregulated, and/or recreational) drugs; turned millions of innocent people into criminals; and created a black market and powerful networks of criminal enforcers to regulate the trade.
People disregard it but that doesn't always seem to be the case. Also the CFL bulbs are pretty expensive. I find that the light from CFL just never seems to disperse over as large an area. Close to the lamp it will work just as well, but unless the light is up high with a wide reflector on it they just don't light up as large an area.
This is the test I performed. I took a 150w longer life incandescent bulb, a 100w comp cfl, a 60w comp cfl, and 60w incan. The 60w incan was not especially bright but illuminated my desk well enough that I could read (back to the light) without additional illumination (it would strain my eyes); the light felt immersive so there was plenty bouncing off the walls and ceiling. The 60w comp cfl seemed equally bright at the lamp but if you were 6ft away it was light having a flashlight shine on you while you are in the dark and just forget about light bouncing off the wall 20 ft away.
I then put in the 100w comp CFL. This was brighter at the lamp than either of the previous bulbs. Further it was a nice crisp white color instead of the yellow sunset type color you get from the 60w incan. However, again the light certainly did not bounce off the ceiling or the walls that were 10-20ft away from the source so it felt like flashlight illumination. My desk is at the far side of the room and you could not have read a book with your back to the light even with strain.
With the 150w incan the entire room was completely immersed in a crisp white light. Words were clear and there would be no strain regardless of how you were holding the book. Plenty of light was bouncing from every direction so that you no longer needed to pay much attention to how things were positioned relative to the light.
I am not drawing conclusions simply stating observations with the different bulbs. Nobody who wants to defend the physics of the lumen or whatever bother replying to debunk me because I am stating reality and you can't debunk it.
Sounds like you lack dedication. Real men can take it.
'People are just strange, and do strange things. I have no doubt that their are lots more people out there than you think, scheming up ways to melt down coins.'
No doubt there are nuts out there. I'm just saying that anyone with half a brain must realize that the coins will be readily exchangable at full metal value (probably a little above at any point). No melting will be needed. Government minted rounds are actually highly sought in metal trades. People buy and sell them for their metal content without ever melting them.
For instance, lets say you are going to make a small precious metal investment in silver. You need to choose between bars minted and guaranteed by private mints you have never heard of or you can just buy Canadian coins with a silver content guaranteed by the Canadian government. Which do you consider the safer choice?
There might be idiots who melt these but it is easy to see that either the coins will be discontinued or the composition will be changed. When that happens the coins will quickly be recognized at their metal value rather than face value. Anyone who saves the coins now not only has a safe investment but they will be able to cash in on that investment without ever defacing a government coin.
"I think I read that the average coin lifespan is around 30 years. They could stop producing pennies today I guess, but there's still probalby billions of them out there."
Yes but they didn't pay more than a penny for the raw materials they used in THOSE pennies. Is the issue really that someone other than the mint would gain the profit from the metal price increase of the copper they previously used in coins? Would it be so terrible is the real people who have the actual currency profited instead? If they stop circulation, then the mint doesn't actually lose any money at all. Since the pennies wouldn't be legal currency anymore then metal investors would use them as inexpensive investment pieces. The poor man's Canadian leaf coins if you will.
I also doubt anyone would go through the trouble of melting them. The metal content was measured and guaranteed by the US Mint and that lends no small amount of security in the coin content. Melting would bring question to the purity of the metals and the process would actually add overhead to the process.
"Bullying, on the other hand, is not a jockeying for position with the expectation that, at some point, a reasonable hierarchy will be established with varying degrees of inclusiveness. Bullying is a predatory action that intends to victimize another rather than establish a place for oneself."
I think its not so much the literal definition of bullying we disagree on but the motivation. For you it would seem the motivation is part of the definition; so I realize that fuzzes the distinction.
My definition of bullying would include any action that is undertaken by someone who is stronger to establish their dominance of someone weaker in a fashion that belittles the weaker individual.
When a young boy sticks a firework in a small animal and blows it up he is bullying. He is not doing it to be cruel to the animal and I doubt there are many bullies on the playground who are picking on the weaker one for the sake of being cruel. They are doing so to impress their friends (in schools you have social groups and the one being bullied typically is not part of the social group of the bully) and establish their position. A bully bullies not to harm someone else but to feel powerful and dominant; also to show the peers he is really competing with that he is powerful. It is pretty rare to find someone taking an action with the ultimate motivation being the feelings of another, humans are more self-centered than that. Even when we are doing good things for someone it is usually ultimate because doing so makes US feel good.
School is not for keeping children occupied and off the streets. School is for conveying information to children.
I would also disagree with the association between good behavior and wealth. Before bringing out a stereotype about the poor you are going to have to produce actual study to backup your claims. The studies will of course need to exclude minority ghettos where there is also a culture of discontent, rebellion, and violence that would augment the data.
Touche. I probably should have said 'mature science'.
"Umm... bullshit right back. When the system is altered so that when a child stands up for himself against a known bully and is not treated just the same as the bully (or worse because, after all the bully has known, documented issues), I will be more inclined to agree with you. Until then, don't dare try to convince me that children should be required to stand up to both the bully and the system that is failing those who are bullied. (Well, you can dare - but you won't get very far.)"
That isn't how it works in the real world either. There are consequences to standing up to bullies in the real world as well. Normally the establishment will not side with you. Bullies typically bully from a position of some kind of power. Hell in the real world nothing usually happens to the bully. The real effect of bullying is that the bully will usually back off (not always but predators typically look for easy prey) you will gain respect in the eyes of your peers, and anyone else who gains the chance to bully in the future probably won't see you has the weak link in the first place.
Bullying and being the target of bullying is actually normal male interaction. That is why it happens everywhere in every aspect of life. There are many degrees of bullying but males constantly lock horns on many levels. If you are male, you have bullied before in your life as well. You may have felt justified and it may have been something small but I guarantee there was some point where you smiled that little smile that comes with having the power this time.
Healthy child rearing requires the child dealing with tough issue and making it through. The answer is not to try to put a stop to 'unfairness' or the challenges of life. Some kids won't make it, probably a couple in your graduating class failed to learn these skills. Because a handful out of thousands fail should we make the thousands dysfunctional? Of course not. That is natural selection and evolution at work.
"I'm not saying that it's the schools responsibility to deal with episodes which happen at MacD's but that behviour will, inevitably, be part of a pattern which is repeated in school which is their responsibility, both social, and, in the UK, legal."
That may be their legal responsibility in the UK but it certainly isn't their social responsibility. That task is in the hands of parents. In the case of a bully that task is mostly in the hands of the student themself. Learning to deal with a bully and stand up for yourself is an essential social skill. Individuals need to be taught to rely on their own strength rather than to flee so some social structure to solve their problems for them.
When you leave school you will be in a sorry state if the way you have been taught to deal with bullies is to call the police/your boss/ or what have you. That has the same effect in the real world it does in school; it costs you the respect of your peers and lowers you a dozen notches on the alpha male scale. If you stand up for yourself you will rarely get bullied in the first place. If you do get bullied standing up with might escalate into a single dramatic consequence (like a fight) but then the bully will move on. Predators look for easy prey.
The point is null. It doesn't matter if bullying it occuring at school (unless there are physical results, a fight for instance). Inside a classroom you a disciplined environment where the students are not permitted to speak to one another while teaching occurs. Since the students have no opportunity to communicate or bully one another inside the classroom it will not impact either the bully or the bullied's ability to actually learn.
For pre-school and kindergarden you may have a point. Those grades are baby sitting as much as education. After that it is the teachers responsibility to teach, not to babysit. If a child is trained properly they will behave. Believe me, if they may not start that way but the first time a parent is called out a meeting with their boss to pick up a whining child the problem will end there.
If a child is a continued behavior problem that the parent can't handle then the parent will just have to take that child to private sector school where parents are paying for the service of combined babysitting and education.
I wish I had mod points. Sometimes a comparison to Hitler or Nazi's is actually a legitimate comparison.
Rules do not teach one how to behave. They regulate behavior in order to maintain order. There is a difference. When a teacher requires students to be silent, he is not teaching kids that they should never speak. A teacher requires students to be silent so that his message can be conveyed effectively. Students don't misinterpret this message either, just listen to them the moment the bell rings.
"90% of what you learn in school is about social skills, or 'how to behave'. Most of it you learn from your peers, but teachers, especially the good ones, will be leading the way."
Yes, a lot of social interaction takes place between peers at school. That is a side effect of grouping students together in order to convey knowledge to them. Beyond regulation to maintain order a teacher damn well better not try to teach any child of mine how to behave. Morals and behavior are things a parent teachs, not a school. If the parent does their job well then the child will bring those morals and behavior to the social interactions they have in school. Either way, the presence or lack of morals and appropriate behavior are not the concern of a teacher unless they are impairing the teacher's ability to convey the knowledge they are hired to teach.
To hell if it is. Teaching children how to behave is something that exclusively belongs in the realm of the PARENTS.
Children are sent to school to gain knowledge. Making sure that knowledge (along with any other weapons they aquire) are used for good instead of evil is WAY outside the schools scope.
"They keep breading until competition for the food keeps them thin..."
And humans don't?
"Capture a few squirrels, put them in enclosures with lots of easily reached food, and give vasectimies to all the males, they will get quite fat..."
That would tell you what happens when you put a squirrel in a cage and disrupt its natural diet and excercise pattern. That would tell you what doesn't work (something we already know) but it wouldn't tell you anything about what is working. Cages are fairly sprawl resistant as well.
It is really very simple. Chinese businessman has 40 plants in China and one in Taiwan, he manufacturers 40,000 pairs of shoes in Chinese plants. Then ships them to Taiwan and completes the final step by having the last factory stamp Nike logos, attach made in Taiwan tags and ship to the United States. The whole process bypasses the entire moral point of the embargo but may have even been legal.
That is why big business pushes the idea of 'upholding the law' and the idea that legal and morally right (and the reverse, illegal and morally wrong) have some sort of relation. That way, as long as they adhere to whatever regulations or laws exist they can do anything they want (including bypass the spirit of said laws) without ever doing anything 'wrong' or 'bad'. Couple that with constant lobbying to support a 'free market' where there are as few regulations and laws to 'work around' in the first place and business can basically do anything that turns a profit. Most businesses even stretch their moral concepts to include it being okay to break agreements and laws so long as they are willing to pay the fines and penalties associated with doing so. Microsoft is a good example of this.
I call bullshit right back. First items made in taiwan are stamped that way. Second, it is no secret that Taiwan was used a front to faciliate trade between the Chinese and the US when the government was unwilling to admit to the people that such trade occured.
It is really very simple. Chinese businessman has 40 plants in China and one in Taiwan, he manufacturers 40,000 pairs of shoes in Chinese plants. Then ships them to Taiwan and completes the final step by having the last factory stamp Nike logos, attach made in Taiwan tags and ship to the United States. The whole process bypasses the entire moral point of the embargo but may have even been legal.
That is why big business pushes the idea of 'upholding the law' and the idea that legal and morally right (and the reverse, illegal and morally wrong) have some sort of relation. That way, as long as they adhere to whatever regulations or laws exist they can do anything they want (including bypass the spirit of said laws) without ever doing anything 'wrong' or 'bad'. Couple that with constant lobbying to support a 'free market' where there are as few regulations and laws to 'work around' in the first place and business can basically do anything that turns a profit. Most businesses even stretch their moral concepts to include it being okay to break agreements and laws so long as they are willing to pay the fines and penalties associated with doing so. Microsoft is a good example of this.
I am not a physicist or even a scientist. But my understanding of science as a whole is that no model is ever intended to be the truth or the right answer. All models exist only to give a system by which something can be predicted if the observed behavior to date continues. Any model that explains observed behavior as well the current favorite can be no more less correct.
I'm not sure about the diet side of things. I do know that nutrition is not a science I wouldn't put much faith into it. What is believed to be healthy diet continually changes and often directly contradicts what we 'knew' a few years ago. Remember that documentary about the guy who stopped eating anything but McDonalds for a month? He didn't just cut out the fast food; he cut out excercise at the same time. That sort of eliminates the ability to draw any direct conclusions from his experience.
I do believe that excercise plays a bigger role in practice than diet. Even there, the science needs to catch up with the reality. The science will get you heavily muscled individuals with low fat content or trim ladies with hot bodies but those individuals don't live longer than the rest of us with a small gut and no ribs poking out. There is not just fit and obese. 'Healthy' greens, atheletics, bodybuilders, farmers and ranchers, the average joe with a small gut and no ribs poking out, John Candy, and the gargantuan woman hauling herself around with the motorized cart at Wal-mart are all completely different physical conditions. John Candy and Walmart woman have extremely short lives; farmers and ranchhands typically have long lives; the rest live about the same length of time in practice.
Farmers who work 16hrs a day/7 days a week eat diets filled with bacon, sausage, eggs, and corn. All of it cooked in real animal lard. They live long lives. They are usually physically powerful individuals without any substantial physical definition. Even changes in cholesterol theory don't explain this. The kind of excercise we get in a gym doesn't replicate the results. Just ask all the bodybuilders and runners dying at 65. What is the difference? Hell if I know but it certainly seems to be there.
Also, looking at nature I haven't found animals watching their diets. Other animals don't have any magic diet regulator switch instinct built in that the human animal does not. The natural habitat of most animals is certainly pretty sprawling. lol. I know of some predators that seem to dine almost exclusively on red meat and are quite healthy. The diets of animals in nature are diverse but they seem to have a few things in common. They all get quite a bit of natural, varied, excercise. Animals in nature are capable of storing fat (even if the vegetarians) for winter but otherwise aren't obese.
"That's why cities with high-density office buildings"
Building designed for economy.
"also have high-density residential buildings"
Buildings designed as a last resort because there is no other practical choice.
"of houses"
The ideal dwelling for a human. With a reasonable amount of personal space and all the activities that come with it.
Does anyone actually WANT to live in a high density residential building? A place where you can't bbq, fly a kite, play catch with your kid, engage in your latest and craziest idea like building a teepee?
The idea that having space to move around directly contradicts the fact that the natural habitat for humans is nothing but open space.
The fact that poor people live in the dense population residences (except for a small areas where the residents are extremely wealthy) and those who have a few more dollars in their pockets live in the sprawling suberbs couldn't have anything to do with it eh?
Lets do another study, this time lets only look at poor rural communities that are far more sprawled than any suberb could ever dream of being.