Why doesn't the USA do the same? Think about what Norway has and the USA does not. Norway has hydroelectric coming out their ears. The USA does not.
What's green energy and grows all over the USA? Sounds like the start of a joke, and I guess it is. The answer is corn. While Norway has been building hydro dams for practically centuries now the USA had to look for other means to get green energy.
I've heard that burning coal to charge electric cars would be greener than burning gasoline in cars. That's great but that means being able to burn coal. Can we use nuclear power? Of course not, because reasons. Wind power? Sure, that works. Or it does until some fuckwits complain of dead birds.
What about solar power? Well, until about last week solar power was too expensive. It takes time to deploy solar power. We'd also need to keep the fuckwits silent on complaints of disturbing the desert turtles or some shit.
Nuclear power? That's a great idea. Only we have fuckwits complaining.
Not many people complain about corn ethanol though. Sure would be nice to have more of that. What's stopping us? I've heard from people in the industry that it's simple. The ATF is stopping it. Thanks to the holdovers from Prohibition that is the ATF if you want to brew ethanol for fuel, and not risk getting shot for it by government agents, you need an army of lawyers and inspectors to make sure everything is on the level. That costs money, lots of it. It's just easier to burn gasoline.
I'd say that Prohibition set back bio-fuels more than 100 years. The USA might not have hydro power like Norway for their cars but they got corn. The ATF is a joke of an agency, get rid of them and perhaps we'd see some real investment in bio-fuels rather than the government paying them to make the ethanol only to tax and inspect them for doing so.
Maybe corn is not the solution but it sure would be nice to see if it works. Just like with wind, solar, and nuclear, it would be nice to try those too without some government agency looking to shut them down. I guess the EPA is easier to deal with than the ATF, the EPA will fire off lawsuits and fines but the ATF fires with real bullets. Get rid of the fuckwits, or just a government with enough of a spine to ignore them. Then maybe we'll see green energy in the USA.
Then I will summarize. Is the realization of the need to have critical theory taught in high school a result of exposure to mixed cultures, problems of those mixed cultures in their own state and neighboring states, an inherent need to understand cause and effect from a volatile industry like agriculture, and high rates of exposure to high school education?
Is there another state has both the proximity to these problems and yet still an arm's length distance from it to see them from the outside? I won't say that this is something that cannot be realized in another state since I'm certain that others could come to the same conclusion anywhere in the USA. I only say that it is interesting this made it to print in Iowa, perhaps due to being something of greater importance, and discussed more openly where it could not elsewhere.
Another theory, eating corn fed pork results in higher rates of high school graduation.
I'm pretty sure I was moderated down for offending someone's feelings. Facts don't care about your feelings.
Seems to me that there is in fact a set of crazy beliefs that are better than another set of crazy beliefs. One set encourages discovering the world that their imaginary friend created for them, which requires critical thinking. The other believes that their imaginary friend will bend the world in their favor if only they pray hard enough.
Let's compare the views of these two imaginary friends on a topic like same sex marriage. The first one says two things, don't do it and follow secular law. I can look up chapter and verse if you insist. The second? Kill those that do it in the most humiliating and public way possible. I'm pretty sure I can find chapter and verse on that too.
Or, think of the politics of this. A politician may vote the way I like because it's the right thing to do. A politician may vote the way I like because their imaginary friend tells them to. I don't much care why they voted this way, only that they did. Turns out that the followers of one imaginary friend tends to produce generally peaceful and productive societies and the followers of the other imaginary friend does not. Given the choice between the two I'd prefer those with the peaceful imaginary friend over the not so peaceful imaginary friend.
Oh, to repeat how this is relevant, this peaceful imaginary friend is not antagonistic to things like critical thinking, unlike the other.
You might prefer a world without imaginary friends but that's not the world we live in.
That's the problem with abolishing public schools. Who's going to take their place?
What of a failed public school? How is that fixed? If you close it then something has to take it's place. What's that going to be? Another public school? The only solution is to not establish public schools in the first place.
It's going to be mostly religious schools, often extremist, and a very few very expensive high-quality private schools.
That's unfortunately the risk you run. Parents should still have the choice on which school to send their children to, or not send them to school at all. Parents would only send their children to indoctrination centers like these extremist schools if given no choice (much like many public school systems), out of ignorance of what goes on there (also much like many public schools), or because they agree with what is taught.
I've talked to people that grew up in places with few private schools. All the schools suck. There's also always one where the misfits that were barred from the other schools end up. That school is just a government funded babysitter or perhaps more accurately a pseudo-prison where students have to be checked for weapons at the door. Is that the kind of school any parent would willingly send their children?
I don't see the problems that you do of having only private schools. There is a lot of evidence of private schools excelling over public schools. In places where people have demanded the freedom to send their children to private schools, or educate them at home, this is fought by the government. Why is that? Do they fear that the students might get a superior education? I know what they fear, losing their jobs. If they had to compete for their teaching jobs would they be able to do so? Not likely. If they thought public schools were the pinnacle of education then they'd welcome private education, or at least be ambivalent about it. They should be confident that students of a public school will prove to be highly educated, highly successful, and very productive.
Will there be some students indoctrinated with religious beliefs that any "civilized society" (however you wish to define that) would find abhorrent? Of course. The freedom to succeed requires the freedom to fail. Public schools are not allowed to fail, therefore they will never succeed.
Also, we'd have to only separate the plastic into two piles, not several. We separate the chlorine containing plastics from those that don't. We can burn one pile. The other pile, maybe burn that too but in a facility equipped to contain the chlorine. Where do we put the chlorine? Recycle that. Put it in new plastics, use it for water treatment, whatever.
PVC can be recycled, though I question the economics of it. We could also burn it without separation from other plastics but this means building all plastic burning facilities to handle the chlorine, and depending on the relative costs of separation may in fact be the better option.
I remember my chemistry professor in college commenting on the stupidity of recycling plastic. We haul around this plastic and burn a lot of fuel doing it. As I recall the neighboring city was at the time proposing a waste burning power plant. Made sense to me. Burn the plastic so we're not just burning more oil to keep moving it around.
I know the adage, any simple solution to a complex problem is often wrong. I'm trying to see the failure in this simple solution.
I understand that these plastic burning facilities have to be built, and we're still carrying plastic to these facilities, but it's not like we don't need the energy anyway or haul fuel to the power plants. We'd be moving the plastic but we don't have to be terribly concerned about separating one kind of plastic from another. All plastic will burn. Paper does too. Burn it all. Separate out the metal and glass, then burn the rest. Rubber, paper, wood, cloth, plastic, just burn it.
Recycling of most things is just stupid, my chemistry professor told me so.
Really? Afghanistan has kept modern armies from invading with little more than riflemen on the backs of camels.
The United States got their freedom from a nation with the largest and most powerful military in the world at the time. They had farmers with turkey guns, on foot.
Off topic? Let's see. We have an article that points out that we need more people in the USA with a critical view of what they are told. What happens when you have a population that lacks a public taught critical thought?
One example, USA. Predominately Christian, about 70%. People are generally free to seek whatever education for their children as they wish. Highly literate, some estimates give 85%, some give 99%. I don't know where this large range comes from but they both agree that the difference between male and female literacy is small to effectively non-existent. To get into the armed forces one must have a high school education, or equivalent, meet minimum requirements on intelligence and moral character. This results in a US Army where every soldier going in has at least the basic idea of cause and effect, and every soldier can at least hit a fucking target with a rifle.
Another example, Iraq. Predominately Muslim, over 90%. People lack the basic freedom to seek the education they wish. Schools are largely funded by Muslims for the purpose of teaching Islam. Literacy among men is about 85%, and women 70%. To get in the armed forces it appears one must be able to read and do some pushups. The standards on moral character are, shall we say, lax. They will allow child molesters and wife beaters to remain in the armed forces, and be in command of others. They will keep soldiers on the payroll that will state with a straight face that prayer will allow them to hit a target with their rifle.
What happens when the basics of critical thought are lost on a nation? We get Iraq, a nation that is held together with foreign money and a handful of indigenous people that know that prayer will not send a bullet to the intended target. In the USA this concept of critical thought slips in the slightest and it's considered a national crisis. In Iraq the lack of critical thought is the norm and those people run their military.
How can I say that this is how the Iraqi military is run? Because this soldier was not slapped across the face by his superiors for stating that his faith would make him a better shot.
Interesting where this article comes from. A little state like Iowa had the idea that we should be teaching critical thought in public schools. Why would it come from there?
I have a theory. Iowa sits between the Bible Belt and the socialists in Illinois and Minnesota. A quick internet search tells me that there's a mix of Protestants, Catholics, atheists/non-religious, and even a few Muslims. They've seen the disasters from the religious right to the south and the liberal left to the north. What separates the indoctrination of the Muslims that are becoming problematic in Minnesota from the problems of the Christian doctrine in Missouri? Could that be having a critical view of both?
Why isn't this coming from a predominately urban or secular state? 80% of Iowans identify as Christian. Could it be the large agricultural community? I mean farmers, ranchers, and those that depend on them, must have a very real understanding of cause and effect that might not be so apparent in urban communities. An urban society is insulated from things like a drought affecting their income like a rural community. They don't see this cause and effect like people that have to deal with bad weather and the lasting effect it can have on them.
I had to look at how many people in Iowa completed high school compared to other states. To my surprise Iowa is at the top, 90%. So, how did Iowa do on rates of college graduates? 26%, which is average or perhaps a bit below average. Interesting.
Maybe those hicks in fly-over country aren't so backwards after all. What's the definition of a farmer? A man out standing in his field.
Not all states, or nations, are equal on this. Yes, I was educated in a private school. This happened only because my parents has the wealth to pay for my private education (and the public education of their neighbors from their taxes) and personal beliefs that I should not attend a public school.
It took me, just me, from hundreds or thousands of people to have enough of an education of critical thinking to pose a question that should have been obvious to anyone with a similar education. I guess that makes me part of the 1%. We hear a lot of people getting upset of the wealth and power of the 1%. Did these people have the education to realize that maybe these people are the 1% because they got a better education from not attending sub-par public schools?
Do these people have the education to realize that, mathematically speaking, there will always be a top 1%? If we allow 99% of the people to get this shitty education from public schools then we will inevitably get ignorant fools get dragged around by their nose by anyone that can create a half-assed argument to hate the "others".
It seems the public school system, like every other system built on the same ideals, is starting to eat their own. They now see that this indoctrination of the public from the public school system is creating a public that can be lead by the opposition. If they begin to teach critical thought in schools then we might just have people learn that public schools aren't such a great idea after all. If taught to question everything then they might just question the very structures that taught them.
This is the beginning of the end of public education.
Oh, and this:
Regarding public schools teaching horrible things, what exactly prevents private schools from teaching horrible things?
Parental choice, competition, a free market. It will soon become obvious which private schools teach their children well and those that do not. Those that do poorly will fail. A public school that does poorly cannot fail because they have no competition in an area were public education is the only choice. Improving public schools to the level of a private school is near impossible. A bad private school can fall in a single year. A bad public school can continue so long as there is ink in the press that prints the currency.
The separation of church and state was not to keep religion from government but from government to stay out of religion. Both are important, which I hope is obvious.
The separation of church and state is often misinterpreted as "freedom from religion" as opposed to "freedom of religion". What has happened is we see students and teachers in public schools punished for wearing a cross on a necklace, or praying silently before a meal. That is not what separation of church and state was intended to do.
We saw same sex marriage become law. That in itself is meaningless in the separation of church and state. What we are seeing now, and we were warned would come, is now churches being compelled to perform same sex weddings. The legal argument is that a preacher is performing a civil act when witnessing a marriage, therefore by denying the act of witnessing a civil marriage the preacher is discriminating based on religious belief.
The same sex marriage people did not ask the government to stop recognizing religious wedding ceremonies, which is what has happened in many other nations that had this same separation of church and state. They wanted religious ceremonies to become a civil act.
If you want your government fact separated from religious fiction then I'm fine with that. Keep the government out of the church, God damn it!
In theory they could. In reality, those who actually do push for such laws are almost entirely motivated by religion. They're much more alike than similar in that regard.
I remember a few lessons from a religion class I had at a private Catholic high school. The reason they stuck with me is that the rules in the Holy Bible weren't all arbitrary if one thinks them through. This was made clear in one of the lessons in that religion class. The lesson was simple, imagine being stranded on an island and having to create a government for this new civilization. There's no guarantee of being rescued anytime soon so what rules you write now have to make a long lasting civilization.
So, what rules did we come up with? Don't kill people. Don't take other people's stuff. Set aside a small portion of your labors for those that can't work. And so on. What we came up with was basically the rules taught in the Bible. Was this a reflection of our prior teaching as students in a Catholic school? Or, was it an understanding of human nature and how the world works? I say it's both.
There's plenty of superfluous stuff in the Bible that can be ignored in a modern world, but a complete disregard of the wisdom compiled in the Bible is dangerous for society. Much of the Bible is a shortcut to the philosophy of a functioning society for those that lack the mental capacity to think it all through, children mostly but even adults can benefit from this. I've seen atheist just marvel at the compiled wisdom of the Bible. They don't believe a bit of the whole supreme being thing but they recognize the wisdom contained in Christian beliefs.
If you feel the need to scoff at Christian habits and doctrine then I suggest you take the time to think of what would happen to society if these beliefs were not followed over many iterations. I thought of giving an example but stopped myself as that might distract from my point. Take a top five of Christian beliefs you believe are mock worthy. Now iterate them over generations. I expect that you will find that at least one, if not all five, will not do well for society.
You can make fun of Judaeo-Christian habits, doctrines, and beliefs if you like but the modern world we live in is based on what those beliefs have encouraged and allowed. Much of what we understand of genetics and astronomy came from Catholics. Even the word "university" comes from the tradition of sending people off to learn of what they believe God created.
Compare this with other religions. Picking one at random we have Islam as an example. They believe in an all powerful god, capable of doing anything for people so long as people believe in this god and worship him with sufficient vigor.
An example. An Army friend of mine got called up to go "play in the sand" and part of his duties while there was to train the local soldiers how to shoot a rifle. This is something that in the US Armed Forces an enlisted person is expected to master in a week or three of intense training.
He saw this indigenous soldier shoot wildly at the target before him and stopped him to ask what he thought he was doing. He said that all he had to do was shoot in the general direction and his god would make the bullets find their target. How do you create a prosperous, or even functioning, society with that thinking?
There's even a term for this idea of hard work relating to prosperity, "Protestant work ethic". Sure, this work ethic comes with a lot of baggage from an imaginary friend in the sky. I'll take that if it means people are free to question the nature of the universe, free to teach their daughters how to read, and think that "God helps those that help themselves". This isn't a binary here, you believe in causality or you believe in a god. Both can be true at once. People can understand that there are rules to the universe and that there is a god that is worthy of worship. So what if it means taking a few hours a week to pray to nothing. At least they aren't praying for their god to bring them success in life.
I'm in this college course, Modern Western Civilization, or something like that. When we get to the chapter on the years leading up to World War II we are told about the horrendous stuff taught to children in public schools by the now dominant National Socialist party. Things like mathematics problems on how much money has to be taken from the able bodied workers to pay for the care of the invalids. When these children grow up they will have learned that it's just math, we have to kill the mentally retarded or they will bring down the country. That's terrible, right? The public schools being used like that is just terrible.
Then next week comes the chapter on the post war period. We're taught on how the UK had this "lost generation" from all the people killed and injured in the war. To combat this problem what did the UK government do? Well, they set up public schools to make sure all the orphaned and single parent children got an education in a time of need.
So, I raised my hand and asked what I thought was a simple question. What kept the public schools in the UK from indoctrinating the children like what happened in pre-war Germany?
The professor asked me to repeat the question, and I did. What kept the UK public schools from teaching horrible things to children like the proto-Nazis did? He thought for a second, waved me off like he didn't have time for that, and moved on with his lecture.
I saw this as not only a failure of past public schools but also of the present. I was in a room with 20 or so students that were presumably largely educated by public high schools and no one thought to ask this same question. Even more damning is this professor, with a doctorate in history and years of teaching this same course, was not prepared to answer this question. That tells me that while he was doing his studies he didn't have a classmate ask this question, he didn't think to ask this question, and none of his previous students thought to ask this question.
I'm quite certain I know the answer. There was nothing to keep post-war UK public schools from teaching horrendous things to children. Public schools can only take people's money for education and add the government slant to everything taught, even mathematics, and skim a bit off the top of that money for the administration of the schools. Does a lack of public schools mean children are left ignorant? Unlikely, that money taken from the people to educate their children in public schools is only diluted with government bureaucracy and indoctrination. Even if you have some parents that would rather spend that money on beer and horse races means that at least the public schools are teaching EVERY child what we'd rather not have them taught.
Public schools are inherently bad. There is no way to fix them. The government should not be teaching your children. You should be free to choose who teaches your children. There were schools before the government came along to fund them. Quite good schools too. High schools used to teach people to be a capable workforce. Education beyond high school was quite rare until fairly recently. Now we have people with doctorates in history unable to answer a simple question from an ignorant undergrad student taught in a private high school.
I have to wonder if I got a better education in a private high school than that professor got in graduate school.
Look at the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution. Now look at the Fifth Amendment. Understand those? The Fourth says the government can't just bust open your door and go looking for stuff, they need a warrant. The Fifth says they can take your stuff, but only after they've either determined you've had your day in court or they've compensated you for it.
Now, look at the Second Amendment. All that says is that the Fourth and Fifth Amendment applies to your weapons too. The Second Amendment can be repealed but that does not allow the government to go searching houses and taking people weapons. The people still have the right to keep their stuff, guns included.
What keeps government agents from just using strong arm tactics and breaking the rules on confiscating the guns any way? The risk of getting shot for trying. Oh, you think that people can't just shoot a cop and get away with it? That's where the Fourth and Fifth Amendments come in again. The government has to give the accused their day in open court. What keeps them from violating that rule too? The risk of getting shot.
The Second Amendment is redundant. Those that know the law also know it's redundant. Those that don't understand this think that repeal of the Second Amendment would make them safe from getting shot too. Tell me, what's a weapon? In truth just about anything is a weapon. If we have a government that capable of taking your guns then they are capable of taking anything you own.
The Constitution says, "this is mine and you can't have it", while the Second Amendment just adds an exclamation point to that statement.
The USA is a federation of independent states. The people don't elect POTUS and VPOTUS, the states do. The concept of a federation has been watered down considerably when we got popular election of US senators and a federal income tax. Since then the federal government can easily circumvent the states by appealing to the public at large with tax incentives, and coerce the states into compliance by withholding taxes they collected directly from the people.
There is a triad in the federal government to keep it in check of a separation of judicial, executive, and legislative powers. There is another triad of checks, bypassed somewhat with the 16th and 17th Amendments, between the states, federal, and the people.
If we lose the electoral college then the state governments become largely redundant, the states become just administrative areas of a national government.
What is interesting is how the federal government has been brought back into check. The first one that I see was the repeal of Prohibition. The states simply refused to comply with a federal mandate to prohibit the sale of alcohol. We're seeing it now again with marijuana. How long can the states openly violate federal law before the federal government must assert its (supposed) authority, or the federal government backs down and admits defeat? States breaking federal laws, and not being punished for it, puts all federal laws up to question.
I believe that federal marijuana prohibitions will fall before Trump leaves office. And that would be a good thing for states' rights.
The USA was never designed to be a democracy. The founders of this federation feared democracies since they knew their history. True democracies cannot stand forever. Some things must simply not be left up to public vote, natural law will have to be greater than the public vote or it all falls apart eventually.
What would this James Bond villain do with his nuclear reactor on an artificial island? Threaten to sell electricity at below market prices or.... not?
In the grandparent post I saw links to a number of very interesting articles on how nuclear power is the only solution to the problem of greenhouse gas emissions. The parent post is just ad hominem. Interesting isn't it?
You can claim that wind and solar power is the solution to our greenhouse gas problem but without some kind of data that claim is rather empty, no? Sure, we do in fact see plenty of wind and solar power capacity being developed. In fact I see windmill parts being transported down the interstate daily where I live. I will not dispute the increasing pace of wind and solar energy deployment. What I dispute is the economics of it all. Not just in dollars and cents but in the greenhouse gas emitted.
Nuclear already has a lower greenhouse gas emission rate per energy produce than solar and is on par with wind and hydro. I know the argument, when solar power hits its stride then the greenhouse gas emissions will drop. That's fine, I'll go with that. What happens though when nuclear power hits its stride? It's lower than solar now, what happens when we see cement and steel for the next nuclear reactor getting produced from nuclear power?
Another argument is how energy storage will make wind and solar reliable enough to keep the lights on 24/7 instead of when the sun shines and wind blows. I ask this, what do you think that same electric storage technology could do if paired with an already inherently reliable energy source like nuclear power? I hear the argument on how a failure of a large nuclear power plant could render large areas without power. Sure, that could happen. That would happen now, that is, since we have a "dumb" grid and no storage. What happens if we pair nuclear power with a "smart" grid and battery storage? Or with, what seems to be everyone's favorite energy storage, pumped hydroelectric? Hydroelectric dams are already used now for load following, seasonal scale storage, and such for nuclear power. Just ask the Tennessee Valley Authority. I've seen the facility.
The argument against nuclear seems to me rides on the idea that it is somehow separated from technologies like grid scale battery storage and "smart" grids. Nuclear power can have those things too. Solar and wind as energy sources are impossible without storage and enough "smarts" to manage it all, nuclear does not need them. What happens though if these storage and "smart" technologies are mated with nuclear power then we have something far safer, cheaper, and "greener" than anything solar and wind could do.
That's fine though. Keep claiming that wind and solar will win in the end. I see a different future. A future powered by nuclear reactors.
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Can you elaborate? If it's not the left telling people to shut up and the right telling people to keep talking then how does it work?
Why doesn't the USA do the same? Think about what Norway has and the USA does not. Norway has hydroelectric coming out their ears. The USA does not.
What's green energy and grows all over the USA? Sounds like the start of a joke, and I guess it is. The answer is corn. While Norway has been building hydro dams for practically centuries now the USA had to look for other means to get green energy.
I've heard that burning coal to charge electric cars would be greener than burning gasoline in cars. That's great but that means being able to burn coal. Can we use nuclear power? Of course not, because reasons. Wind power? Sure, that works. Or it does until some fuckwits complain of dead birds.
What about solar power? Well, until about last week solar power was too expensive. It takes time to deploy solar power. We'd also need to keep the fuckwits silent on complaints of disturbing the desert turtles or some shit.
Nuclear power? That's a great idea. Only we have fuckwits complaining.
Not many people complain about corn ethanol though. Sure would be nice to have more of that. What's stopping us? I've heard from people in the industry that it's simple. The ATF is stopping it. Thanks to the holdovers from Prohibition that is the ATF if you want to brew ethanol for fuel, and not risk getting shot for it by government agents, you need an army of lawyers and inspectors to make sure everything is on the level. That costs money, lots of it. It's just easier to burn gasoline.
I'd say that Prohibition set back bio-fuels more than 100 years. The USA might not have hydro power like Norway for their cars but they got corn. The ATF is a joke of an agency, get rid of them and perhaps we'd see some real investment in bio-fuels rather than the government paying them to make the ethanol only to tax and inspect them for doing so.
Maybe corn is not the solution but it sure would be nice to see if it works. Just like with wind, solar, and nuclear, it would be nice to try those too without some government agency looking to shut them down. I guess the EPA is easier to deal with than the ATF, the EPA will fire off lawsuits and fines but the ATF fires with real bullets. Get rid of the fuckwits, or just a government with enough of a spine to ignore them. Then maybe we'll see green energy in the USA.
Then I will summarize. Is the realization of the need to have critical theory taught in high school a result of exposure to mixed cultures, problems of those mixed cultures in their own state and neighboring states, an inherent need to understand cause and effect from a volatile industry like agriculture, and high rates of exposure to high school education?
Is there another state has both the proximity to these problems and yet still an arm's length distance from it to see them from the outside? I won't say that this is something that cannot be realized in another state since I'm certain that others could come to the same conclusion anywhere in the USA. I only say that it is interesting this made it to print in Iowa, perhaps due to being something of greater importance, and discussed more openly where it could not elsewhere.
Another theory, eating corn fed pork results in higher rates of high school graduation.
In other words, the political left says to shut up while the political right says to keep talking.
Is that about right?
Is that such a bad state to be in?
I'm pretty sure I was moderated down for offending someone's feelings. Facts don't care about your feelings.
Seems to me that there is in fact a set of crazy beliefs that are better than another set of crazy beliefs. One set encourages discovering the world that their imaginary friend created for them, which requires critical thinking. The other believes that their imaginary friend will bend the world in their favor if only they pray hard enough.
Let's compare the views of these two imaginary friends on a topic like same sex marriage. The first one says two things, don't do it and follow secular law. I can look up chapter and verse if you insist. The second? Kill those that do it in the most humiliating and public way possible. I'm pretty sure I can find chapter and verse on that too.
Or, think of the politics of this. A politician may vote the way I like because it's the right thing to do. A politician may vote the way I like because their imaginary friend tells them to. I don't much care why they voted this way, only that they did. Turns out that the followers of one imaginary friend tends to produce generally peaceful and productive societies and the followers of the other imaginary friend does not. Given the choice between the two I'd prefer those with the peaceful imaginary friend over the not so peaceful imaginary friend.
Oh, to repeat how this is relevant, this peaceful imaginary friend is not antagonistic to things like critical thinking, unlike the other.
You might prefer a world without imaginary friends but that's not the world we live in.
That's the problem with abolishing public schools. Who's going to take their place?
What of a failed public school? How is that fixed? If you close it then something has to take it's place. What's that going to be? Another public school? The only solution is to not establish public schools in the first place.
It's going to be mostly religious schools, often extremist, and a very few very expensive high-quality private schools.
That's unfortunately the risk you run. Parents should still have the choice on which school to send their children to, or not send them to school at all. Parents would only send their children to indoctrination centers like these extremist schools if given no choice (much like many public school systems), out of ignorance of what goes on there (also much like many public schools), or because they agree with what is taught.
I've talked to people that grew up in places with few private schools. All the schools suck. There's also always one where the misfits that were barred from the other schools end up. That school is just a government funded babysitter or perhaps more accurately a pseudo-prison where students have to be checked for weapons at the door. Is that the kind of school any parent would willingly send their children?
I don't see the problems that you do of having only private schools. There is a lot of evidence of private schools excelling over public schools. In places where people have demanded the freedom to send their children to private schools, or educate them at home, this is fought by the government. Why is that? Do they fear that the students might get a superior education? I know what they fear, losing their jobs. If they had to compete for their teaching jobs would they be able to do so? Not likely. If they thought public schools were the pinnacle of education then they'd welcome private education, or at least be ambivalent about it. They should be confident that students of a public school will prove to be highly educated, highly successful, and very productive.
Will there be some students indoctrinated with religious beliefs that any "civilized society" (however you wish to define that) would find abhorrent? Of course. The freedom to succeed requires the freedom to fail. Public schools are not allowed to fail, therefore they will never succeed.
Recycling is a complex process, burning is not.
Also, we'd have to only separate the plastic into two piles, not several. We separate the chlorine containing plastics from those that don't. We can burn one pile. The other pile, maybe burn that too but in a facility equipped to contain the chlorine. Where do we put the chlorine? Recycle that. Put it in new plastics, use it for water treatment, whatever.
PVC can be recycled, though I question the economics of it. We could also burn it without separation from other plastics but this means building all plastic burning facilities to handle the chlorine, and depending on the relative costs of separation may in fact be the better option.
I remember my chemistry professor in college commenting on the stupidity of recycling plastic. We haul around this plastic and burn a lot of fuel doing it. As I recall the neighboring city was at the time proposing a waste burning power plant. Made sense to me. Burn the plastic so we're not just burning more oil to keep moving it around.
I know the adage, any simple solution to a complex problem is often wrong. I'm trying to see the failure in this simple solution.
I understand that these plastic burning facilities have to be built, and we're still carrying plastic to these facilities, but it's not like we don't need the energy anyway or haul fuel to the power plants. We'd be moving the plastic but we don't have to be terribly concerned about separating one kind of plastic from another. All plastic will burn. Paper does too. Burn it all. Separate out the metal and glass, then burn the rest. Rubber, paper, wood, cloth, plastic, just burn it.
Recycling of most things is just stupid, my chemistry professor told me so.
Really? Afghanistan has kept modern armies from invading with little more than riflemen on the backs of camels.
The United States got their freedom from a nation with the largest and most powerful military in the world at the time. They had farmers with turkey guns, on foot.
Off topic? Let's see. We have an article that points out that we need more people in the USA with a critical view of what they are told. What happens when you have a population that lacks a public taught critical thought?
One example, USA. Predominately Christian, about 70%. People are generally free to seek whatever education for their children as they wish. Highly literate, some estimates give 85%, some give 99%. I don't know where this large range comes from but they both agree that the difference between male and female literacy is small to effectively non-existent. To get into the armed forces one must have a high school education, or equivalent, meet minimum requirements on intelligence and moral character. This results in a US Army where every soldier going in has at least the basic idea of cause and effect, and every soldier can at least hit a fucking target with a rifle.
Another example, Iraq. Predominately Muslim, over 90%. People lack the basic freedom to seek the education they wish. Schools are largely funded by Muslims for the purpose of teaching Islam. Literacy among men is about 85%, and women 70%. To get in the armed forces it appears one must be able to read and do some pushups. The standards on moral character are, shall we say, lax. They will allow child molesters and wife beaters to remain in the armed forces, and be in command of others. They will keep soldiers on the payroll that will state with a straight face that prayer will allow them to hit a target with their rifle.
What happens when the basics of critical thought are lost on a nation? We get Iraq, a nation that is held together with foreign money and a handful of indigenous people that know that prayer will not send a bullet to the intended target. In the USA this concept of critical thought slips in the slightest and it's considered a national crisis. In Iraq the lack of critical thought is the norm and those people run their military.
How can I say that this is how the Iraqi military is run? Because this soldier was not slapped across the face by his superiors for stating that his faith would make him a better shot.
Interesting where this article comes from. A little state like Iowa had the idea that we should be teaching critical thought in public schools. Why would it come from there?
I have a theory. Iowa sits between the Bible Belt and the socialists in Illinois and Minnesota. A quick internet search tells me that there's a mix of Protestants, Catholics, atheists/non-religious, and even a few Muslims. They've seen the disasters from the religious right to the south and the liberal left to the north. What separates the indoctrination of the Muslims that are becoming problematic in Minnesota from the problems of the Christian doctrine in Missouri? Could that be having a critical view of both?
Why isn't this coming from a predominately urban or secular state? 80% of Iowans identify as Christian. Could it be the large agricultural community? I mean farmers, ranchers, and those that depend on them, must have a very real understanding of cause and effect that might not be so apparent in urban communities. An urban society is insulated from things like a drought affecting their income like a rural community. They don't see this cause and effect like people that have to deal with bad weather and the lasting effect it can have on them.
I had to look at how many people in Iowa completed high school compared to other states. To my surprise Iowa is at the top, 90%. So, how did Iowa do on rates of college graduates? 26%, which is average or perhaps a bit below average. Interesting.
Maybe those hicks in fly-over country aren't so backwards after all. What's the definition of a farmer? A man out standing in his field.
Interesting that you found the same thing and yet my grandparent post was moderated down. Why was that, I ask? Moderated down for too much truth?
Not all states, or nations, are equal on this. Yes, I was educated in a private school. This happened only because my parents has the wealth to pay for my private education (and the public education of their neighbors from their taxes) and personal beliefs that I should not attend a public school.
It took me, just me, from hundreds or thousands of people to have enough of an education of critical thinking to pose a question that should have been obvious to anyone with a similar education. I guess that makes me part of the 1%. We hear a lot of people getting upset of the wealth and power of the 1%. Did these people have the education to realize that maybe these people are the 1% because they got a better education from not attending sub-par public schools?
Do these people have the education to realize that, mathematically speaking, there will always be a top 1%? If we allow 99% of the people to get this shitty education from public schools then we will inevitably get ignorant fools get dragged around by their nose by anyone that can create a half-assed argument to hate the "others".
It seems the public school system, like every other system built on the same ideals, is starting to eat their own. They now see that this indoctrination of the public from the public school system is creating a public that can be lead by the opposition. If they begin to teach critical thought in schools then we might just have people learn that public schools aren't such a great idea after all. If taught to question everything then they might just question the very structures that taught them.
This is the beginning of the end of public education.
Oh, and this:
Regarding public schools teaching horrible things, what exactly prevents private schools from teaching horrible things?
Parental choice, competition, a free market. It will soon become obvious which private schools teach their children well and those that do not. Those that do poorly will fail. A public school that does poorly cannot fail because they have no competition in an area were public education is the only choice. Improving public schools to the level of a private school is near impossible. A bad private school can fall in a single year. A bad public school can continue so long as there is ink in the press that prints the currency.
The separation of church and state was not to keep religion from government but from government to stay out of religion. Both are important, which I hope is obvious.
The separation of church and state is often misinterpreted as "freedom from religion" as opposed to "freedom of religion". What has happened is we see students and teachers in public schools punished for wearing a cross on a necklace, or praying silently before a meal. That is not what separation of church and state was intended to do.
We saw same sex marriage become law. That in itself is meaningless in the separation of church and state. What we are seeing now, and we were warned would come, is now churches being compelled to perform same sex weddings. The legal argument is that a preacher is performing a civil act when witnessing a marriage, therefore by denying the act of witnessing a civil marriage the preacher is discriminating based on religious belief.
The same sex marriage people did not ask the government to stop recognizing religious wedding ceremonies, which is what has happened in many other nations that had this same separation of church and state. They wanted religious ceremonies to become a civil act.
If you want your government fact separated from religious fiction then I'm fine with that. Keep the government out of the church, God damn it!
In theory they could. In reality, those who actually do push for such laws are almost entirely motivated by religion. They're much more alike than similar in that regard.
I remember a few lessons from a religion class I had at a private Catholic high school. The reason they stuck with me is that the rules in the Holy Bible weren't all arbitrary if one thinks them through. This was made clear in one of the lessons in that religion class. The lesson was simple, imagine being stranded on an island and having to create a government for this new civilization. There's no guarantee of being rescued anytime soon so what rules you write now have to make a long lasting civilization.
So, what rules did we come up with? Don't kill people. Don't take other people's stuff. Set aside a small portion of your labors for those that can't work. And so on. What we came up with was basically the rules taught in the Bible. Was this a reflection of our prior teaching as students in a Catholic school? Or, was it an understanding of human nature and how the world works? I say it's both.
There's plenty of superfluous stuff in the Bible that can be ignored in a modern world, but a complete disregard of the wisdom compiled in the Bible is dangerous for society. Much of the Bible is a shortcut to the philosophy of a functioning society for those that lack the mental capacity to think it all through, children mostly but even adults can benefit from this. I've seen atheist just marvel at the compiled wisdom of the Bible. They don't believe a bit of the whole supreme being thing but they recognize the wisdom contained in Christian beliefs.
If you feel the need to scoff at Christian habits and doctrine then I suggest you take the time to think of what would happen to society if these beliefs were not followed over many iterations. I thought of giving an example but stopped myself as that might distract from my point. Take a top five of Christian beliefs you believe are mock worthy. Now iterate them over generations. I expect that you will find that at least one, if not all five, will not do well for society.
I only believe it if someone in the YouTube comment section thinks it's shilling for some conspiracy.
That what "they" want you to think.
You can make fun of Judaeo-Christian habits, doctrines, and beliefs if you like but the modern world we live in is based on what those beliefs have encouraged and allowed. Much of what we understand of genetics and astronomy came from Catholics. Even the word "university" comes from the tradition of sending people off to learn of what they believe God created.
Compare this with other religions. Picking one at random we have Islam as an example. They believe in an all powerful god, capable of doing anything for people so long as people believe in this god and worship him with sufficient vigor.
An example. An Army friend of mine got called up to go "play in the sand" and part of his duties while there was to train the local soldiers how to shoot a rifle. This is something that in the US Armed Forces an enlisted person is expected to master in a week or three of intense training.
He saw this indigenous soldier shoot wildly at the target before him and stopped him to ask what he thought he was doing. He said that all he had to do was shoot in the general direction and his god would make the bullets find their target. How do you create a prosperous, or even functioning, society with that thinking?
There's even a term for this idea of hard work relating to prosperity, "Protestant work ethic". Sure, this work ethic comes with a lot of baggage from an imaginary friend in the sky. I'll take that if it means people are free to question the nature of the universe, free to teach their daughters how to read, and think that "God helps those that help themselves". This isn't a binary here, you believe in causality or you believe in a god. Both can be true at once. People can understand that there are rules to the universe and that there is a god that is worthy of worship. So what if it means taking a few hours a week to pray to nothing. At least they aren't praying for their god to bring them success in life.
I'm in this college course, Modern Western Civilization, or something like that. When we get to the chapter on the years leading up to World War II we are told about the horrendous stuff taught to children in public schools by the now dominant National Socialist party. Things like mathematics problems on how much money has to be taken from the able bodied workers to pay for the care of the invalids. When these children grow up they will have learned that it's just math, we have to kill the mentally retarded or they will bring down the country. That's terrible, right? The public schools being used like that is just terrible.
Then next week comes the chapter on the post war period. We're taught on how the UK had this "lost generation" from all the people killed and injured in the war. To combat this problem what did the UK government do? Well, they set up public schools to make sure all the orphaned and single parent children got an education in a time of need.
So, I raised my hand and asked what I thought was a simple question. What kept the public schools in the UK from indoctrinating the children like what happened in pre-war Germany?
The professor asked me to repeat the question, and I did. What kept the UK public schools from teaching horrible things to children like the proto-Nazis did? He thought for a second, waved me off like he didn't have time for that, and moved on with his lecture.
I saw this as not only a failure of past public schools but also of the present. I was in a room with 20 or so students that were presumably largely educated by public high schools and no one thought to ask this same question. Even more damning is this professor, with a doctorate in history and years of teaching this same course, was not prepared to answer this question. That tells me that while he was doing his studies he didn't have a classmate ask this question, he didn't think to ask this question, and none of his previous students thought to ask this question.
I'm quite certain I know the answer. There was nothing to keep post-war UK public schools from teaching horrendous things to children. Public schools can only take people's money for education and add the government slant to everything taught, even mathematics, and skim a bit off the top of that money for the administration of the schools. Does a lack of public schools mean children are left ignorant? Unlikely, that money taken from the people to educate their children in public schools is only diluted with government bureaucracy and indoctrination. Even if you have some parents that would rather spend that money on beer and horse races means that at least the public schools are teaching EVERY child what we'd rather not have them taught.
Public schools are inherently bad. There is no way to fix them. The government should not be teaching your children. You should be free to choose who teaches your children. There were schools before the government came along to fund them. Quite good schools too. High schools used to teach people to be a capable workforce. Education beyond high school was quite rare until fairly recently. Now we have people with doctorates in history unable to answer a simple question from an ignorant undergrad student taught in a private high school.
I have to wonder if I got a better education in a private high school than that professor got in graduate school.
Look at the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution. Now look at the Fifth Amendment. Understand those? The Fourth says the government can't just bust open your door and go looking for stuff, they need a warrant. The Fifth says they can take your stuff, but only after they've either determined you've had your day in court or they've compensated you for it.
Now, look at the Second Amendment. All that says is that the Fourth and Fifth Amendment applies to your weapons too. The Second Amendment can be repealed but that does not allow the government to go searching houses and taking people weapons. The people still have the right to keep their stuff, guns included.
What keeps government agents from just using strong arm tactics and breaking the rules on confiscating the guns any way? The risk of getting shot for trying. Oh, you think that people can't just shoot a cop and get away with it? That's where the Fourth and Fifth Amendments come in again. The government has to give the accused their day in open court. What keeps them from violating that rule too? The risk of getting shot.
The Second Amendment is redundant. Those that know the law also know it's redundant. Those that don't understand this think that repeal of the Second Amendment would make them safe from getting shot too. Tell me, what's a weapon? In truth just about anything is a weapon. If we have a government that capable of taking your guns then they are capable of taking anything you own.
The Constitution says, "this is mine and you can't have it", while the Second Amendment just adds an exclamation point to that statement.
The USA is a federation of independent states. The people don't elect POTUS and VPOTUS, the states do. The concept of a federation has been watered down considerably when we got popular election of US senators and a federal income tax. Since then the federal government can easily circumvent the states by appealing to the public at large with tax incentives, and coerce the states into compliance by withholding taxes they collected directly from the people.
There is a triad in the federal government to keep it in check of a separation of judicial, executive, and legislative powers. There is another triad of checks, bypassed somewhat with the 16th and 17th Amendments, between the states, federal, and the people.
If we lose the electoral college then the state governments become largely redundant, the states become just administrative areas of a national government.
What is interesting is how the federal government has been brought back into check. The first one that I see was the repeal of Prohibition. The states simply refused to comply with a federal mandate to prohibit the sale of alcohol. We're seeing it now again with marijuana. How long can the states openly violate federal law before the federal government must assert its (supposed) authority, or the federal government backs down and admits defeat? States breaking federal laws, and not being punished for it, puts all federal laws up to question.
I believe that federal marijuana prohibitions will fall before Trump leaves office. And that would be a good thing for states' rights.
The USA was never designed to be a democracy. The founders of this federation feared democracies since they knew their history. True democracies cannot stand forever. Some things must simply not be left up to public vote, natural law will have to be greater than the public vote or it all falls apart eventually.
Oh, I have no doubt that six more nuclear reactors will shutter in 2018. I also have little doubt we'll see at least ten new ones come online.
What would this James Bond villain do with his nuclear reactor on an artificial island? Threaten to sell electricity at below market prices or.... not?
Drain the water away.
In the grandparent post I saw links to a number of very interesting articles on how nuclear power is the only solution to the problem of greenhouse gas emissions. The parent post is just ad hominem. Interesting isn't it?
You can claim that wind and solar power is the solution to our greenhouse gas problem but without some kind of data that claim is rather empty, no? Sure, we do in fact see plenty of wind and solar power capacity being developed. In fact I see windmill parts being transported down the interstate daily where I live. I will not dispute the increasing pace of wind and solar energy deployment. What I dispute is the economics of it all. Not just in dollars and cents but in the greenhouse gas emitted.
Nuclear already has a lower greenhouse gas emission rate per energy produce than solar and is on par with wind and hydro. I know the argument, when solar power hits its stride then the greenhouse gas emissions will drop. That's fine, I'll go with that. What happens though when nuclear power hits its stride? It's lower than solar now, what happens when we see cement and steel for the next nuclear reactor getting produced from nuclear power?
Another argument is how energy storage will make wind and solar reliable enough to keep the lights on 24/7 instead of when the sun shines and wind blows. I ask this, what do you think that same electric storage technology could do if paired with an already inherently reliable energy source like nuclear power? I hear the argument on how a failure of a large nuclear power plant could render large areas without power. Sure, that could happen. That would happen now, that is, since we have a "dumb" grid and no storage. What happens if we pair nuclear power with a "smart" grid and battery storage? Or with, what seems to be everyone's favorite energy storage, pumped hydroelectric? Hydroelectric dams are already used now for load following, seasonal scale storage, and such for nuclear power. Just ask the Tennessee Valley Authority. I've seen the facility.
The argument against nuclear seems to me rides on the idea that it is somehow separated from technologies like grid scale battery storage and "smart" grids. Nuclear power can have those things too. Solar and wind as energy sources are impossible without storage and enough "smarts" to manage it all, nuclear does not need them. What happens though if these storage and "smart" technologies are mated with nuclear power then we have something far safer, cheaper, and "greener" than anything solar and wind could do.
That's fine though. Keep claiming that wind and solar will win in the end. I see a different future. A future powered by nuclear reactors.