The widespread use of WP against personnel would end war as we know it. No one would ever agree to risk that. Anyone who's ever even read about what WP does to people while it kills them would sooner take a hundred bullets than to die that way. For that reason, and only that reason, its use against personnel is banned by international laws and treaties which only Israel is known to have routinely violated (though there is some evidence of U.S. use as well, and all armies do use WP for legal purposes such as tracer bullets). No government wants to risk its citizens turning against it, rather than the purported enemy.
I agree with the sentiment, and I think the U.S. government sees it this way too, but what most people don't understand is the degree of indebtedness the U.S. has taken on (around $220 trillion according to GAAP) and that much of this was the direct or indirect result of the wars it has started since 2001. It cannot borrow much more than it already does without risking a catastrophic rise in interest rates. It also cannot confiscate much more than it already does without risking civil unrest. It will probably continue to inflate the money supply, as it has been doing for the past several years, but when and if banks ever start loaning that money out it will cause terrible inflation, and this time, there are no large domestic businesses left to blame it on like they did in the 70s. Plus, Austrian and Chicago school economists will rightly point out that the inflation was a result of monetary expansion and not the fault of businesses. As I see it, the U.S. government is already past the point of no return, but it could hold on for a few more years, perhaps even a decade or two, IF it stayed out of stupid wars. That it apparently is unwilling to do so will only hasten its demise.
Big parts of Detroit are already reverting to urban gardens and farms. It's not racist. It's just good sense, given the current situation (lots of abandoned land, lots of unemployed people, and, for those people, well over 90% of them Black, not a lot of other good options for fresh food). The "Great Migration" likewise is already being reversed, albeit gradually. Black people are moving from the inner-city to suburbs, and from metro areas in the North and East to others in the South and West, increasing diversity almost everywhere, which I see as a good thing. More immigration, which is an absolute necessity and inevitability given current demographics (otherwise, not even half as many taxpayers as are needed to pay for the Baby Boomers' retirement), will eventually repopulate those cities, or those portions of cities, that potentially can support gainful employment of any kind.
Yes . ..apparently one of the busiest lines in the world at that. I believe Seoul also has one and that one is being built in (relatively) nearby Incheon.
I'm sure it is not a perfect circle any more than "lines" are straight lines. Both have to route around natural and possibly man-made obstacles. But I did read an interesting story. This route apparently was constructed during Stalin's reign. Allegedly, he had been drinking coffee, and at some point placed his coffee cup down on a map of the existing metro system at the time, creating a big brown circle, and this is how the idea for the route was first conceived. It is colored brown on the standard Moscow metrp map. I have no idea whether it's true or not, but I found the story interesting.
Christ called His followers to live according to His standards, not to judge others for failing to live up to theirs. I am generally opposed to suicide in any form, for all of the traditional reasons, yet I accept that there may be circumstances that might justify it in specific cases. I for instance will not consent to medical treatment under any circumstances unless it will preserve my ability to work. I do not wish to be a burden to my family, and it may well be that I die unnecessarily for that reason and that some might even consider it suicide. Likewise I have decided that, courage permitting (I will not pretend to actually have it until I've demonstrated that, which I haven't, yet), I will willingly give my life to save the life of any innocent person if I'm able to, and I will risk it if necessary in order to fight against injustice, oppression, and tyranny. Again, some may consider this suicide, and they are entitled to their opinion, but what I fear having to explain to God one day is not that I risked my life to do what was right, but rather that so often I did not. Yes, absolutely, I believe God decides our fate; yet, our own circumstances and our decisions, right or wrong, are part of the means by which He does so. If we wish to convince others, it is better to demonstrate by our example, than to condemn them for making choices we don't agree with.
I've always managed to find interesting destinations outside of Manhattan. This might be because I usually drive in and around the outer boroughs, and park near a subway or NJ Transit station to get to Manhattan. I'm not afraid to drive in the outer boroughs when I'm there, which is usually weekends, although even I'm not crazy enough to drive in Manhattan if I don't have to. In the outer boroughs, you can't really tell what's there if you're on the subway (even though it's often above ground there). Driving or walking, presuming it's someplace walking is safe (which is most of NYC nowadays), is far more interesting to me.
OK, I'm not at all familiar with London, but the proximity of the stations led me to suspect that walking would be fastest. Google Maps seemed to agree in this particular case. I'm aware of course that, as others have pointed out, this correlation does not always work (e.g., in Boston). Two adjacent stations may require a 40 minute walk through a bad neighborhood (e.g., West 25 and West 65 in my native Cleveland). But the combination of physical and topological maps usually work well everyplace I've ever been.
Just because you might never have been a victim of violent crime - which has a tendency to concentrate itself in certain geographic areas, including the one where I was born and still live today - does not mean everyone else is so fortunate. I grew up in what would now be considered the ghetto. From the time I started working around age 10 (delivering papers), until the time I got a car and moved to the suburbs, which was when I was in my early 20s, I was violently assaulted roughly every year. About two thirds of those times I fought off my attackers with a deadly weapon (although none of those times ever resulted injury to anyone - I only needed to display it for them, cowardly bullies they were, to turn around and run off). One time I was able to run to safety and another time I was able to lock myself in a room until the attackers left. But on the remaining 2 or 3 occasions I was beaten badly and robbed of everything I had on me. I was very lucky I did not get shot (there were guns pointed at me on all those occasions as well as one or two of the others). Now that I don't have to hang out at bus stops at weird hours of the night, and live in a relatively safe part of town, that kind of stuff doesn't happen to me anymore, but at one time it did, and during that time, the fact that I was armed very likely saved my life. Some of the people I grew up with have similar stories, and one of them (that I know of) was brutally murdered, for no apparent reason, 2 or 3 months ago. You may be sheltered enough not to have to worry about this sort of thing, but a lot of us are not so fortunate, and I think I can speak on behalf of many of them, at least, when I tell you that their decision of whether and how to arm, train, and protect themselves and those around them is absolutely none of anyone else's business.
First, no one has any rights that all civilians do not also have. People in law enforcement have greater responsibilities, not greater rights. In our form of government, the legitimate powers of government are derived from the consent of the people, not vice versa. Also, our founding documents, one of which is the highest law of the land, it is made explicit that government exists not to grant rights but to protect pre-existing rights that the people already have.
Second, deadly force can be justified without being necessary. Home invasions are a common example. One always has the right to shoot an invader if one has reason to believe his or her safety or the safety of other innocent people are in danger. However, as many people have discovered, the mere act of pumping a shotgun often provides a completely non-lethal resolution of home invasions. The invader(s) typically flee, and sometimes even cooperate with the homeowner (e.g., staying put until help arrives) knowing that if they do not they are more likely to be killed.
Finally, a lot of very overprivileged folks here, who have not lived in areas with pervasive crime or out-of-control governments (local and national), dismiss the idea that ordinary people need or are entitled to use deadly force to protect themselves or those around them. All such people can go fuck themselves. I don't give a flying baboon's hemorrhoid-infested, pus-oozing butt what anyone else thinks when it comes to protecting those I love. They can help, or they can stay the hell out of my way. But the moment they try to interfere with my duty to keep those around me safe, they become every bit as dangerous as any other criminal, and I am likely to respond the same way I would to any other criminal. I hate violence and I would not take the life of another person even to save my own, but I would do so without hestitation to save anyone in my family, or for that matter any innocent person. There are a lot of folks in this country who have blood on their hands because they have played a role in the forcible and unlawful disarmament of teachers, train operators, and various other people who otherwise might have prevented mass shootings and numerous other crimes. If liberty, justice, and rule of law are ever restored in this country, those people MUST be held accountable, and they will be held accountable, in proportion to their level of responsibility. As far as I'm concerned, those who have voted to violate other people's rights have forfeited any further right to vote. Those in power who have done so have forfeited any further right to remain in power. And as for the demonic scum who have knowingly and willfully worked for victim disarmament, e.g., who have sponsored bills to deprive people of their right to defend themselves, I believe they should be held directly responsible for the consequences of their actions, under existing federal and state law which makes this a felony and under some circumstances a capital felony (potential punishment of execution).
It is tragic that these two lives - and hundreds more each and every day - have been ended or destroyed beyond repair. But this will continue until rule of law is restored. That is why I and many other Americans will work as hard as we can, for as long as we have to, in order to do so, regardless of any opposition.
Re:Just shows what we already knew
on
How DRM Won
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· Score: 1
No, I do understand that I am paying for a service. However, I would rather be paying for content rights, or to at least have that as a convenient and affordable option. In the absence of pseudo-legal bullshitthuggery such as DMCA, I believe both options, among others, could peacefully coexist.
Re:Just shows what we already knew
on
How DRM Won
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
For example, I subscribe to netflix. It uses DRM. I can still watch the movies in their collection, repeatedly.
For as long as they remain available via streaming. It is not uncommon for titles to drop out of the streaming catalog. It happened to me once while I was literally in the middle of watching a movie (watched part one day, hoping to watch the rest the next, and it was no longer available via streaming). That is another drawback of DRM. You are guaranteed to be able to watch your rented media today. There is no guarantee about next year or month or week, or even tomorrow.
This should be modded to +10. It's probably the most concise and brilliant refutation I've ever seen of the notion that we are somehow still a society guided by rule of law.
If I were a teacher I would want to be able to stop a live shooter even if it did mean an increased risk of being accidentally shot by the police. I doubt that it would, anyway, given that police rarely arrive until long after the incident begins - often, well after it has already ended. But even if it did, I would prefer to risk my own life rather than to allow an even greater risk of others, perhaps dozens of others, being gunned down due to my inaction and/or cowardice.
We have "food desert light" in Cleveland, Ohio and it is what most people in the city experience. Many have known nothing better. Things are fine in the relatively better neighborhoods (maybe 10-15% of the city proper) and there are excellent urban and farmers' markets in some of these, such as the famous West Side Market. The poorest live in places where the only accessible "food" is a corner bodega which mostly sells booze and lottery tickets, and where venturing far enough from home to catch a bus or train is very dangerous. But for the 80% who are neither destitute, nor wealthy by Cleveland standards, the typical "shopping experience" is a supermarket that is poorly lit, poorly cleaned, and offers mostly the same choices as the corner bodega, just more of them. Lots of off-brand, frozen, highly processed junk of every conceivable kind, but VERY few fruits and vegetables, very poor selection, none of them fresh, most barely edible, and at prices at least double or triple what I pay in my lower-middle-class suburb for vastly higher quality of the same thing. People who drive do of course have access to the much better stores in the suburbs, but many within the inner city do not drive, and are limited to the "selection" at the local Sav-a-Lot. It is not a true food desert, but it probably is representative of many of the less prosperous places in the U.S., which probably explains a lot of why we are among the sickest and fattest people in the developed world in spite of also being among the poorest at the median (not the average), by any meaningful measure of true wealth or human development.
Agreed that there needs to be a way to redact video (or audio) that might infringe the privacy of innocents well before it becomes public. I believe I said that already.
As for "getting the right people in charge" of a system, that might work if it is only the people in charge who are corrupt, and not the system itself. But, as has been well-known to political thinkers since antiquity, the very nature of power itself is corrupting. We can't change human nature, so the best we currently know how to do is to ensure that there are checks and balances to try to encourage decent and honorable behavior and to deter corruption to the extent possible. Even that doesn't work perfectly, but I don't believe anyone has figured out a way to do better.
I would be less troubled by this if the public had access as well. The police are supposed to be there to serve us, not vice versa. I'm aware that there are privacy concerns (they bust into the wrong house, see naked girl, realize they're in the wrong house, but now naked girl is all over Internet). This needs to be addressed. But the public, and defendants in criminal cases, are both severely disadvantaged if the police and prosecution have access to information that the former do not. And yes, I'm aware of the discovery process and the rules of evidence in federal and most other U.S. jurisdictions, but nothing there prevents the cops or prosecution from "accidentally" losing or even altering evidence to suit their agenda. So my stance is that recording is OK if it is, in some way available, if not to the public, than at least to the press and to defendants in criminal cases.
Birth control does not directly cause STDs. However, non-monogamous lifestyles do cause STDs, and birth control, by encouraging those types of lifestyles, does increase the number of STDs over time. I'm not sure why one must be a "religious nut" to see that.
There have been small but healthy vegan populations for practically forever, mainly in southeast Asia. It was believed until recently that a person could not get enough B12 from a purely vegan diet. That has recently been proven incorrect, for a large variety of reasons. (a) The amount we need is tiny, and the body can store enough to last a long, long time. (b) It is naturally present in some vegan foods such as nutritional yeast, soy sauce, and many fermented products. (c) Most people inadvertently ingest enough insects, spiders, dust mites, etc. to more than fulfill their requirement. In modern times we also have B12 added to many kinds of foods. When people have B12 deficiencies, it is usually because of digestive problems such as celiac diseases, and in that case, an monthly injection of B12 is usually sufficient to prevent major problems that the deficiency would otherwise cause.
Incorrect. Insects have successfully adapted to a wide variety of both natural and man-made insecticides which, though no longer fatal for them, may still be harmful to us.
Slashdot Mirror
The widespread use of WP against personnel would end war as we know it. No one would ever agree to risk that. Anyone who's ever even read about what WP does to people while it kills them would sooner take a hundred bullets than to die that way. For that reason, and only that reason, its use against personnel is banned by international laws and treaties which only Israel is known to have routinely violated (though there is some evidence of U.S. use as well, and all armies do use WP for legal purposes such as tracer bullets). No government wants to risk its citizens turning against it, rather than the purported enemy.
I agree with the sentiment, and I think the U.S. government sees it this way too, but what most people don't understand is the degree of indebtedness the U.S. has taken on (around $220 trillion according to GAAP) and that much of this was the direct or indirect result of the wars it has started since 2001. It cannot borrow much more than it already does without risking a catastrophic rise in interest rates. It also cannot confiscate much more than it already does without risking civil unrest. It will probably continue to inflate the money supply, as it has been doing for the past several years, but when and if banks ever start loaning that money out it will cause terrible inflation, and this time, there are no large domestic businesses left to blame it on like they did in the 70s. Plus, Austrian and Chicago school economists will rightly point out that the inflation was a result of monetary expansion and not the fault of businesses. As I see it, the U.S. government is already past the point of no return, but it could hold on for a few more years, perhaps even a decade or two, IF it stayed out of stupid wars. That it apparently is unwilling to do so will only hasten its demise.
Not directly by Microsoft, granted, but it certainly looks maintained to me, with a release candidate dated two days ago.
Big parts of Detroit are already reverting to urban gardens and farms. It's not racist. It's just good sense, given the current situation (lots of abandoned land, lots of unemployed people, and, for those people, well over 90% of them Black, not a lot of other good options for fresh food). The "Great Migration" likewise is already being reversed, albeit gradually. Black people are moving from the inner-city to suburbs, and from metro areas in the North and East to others in the South and West, increasing diversity almost everywhere, which I see as a good thing. More immigration, which is an absolute necessity and inevitability given current demographics (otherwise, not even half as many taxpayers as are needed to pay for the Baby Boomers' retirement), will eventually repopulate those cities, or those portions of cities, that potentially can support gainful employment of any kind.
Yes . . .apparently one of the busiest lines in the world at that. I believe Seoul also has one and that one is being built in (relatively) nearby Incheon.
I'm sure it is not a perfect circle any more than "lines" are straight lines. Both have to route around natural and possibly man-made obstacles. But I did read an interesting story. This route apparently was constructed during Stalin's reign. Allegedly, he had been drinking coffee, and at some point placed his coffee cup down on a map of the existing metro system at the time, creating a big brown circle, and this is how the idea for the route was first conceived. It is colored brown on the standard Moscow metrp map. I have no idea whether it's true or not, but I found the story interesting.
Christ called His followers to live according to His standards, not to judge others for failing to live up to theirs. I am generally opposed to suicide in any form, for all of the traditional reasons, yet I accept that there may be circumstances that might justify it in specific cases. I for instance will not consent to medical treatment under any circumstances unless it will preserve my ability to work. I do not wish to be a burden to my family, and it may well be that I die unnecessarily for that reason and that some might even consider it suicide. Likewise I have decided that, courage permitting (I will not pretend to actually have it until I've demonstrated that, which I haven't, yet), I will willingly give my life to save the life of any innocent person if I'm able to, and I will risk it if necessary in order to fight against injustice, oppression, and tyranny. Again, some may consider this suicide, and they are entitled to their opinion, but what I fear having to explain to God one day is not that I risked my life to do what was right, but rather that so often I did not. Yes, absolutely, I believe God decides our fate; yet, our own circumstances and our decisions, right or wrong, are part of the means by which He does so. If we wish to convince others, it is better to demonstrate by our example, than to condemn them for making choices we don't agree with.
I've always managed to find interesting destinations outside of Manhattan. This might be because I usually drive in and around the outer boroughs, and park near a subway or NJ Transit station to get to Manhattan. I'm not afraid to drive in the outer boroughs when I'm there, which is usually weekends, although even I'm not crazy enough to drive in Manhattan if I don't have to. In the outer boroughs, you can't really tell what's there if you're on the subway (even though it's often above ground there). Driving or walking, presuming it's someplace walking is safe (which is most of NYC nowadays), is far more interesting to me.
OK, I'm not at all familiar with London, but the proximity of the stations led me to suspect that walking would be fastest. Google Maps seemed to agree in this particular case. I'm aware of course that, as others have pointed out, this correlation does not always work (e.g., in Boston). Two adjacent stations may require a 40 minute walk through a bad neighborhood (e.g., West 25 and West 65 in my native Cleveland). But the combination of physical and topological maps usually work well everyplace I've ever been.
The Moscow Metro is one of the few in the world with an actual circular line.
OK. My apologies then.
Just because you might never have been a victim of violent crime - which has a tendency to concentrate itself in certain geographic areas, including the one where I was born and still live today - does not mean everyone else is so fortunate. I grew up in what would now be considered the ghetto. From the time I started working around age 10 (delivering papers), until the time I got a car and moved to the suburbs, which was when I was in my early 20s, I was violently assaulted roughly every year. About two thirds of those times I fought off my attackers with a deadly weapon (although none of those times ever resulted injury to anyone - I only needed to display it for them, cowardly bullies they were, to turn around and run off). One time I was able to run to safety and another time I was able to lock myself in a room until the attackers left. But on the remaining 2 or 3 occasions I was beaten badly and robbed of everything I had on me. I was very lucky I did not get shot (there were guns pointed at me on all those occasions as well as one or two of the others). Now that I don't have to hang out at bus stops at weird hours of the night, and live in a relatively safe part of town, that kind of stuff doesn't happen to me anymore, but at one time it did, and during that time, the fact that I was armed very likely saved my life. Some of the people I grew up with have similar stories, and one of them (that I know of) was brutally murdered, for no apparent reason, 2 or 3 months ago. You may be sheltered enough not to have to worry about this sort of thing, but a lot of us are not so fortunate, and I think I can speak on behalf of many of them, at least, when I tell you that their decision of whether and how to arm, train, and protect themselves and those around them is absolutely none of anyone else's business.
So much bullshit, so little time.
First, no one has any rights that all civilians do not also have. People in law enforcement have greater responsibilities, not greater rights. In our form of government, the legitimate powers of government are derived from the consent of the people, not vice versa. Also, our founding documents, one of which is the highest law of the land, it is made explicit that government exists not to grant rights but to protect pre-existing rights that the people already have.
Second, deadly force can be justified without being necessary. Home invasions are a common example. One always has the right to shoot an invader if one has reason to believe his or her safety or the safety of other innocent people are in danger. However, as many people have discovered, the mere act of pumping a shotgun often provides a completely non-lethal resolution of home invasions. The invader(s) typically flee, and sometimes even cooperate with the homeowner (e.g., staying put until help arrives) knowing that if they do not they are more likely to be killed.
Finally, a lot of very overprivileged folks here, who have not lived in areas with pervasive crime or out-of-control governments (local and national), dismiss the idea that ordinary people need or are entitled to use deadly force to protect themselves or those around them. All such people can go fuck themselves. I don't give a flying baboon's hemorrhoid-infested, pus-oozing butt what anyone else thinks when it comes to protecting those I love. They can help, or they can stay the hell out of my way. But the moment they try to interfere with my duty to keep those around me safe, they become every bit as dangerous as any other criminal, and I am likely to respond the same way I would to any other criminal. I hate violence and I would not take the life of another person even to save my own, but I would do so without hestitation to save anyone in my family, or for that matter any innocent person. There are a lot of folks in this country who have blood on their hands because they have played a role in the forcible and unlawful disarmament of teachers, train operators, and various other people who otherwise might have prevented mass shootings and numerous other crimes. If liberty, justice, and rule of law are ever restored in this country, those people MUST be held accountable, and they will be held accountable, in proportion to their level of responsibility. As far as I'm concerned, those who have voted to violate other people's rights have forfeited any further right to vote. Those in power who have done so have forfeited any further right to remain in power. And as for the demonic scum who have knowingly and willfully worked for victim disarmament, e.g., who have sponsored bills to deprive people of their right to defend themselves, I believe they should be held directly responsible for the consequences of their actions, under existing federal and state law which makes this a felony and under some circumstances a capital felony (potential punishment of execution).
It is tragic that these two lives - and hundreds more each and every day - have been ended or destroyed beyond repair. But this will continue until rule of law is restored. That is why I and many other Americans will work as hard as we can, for as long as we have to, in order to do so, regardless of any opposition.
No, I do understand that I am paying for a service. However, I would rather be paying for content rights, or to at least have that as a convenient and affordable option. In the absence of pseudo-legal bullshitthuggery such as DMCA, I believe both options, among others, could peacefully coexist.
For example, I subscribe to netflix. It uses DRM. I can still watch the movies in their collection, repeatedly.
For as long as they remain available via streaming. It is not uncommon for titles to drop out of the streaming catalog. It happened to me once while I was literally in the middle of watching a movie (watched part one day, hoping to watch the rest the next, and it was no longer available via streaming). That is another drawback of DRM. You are guaranteed to be able to watch your rented media today. There is no guarantee about next year or month or week, or even tomorrow.
This should be modded to +10. It's probably the most concise and brilliant refutation I've ever seen of the notion that we are somehow still a society guided by rule of law.
If I were a teacher I would want to be able to stop a live shooter even if it did mean an increased risk of being accidentally shot by the police. I doubt that it would, anyway, given that police rarely arrive until long after the incident begins - often, well after it has already ended. But even if it did, I would prefer to risk my own life rather than to allow an even greater risk of others, perhaps dozens of others, being gunned down due to my inaction and/or cowardice.
We have "food desert light" in Cleveland, Ohio and it is what most people in the city experience. Many have known nothing better. Things are fine in the relatively better neighborhoods (maybe 10-15% of the city proper) and there are excellent urban and farmers' markets in some of these, such as the famous West Side Market. The poorest live in places where the only accessible "food" is a corner bodega which mostly sells booze and lottery tickets, and where venturing far enough from home to catch a bus or train is very dangerous. But for the 80% who are neither destitute, nor wealthy by Cleveland standards, the typical "shopping experience" is a supermarket that is poorly lit, poorly cleaned, and offers mostly the same choices as the corner bodega, just more of them. Lots of off-brand, frozen, highly processed junk of every conceivable kind, but VERY few fruits and vegetables, very poor selection, none of them fresh, most barely edible, and at prices at least double or triple what I pay in my lower-middle-class suburb for vastly higher quality of the same thing. People who drive do of course have access to the much better stores in the suburbs, but many within the inner city do not drive, and are limited to the "selection" at the local Sav-a-Lot. It is not a true food desert, but it probably is representative of many of the less prosperous places in the U.S., which probably explains a lot of why we are among the sickest and fattest people in the developed world in spite of also being among the poorest at the median (not the average), by any meaningful measure of true wealth or human development.
Where on earth do you live, where truckers use 1kw linear amps? Around here, that is unheard of. 10kw is about the minimum.
Agreed that there needs to be a way to redact video (or audio) that might infringe the privacy of innocents well before it becomes public. I believe I said that already.
As for "getting the right people in charge" of a system, that might work if it is only the people in charge who are corrupt, and not the system itself. But, as has been well-known to political thinkers since antiquity, the very nature of power itself is corrupting. We can't change human nature, so the best we currently know how to do is to ensure that there are checks and balances to try to encourage decent and honorable behavior and to deter corruption to the extent possible. Even that doesn't work perfectly, but I don't believe anyone has figured out a way to do better.
I would be less troubled by this if the public had access as well. The police are supposed to be there to serve us, not vice versa. I'm aware that there are privacy concerns (they bust into the wrong house, see naked girl, realize they're in the wrong house, but now naked girl is all over Internet). This needs to be addressed. But the public, and defendants in criminal cases, are both severely disadvantaged if the police and prosecution have access to information that the former do not. And yes, I'm aware of the discovery process and the rules of evidence in federal and most other U.S. jurisdictions, but nothing there prevents the cops or prosecution from "accidentally" losing or even altering evidence to suit their agenda. So my stance is that recording is OK if it is, in some way available, if not to the public, than at least to the press and to defendants in criminal cases.
Yep. And it is not just a "theory," but a straightforward application of mathematics, specifically the mean value theorem, which is trivially proven.
Birth control does not directly cause STDs. However, non-monogamous lifestyles do cause STDs, and birth control, by encouraging those types of lifestyles, does increase the number of STDs over time. I'm not sure why one must be a "religious nut" to see that.
There have been small but healthy vegan populations for practically forever, mainly in southeast Asia. It was believed until recently that a person could not get enough B12 from a purely vegan diet. That has recently been proven incorrect, for a large variety of reasons. (a) The amount we need is tiny, and the body can store enough to last a long, long time. (b) It is naturally present in some vegan foods such as nutritional yeast, soy sauce, and many fermented products. (c) Most people inadvertently ingest enough insects, spiders, dust mites, etc. to more than fulfill their requirement. In modern times we also have B12 added to many kinds of foods. When people have B12 deficiencies, it is usually because of digestive problems such as celiac diseases, and in that case, an monthly injection of B12 is usually sufficient to prevent major problems that the deficiency would otherwise cause.
Incorrect. Insects have successfully adapted to a wide variety of both natural and man-made insecticides which, though no longer fatal for them, may still be harmful to us.