A case could be made that by outlawing the piracy of child porn/kiddie porn, the producers now can profit from selling it.
Websites in countries where child porn is legal, now they can make money because people will have to start buying their products again when perhaps before because of the internet, these groups were going out of business.
How do we know it's not these producers who are backing initiatives like this bill in the first place? The bill does not target them and it somehow indirectly helps them increase their profits.
I don't think it's about justification. In fact I think this will boost the kiddie porn market because it creates economic incentive to produce kiddie porn if you know it wont be traded over the internet.
This would allow the producers to create tapes or DVDs and sell them for $1000 each, or even sell it online though websites and not have to worry about anyone downloading/sealing their images.
I think the law is stupid for the reason that it would protect people who profit from kiddie porn sites in foreign countries where child porn is legal. It's not doing anything to stop the production of it, in fact now these sites will make so much more money because people wont be downloading it and giving it away for free.
And outlawing virtual child porn FORCES people to go to these sites to get their fix.
By preventing people from trading virtual kiddie porn for free, you increase the demand for REAL kiddie porn. If virtual kiddie porn is just as illegal as real kiddie porn, and someone is willing to sell real kiddie porn, now we have to worry about money being exchanged for the production of REAL kiddie porn because we want to outlaw the virtual kiddie porn.
Thats the problem, it's increasing the demand for the real thing when you remove the virtual and fake porn. Because people are addicted to these thought patterns, they are like crack addicts, if they can get it for free they wont ever pay for it and no one will ever get rich selling kiddie porn, but if we crackdown on all the free VIRTUAL kiddie porn, well the only thing left for them to do is go to a REAL kiddie porn dealer and pay for the production of actual kiddie porn.
And it's not like there any treatment for these people. At least drug addicts have some kinda treatment programs. So what is the point? To just fill up the prisons? What does it solve?
Paedophiles aren't inherently driven to commit crimes, because most of us have restraint. I like the idea of having sex with young boys, but I don't go out and do that for the same reasons that you don't rape women. I can believe that, but you should still seek therapy.If you like the idea of having sex with young boys, it's not an idea that is healthy for you. It's like liking the idea of killing people, or raping women.
As far as child pornography is concerned.. a few months ago, I was staying in a country where accessing child pornography is not a criminal offence. At the time, it was not illegal to act contrary to my home jurisdiction's laws abroad (unless the act also constituted an offence in the foreign jurisdiction). While I was in the foreign jurisdiction, I bought a hard drive to use only in said foreign jurisdiction. I was legally able to browse without restriction (although the cache etc had to be disabled due to the strange laws of the foreign jurisdiction). Although there was virtually no "pornographic child pornography" to be found on the internet, it was possible to find a lot of posed images which would be illegal if I'd viewed them in my home jurisdiction. My problem is not with your accessing, viewing, or thinking about these thoughts. My problem is with the people who encourage you to think about these thoughts, THEY are the problem. You should probably seek help/therapy so as to free yourself of addiction to these thoughs, and maybe then you can assist us in tracking and arresting the producers.
The problem with applying the "supply and demand" theory to people who possess but don't purchase child pornography is that they are not contributing to demand, because the supplier is not interested in producing images for people who are effectively "stealing" them by viewing them for free, for the same reasons that artists don't record music for people downloading it from file sharing networks. Supply and demand is an economic theory - a buyer-seller relationship - which applies to commercial sale, not products being used for free. Producers of any material do not want their material to be used freely, so an increased interest in freely available pornography is going to harm them. People will be less likely to purchase child pornography if viewing freely available child pornography is legalised, as viewing freely available child pornography will become the safe and legal option. Production of child pornography will therefore fall because of a lack of demand, meaning that less children will be abused by child pornographers. This is the main argument I agree with. I think that by restricting the viewing of it, it increases the demand for it, creating a market. Just like prohibition did for alcohol.
In this case it's going to create a black market and make the problem even worse because a black market cannot be regulated at all, and it cannot be taxed. This means the mafias could get involved.
A witch hunt is generally defined, in it's normal emotive context, by the prosecution and identification of witches with a complete and utter lack of regard for any standards of evidence, justice, fairness or internal consistency.
It reminds me of the old monty python skit.
(I paraphrase from memory)
She's a witch! how do you know? Because she burns! What else do we burn? Wood! So she is made of wood! Yes, and wood floats! aha! what else floats? ducks! Yes! Therefore witches are lighter than ducks! (puts the witch on a broken scale which shows she is lighter than a duck) Burn her!!!
What is child porn exactly?
Most attorneys will tell you that in most US states, that question is nonsensical when you approach the "border line".
It used to be defined (the first child porn laws came about in 1976, before which it was entirely legal in every way).... that child porn was a child "engaged in sexual contact". That was very shortly later amended to "or showing obvious arousal".
That's a pretty simple definition and the border-cases are rare.
But today, child porn in most states is defined as
"any image of a child, or someone appearing to be a child (or fictionally created to represent a child) which is viewed with the intent to cause arousal or sexual satisfaction"
There are a number of men in prison for things like.... owning a collection of boys underwear catalogs. Or taking photos of girls in bathing suits.
What it comes down to, and the issue that I have with these laws, is that it is impossible to know whether you are possessing child pornography BEFORE the jury reaches a verdict.
In fact, a given image can both be simultaneously porn and not-porn depending on who is looking at it.
In fact, the jury is instructed to divine the "intent" of the viewer of the image, often years after the actual "viewing" took place.
Obviously, there are plenty of cases with dudes downloading videos of 5 year olds being penetrated and I guess there's no argument in that case, but the cultural climate which allows laws that allow statements to enter a US court room such as "jury divined intent", "illegal fiction" and "simultaneous porn and not-porn" are the sort of things that lead us hand-in-hand toward the collapse of our fundamental structures of justice and freedom.
The fact that laws are allowed with these sorts of phrases are a travesty to our judicial and government systems and represent a black-eye to the framing of the constitution and modern law.
That's just my opinion, but I'm sticking to it. I guess thats the whole point. Dont save any pictures of anyone under age 18 on your computer and then you don't have to worry.
It's good vs bad. And because you make it black vs white, you make it easier for rich/powerful/evil whites to dominate you along with the blacks you are fighting.
TOXIC CRIMINALS: TEST MAY OFFER CLUES ABOUT LEAD'S EFFECTS
While the United States is making strides in reducing lead pollution -- primarily by phasing out leaded gasoline and paint -- a recent report notes that "an estimated 3 to 4 million American preschool children have blood lead levels above 10 micrograms/dl, a level now recognized to be associated with subclinical neurologic impairment." The report, by Philip Landrigan and Andrew Todd, adds that as many as 68% of poor, minority children in inner cities may have unsafe lead levels.
That's alarming news, because research suggests lead poisoning is a major risk factor for behavior problems and criminality. One study by Deborah Denno, in fact, found that lead poisoning was the strongest predictor of disciplinary problems in school, which in turn were the strongest predictor of arrests between the ages of 7 and 22. Another study, of 501 boys in Edinburgh, Scotland, found that blood lead levels correlated strongly with measures of psychological deviance.
The lead-crime connection isn't surprising, because lead poisoning causes the types of cognitive problems most strongly linked to criminal behavior. http://www.crimetimes.org/95c/w95cp7.htm
That arguments ridiculous. There's nothing inherent in being black that makes them more likely to commit crimes, the root cause is in society and culture. Also, they don't actively seek out being black, whereas you're not born with a thumb drive full of kiddie porn. This is closer to speeding laws, where a certain behavior hasn't harmed someone else yet, but it's increasing the probability of you hurting someone in the future.
Besides, these people aren't just being put into prison because they might abuse children, they're actively supporting and distributing these acts to other people. Putting someone in jail for kiddie porn is completely reasonable to me, although I do think the process is emotionally charged to the point that it's hard for justice to be done in these cases. It ends up smelling like more of a witch hunt than anything, but, as CS Lewis said, witch hunts are completely reasonable if witches exist. It's not reasonable to put them in prison unless they PURCHASE kiddie porn. Meaning if they buy it with $, then they are supporting it. I don't think just viewing something counts as supporting the product. I don't know how anyone can come to the conclusion that if you view it that you support the production of it on one hand, but then when you talk about movies owned by the MPAA or RIAA, suddenly viewing of it hurts the producers and so we have to stop people from viewing this because there will be less of it produced?
If kiddie porn is bad, and piracy hurts the supplier, then shouldn't piracy be a good thing in this situation? It prevents the producers from selling their child porn.
However if we keep people from viewing it, it seems to have the opposite effect, now the people addicted to this material will have to pay for the production of it, which could actually save the child porn industry.
As far as why people commit crimes, people commit crimes because A. They have to due to situations they face, or B. Their brains are damaged and they lack the ability to judge right and wrong.
If the situation is A. or B. It's got nothing to do with the skin and everything to do with the brain and the situation the brain is placed in.
It has been found that lead, an environmental pollutant, increases criminality by causing brain damage to individuals exposed to it. For all we know there could be all sorts of substances which contribute to making a person a criminal, or even a pedophile for that matter. And it's important that we study the brains of criminals and pedophiles to find out what the actual cause is so that we can prevent and or treat it.
If you want to compare it, it's more like outlawing GTA as a way to prevent people from becoming criminals.
The people who think this way are morons. Criminals are generated more by environmental pollution in their environment causing them to have brain damage than by text, video games, and movies. Most people who are criminals have brains which are physically different from people who are not, their brains develop completely differently.
So to think that you can fight child pornography by banning the images is like thinking you can fight murder by outlawing violent movies. The way to solve this problem is to study the people who think in this way to figure out whats wrong with them, and then offer them treatment.
If they dont get treatment then you can lock them up, but treatment should at least be offered.
If they can outlaw the images of virtual child porn, why not outlaw the stories too?
I don't see why there should be a loophole for text based child pornography. The law is irrational enough, do we need to make it even more irrational by leaving this loophole?
I don't see how this would prevent the production of child pornography.
Actually, it's confusing. Usually they claim that when pictures or media are traded online without paying for it, it's copyright infringement and does all this damage to the industry, but in this case of child pornography we are supposed to make an exception and believe that viewing it increases the demand for production.
The question is, whats in this for the producers? If people are trading it online then the producers don't get paid. However if it's too dangerous to trade online, the producers get to create a black market and actually get paid again.
Nothing is going to stop these people from thinking about or even viewing child pornography. Driving them underground doesn't help trace it back to the producers either.
The reasoning doesn't have to be all that reasonable because it feels good emotionally to attack people who think that way. People who are attracted to children need help, and need to be encouraged to seek help. Criminalizing their thinking will not encourage them to seek help, it will just drive them further underground and make the problem worse.
So I think this is a mental health problem that is being turned into something criminal. The source of their problem is that they are addicted to a certain kind of thinking. I'm sure that some who think like this will probably be disgusted at their own thoughts, and want to seek help for their addiction to these thoughts, and really these laws criminalize thoughts.
In the end, I don't think these laws are rational, and so they do not serve any rational purpose. These laws are emotional, likely revenge laws, or laws passed because we "hate" pedophiles, and find child pornography disgusting, not because we are actually trying to solve anything.
So as a result, this law will solve nothing at all. The end result will be an expanded sex offender database, more people to fill up the prison (probably helps the prison industrial complex), and also it's a backdoor to other types of censorship in the future. So it's probably more about politics of emotion than anything reasonable.
I wouldn't be surprised if a law was passed to allow us to simply kill all who think like pedophiles with no trial or jury, you know, just consider them as terrorists.
In fact, we should have a poll and just ask, how many believe people with pedophile thoughts should just be killed on the spot with no trial whatsoever? I'm sure a lot of people would consider this swift justice.
But then again what about those people who use Google to search for ways to murder their wife?
They need to spend this one billion developing better behavioral profiling techniques rather than to spend billions fighting the internet.
Child porn is not made on the net, it's made in person, so the problem exists in the offline world.
To spend a billion dollars to combat a problem in the virtual world is like spending a billion dollars to fight child pornography in Second Life.
I'm all for ending the production of child pornography and I support any agenda which attacks or stops the producers of child pornography. However I don't see a point to wasting a billion dollars fighting child pornography on the internet, that's just going to be a witchunt, and it's going to be filled with entrapment and excuses to create more illegal hyperlinks.
I think you are misunderstanding what philosophy actually is. Philosophy is a question, not an answer. So far it appears that you believe your ideas about the nature of the universe to be wholly correct without accepting the fact that a complete answer will never be found through philosophy, only more questions.
If you are looking for an answer, switch to science. Science doesn't answer why. And honestly, neither does atheism. Atheism is just another religion based on faith in materialism.
There was never a time when nothing existed. The mind simply existed before all forms and all of the material universe existed. The mind is prima materia.
Proof that things can exist independent of the observer (at least as far as the ability to continue interacting with forces):
1) I place a pot of water on the stove. I turn the stove on. I leave.
2) The stove, water, and pot cease to exist.
3) I ask my friend to go check on the water and they report back to me that the water is/is not boiling.
Thus: Obviously, even while unoberseved, the kinetic energy of the water managed to change. Actions happened without observation, thus existence did not just 'pause' while I was away from the pot. The time to boil will remain unchanged regardless of observation level.
One could choose any interaction to test for this as well. Normal force (by placing a paint can on a board and then viewing only the paint can and not the board), chemical reactions, kinetic reactions (put a ball on a slide). Even if the physical atoms aren't there unobserved, the reactions occur and are recorded to be presented in atomic form when the area is next viewed. If there is no observation then there is no such thing as "I". This is like saying God placed the pot on the stove and then wondering why the pot is still where God placed it.
If something is observed into existence, just because you stop observing it doesnt mean it ceases to exist. It only ceases to exist prior to being observed.
If you aren't willing to look out for your own self interest, someone will dominate and control all those who think of themselves a unimportant simply because they feel more important than you.
we are supposed to believe that "stuff" can exist outside of our minds, which to me doesn't seem any more reasonable than believing in a God who lives in the sky who we can't see, or aliens in space, or angels, or the devil.
If you actually believed yourself, you wouldn't be posting here on slashdot. You'd be utterly confused among the (fake?) sensory inputs and your own imagination. Random thoughts, dreams, emotions, etc. would be just as real to you as what your nerves told you. Instead of posting to slashdot, you'd be catatonic while you dreamed yourself to death.
Of course you can just say that I am you and I am saying this as some sort of gedanken experiment that your mind felt like performing, but I'd disagree. I'm actually in Minnesota, and it's pretty hard for me to not notice that.
-b No, do materialists think that nothing matters because everything are equally worthless atom configurations?
Thoughts are objects, just like 1s and 0s, just like math. Thought objects are just more real than the atom configurations.
When I love someone, I don't love their material body, I love their mind, their consciousness, their soul, their thoughts. Or just the thought of them.
If you can dream it you can do it. Man can fly, can go into space, can have sex with lots of women. Of course it's not going to be easy to do this and get away with it, but it's not impossible because people have done it.
It's not that solipsists don't believe that the idea of another person can exist. The solipsist simply does not believe that the physical form of the idea is the idea itself. I hope that makes sense.
So a solipsist might want to study insects, or wildlife, or people in the same way scientists study natural phenomena, and it's not to be considered a waste of time. Also a solipsist can enjoy some ideas and thoughts more than others.
I don't see why you think a solipsist would act any different from a materialist except in that a solipsist probably only sees you as a thought pattern/idea while a materialist sees you as a bunch of randomly generated atoms. I don't see any difference in how either one would act.
It's not that I believe there is world outside of the world of thought. And frankly, even if there was, I only care about my thoughts anyway so it would be a world not worthy of mentioning or caring about. However, I do have favorite thoughts like anyone else.
Just like materialists can have favorite forms of matter.
Cool, does this apply to everything else too? Is the art viewer more important than the art itself? Is the reader more important than the writer? Am I more important than you because I actually exist and you're just some construct of my mind? (on that note, in the Solipsist universe, how do you know that you exist and aren't just an elaborate simulation from my mind?) Yes to everything above. You have no way of knowing I actually exist. But even if I were just in your mind your behavior wouldn't be any different, unlike what most people tend to think about people who view the world this way, it does not make our behavior vastly different. There are some thoughts we love and some thoughts we hate.
Just like materialists have some atoms arrangements they love some and atom arrangements they hate. But neither the materialist or someone with my viewpoint can say another mind is real. The only difference is, under my viewpoint you can confirm that your mind is not only real, but the most real thing in this universe. Basically you are the master of the universe under my way of thinking but under a materialist way of thinking I'd think you'd end up with no self esteem and no ego whatsoever because you'd be of no more value than dust.
The thing is, Science isn't just how we organize the information. Science is how we gather the information. It's how we interpret the information. Solipsism is how you come up with an idea that allows you to ignore the science because it's just a construct of your (or a collective) mind and no more valid than anything. To gather information is just to perceive of it and record it. Science is recorded and studied according to scientific method, therefore it's an organizing of information.
I think the big problem with Solipsism is that it ISN'T falsifiable. The original case that "my" mind is the only one is no more testable than the idea that the FSM created the world from His Noodly Appendage 8 minutes ago, complete with memories and history. Why does it have to be falsifiable to be correct? Materialism isn't falsifiable yet most athiests are materialists and no ones complaining about their theory of the universe.
Your version where the universal mind (is this some sort of connected consciousness, a connecting "energy", what?) is the only thing to exist is no more testable. Any hypothetical test which MIGHT falsify the idea is explained away as the universal mind having provided that result. I believe there are other minds. I believe there might be aliens who have minds that are more self aware than us. I'm not someone who is so inside my own thinking that I think I'm the only thing in the universe with thoughts. Even if I think my thoughts matter the most, I recognize that other living things in the universe that look similar to me might have similar kinds of thoughts, and the evidence seems to prove that yes, you do have a mind. I know this because I can communicate with you and you don't respond like a computer does.
These are cute ideas to throw around, but they don't supply any progress towards actually understanding the world. And the idea of materialism is any different? The difference is, I'm not a materialist, I believe matter is more like a fake dreamlike material that we mold in our image, like clay, but I don't believe it's more real that the thoughts we use t mold and shape it.
To be honest, I think straight Solipsism sounds a whole lot more plausible than your "universal mind". If everything is a simulation created by our minds then what, other than some desire to not be alone, makes you think I'm not just another thread in that simulation? Thats optional. You can believe there are no other minds. I believe there are other minds, but overall I do believe my mind is the best mind even if there are other minds. I do believe there are multiple universe, and I believe each mind is in a universe of it's own perspective, and that when our minds connect we create a new universe.
Matter is just information to me. And I see us as the programmers of matter. I know I'm not the only one who can do it, because scientists have gone places with their mind that I've never gone before, and they bring these places back to us. They are our eyes and ears.
Also, no one is suggesting anything exists outside of reality. It seems to me that you're suggesting that reality doesn't exist. I don't believe matter is anything more than information, and how can information exist without something to experience and interpret it?
This seems little more than a thought experiment claiming that in order to save processor cycles, the Universal Simulation Machine doesn't render what no one is looking at, touching, smelling, hearing, etc. So indeed, if no one and no experiment is observing something, how do you know it hasn't ceased to exist and will be recreated when it is re-experienced again? You can't. I didn't say it ceases to exist after it's experienced into existence and inside the universe mind. I'm saying prior to it being experienced by the universal mind it cannot exist.
Science isn't concerned with things such as this and I don't know that it's valid for you to claim that science is therefore somehow supporting Solipsism and your universal mind. I never said science answers the whys. Science is just how we organize the information. Solipsism is how we interpret the information. And the interpretation is more important than anything else.
Slashdot Mirror
A case could be made that by outlawing the piracy of child porn/kiddie porn, the producers now can profit from selling it.
Websites in countries where child porn is legal, now they can make money because people will have to start buying their products again when perhaps before because of the internet, these groups were going out of business.
How do we know it's not these producers who are backing initiatives like this bill in the first place? The bill does not target them and it somehow indirectly helps them increase their profits.
I don't think it's about justification.
In fact I think this will boost the kiddie porn market because it creates economic incentive to produce kiddie porn if you know it wont be traded over the internet.
This would allow the producers to create tapes or DVDs and sell them for $1000 each, or even sell it online though websites and not have to worry about anyone downloading/sealing their images.
I think the law is stupid for the reason that it would protect people who profit from kiddie porn sites in foreign countries where child porn is legal. It's not doing anything to stop the production of it, in fact now these sites will make so much more money because people wont be downloading it and giving it away for free.
And outlawing virtual child porn FORCES people to go to these sites to get their fix.
By preventing people from trading virtual kiddie porn for free, you increase the demand for REAL kiddie porn. If virtual kiddie porn is just as illegal as real kiddie porn, and someone is willing to sell real kiddie porn, now we have to worry about money being exchanged for the production of REAL kiddie porn because we want to outlaw the virtual kiddie porn.
Thats the problem, it's increasing the demand for the real thing when you remove the virtual and fake porn. Because people are addicted to these thought patterns, they are like crack addicts, if they can get it for free they wont ever pay for it and no one will ever get rich selling kiddie porn, but if we crackdown on all the free VIRTUAL kiddie porn, well the only thing left for them to do is go to a REAL kiddie porn dealer and pay for the production of actual kiddie porn.
And it's not like there any treatment for these people. At least drug addicts have some kinda treatment programs. So what is the point? To just fill up the prisons? What does it solve?
In this case it's going to create a black market and make the problem even worse because a black market cannot be regulated at all, and it cannot be taxed. This means the mafias could get involved.
A witch hunt is generally defined, in it's normal emotive context, by the prosecution and identification of witches with a complete and utter lack of regard for any standards of evidence, justice, fairness or internal consistency.
It reminds me of the old monty python skit.
(I paraphrase from memory)
She's a witch!
how do you know?
Because she burns!
What else do we burn?
Wood!
So she is made of wood!
Yes, and wood floats!
aha! what else floats?
ducks!
Yes! Therefore witches are lighter than ducks!
(puts the witch on a broken scale which shows she is lighter than a duck)
Burn her!!!
What is child porn exactly?
Most attorneys will tell you that in most US states, that question is nonsensical when you approach the "border line".
It used to be defined (the first child porn laws came about in 1976, before which it was entirely legal in every way).... that child porn was a child "engaged in sexual contact". That was very shortly later amended to "or showing obvious arousal".
That's a pretty simple definition and the border-cases are rare.
But today, child porn in most states is defined as
"any image of a child, or someone appearing to be a child (or fictionally created to represent a child) which is viewed with the intent to cause arousal or sexual satisfaction"
There are a number of men in prison for things like.... owning a collection of boys underwear catalogs. Or taking photos of girls in bathing suits.
What it comes down to, and the issue that I have with these laws, is that it is impossible to know whether you are possessing child pornography BEFORE the jury reaches a verdict.
In fact, a given image can both be simultaneously porn and not-porn depending on who is looking at it.
In fact, the jury is instructed to divine the "intent" of the viewer of the image, often years after the actual "viewing" took place.
Obviously, there are plenty of cases with dudes downloading videos of 5 year olds being penetrated and I guess there's no argument in that case, but the cultural climate which allows laws that allow statements to enter a US court room such as "jury divined intent", "illegal fiction" and "simultaneous porn and not-porn" are the sort of things that lead us hand-in-hand toward the collapse of our fundamental structures of justice and freedom.
The fact that laws are allowed with these sorts of phrases are a travesty to our judicial and government systems and represent a black-eye to the framing of the constitution and modern law.
That's just my opinion, but I'm sticking to it. I guess thats the whole point. Dont save any pictures of anyone under age 18 on your computer and then you don't have to worry.
It's good vs bad. And because you make it black vs white, you make it easier for rich/powerful/evil whites to dominate you along with the blacks you are fighting.
While the United States is making strides in reducing lead pollution -- primarily by phasing out leaded gasoline and paint -- a recent report notes that "an estimated 3 to 4 million American preschool children have blood lead levels above 10 micrograms/dl, a level now recognized to be associated with subclinical neurologic impairment." The report, by Philip Landrigan and Andrew Todd, adds that as many as 68% of poor, minority children in inner cities may have unsafe lead levels.
That's alarming news, because research suggests lead poisoning is a major risk factor for behavior problems and criminality. One study by Deborah Denno, in fact, found that lead poisoning was the strongest predictor of disciplinary problems in school, which in turn were the strongest predictor of arrests between the ages of 7 and 22. Another study, of 501 boys in Edinburgh, Scotland, found that blood lead levels correlated strongly with measures of psychological deviance.
The lead-crime connection isn't surprising, because lead poisoning causes the types of cognitive problems most strongly linked to criminal behavior. http://www.crimetimes.org/95c/w95cp7.htm
Besides, these people aren't just being put into prison because they might abuse children, they're actively supporting and distributing these acts to other people. Putting someone in jail for kiddie porn is completely reasonable to me, although I do think the process is emotionally charged to the point that it's hard for justice to be done in these cases. It ends up smelling like more of a witch hunt than anything, but, as CS Lewis said, witch hunts are completely reasonable if witches exist. It's not reasonable to put them in prison unless they PURCHASE kiddie porn. Meaning if they buy it with $, then they are supporting it. I don't think just viewing something counts as supporting the product. I don't know how anyone can come to the conclusion that if you view it that you support the production of it on one hand, but then when you talk about movies owned by the MPAA or RIAA, suddenly viewing of it hurts the producers and so we have to stop people from viewing this because there will be less of it produced?
If kiddie porn is bad, and piracy hurts the supplier, then shouldn't piracy be a good thing in this situation? It prevents the producers from selling their child porn.
However if we keep people from viewing it, it seems to have the opposite effect, now the people addicted to this material will have to pay for the production of it, which could actually save the child porn industry.
As far as why people commit crimes, people commit crimes because A. They have to due to situations they face, or B. Their brains are damaged and they lack the ability to judge right and wrong.
If the situation is A. or B. It's got nothing to do with the skin and everything to do with the brain and the situation the brain is placed in.
Lead poisoning and criminality
It has been found that lead, an environmental pollutant, increases criminality by causing brain damage to individuals exposed to it. For all we know there could be all sorts of substances which contribute to making a person a criminal, or even a pedophile for that matter. And it's important that we study the brains of criminals and pedophiles to find out what the actual cause is so that we can prevent and or treat it.
If you want to compare it, it's more like outlawing GTA as a way to prevent people from becoming criminals.
The people who think this way are morons. Criminals are generated more by environmental pollution in their environment causing them to have brain damage than by text, video games, and movies. Most people who are criminals have brains which are physically different from people who are not, their brains develop completely differently.
So to think that you can fight child pornography by banning the images is like thinking you can fight murder by outlawing violent movies. The way to solve this problem is to study the people who think in this way to figure out whats wrong with them, and then offer them treatment.
If they dont get treatment then you can lock them up, but treatment should at least be offered.
If they can outlaw the images of virtual child porn, why not outlaw the stories too?
I don't see why there should be a loophole for text based child pornography. The law is irrational enough, do we need to make it even more irrational by leaving this loophole?
I don't see how this would prevent the production of child pornography.
Actually, it's confusing. Usually they claim that when pictures or media are traded online without paying for it, it's copyright infringement and does all this damage to the industry, but in this case of child pornography we are supposed to make an exception and believe that viewing it increases the demand for production.
The question is, whats in this for the producers? If people are trading it online then the producers don't get paid. However if it's too dangerous to trade online, the producers get to create a black market and actually get paid again.
Nothing is going to stop these people from thinking about or even viewing child pornography. Driving them underground doesn't help trace it back to the producers either.
The reasoning doesn't have to be all that reasonable because it feels good emotionally to attack people who think that way. People who are attracted to children need help, and need to be encouraged to seek help. Criminalizing their thinking will not encourage them to seek help, it will just drive them further underground and make the problem worse.
So I think this is a mental health problem that is being turned into something criminal. The source of their problem is that they are addicted to a certain kind of thinking. I'm sure that some who think like this will probably be disgusted at their own thoughts, and want to seek help for their addiction to these thoughts, and really these laws criminalize thoughts.
In the end, I don't think these laws are rational, and so they do not serve any rational purpose. These laws are emotional, likely revenge laws, or laws passed because we "hate" pedophiles, and find child pornography disgusting, not because we are actually trying to solve anything.
So as a result, this law will solve nothing at all. The end result will be an expanded sex offender database, more people to fill up the prison (probably helps the prison industrial complex), and also it's a backdoor to other types of censorship in the future. So it's probably more about politics of emotion than anything reasonable.
I wouldn't be surprised if a law was passed to allow us to simply kill all who think like pedophiles with no trial or jury, you know, just consider them as terrorists.
In fact, we should have a poll and just ask, how many believe people with pedophile thoughts should just be killed on the spot with no trial whatsoever? I'm sure a lot of people would consider this swift justice.
But then again what about those people who use Google to search for ways to murder their wife?
They need to spend this one billion developing better behavioral profiling techniques rather than to spend billions fighting the internet.
Child porn is not made on the net, it's made in person, so the problem exists in the offline world.
To spend a billion dollars to combat a problem in the virtual world is like spending a billion dollars to fight child pornography in Second Life.
I'm all for ending the production of child pornography and I support any agenda which attacks or stops the producers of child pornography. However I don't see a point to wasting a billion dollars fighting child pornography on the internet, that's just going to be a witchunt, and it's going to be filled with entrapment and excuses to create more illegal hyperlinks.
I guess the war on the internet continues.
Just because we are all from the same mind it doesn't mean that all minds, or all thoughts, are of equal worth.
The only thing that makes you of the same mind is the fact that you have the same sense of self.
If there is something you can't do then you merely need to empower yourself and the impossible becomes possible.
And no, the matter isn't what took man into space, it was mans mind which designed the spacecraft and worked out the math.
If you are looking for an answer, switch to science. Science doesn't answer why. And honestly, neither does atheism. Atheism is just another religion based on faith in materialism.
There was never a time when nothing existed.
The mind simply existed before all forms and all of the material universe existed. The mind is prima materia.
1) I place a pot of water on the stove. I turn the stove on. I leave.
2) The stove, water, and pot cease to exist.
3) I ask my friend to go check on the water and they report back to me that the water is/is not boiling.
Thus: Obviously, even while unoberseved, the kinetic energy of the water managed to change. Actions happened without observation, thus existence did not just 'pause' while I was away from the pot. The time to boil will remain unchanged regardless of observation level.
One could choose any interaction to test for this as well. Normal force (by placing a paint can on a board and then viewing only the paint can and not the board), chemical reactions, kinetic reactions (put a ball on a slide). Even if the physical atoms aren't there unobserved, the reactions occur and are recorded to be presented in atomic form when the area is next viewed. If there is no observation then there is no such thing as "I". This is like saying God placed the pot on the stove and then wondering why the pot is still where God placed it.
If something is observed into existence, just because you stop observing it doesnt mean it ceases to exist. It only ceases to exist prior to being observed.
If you aren't willing to look out for your own self interest, someone will dominate and control all those who think of themselves a unimportant simply because they feel more important than you.
If you actually believed yourself, you wouldn't be posting here on slashdot. You'd be utterly confused among the (fake?) sensory inputs and your own imagination. Random thoughts, dreams, emotions, etc. would be just as real to you as what your nerves told you. Instead of posting to slashdot, you'd be catatonic while you dreamed yourself to death.
Of course you can just say that I am you and I am saying this as some sort of gedanken experiment that your mind felt like performing, but I'd disagree. I'm actually in Minnesota, and it's pretty hard for me to not notice that.
-b No, do materialists think that nothing matters because everything are equally worthless atom configurations?
Thoughts are objects, just like 1s and 0s, just like math. Thought objects are just more real than the atom configurations.
When I love someone, I don't love their material body, I love their mind, their consciousness, their soul, their thoughts. Or just the thought of them.
If you can dream it you can do it. Man can fly, can go into space, can have sex with lots of women. Of course it's not going to be easy to do this and get away with it, but it's not impossible because people have done it.
It's not that solipsists don't believe that the idea of another person can exist. The solipsist simply does not believe that the physical form of the idea is the idea itself. I hope that makes sense.
So a solipsist might want to study insects, or wildlife, or people in the same way scientists study natural phenomena, and it's not to be considered a waste of time. Also a solipsist can enjoy some ideas and thoughts more than others.
I don't see why you think a solipsist would act any different from a materialist except in that a solipsist probably only sees you as a thought pattern/idea while a materialist sees you as a bunch of randomly generated atoms. I don't see any difference in how either one would act.
It's not that I believe there is world outside of the world of thought. And frankly, even if there was, I only care about my thoughts anyway so it would be a world not worthy of mentioning or caring about. However, I do have favorite thoughts like anyone else.
Just like materialists can have favorite forms of matter.
Are you rational enough to put yourself at the top of the list of most important?
Just like materialists have some atoms arrangements they love some and atom arrangements they hate. But neither the materialist or someone with my viewpoint can say another mind is real. The only difference is, under my viewpoint you can confirm that your mind is not only real, but the most real thing in this universe. Basically you are the master of the universe under my way of thinking but under a materialist way of thinking I'd think you'd end up with no self esteem and no ego whatsoever because you'd be of no more value than dust. The thing is, Science isn't just how we organize the information. Science is how we gather the information. It's how we interpret the information. Solipsism is how you come up with an idea that allows you to ignore the science because it's just a construct of your (or a collective) mind and no more valid than anything. To gather information is just to perceive of it and record it. Science is recorded and studied according to scientific method, therefore it's an organizing of information.
Stop worrying about the weapons and arm yourself.
Crazy people are the ones who are dangerous.
Matter is just information to me. And I see us as the programmers of matter. I know I'm not the only one who can do it, because scientists have gone places with their mind that I've never gone before, and they bring these places back to us. They are our eyes and ears. Also, no one is suggesting anything exists outside of reality. It seems to me that you're suggesting that reality doesn't exist. I don't believe matter is anything more than information, and how can information exist without something to experience and interpret it? This seems little more than a thought experiment claiming that in order to save processor cycles, the Universal Simulation Machine doesn't render what no one is looking at, touching, smelling, hearing, etc. So indeed, if no one and no experiment is observing something, how do you know it hasn't ceased to exist and will be recreated when it is re-experienced again? You can't. I didn't say it ceases to exist after it's experienced into existence and inside the universe mind. I'm saying prior to it being experienced by the universal mind it cannot exist. Science isn't concerned with things such as this and I don't know that it's valid for you to claim that science is therefore somehow supporting Solipsism and your universal mind. I never said science answers the whys. Science is just how we organize the information. Solipsism is how we interpret the information. And the interpretation is more important than anything else.