I see this assertion time after time -- that we must feed 8, 10, 15 billions of people -- without asking the question, "Does the planet need that many people?"
There are many problems with your reasoning. First, fertility rates are plummeting. Much of the world (including the USA) is already below replacement rate, leading to problems such as population aging and cultural weakening. Some countries still have large fertility rates, but even there it is falling fast. As a result, world population is projected by the UN to peak at 9B or maybe 10B, then start falling.
Second, much of the world is obese, and 1/3 of the food is not even eaten - it is thrown away at any of the several stages of production. Food production per capita is growing. Starvation is not caused by lack of food, it is caused by civil wars, terrorism, or corrupt, authoritarian and incompetent governments.
Third, inflation-adjusted price of many commodities have been stable for a century.
Fourth, there is no clear correlation between population density and income per capita.
Fifth: while we compete for primary resources (but see the third point above), when the population grows we share the benefits of more scientists, engineers, musicians, writers, philosophers, etc.
If you want to be a Christian today, you have to believe that Jesus is God or you're a heretic, period the end full stop fuck off.
What? No, you can believe that Jesus is not God, or that Jesus was purple with yellow dots, to your hearts content. No one will stop you.
Of course, the only place that Jesus claims a godhead is in the works of Saul
Read the Gospel of John.
And those books were written well after the others. So in fact, Jesus wasn't even God in early Christianity.
Non-sequitur; even if the works of Saul were indeed the only written source of the doctrine of Trinity, that doesn't mean early Christians did not believe in it, unless you hold the self-contradictory doctrine of radical Sola Scriptura.
Might I add, it's good to have a conversation on slashdot with a total stranger with your manners. Most here simply throw bricks at others.
I'm glad you you liked the converstation. However, I occasionally fall into obsessive internet arguments like this: http://xkcd.com/386/ Gradually, I am improving, but occasionally I have a relapse.
I think we simply have a different definition of "work". Work, in my mind, isn't a noun, it's a verb. You are correct in what you said about union laws and that. However, I don't understand: "So striking is 'having the cake and eating it too'." If job=cake, then eating=?
I used that proverb in a very general sense. Maybe too general. What I meant is that by striking, you withhold your productive power, but because of labor laws, the company is forbidden from replacing you. So you get to refuse a job condition you didn't like, but without having to find another job. The end result is that you get a raise for little effort.
I am not saying that unions are evil; I am just saying that they are not angels, and there needs to be some moderation when designing labor laws otherwise you ruin the industry.
Also, if you mod a comment here, then commenting in that thread yourself, removes the mod.
This is what I meant. I accidentally modded you flamebait, then removed that mod by commenting in the article.
They do work, they get paid for part of the value of their work (if they got paid the full value of their work, it wouldn't be profitable for their employer to hire them)
You assume that value is 100% objective, the same for everyone. That is of course wrong. If I buy soft drink for a dollar, I do it because I value soft drink more than a dollar; the soft drink company does it because it values a dollar more than the soft drink.
Voluntary transactions are not a zero-sum game. Suppose I have two hammers and no nails; you have 100 nails and no hammer. Both of us need to hammer 50 nails. If you give me 50 nails and I give you one hammer, both sides profit.
Seriously, if you don't want the work don't take it. Nobody forces you to work at Amazon
And, what the hell do you think a strike is, anyway?
You can argue that strikes are good, but that argument didn't cut it. The grand-parent was arguing that if you don't like the work, you should find another one. You argue that this is what a strike is; wrong. The company is prohibited by law from firing strikers. So striking is "having the cake and eating it too".
(also, I modded you "flamebait" by accident, and I am undoing it now)
The problem is that they define "propaganda" as broadly as possible, to the point where even talking about homosexuality in a non-negative light is criminalized. Gatherings of gay groups is also criminalized (and not just parades, this includes political groups), whether a minor is present or not. In fact the law is worded in such a way that it doesn't really matter if a minor is present
Do you have reliable, impartial, non-activist sources on your claims?
Correct, because I do not have the details, and am too busy to spend time studying a Russian law which I have no way to change.
you're upset people are coming out against it?
Wrong. I am upset that people are using outrageous logical fallacies for political reasons. Politics is already dominated by logical fallacies, it is a huge problem. We don't need more of it.
And saying "At least they aren't shooting people!" isn't the greatest defense.
Except that I didn't say that. Read my post and read its parent. I was exemplifying what hyperbole is and what it isn't.
Yeah, it's as hyperbolic as pointing out that Castro imprisoned people for saying stuff he didn't like.
Fidel Castro was not content with imprisioning, he shot them. And saying that is not hyperbole, because it actually describes objectively what Fidel Castro did, without exageration.
Sorry, but the excuse that it's "not because they're gay but because they're speading gay propaganda" line is simply bullshit.
The law (which I do not necessarily support) forbids people from spreading a specific kind of propaganda to minors. You are implying that people get arrested for being attracted to the same sex (that is, beging gay). That is undeniably hyperbole.
If you can't understand words based on their definition, lets try an analogy. The government of Elbonia forbids spreading alcochol propaganda to minors. Then someone says "Oh my God, that is fascism, they are imprisioning people who like beer!".
You are free to choose: that's what the ballot box is for. Capitalistic "freedom of choice" is weighted by the size of your wallet.
I am not a libertarian (nor do I oppose reasonable environmental regulations) but I take offsense at your suggestion that I should always obey what the majority decides at the ballot box.
Majority decision is reasoanble in many situations, but in other situations it leads to the majority trampling over the rights of dissenting individuals. At the very very least, we need checks and balances - multiple levels of government (local, state, federal), multiple branches at each level, and all limited by a good Constitution. Like the USA was supposed to be.
Remember that it wasn't so long ago that everyone "knew" the world was flat and you were a whackjob if you believed any differently
Ancient Greeks had already calculated the Earth's radius. In medieval Europe, educated people knew the Earth was round. Columbus did *not* face resistance because people thought the Earth was flat. He faced resistance because people correctly pointed that the Earth was about 40000km in circunference and that his ships could not reach Asia by traveling West. Columbus based his expedition on faulty calculations.
Chavism: 1) Turned the Supreme Court into its puppet. 2) Directly controls a large part of the media, and harasses much of the rest into submission. 3) Threatens, promotes hatred against, harasses and sometimes arrests, political dissidents.
Venezuela still has elections, yes. So did the Soviet Union. Elections are not enough to guarantee freedom; the elections need to be free and fair, and there needs to be freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, and generally the majority must respect the rights and liberties of the minorities and individuals. Also, the current government must never entrench itself. These guarantees were violated by the Soviet Union and are violated by Venezuela.
By the way, Chavez attempted a coup d'état himself, and constantly licked the boots of Fidel Castro and other dictators who were his heroes. A chavist complaining of "golpismo" is like the Ku Klux Klan complaining of racism. It is beyond incoherent.
When has the U.S. sold large amounts of weapons to Cuba, Vietnam, or China?
Absolutely correct, however a dirty bomb isn't really a weapon of mass destruction, it's a weapon of terror.
Unfortunately it would be a very effective weapon. The more the government tried to explain that the radiation was relatively mild, the more people would say "the government is lying to us to avoid a panic, and to cover up their incompetence" and panic. Many people would flee, but they would be labeled as "radioactive" and would be violently expelled from wherever they tried to settle in. And general lawlessness. It would be ugly.
I don't necessarily advocate the capital punishment. And I support human rights for criminals. But 1) Mexico has a HDI of 0.775, almost tied with Portugal at 0.816. 2) These guys were not stealing food. They performed an armed robbery. Don't portray them as victims.
The only reason Mandela sought the support of the Soviet Union was because the West had already turned him down.
I heard the same thing with respect to Fidel Castro. "He wasn't a communist, he turned to the Soviet Union because he had no alternative". He then installed a one-party oppressive dictatorship and continues oppressing his people long after the end of the Cold War. I have not formed an opinion on Mandela, but that kind of argument is suspicious.
I hope that, for consistency, you are a staunch critic of Venezuela, Cuba, Vietnam and China.
The USA has its flaws, but many (maybe the majority) of its critics turn a blind eye to socialist atrocities, and often actively support it. I ask for consistency.
By the way: if there was a worldwide poll asking "if you could immigrate legally to any country, where would you go?". The USA would be in the top, likely #1. If you complain of economic disparity, then restrict your poll to poor people. The USA would still be at the top, because it has far more opportunity to poor people than most of the world.
Then do another poll: "in which country would you prefer to be treated as a political dissident?" The USA would be among the top.
Criticism of the USA must acknowledge its upsides. And make sure to criticize uniformly.
I'm confused because you brought up discriminatory laws around abortion protest when it has nothing to do with the article or my response except being barely linked to my comment about protesting in general.
I may have failed at reading comprehension. Your original post said:
A DDoS should be punished with community service; its no different from protesting a store you dislike and making it hard for customers to get in.
I interpreted it as meaning that blocking entrance to a store is an acceptable way to protest. I strongly disagree with that and it opened a can of worms in my head. I then mentioned abortion and animal rights as examples of double standard. I just wanted people to be as gentle in their own protests as they demand from protesters they disagree with.
But reading your post again, it does not say that coercion is acceptable expression. Community service is not necessarily trivial.
Yes, lets bring up abortion because its incredibly controversial
Being controversial does not justify restricting peaceful protests. Would you accept this justification for restricting protests for a cause you agree with?
and one of the only situations that has its own laws for protest.
I am precisely complaining of double-standard. These discriminatory laws should not be in place.
On Slashdot, one can get modded "troll" for pointing out that people shouldn't be considered guilty without at least _some_ evidence. "I bet" does not count as evidence.
A DDoS should be punished with community service; its no different from protesting a store you dislike and making it hard for customers to get in.
Double-standard: if it is done against abortion, then it is fundamentalist bigotry and we need stricter bubble zones, even if it is peaceful and non-coercive. If it is done in support to a trendy, politically correct cause such as animal rights then it is freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, even if it is coercive.
Just because the government does some things in secrecy, it does not mean I should start believing bizarre fantasies with no evidence or reason.
Also, there are conspiracy theories to fit every worldview. There are conspiracy theories for leftists (for example, "Bush demolished the WTC"), for right-wingers (for example, "global warming is a leftist hoax"), for Christians, for Muslims, for atheists. There is a huge pool of conspiracy theories, each one contradicting the others, and each conspiracy-minded individual simply picks the ones that reinforce his own biases, while ignoring the others. [posting again to fix errors]
Slashdot Mirror
There are many problems with your reasoning.
First, fertility rates are plummeting. Much of the world (including the USA) is already below replacement rate, leading to problems such as population aging and cultural weakening. Some countries still have large fertility rates, but even there it is falling fast. As a result, world population is projected by the UN to peak at 9B or maybe 10B, then start falling.
Second, much of the world is obese, and 1/3 of the food is not even eaten - it is thrown away at any of the several stages of production. Food production per capita is growing. Starvation is not caused by lack of food, it is caused by civil wars, terrorism, or corrupt, authoritarian and incompetent governments.
Third, inflation-adjusted price of many commodities have been stable for a century.
Fourth, there is no clear correlation between population density and income per capita.
Fifth: while we compete for primary resources (but see the third point above), when the population grows we share the benefits of more scientists, engineers, musicians, writers, philosophers, etc.
See
http://overpopulationisamyth.com/
You got the date totally wrong.
What? No, you can believe that Jesus is not God, or that Jesus was purple with yellow dots, to your hearts content. No one will stop you.
Read the Gospel of John.
Non-sequitur; even if the works of Saul were indeed the only written source of the doctrine of Trinity, that doesn't mean early Christians did not believe in it, unless you hold the self-contradictory doctrine of radical Sola Scriptura.
The buggy Slashdot mod system made me mod "overrated" by accident.
This post will undo it.
I'm glad you you liked the converstation. However, I occasionally fall into obsessive internet arguments like this:
http://xkcd.com/386/
Gradually, I am improving, but occasionally I have a relapse.
I used that proverb in a very general sense. Maybe too general. What I meant is that by striking, you withhold your productive power, but because of labor laws, the company is forbidden from replacing you. So you get to refuse a job condition you didn't like, but without having to find another job. The end result is that you get a raise for little effort.
I am not saying that unions are evil; I am just saying that they are not angels, and there needs to be some moderation when designing labor laws otherwise you ruin the industry.
This is what I meant. I accidentally modded you flamebait, then removed that mod by commenting in the article.
You assume that value is 100% objective, the same for everyone. That is of course wrong. If I buy soft drink for a dollar, I do it because I value soft drink more than a dollar; the soft drink company does it because it values a dollar more than the soft drink.
Voluntary transactions are not a zero-sum game. Suppose I have two hammers and no nails; you have 100 nails and no hammer. Both of us need to hammer 50 nails. If you give me 50 nails and I give you one hammer, both sides profit.
Seriously, if you don't want the work don't take it. Nobody forces you to work at Amazon
And, what the hell do you think a strike is, anyway?
You can argue that strikes are good, but that argument didn't cut it.
The grand-parent was arguing that if you don't like the work, you should find another one.
You argue that this is what a strike is; wrong. The company is prohibited by law from firing strikers. So striking is "having the cake and eating it too".
(also, I modded you "flamebait" by accident, and I am undoing it now)
Do you have reliable, impartial, non-activist sources on your claims?
Correct, because I do not have the details, and am too busy to spend time
studying a Russian law which I have no way to change.
Wrong. I am upset that people are using outrageous logical fallacies for
political reasons. Politics is already dominated by logical fallacies, it is
a huge problem. We don't need more of it.
Except that I didn't say that. Read my post and read its parent. I was
exemplifying what hyperbole is and what it isn't.
Fidel Castro was not content with imprisioning, he shot them. And saying that is not hyperbole, because it actually describes objectively what Fidel Castro did, without exageration.
The law (which I do not necessarily support) forbids people from spreading a specific kind of propaganda to minors. You are implying that people get arrested for being attracted to the same sex (that is, beging gay). That is undeniably hyperbole.
If you can't understand words based on their definition, lets try an analogy.
The government of Elbonia forbids spreading alcochol propaganda to minors. Then someone says "Oh my God, that is fascism, they are imprisioning people who like beer!".
Would not that be hyperbole?
Hyperbole much?
I am not a libertarian (nor do I oppose reasonable environmental regulations) but I take offsense at your suggestion that I should always obey what the majority decides at the ballot box.
Majority decision is reasoanble in many situations, but in other situations it leads to the majority trampling over the rights of dissenting individuals. At the very very least, we need checks and balances - multiple levels of government (local, state, federal), multiple branches at each level, and all limited by a good Constitution. Like the USA was supposed to be.
Ancient Greeks had already calculated the Earth's radius. In medieval Europe, educated people knew the Earth was round.
Columbus did *not* face resistance because people thought the Earth was flat. He faced resistance because people correctly pointed that the Earth was about 40000km in circunference and that his ships could not reach Asia by traveling West. Columbus based his expedition on faulty calculations.
Columbus was lucky that America was in the way.
See http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/03/05/venezuela-chavez-s-authoritarian-legacy
Chavism:
1) Turned the Supreme Court into its puppet.
2) Directly controls a large part of the media, and harasses much of the rest into submission.
3) Threatens, promotes hatred against, harasses and sometimes arrests, political dissidents.
Venezuela still has elections, yes. So did the Soviet Union. Elections are not enough to guarantee freedom; the elections need to be free and fair, and there needs to be freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, and generally the majority must respect the rights and liberties of the minorities and individuals. Also, the current government must never entrench itself. These guarantees were violated by the Soviet Union and are violated by Venezuela.
By the way, Chavez attempted a coup d'état himself, and constantly licked the boots of Fidel Castro and other dictators who were his heroes. A chavist complaining of "golpismo" is like the Ku Klux Klan complaining of racism. It is beyond incoherent.
I don't get your point.
Unfortunately it would be a very effective weapon. The more the government tried to explain that the radiation was relatively mild, the more people would say "the government is lying to us to avoid a panic, and to cover up their incompetence" and panic. Many people would flee, but they would be labeled as "radioactive" and would be violently expelled from wherever they tried to settle in. And general lawlessness. It would be ugly.
I don't necessarily advocate the capital punishment. And I support human rights for criminals.
But
1) Mexico has a HDI of 0.775, almost tied with Portugal at 0.816.
2) These guys were not stealing food. They performed an armed robbery. Don't portray them as victims.
I heard the same thing with respect to Fidel Castro. "He wasn't a communist, he turned to the Soviet Union because he had no alternative".
He then installed a one-party oppressive dictatorship and continues oppressing his people long after the end of the Cold War.
I have not formed an opinion on Mandela, but that kind of argument is suspicious.
I hope that, for consistency, you are a staunch critic of Venezuela, Cuba, Vietnam and China.
The USA has its flaws, but many (maybe the majority) of its critics turn a blind eye to socialist atrocities, and often actively support it. I ask for consistency.
By the way: if there was a worldwide poll asking "if you could immigrate legally to any country, where would you go?". The USA would be in the top, likely #1. If you complain of economic disparity, then restrict your poll to poor people. The USA would still be at the top, because it has far more opportunity to poor people than most of the world.
Then do another poll: "in which country would you prefer to be treated as a political dissident?" The USA would be among the top.
Criticism of the USA must acknowledge its upsides. And make sure to criticize uniformly.
I may have failed at reading comprehension.
Your original post said:
I interpreted it as meaning that blocking entrance to a store is an acceptable way to protest. I strongly disagree with that and it opened a can of worms in my head. I then mentioned abortion and animal rights as examples of double standard. I just wanted people to be as gentle in their own protests as they demand from protesters they disagree with.
But reading your post again, it does not say that coercion is acceptable expression. Community service is not necessarily trivial.
Being controversial does not justify restricting peaceful protests. Would you accept this justification for restricting protests for a cause you agree with?
I am precisely complaining of double-standard. These discriminatory laws should not be in place.
Would you support direct action against abortion clinics? Or it is only "freedom of assembly" if it is politically correct and trendy?
On Slashdot, one can get modded "troll" for pointing out that people shouldn't be considered guilty without at least _some_ evidence. "I bet" does not count as evidence.
Double-standard: if it is done against abortion, then it is fundamentalist bigotry and we need stricter bubble zones, even if it is peaceful and non-coercive. If it is done in support to a trendy, politically correct cause such as animal rights then it is freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, even if it is coercive.
You say that based on what evidence?
I thank Slashdot for not click-whoring that badly (at least this time).
Just because the government does some things in secrecy, it does not mean I should start believing bizarre fantasies with no evidence or reason.
Also, there are conspiracy theories to fit every worldview. There are conspiracy theories for leftists (for example, "Bush demolished the WTC"), for right-wingers (for example, "global warming is a leftist hoax"), for Christians, for Muslims, for atheists. There is a huge pool of conspiracy theories, each one contradicting the others, and each conspiracy-minded individual simply picks the ones that reinforce his own biases, while ignoring the others.
[posting again to fix errors]