Another example is the Tragedy of the Commons for your second criticism, more closely related to management of natural resources.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of _the_Commons )
Aside from anti-competitive monopoly practices(nothing wrong with monopolies as long as they avoid anti-competitive practices), the free market is indeed highly effective at generating wealth.
However, the wealth distribution issues are non-trivial and at least some government regulation is necessary to prevent the worst offenses. For some it may not simply mean inequality in distribution of benefits, but actual harm.
For example if globalization allowed unfettered free trade for a farming industry it does allow nations with higher capital to use technology to produce goods at a lower unit cost allowing the world to enjoy the good at lower prices. This benefits all consumers and the nation with the higher capital. However, this means that low capital nations who rely on human labor to produce the goods cannot compete with these prices.
In America, this is/sometimes/ a wash because those who lose menial labor jobs can move on, (re-)educate themselves, and sometimes end up with a better paying job and producing more for the economy. This is not always the case.
Due to lower standards of education backcountry areas and "developing"(3rd world) nations there is a much higher level of frictional unemployment. It's not easy to just start a new career in something else when all you know is how to fish and little else. The education infrastructure is necessary to grease the gears of this transfer, and it's a legitimate reason for government intervention and protectionism. The benefit of lower costs in purchasing goods may not upset this disruption to their income. Opening free trade is good, but the specifics of how it happens is very important, and the free market will not take care of it.
Wealth existing in and of itself is not a good thing. It's only good in the context of the human beings who use it. It's the human side and the ultimate goal of economics, which is dealing with scarcity. Having maximum production is not the ultimate goal, it's how that production relates to humans.
Both investment and consumption need to find a point on the curve where consumption is maximized over time and so that the population can enjoy maximum benefit rather than a sparse few rich folk. The free market powered by self interest is efficient at wealth production but not at wealth distribution and the production and distribution cannot be seperated because the value of having that wealth is reliant on the human context. Increasing levels of income inequality is a valid form of diminishing returns in capitalism.
Both capitalism and communism have diminishing returns and the ideal solution in such a case isn't going to lie at one extreme or another, but at some midpoint between the two.
Same here, I learned how to solve these problems around 9th grade (I'm U.Sian)
Unfortunately, right after I learned it I made it through college without needing it again till I saw this article. And of course, I now have no idea how to solve this problem without digging up a textbook and reacquainting myself with the necessary information for a solving this.
I would agree that U.S kids have the potential to learn more during their K-12 years. Getting through highschool with good grades required little more than attendance and 2-3 hours of homework a week. I had a large amount of free time even after my extracurricular activities. I wasted it.
I wasn't trying to maximize my education or potential, but to simply meet requirements in order to "break into the middle" of the pack. I couldn't see any benefit in learning more than what was required to get a B to an A on the upcoming test. After that, it's gone forever. There wasn't a reward in education anywhere in sight, only punishment for failing. This encourages bare minimums of performance. If the kids are ending up at bare minimums of performance the last thing that should be done is a reduction in the level of challenge. If the kid isn't challenged then they won't even learn what they're capable of.
Some Earth athletes partake in "Altitude Training" where they take a trip to a high-altitude training locations to get their bodies to adapt to low oxygen levels. I believe world-heavyweight MMA champion Fedor does this.
This topic of discussion reminds me of Larry Niven's Jinxians. Humans who've grown up under higher gravity turning into short, musclebound freaks, while Flatlanders look like normal humans, and Spacers are tall, thin, and fragile.
Hmm, 2.25Gs? I weigh 195lbs right now at 1G so at 2.25G I'd be walking around with 438.75lbs of weight.
I can leg press that no problem. I can probably get off 5 sets of 10 reps of that in one day. However, 5 sets of 10 reps is barely enough to get my ass to the bathroom, forget the rest of my daily activities.
I miiiiight be able envision humans adapting over many generations working up to 2.25Gs. But you'd need to work up to that kind of duress in increments. Send anybody right now, even our champion strongman competitors, and they'd probably die within a week from the tremendous stress on their heart and joints.
Free trade in and of itself is not good. Isolationism in and of itself is not good. Capitalism in and of itself is not good. Communism in an--you get the picture.
All of the above are not intrinsically good. The above terms are definitions for an extreme end of the spectra. When dealing with extremes in economics you have to watch out for diminishing returns. How do you deal with such diminishing returns in all these factors? Going straight to the extremes undercuts total benefit due to the diminishing returns. You look for a point in the middle that brings the largest benefit.
The principle goal is to use resources effectively. What does effective mean? That depends on the context. Who is trying to gain from an effective economy? The individual? The people? The business? The government? Etc.
Free trade produces more overall GDP, but as all economists know, GDP is an imperfect measurement of economic health. They use multiple measurements because GDP says nothing about industry distribution, wealth distribution, purchasing power, etc.
Protectionism well, protects. Some parts of an economy need defending for whatever reason because even though something can be good for an economy, there are/people/ who are trying to live in it. It's also bad because it's a restraint on efficient resource allocation.
Why are some nations poor and others rich? Don't bother giving a simple explanation because you're going to be wrong. The global economy is not a simple system. This topic has been thoroughly researched and there are a large number of theories with good evidence and it's likely that all of the theories are a factor in play. For example: "Indians should just start their own companies in India, instead of dragging down ours", that's only possible if there is capital available, and abundant enough to be distributed at survivable rates for the entrepeneur who needs the loan. A country needs capital to modernize. It also needs educated citizens to operate the industries. Education requires either people who can economically afford schooling or a government efficient and powerful enough to legislate free schooling. Owning property also requires security(why work harder to get nice things if a thief/a company/a government can take it away from you?) The list goes on and on.
I did the water for awhile, but it just wasn't filling the hole in my palate. Seltzer however did wonderfully. Taking a few bites of a meal and washing it down with Seltzer leaves the mouth fresh and clean, ready to fully appreciate the taste of the next few bites.
However, the cheapskate in me is repulsed by having to pay the same price for Seltzer as for sodas. And I'm not afraid of artificial sweetners. So I end up drinking Aspartame and Splenda(preferable) laced sodas if I'm going to be shelling out money for drinks.
I acquired carotenesis when I was a little kid because I adored Bugs Bunny and pestered my mother for lots and lots of carrots. I also remembered a strong affinity for spinach that I attribute to Popeye. That advertising really worked wonders on me as a kid. I'm not hooked on the stuff anymore, but at least those cartoons got me to eat my veggies willingly as a child.
On the first point, our kill:death ratio was superior in Vietnam as well, but we lost that war as well. An American soldier's life is worth more to the American war effort than an insurgent's life to the insurgency(it may even be used to recruit more insurgents if the dead insurgent is advertised as an innocent killed in the line of fire, whether or not it's true is irrelevant).
On the second, we're talking about the value of the right to bear arms as a deterrent against a tyrannical government. So far having arms is allowing resistance against us over there, where we're regarded as a tyrannical government. So far over here, we have displeasure with our government, but no action.
This does not necessarily mean that we are incapable of acting, but that we have not been provoked to the point of acting. I don't necessarily like some of the things that the U.S government has done, particularly the current administration, but I am firmly against the use of armed revolution at this point. I still believe change can be brought about in the U.S without the use of violence, even though it will take much longer. We've got a democratic Congress, which isn't a blanket solution, but it's a step that provides hope for getting there "Eventually". And so long as we have that, I don't think anyone in the U.S should be talking about violent uprising while a peaceful means of resolution is still possible. The U.S populace is nowhere near as pissed off as the arab population in the middle-east. I think that if America is pushed towards that point, it still has the potential to force change as a last resort, and it's good that it takes that much to push America to violent civil war because the consequences are so dire. I vaguely remember a phrase quoted here on slashdot: "Soapbox, ballot box, ammo box, to be used in that order."
The insurgents in Iraq are indeed being exterminated in large numbers, along with a large number of bystanders, for a small amount of American lives. However, the Iraq War is not going well, and there is a very good chance that the insurgents will achieve their goal of ousting an American presence due to the calls for withdrawal at home. It's dependent on the "homefront" will to stay there despite the cost.
So a revolution here wouldn't require killing everybody on the other side, just depleting their will to continue the war, via economic or political drain.
Summing up and getting to the original point of discussion, having an effective 2nd amendment can still result in a populace that is capable of armed revolution against a modern army. The kill ratio isn't necessarily a measurement of victory. That's the only assertion I'm trying to make.
I used to agree, but the war in Iraq has made it apparent that I was wrong. Our professional army can't completely stop resistance.
Guerilla warfare still works very well against a government with limited political and fiscal resources. As long as they can't just mass-exterminate everything to get at you, it doesn't take much to put metal into skin, be it via gun, or IED. I hear there's still some hand-to-hand going on in Iraq.
Answer to this problem is more complicated than the tax code itself.
All those little tax breaks in case of _________ have a reason because some people weren't supposed to be affected by certain taxes, plus the extra tax in case of __________ also have reasons. These odd situations have valid pros and cons for having a rule setup for them. And it all just adds up. Sorta like feature bloat. It's trying to do to many things at once and gets complicated by the details until the system as a whole is dragged down.
Thankfully mine were quite simple, only took about 2-3 hours tops. But it must be horrifyingly burdensome for others. What I don't get, is why do I have to go through turbo-tax and it's like, instead of straight to the government?
I would agree that no one is born evil, but I would say they immediately start on their their path towards evil right after birth. It's then through the continual struggle of parenthood that children are steered away from their selfish or worse, malicious tendencies. Then through parentage they learn to accept society and how to redefine their goals behind the individual good and accept some level of value in a common good.
I remember the announcement as well that the console sales are now generating a profit(less than 10 bucks IIRC, less than the per unit profit Nintendo is getting, but still a profit). I could google up a source for you, but then, you could do the same just as easily. And like you and the other poster, I too would bet that the MS gaming division has yet to make up for the amount of money sunk into it. It has made considerable headway in that regard though over the Xbox predecessor.
I agree with parent, I'd also like to add that part of the difficulty in some of the older games has a very different nature than difficulty in today's games.
Less rigorous inspection(smaller teams, smaller budget, smaller dev cycles) allowed situations to occur in gameplay that lacked playtesting and feedback. Difficulty in today's games are supposed to be a challenge, but due to player fallibility rather than wrestling with fate. Players hate feeling helpless.
For example, when gameplay revolves around luck conditions and the CPU gets a huge bonus to their luck. Players like to win based on their manipulation of the game, rather than leaving their fate to random chance. Randomness is good when it provides unpredictability in the gameplay as a challenge, but it is BAD when the outcome is predictable, because the outcome is against you the majority of the time.
Even the perception is important. A frustration about a recent game "Lost Planet" was that players felt like they had no control, a feature that the japanese developers implemented intentionally. The large monsters cause the player to be stunned or stumble about, even knocked down. This upset players because they were put into these helpless positions even with an already sluggish movement speed against lightning-fast monsters. However, the developers accounted for all this, and every stun-situation that resulted in a player being hit was avoidable. Every stun-situation that was not avoidable, had the boss monster wait and give the player time to recover and have a split-second to dodge. The problem was that the stun masked this and made it appear as though the damage was inevitable and that the player was helpless. Those who finish the game realize this thin but important difference, but many become discouraged and upset early on since it appeared as though there was nothing they could have done to improve.
U.S has enough problems of its own, by it's own hand or otherwise. We don't have the resources to stabilize Iraq, for that matter, how's Afganistan doing? Go ask China to police the world. Once we manage to fix the problems that are over here, then we can talk about fixing things halfway around the world. If we can't fix what's over here, we sure as hell can't do jack over there.
American resources should go to American problems first.
Auto-aim is present in the majority of console shooters, and those games are selling just fine. The effectiveness of the auto-aim varies from game to game, and the game mechanics themselves are sometimes adjusted to de-emphasize aiming as the principle factor in victory for console shooters.
Why? Because it's true, KB+M > control sticks as an input. These changes are put in there to make up for the handicap. If MS would just let KB+M mouse be implemented for the Xbox360, then that's what would be the primary input, but MS doesn't want to let that happen.
Slashdot Mirror
Another example is the Tragedy of the Commons for your second criticism, more closely related to management of natural resources.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of _the_Commons )
/sometimes/ a wash because those who lose menial labor jobs can move on, (re-)educate themselves, and sometimes end up with a better paying job and producing more for the economy. This is not always the case.
Aside from anti-competitive monopoly practices(nothing wrong with monopolies as long as they avoid anti-competitive practices), the free market is indeed highly effective at generating wealth.
However, the wealth distribution issues are non-trivial and at least some government regulation is necessary to prevent the worst offenses. For some it may not simply mean inequality in distribution of benefits, but actual harm.
For example if globalization allowed unfettered free trade for a farming industry it does allow nations with higher capital to use technology to produce goods at a lower unit cost allowing the world to enjoy the good at lower prices. This benefits all consumers and the nation with the higher capital. However, this means that low capital nations who rely on human labor to produce the goods cannot compete with these prices.
In America, this is
Due to lower standards of education backcountry areas and "developing"(3rd world) nations there is a much higher level of frictional unemployment. It's not easy to just start a new career in something else when all you know is how to fish and little else. The education infrastructure is necessary to grease the gears of this transfer, and it's a legitimate reason for government intervention and protectionism. The benefit of lower costs in purchasing goods may not upset this disruption to their income. Opening free trade is good, but the specifics of how it happens is very important, and the free market will not take care of it.
Wealth existing in and of itself is not a good thing. It's only good in the context of the human beings who use it. It's the human side and the ultimate goal of economics, which is dealing with scarcity. Having maximum production is not the ultimate goal, it's how that production relates to humans.
Both investment and consumption need to find a point on the curve where consumption is maximized over time and so that the population can enjoy maximum benefit rather than a sparse few rich folk. The free market powered by self interest is efficient at wealth production but not at wealth distribution and the production and distribution cannot be seperated because the value of having that wealth is reliant on the human context. Increasing levels of income inequality is a valid form of diminishing returns in capitalism.
Both capitalism and communism have diminishing returns and the ideal solution in such a case isn't going to lie at one extreme or another, but at some midpoint between the two.
Same here, I learned how to solve these problems around 9th grade (I'm U.Sian)
Unfortunately, right after I learned it I made it through college without needing it again till I saw this article. And of course, I now have no idea how to solve this problem without digging up a textbook and reacquainting myself with the necessary information for a solving this.
I would agree that U.S kids have the potential to learn more during their K-12 years. Getting through highschool with good grades required little more than attendance and 2-3 hours of homework a week. I had a large amount of free time even after my extracurricular activities. I wasted it.
I wasn't trying to maximize my education or potential, but to simply meet requirements in order to "break into the middle" of the pack. I couldn't see any benefit in learning more than what was required to get a B to an A on the upcoming test. After that, it's gone forever. There wasn't a reward in education anywhere in sight, only punishment for failing. This encourages bare minimums of performance. If the kids are ending up at bare minimums of performance the last thing that should be done is a reduction in the level of challenge. If the kid isn't challenged then they won't even learn what they're capable of.
I visit game news sites daily, and have never even heard of these two games.
Some Earth athletes partake in "Altitude Training" where they take a trip to a high-altitude training locations to get their bodies to adapt to low oxygen levels. I believe world-heavyweight MMA champion Fedor does this.
This topic of discussion reminds me of Larry Niven's Jinxians. Humans who've grown up under higher gravity turning into short, musclebound freaks, while Flatlanders look like normal humans, and Spacers are tall, thin, and fragile.
Hmm, 2.25Gs? I weigh 195lbs right now at 1G so at 2.25G I'd be walking around with 438.75lbs of weight.
I can leg press that no problem. I can probably get off 5 sets of 10 reps of that in one day. However, 5 sets of 10 reps is barely enough to get my ass to the bathroom, forget the rest of my daily activities.
I miiiiight be able envision humans adapting over many generations working up to 2.25Gs. But you'd need to work up to that kind of duress in increments. Send anybody right now, even our champion strongman competitors, and they'd probably die within a week from the tremendous stress on their heart and joints.
Free trade in and of itself is not good.
Isolationism in and of itself is not good.
Capitalism in and of itself is not good.
Communism in an--you get the picture.
All of the above are not intrinsically good. The above terms are definitions for an extreme end of the spectra. When dealing with extremes in economics you have to watch out for diminishing returns. How do you deal with such diminishing returns in all these factors? Going straight to the extremes undercuts total benefit due to the diminishing returns. You look for a point in the middle that brings the largest benefit.
The principle goal is to use resources effectively. What does effective mean? That depends on the context. Who is trying to gain from an effective economy? The individual? The people? The business? The government? Etc.
Free trade produces more overall GDP, but as all economists know, GDP is an imperfect measurement of economic health. They use multiple measurements because GDP says nothing about industry distribution, wealth distribution, purchasing power, etc.
Protectionism well, protects. Some parts of an economy need defending for whatever reason because even though something can be good for an economy, there are
Why are some nations poor and others rich? Don't bother giving a simple explanation because you're going to be wrong. The global economy is not a simple system. This topic has been thoroughly researched and there are a large number of theories with good evidence and it's likely that all of the theories are a factor in play. For example: "Indians should just start their own companies in India, instead of dragging down ours", that's only possible if there is capital available, and abundant enough to be distributed at survivable rates for the entrepeneur who needs the loan. A country needs capital to modernize. It also needs educated citizens to operate the industries. Education requires either people who can economically afford schooling or a government efficient and powerful enough to legislate free schooling. Owning property also requires security(why work harder to get nice things if a thief/a company/a government can take it away from you?) The list goes on and on.
It makes m'flow "mo' betta'".
Holy crap that was informative. And pretty elusive information too among the general population. Lacking mod points all I can give you is props.
Heh, this is happening in my office right now.
I did the water for awhile, but it just wasn't filling the hole in my palate. Seltzer however did wonderfully. Taking a few bites of a meal and washing it down with Seltzer leaves the mouth fresh and clean, ready to fully appreciate the taste of the next few bites.
However, the cheapskate in me is repulsed by having to pay the same price for Seltzer as for sodas. And I'm not afraid of artificial sweetners. So I end up drinking Aspartame and Splenda(preferable) laced sodas if I'm going to be shelling out money for drinks.
I acquired carotenesis when I was a little kid because I adored Bugs Bunny and pestered my mother for lots and lots of carrots. I also remembered a strong affinity for spinach that I attribute to Popeye. That advertising really worked wonders on me as a kid. I'm not hooked on the stuff anymore, but at least those cartoons got me to eat my veggies willingly as a child.
I'm already prepared.
*taps his tinfoil hat*
On the first point, our kill:death ratio was superior in Vietnam as well, but we lost that war as well. An American soldier's life is worth more to the American war effort than an insurgent's life to the insurgency(it may even be used to recruit more insurgents if the dead insurgent is advertised as an innocent killed in the line of fire, whether or not it's true is irrelevant).
On the second, we're talking about the value of the right to bear arms as a deterrent against a tyrannical government. So far having arms is allowing resistance against us over there, where we're regarded as a tyrannical government. So far over here, we have displeasure with our government, but no action.
This does not necessarily mean that we are incapable of acting, but that we have not been provoked to the point of acting. I don't necessarily like some of the things that the U.S government has done, particularly the current administration, but I am firmly against the use of armed revolution at this point. I still believe change can be brought about in the U.S without the use of violence, even though it will take much longer. We've got a democratic Congress, which isn't a blanket solution, but it's a step that provides hope for getting there "Eventually". And so long as we have that, I don't think anyone in the U.S should be talking about violent uprising while a peaceful means of resolution is still possible. The U.S populace is nowhere near as pissed off as the arab population in the middle-east. I think that if America is pushed towards that point, it still has the potential to force change as a last resort, and it's good that it takes that much to push America to violent civil war because the consequences are so dire. I vaguely remember a phrase quoted here on slashdot: "Soapbox, ballot box, ammo box, to be used in that order."
The insurgents in Iraq are indeed being exterminated in large numbers, along with a large number of bystanders, for a small amount of American lives. However, the Iraq War is not going well, and there is a very good chance that the insurgents will achieve their goal of ousting an American presence due to the calls for withdrawal at home. It's dependent on the "homefront" will to stay there despite the cost.
So a revolution here wouldn't require killing everybody on the other side, just depleting their will to continue the war, via economic or political drain.
Summing up and getting to the original point of discussion, having an effective 2nd amendment can still result in a populace that is capable of armed revolution against a modern army. The kill ratio isn't necessarily a measurement of victory. That's the only assertion I'm trying to make.
I used to agree, but the war in Iraq has made it apparent that I was wrong. Our professional army can't completely stop resistance.
Guerilla warfare still works very well against a government with limited political and fiscal resources. As long as they can't just mass-exterminate everything to get at you, it doesn't take much to put metal into skin, be it via gun, or IED. I hear there's still some hand-to-hand going on in Iraq.
I want that eye monitor thingie so I can pretend to be borg. Please?
Answer to this problem is more complicated than the tax code itself.
All those little tax breaks in case of _________ have a reason because some people weren't supposed to be affected by certain taxes, plus the extra tax in case of __________ also have reasons. These odd situations have valid pros and cons for having a rule setup for them. And it all just adds up. Sorta like feature bloat. It's trying to do to many things at once and gets complicated by the details until the system as a whole is dragged down.
Thankfully mine were quite simple, only took about 2-3 hours tops. But it must be horrifyingly burdensome for others. What I don't get, is why do I have to go through turbo-tax and it's like, instead of straight to the government?
I would agree that no one is born evil, but I would say they immediately start on their their path towards evil right after birth. It's then through the continual struggle of parenthood that children are steered away from their selfish or worse, malicious tendencies. Then through parentage they learn to accept society and how to redefine their goals behind the individual good and accept some level of value in a common good.
I remember the announcement as well that the console sales are now generating a profit(less than 10 bucks IIRC, less than the per unit profit Nintendo is getting, but still a profit). I could google up a source for you, but then, you could do the same just as easily. And like you and the other poster, I too would bet that the MS gaming division has yet to make up for the amount of money sunk into it. It has made considerable headway in that regard though over the Xbox predecessor.
I agree with parent, I'd also like to add that part of the difficulty in some of the older games has a very different nature than difficulty in today's games.
Less rigorous inspection(smaller teams, smaller budget, smaller dev cycles) allowed situations to occur in gameplay that lacked playtesting and feedback. Difficulty in today's games are supposed to be a challenge, but due to player fallibility rather than wrestling with fate. Players hate feeling helpless.
For example, when gameplay revolves around luck conditions and the CPU gets a huge bonus to their luck. Players like to win based on their manipulation of the game, rather than leaving their fate to random chance. Randomness is good when it provides unpredictability in the gameplay as a challenge, but it is BAD when the outcome is predictable, because the outcome is against you the majority of the time.
Even the perception is important. A frustration about a recent game "Lost Planet" was that players felt like they had no control, a feature that the japanese developers implemented intentionally. The large monsters cause the player to be stunned or stumble about, even knocked down. This upset players because they were put into these helpless positions even with an already sluggish movement speed against lightning-fast monsters. However, the developers accounted for all this, and every stun-situation that resulted in a player being hit was avoidable. Every stun-situation that was not avoidable, had the boss monster wait and give the player time to recover and have a split-second to dodge. The problem was that the stun masked this and made it appear as though the damage was inevitable and that the player was helpless. Those who finish the game realize this thin but important difference, but many become discouraged and upset early on since it appeared as though there was nothing they could have done to improve.
U.S has enough problems of its own, by it's own hand or otherwise. We don't have the resources to stabilize Iraq, for that matter, how's Afganistan doing? Go ask China to police the world. Once we manage to fix the problems that are over here, then we can talk about fixing things halfway around the world. If we can't fix what's over here, we sure as hell can't do jack over there.
American resources should go to American problems first.
Auto-aim is present in the majority of console shooters, and those games are selling just fine. The effectiveness of the auto-aim varies from game to game, and the game mechanics themselves are sometimes adjusted to de-emphasize aiming as the principle factor in victory for console shooters.
Why? Because it's true, KB+M > control sticks as an input. These changes are put in there to make up for the handicap. If MS would just let KB+M mouse be implemented for the Xbox360, then that's what would be the primary input, but MS doesn't want to let that happen.
True Crime: Streets of NYC may have tried to mimic NYC's streets like True Crime: Streets of LA.
However, GTAIV is not set in NYC, it's set in Liberty City, an imaginary city that's just taking thematic inspirations from existing cities.
It's also the alien UFO door sound in X-COM by Microprose.