And what, pray tell, would it matter if we lived in a pure democracy? Lets think about this for a minute, what says that the majority is wise, smart, or looking out for anyone but themselves?
In case studies does in California (I don't have my notes w/ me to give you the study) most laws voted on by the populace took away rights from people.
Ever heard of Tocqueville, he had some serious concerns with democracy. The idea of the "tyranny of the majority" is, I think, a very legitimate one. There is no evidence that people will vote to give other people equal rights when they can vote to give themselves more rights. Yes sometimes people do the right thing but I'm not going to hold my breath.
No a democratic republic isn't perfect, but it does give some checks and balances that can help to protect us from the worst that the majority can throw at the minority.
There are plenty of equally absurd situations. In Florida there was a "zero tolerance" policy, such that when a child brought in his step-father's gun to a trusted teacher because his step-father threatened his mother he was suspended for bringing a gun to school.
Even beyond these growing absurdities of the education system are the lack of uniform funding (hello property tax), growing set of standards that are meant to make the system better by being help more accountable, but instead removes any opportunity for truly motivated teachers from doing anything but teaching to test and not foster intellectual curiosity. The reasons for concerned parents to look at home schooling are growing not getting better.
I'm curious why no one brought up other possible uses of this idea. While it is obviously far from perfected this might be a nice technology for the disabled or injured to have. Being able to appear to walk normally and move about would be really nice. I know that there have been a lot of injuries in Iraq involving legs and other movement impairing injuries.
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And what, pray tell, would it matter if we lived in a pure democracy? Lets think about this for a minute, what says that the majority is wise, smart, or looking out for anyone but themselves?
In case studies does in California (I don't have my notes w/ me to give you the study) most laws voted on by the populace took away rights from people.
Ever heard of Tocqueville, he had some serious concerns with democracy. The idea of the "tyranny of the majority" is, I think, a very legitimate one. There is no evidence that people will vote to give other people equal rights when they can vote to give themselves more rights. Yes sometimes people do the right thing but I'm not going to hold my breath.
No a democratic republic isn't perfect, but it does give some checks and balances that can help to protect us from the worst that the majority can throw at the minority.
There are plenty of equally absurd situations. In Florida there was a "zero tolerance" policy, such that when a child brought in his step-father's gun to a trusted teacher because his step-father threatened his mother he was suspended for bringing a gun to school.
Even beyond these growing absurdities of the education system are the lack of uniform funding (hello property tax), growing set of standards that are meant to make the system better by being help more accountable, but instead removes any opportunity for truly motivated teachers from doing anything but teaching to test and not foster intellectual curiosity. The reasons for concerned parents to look at home schooling are growing not getting better.
I'm curious why no one brought up other possible uses of this idea. While it is obviously far from perfected this might be a nice technology for the disabled or injured to have. Being able to appear to walk normally and move about would be really nice. I know that there have been a lot of injuries in Iraq involving legs and other movement impairing injuries.