Exactly. You can roughly say that there is a very direct relationship between depending on technology and society, and the chance of survival in case of society and the economy collapsing. As another reply to my post pointed out, hunter-gatherers have an even better chance on survival in that case.
2. Knowingly allowing, accepting, and encouraging reproduction of individuals, who...shouldn't (No, I don't mean Bush). There's some bad genes out there. Some that shouldn't be passed on. While we're at a point where we can curtail some of this through prescreening parents for likely inherited traits, we continue to become more accepting of people with, well, bad genes. Aren't we effectively letting people piss into the pool?
Ah yes, we have heard that one before, haven't we?
This might just invoke Godwin's law, but this is the exact type of argument that was used to legitimize the holocaust and forced stilarisation projects in the 1940s.
Sorry but it doesn't work like that.
While you are right that there are genes that are a disadvantage at least in specific situations, those will be weeded out over time due to such individuals being less attractive. There is no need to 'not allow' those to reproduce.
It looks to me like you missed this little part of my post:
and while it depends to some level on peace so the lands don't get burned all the time, it has very little dependencies on either economic or social development.
the only thing that passes on from generation to generation is culture.
And the only culture that we know about that actually has been passed on from generation to generation for a historically relevant amount of time is the bushman culture in southern Africa (uninterupted for approx 25000 years now). All other cultures are either gone or too young to say anything usefull about culture lasting.
Society is not designed to help the weak poor, society is designed to help the strong rich.
You are arguing that we did not manage to evolve our society beyond that of an ant nest or the typical herd it seems.
What sets humans apart from animals socially is our abbility to build a society that supports more then just the strongest individuals.
The quality of a society is measured by its abbility to care for the weak, and not by the success of the strongest.
If you follow your idea, you end up with the exact situation that many African countries face nowadays. A few very rich people, and a large poor majority.
No monetary system survived for a relevant amount of time compared to how long humans have been roaming this planet. Money is usefull, but it is a means to obtain material things, and nothing more.
When the economy collapses, a farmer has a much better chance on survival then the owner of a big company. A farmer can produce his own food.
If you look throughout history, most jobs exist for a limited amount of time and depend heavily on the economic and social development of a society. Farming has been there ever since it was invented, and while it depends to some level on peace so the lands don't get burned all the time, it has very little dependencies on either economic or social development.
Your answer however gives a hint at why at least some people don't realize that evolution is continuing. Many people cannot see that whatever state society has reached today is only temporary, and todays success can easily be tomorrows failure, esp. if that success has very little to do with forfilling the basic needs of survival.
You cannot at a whim deny these powers any more than the government can deny your true right to privacy, such as entering your home and going through your papers without a warrant. The corporation's papers and records do not enjoy the same privacy, furthermore you probably signed away many privacies when you agreed to accept the line of credit with the corporation. They share that information with 3rd parties, such as the credit rating services. Anyone who can look at your credit report can see whether or not your debt is paid off.
That is all nice and well, and I roughly agree with you.
But now think about this:
People can see you have a debt, or payed it off, but can't see how you did that. The fact that people can see if you have a debt serves a real purpose, and is in part supposed to protect you from getting into inresponsible debt (can argue about how well that works of course)
In order to collect taxes, the government has to know about your income. They have no need to know about you moving money from your account into your debt account or anything of that sort, that is effec tively transfering money they already know about.
Implementing laws for the purpose of collecting taxes etc is nice, but is no excuse to monitor EVERY financial transaction, it is only an excuse to monitor those transactions that are actually relevant for this.
The constitution is quite clear that anything not explicitly mentioned in it as a power the feds have, is NOT a power the feds have. Explaining things broader then they are mentioned in the constitution in the 'advantage' of the feds is against the spirit as well as the letter of said constitution. Hence I don't see how the part you quote can be an excuse to monitor every financial transaction.
Where? A business transaction with a corporation is not "on your person", in your "house", part of your "effects" - property, or limited to your "papers" - you've allowed the corporation to have your transaction on their papers.
Letter vs spirit of the law, which one do you believe actually captures the intention of said law better?
Also, I hope that you are not arguing that paying off a debt is reasonable cause.
"The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises."
And how does that apply to a transaction for paying off a debt?
It is interesting imho how you interpret one part overly narrow, and another part overly broad.
In Washington, Secretary of State Colin Powell said the statement would allow a possible collective response once the U.S. has identified who was responsible for the attacks.
That neither confirms nor denies my or your claims. Rather, it points out what would be possible as a consequence of the activation of the article.
Indeed EWACS has been used to protect US airspace, and European airspace was made available.
In that you are definitely right, but European airspace had been available to US forces for a long time (I used to live relatively close to one of the USAF bases in the Netherlands). EWACS operating over NATO territory (and that includes the USA) has been the norm for a long time.
Neither required or were imho even a direct result of the activation of article 5.
For all I can tell, any actual collective action was declined, rather, some individual member states were asked for help under US flag.
There was no foreign nation attacking any of the member states. It was still considered a reason for activating article 5 because it was held to be the right thing to do despite that. There was willingness to help, not so much obligation.
All of NATO was available for the invasion of Afghanistan, but the US was quite capable of handling that by itself, and only really wanted extra help from British super-l337 infantry (because, as they said, 'we don't do mountains'...)
The USA has been quite capable of toppling a foreign government, but as both Afghanistan and Iraq show (and quite a few past examples do as well), the USA hasn't been able to invade and occupy a country of any substance thoroughly for the last 60 years.
Arrogance, refusing well meant and likely usefull help, and then comming back on it..
You don't have to send along a few hundred guys from every member nation just to show the flag, if they're only going to lead to a confused command structure and the need to bring dozens of translators along.
Uh, I believe that NATO has been around for a while, has the command and control structure for this, has solved the language problems for decades, spent decades training together to make sure this all works etc..
The problem seems more that the USA government wanted absolute control over the command structure and did not want NATO inbetween.
After the invasion the occupation was taken over by NATO units: initially British and German for the most part, though since then they've been rotated several times and I really don't know who's out there at present.
1. occupation has never been completed, and there are still territories outside the control of anyone other then Taliban alligned warlords. 2. NATO was only called in when it became clear that the USA army was good at fast, high intensity operations, but sucks at stabilizing a country afterward.
It was the invasion of Iraq that spit the alliance, not Afghanistan.
Afghanistan didn't split the alliance, it did create the conditions for what followed.
Refusing NATO initially, then leaving it to NATO forces to clean up the mess so the USA could move on to its next target was a big part of this (and yes, I am quite aware there are still special forces from the USA active in Afghanistan, they work closely with some of my fellow countrymen (not native English speakers) in mountainous areas)
Regarding NATO, ISTR that the US tried to invoke the alliance to get allied nations to send troops to Turkey, to help protect it from Iraq. But why, we asked, did Turkey think it might get attacked by Iraq? Oh, said the US, because we're about to attack Iraq and the Turks are helping.
Hmm. NATO is for mutual defence; OTOH, if one member of NATO is bloody stupid enough to start a war, are we obliged to step in to protect them from the consequences of their foolishness?
No, and that is definitely not what the NATO charter says. This kind of repeated abuse of the alliance is what causes a lot of distrust among former as well as current allies.
Which results in frustration for the rest of us that want to change things
I bet.
While I am not American myself, I lived in the USA for a while, and I strongly believe in the ideals that the country used to stand for, and that are reflected in its constitution. For me it is already frustrating to see this happen, eventho I'm not directly involved.
All I can really say is 'Don't give up'. Use whatever legal means you have to wake people up, and maybe you do get something done still.
If everyone just runs away, we'll end up with a huge country with a huge military and nuclear arsenal, but without any sane people..
The strange thing is that, I don't think anyone thought entering Afghanistan was a good thing or the thing to do. Heck everyone I know knew they weren't going to find bin Laden and that it was a stupid thing to flatten a country to the ground in trying.
Hmm. interesting. Most people I spoke to about this thought they had at least some chance at catching Bin Laden, and thought that the country was already so bombed out that it wouldn't matter much. Also they thought that the Taliban being supportive of Bin Laden and being a fundamentalist and extremely oppressive administration should be dealt with. But then, we probably don't move in the same circles..
Maybe you are right and most people didn't really like the idea, but I do believe that opposition against the Afghanistan invasion was little, unlike opposition to the Iraq war.
That would explain how the US and British special forces entered Afghanistan 07 October 2001 -- less than a month after the attacks of 11 September 2001. Within months several other NATO countries were also involved in the operation.
If article 5 had been used, you'd have seen a lot more countries participating then the Brits and a few other NATO members. Basicly all member countries have the obligation to come to eachothers defense.
Few people in Europe objected to the Afghanistan invasion, and even without NATO involvement, many felt that the USA deserved support in their efford to find and catch the people responsible for the 9/11 attacks, at least initially.
I seem to remember a past 5 years where the mere suggestion of possibly distrusting the USA government would get me hordes of Americans telling me I am Anti American, supporting 'the enemy', and that their government was definitely doing the right thing and such..
It was a bit extreme in the last 5 years, but its not exactly new.
Sadly enough, too many Americans don't care enough or are too ignorant to distrust their government and think critically about what it is doing.
Ever wondered why this idea of checks and balances exists?
I'm sorry, but you should always have a slight level of distrust with regards to your government. The day you give that up is the day you allow for tyrany.
Ah, Axis forces changed their codes many times during the war. While you are right about the allies being very carefull to keep their code breaking ability secret, it wasn't that hard to find out or suspect, and changing keys at regular intervals was already known to be a mandatory part of a working encryption sceme back then, so regardless of if they knew, the germans changed their codes at times anyway.
Of course much of the code breaking effords were helped by improper key management, small mistakes, and an inherent weakness of the Enigma encryption system, so the key changes didn't help that much
The action that has had the biggest effect on shutting down Al Qaeda operations around the world was not the invasion of Iraq, nor that of Afghanistan. It was to follow the money trail and cut off their operatives as much as possible.
They shut down Al Queda operations around the world? I must have missed some big news there...
I won't comment on most of your post, but 3 things stand out that can't be left without answer.
How about the United State's ties to Europe? 911 sure helped damage those (or at least finally brought the problems to the surface)
After the september 11 attacks, NATO 'woke up' and activated the 'an attack against one is an attack against us all' article (article 5 if I'm not mistaken).
The USA government said 'no thanks'.
Years later, they had to come back to NATO because of not being able to handle Afghanistan alone.
Few people in Europe took issue with the Afghanistan invasion, many believed there was enough proof and enough reason to go there.
What did cause the trouble between the USA and Europe is: 1. The refusal of the US government to involve NATO, and then comming back on that when they couldn't handle things (and still trying to hide the fact that they can't handle things) 2. The Iraq invasion.
9/11 only has to do with this indirectly due to reason 1. The US government handling of those attacks and the Iraq invasion are the real problem there.
How about all the looney conspiracy theories? Can't say I've ever seen such a division amongst the American people since the civil war.
Try having a discussion about abortion, and you will see the same approx 50 50 split and the same fanatism... No, it is not new, has nothing to do with 9/11, and everything with a long standing 2 party system that does not allow for any 'middle ground' or nuance.
And how about civil liberties? For christ sakes, we have to actually consider a torture policy now.
No you don't. The only way to consider a torture policy is disbanding one. Any other 'considering' is a clear sign of tyrany.
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Exactly. You can roughly say that there is a very direct relationship between depending on technology and society, and the chance of survival in case of society and the economy collapsing. As another reply to my post pointed out, hunter-gatherers have an even better chance on survival in that case.
2. Knowingly allowing, accepting, and encouraging reproduction of individuals, who...shouldn't (No, I don't mean Bush). There's some bad genes out there. Some that shouldn't be passed on. While we're at a point where we can curtail some of this through prescreening parents for likely inherited traits, we continue to become more accepting of people with, well, bad genes. Aren't we effectively letting people piss into the pool?
Ah yes, we have heard that one before, haven't we?
This might just invoke Godwin's law, but this is the exact type of argument that was used to legitimize the holocaust and forced stilarisation projects in the 1940s.
Sorry but it doesn't work like that.
While you are right that there are genes that are a disadvantage at least in specific situations, those will be weeded out over time due to such individuals being less attractive. There is no need to 'not allow' those to reproduce.
It looks to me like you missed this little part of my post:
and while it depends to some level on peace so the lands don't get burned all the time, it has very little dependencies on either economic or social development.
the only thing that passes on from generation to generation is culture.
And the only culture that we know about that actually has been passed on from generation to generation for a historically relevant amount of time is the bushman culture in southern Africa (uninterupted for approx 25000 years now). All other cultures are either gone or too young to say anything usefull about culture lasting.
Society is not designed to help the weak poor, society is designed to help the strong rich.
You are arguing that we did not manage to evolve our society beyond that of an ant nest or the typical herd it seems.
What sets humans apart from animals socially is our abbility to build a society that supports more then just the strongest individuals.
The quality of a society is measured by its abbility to care for the weak, and not by the success of the strongest.
If you follow your idea, you end up with the exact situation that many African countries face nowadays. A few very rich people, and a large poor majority.
I see you have found your god..
No monetary system survived for a relevant amount of time compared to how long humans have been roaming this planet. Money is usefull, but it is a means to obtain material things, and nothing more.
When the economy collapses, a farmer has a much better chance on survival then the owner of a big company. A farmer can produce his own food.
If you look throughout history, most jobs exist for a limited amount of time and depend heavily on the economic and social development of a society. Farming has been there ever since it was invented, and while it depends to some level on peace so the lands don't get burned all the time, it has very little dependencies on either economic or social development.
Your answer however gives a hint at why at least some people don't realize that evolution is continuing. Many people cannot see that whatever state society has reached today is only temporary, and todays success can easily be tomorrows failure, esp. if that success has very little to do with forfilling the basic needs of survival.
You cannot at a whim deny these powers any more than the government can deny your true right to privacy, such as entering your home and going through your papers without a warrant. The corporation's papers and records do not enjoy the same privacy, furthermore you probably signed away many privacies when you agreed to accept the line of credit with the corporation. They share that information with 3rd parties, such as the credit rating services. Anyone who can look at your credit report can see whether or not your debt is paid off.
That is all nice and well, and I roughly agree with you.
But now think about this:
People can see you have a debt, or payed it off, but can't see how you did that. The fact that people can see if you have a debt serves a real purpose, and is in part supposed to protect you from getting into inresponsible debt (can argue about how well that works of course)
In order to collect taxes, the government has to know about your income. They have no need to know about you moving money from your account into your debt account or anything of that sort, that is effec tively transfering money they already know about.
Implementing laws for the purpose of collecting taxes etc is nice, but is no excuse to monitor EVERY financial transaction, it is only an excuse to monitor those transactions that are actually relevant for this.
The constitution is quite clear that anything not explicitly mentioned in it as a power the feds have, is NOT a power the feds have. Explaining things broader then they are mentioned in the constitution in the 'advantage' of the feds is against the spirit as well as the letter of said constitution. Hence I don't see how the part you quote can be an excuse to monitor every financial transaction.
Where? A business transaction with a corporation is not "on your person", in your "house", part of your "effects" - property, or limited to your "papers" - you've allowed the corporation to have your transaction on their papers.
Letter vs spirit of the law, which one do you believe actually captures the intention of said law better?
Also, I hope that you are not arguing that paying off a debt is reasonable cause.
"The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises."
And how does that apply to a transaction for paying off a debt?
It is interesting imho how you interpret one part overly narrow, and another part overly broad.
Isn't the idea behind checks and balances to create a system where the power can't be abused by any one branch/group/individual?
Supposedly one of the branches involved in this contains a representation of 'the people', imho formalizing this 'distrust'.
Wouldn't that give people some slight comfort in the way their Government is organized? I'm not sure I'd use it as a reason for distrust.
You are right of course that such a system gives less reason for distrust.
But, if you don't check what those who represent you are doing, how do you know they are actually representing you?
I think you specifically mean this quote:
In Washington, Secretary of State Colin Powell said the statement would allow a possible collective response once the U.S. has identified who was responsible for the attacks.
That neither confirms nor denies my or your claims. Rather, it points out what would be possible as a consequence of the activation of the article.
Indeed EWACS has been used to protect US airspace, and European airspace was made available.
In that you are definitely right, but European airspace had been available to US forces for a long time (I used to live relatively close to one of the USAF bases in the Netherlands). EWACS operating over NATO territory (and that includes the USA) has been the norm for a long time.
Neither required or were imho even a direct result of the activation of article 5.
For all I can tell, any actual collective action was declined, rather, some individual member states were asked for help under US flag.
Well, they have to offer.
In this specific case, strictly spoken, no.
There was no foreign nation attacking any of the member states. It was still considered a reason for activating article 5 because it was held to be the right thing to do despite that. There was willingness to help, not so much obligation.
All of NATO was available for the invasion of Afghanistan, but the US was quite capable of handling that by itself, and only really wanted extra help from British super-l337 infantry (because, as they said, 'we don't do mountains'...)
The USA has been quite capable of toppling a foreign government, but as both Afghanistan and Iraq show (and quite a few past examples do as well), the USA hasn't been able to invade and occupy a country of any substance thoroughly for the last 60 years.
Arrogance, refusing well meant and likely usefull help, and then comming back on it..
You don't have to send along a few hundred guys from every member nation just to show the flag, if they're only going to lead to a confused command structure and the need to bring dozens of translators along.
Uh, I believe that NATO has been around for a while, has the command and control structure for this, has solved the language problems for decades, spent decades training together to make sure this all works etc..
The problem seems more that the USA government wanted absolute control over the command structure and did not want NATO inbetween.
After the invasion the occupation was taken over by NATO units: initially British and German for the most part, though since then they've been rotated several times and I really don't know who's out there at present.
1. occupation has never been completed, and there are still territories outside the control of anyone other then Taliban alligned warlords.
2. NATO was only called in when it became clear that the USA army was good at fast, high intensity operations, but sucks at stabilizing a country afterward.
It was the invasion of Iraq that spit the alliance, not Afghanistan.
Afghanistan didn't split the alliance, it did create the conditions for what followed.
Refusing NATO initially, then leaving it to NATO forces to clean up the mess so the USA could move on to its next target was a big part of this (and yes, I am quite aware there are still special forces from the USA active in Afghanistan, they work closely with some of my fellow countrymen (not native English speakers) in mountainous areas)
Regarding NATO, ISTR that the US tried to invoke the alliance to get allied nations to send troops to Turkey, to help protect it from Iraq. But why, we asked, did Turkey think it might get attacked by Iraq? Oh, said the US, because we're about to attack Iraq and the Turks are helping.
Hmm. NATO is for mutual defence; OTOH, if one member of NATO is bloody stupid enough to start a war, are we obliged to step in to protect them from the consequences of their foolishness?
No, and that is definitely not what the NATO charter says. This kind of repeated abuse of the alliance is what causes a lot of distrust among former as well as current allies.
Which results in frustration for the rest of us that want to change things
I bet.
While I am not American myself, I lived in the USA for a while, and I strongly believe in the ideals that the country used to stand for, and that are reflected in its constitution. For me it is already frustrating to see this happen, eventho I'm not directly involved.
All I can really say is 'Don't give up'. Use whatever legal means you have to wake people up, and maybe you do get something done still.
If everyone just runs away, we'll end up with a huge country with a huge military and nuclear arsenal, but without any sane people..
The strange thing is that, I don't think anyone thought entering Afghanistan was a good thing or the thing to do. Heck everyone I know knew they weren't going to find bin Laden and that it was a stupid thing to flatten a country to the ground in trying.
Hmm. interesting. Most people I spoke to about this thought they had at least some chance at catching Bin Laden, and thought that the country was already so bombed out that it wouldn't matter much. Also they thought that the Taliban being supportive of Bin Laden and being a fundamentalist and extremely oppressive administration should be dealt with. But then, we probably don't move in the same circles..
Maybe you are right and most people didn't really like the idea, but I do believe that opposition against the Afghanistan invasion was little, unlike opposition to the Iraq war.
You are thinking about Iraq, I was talking about Afghanistan.
Entirely different story.
Oh, and for the record, I live in Europe as well (Netherlands)
Hello moderators, it rather looks like the reply to my post is correct and this is indeed 2 seperate CPUs, and not a dual core CPU.
That would explain how the US and British special forces entered Afghanistan 07 October 2001 -- less than a month after the attacks of 11 September 2001. Within months several other NATO countries were also involved in the operation.
If article 5 had been used, you'd have seen a lot more countries participating then the Brits and a few other NATO members. Basicly all member countries have the obligation to come to eachothers defense.
Few people in Europe objected to the Afghanistan invasion, and even without NATO involvement, many felt that the USA deserved support in their efford to find and catch the people responsible for the 9/11 attacks, at least initially.
Uh, what cave have you been living in?
I seem to remember a past 5 years where the mere suggestion of possibly distrusting the USA government would get me hordes of Americans telling me I am Anti American, supporting 'the enemy', and that their government was definitely doing the right thing and such..
It was a bit extreme in the last 5 years, but its not exactly new.
Sadly enough, too many Americans don't care enough or are too ignorant to distrust their government and think critically about what it is doing.
I have a SUN SS20 with what looks like 2 hypersparc CPUs in a single module... Seems to me they were even earlier then you are saying.
You shouldn't have to. Thus our current problem.
Ever wondered why this idea of checks and balances exists?
I'm sorry, but you should always have a slight level of distrust with regards to your government. The day you give that up is the day you allow for tyrany.
Ah, Axis forces changed their codes many times during the war. While you are right about the allies being very carefull to keep their code breaking ability secret, it wasn't that hard to find out or suspect, and changing keys at regular intervals was already known to be a mandatory part of a working encryption sceme back then, so regardless of if they knew, the germans changed their codes at times anyway.
Of course much of the code breaking effords were helped by improper key management, small mistakes, and an inherent weakness of the Enigma encryption system, so the key changes didn't help that much
The action that has had the biggest effect on shutting down Al Qaeda operations around the world was not the invasion of Iraq, nor that of Afghanistan. It was to follow the money trail and cut off their operatives as much as possible.
They shut down Al Queda operations around the world? I must have missed some big news there...
"Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" perhaps? Having a delay in my payment being posted to my account just doesn't seem to qualify.
Government poking into your private afairs conflicts with liberty, and is actually quite explicitly mentioned in things like the US constitution.
The delay in the payment is not the problem, the cause of that delay is.
I won't comment on most of your post, but 3 things stand out that can't be left without answer.
How about the United State's ties to Europe? 911 sure helped damage those (or at least finally brought the problems to the surface)
After the september 11 attacks, NATO 'woke up' and activated the 'an attack against one is an attack against us all' article (article 5 if I'm not mistaken).
The USA government said 'no thanks'.
Years later, they had to come back to NATO because of not being able to handle Afghanistan alone.
Few people in Europe took issue with the Afghanistan invasion, many believed there was enough proof and enough reason to go there.
What did cause the trouble between the USA and Europe is:
1. The refusal of the US government to involve NATO, and then comming back on that when they couldn't handle things (and still trying to hide the fact that they can't handle things)
2. The Iraq invasion.
9/11 only has to do with this indirectly due to reason 1.
The US government handling of those attacks and the Iraq invasion are the real problem there.
How about all the looney conspiracy theories? Can't say I've ever seen such a division amongst the American people since the civil war.
Try having a discussion about abortion, and you will see the same approx 50 50 split and the same fanatism... No, it is not new, has nothing to do with 9/11, and everything with a long standing 2 party system that does not allow for any 'middle ground' or nuance.
And how about civil liberties? For christ sakes, we have to actually consider a torture policy now.
No you don't. The only way to consider a torture policy is disbanding one. Any other 'considering' is a clear sign of tyrany.
Laws can't be created ex post facto in the US.
1972 copyright extention act?
Obviously, you can at least change laws retroactively with enough money.