"The American Revolution was sparked, in part, by taxes of 2-5%."
Accompanied by NO REPRESENTATION. "Taxation without Representation is Tyranny" went the phrase. I certainly agree with that. But taxation *with* representation isn't tyranny. It's the democratic majority's right to determine by law what property is whose property.
If democracy didn't create such laws, there wouldn't be any property at all, merely possession.
All physical property depends on material resources which preexisted your birth, or any other human being's birth.
Therefore it's not a "natural right" to claim exclusivityover any material object - to call any material object your property.
Property is a legal right which people through their governments uphold, because it's a very *useful* legal right (as it incentivizes work and wealth-production, and defends us from each other's parasitism). But claiming it a "natural right" is merely a form of superstition.
I'm pretty sure that most people who had abortions valued their own human lives -- and as such valued human life in general (if not always in the specific case of a foetus).
This is a game of definitions. I believe you are misusing the word "arbitrary": I think you are using it where you should more properly be using the word "subjective".
The laws of physics are objective. The value of human life is subjective. The definition of the meter is arbitrary.
Society's desire to protect itself is not "arbitrary" - it's a necessity for a long-lasting society, and therefore not arbitrary, based on the the basic human desire for survival (which again is not arbitrary, but a fundamental part of our genetic makeup).
Something is arbitrary only if the same people having the same concerns could reach a completely different solution. (e.g. should we use the symbol "+" or "-" to signify addition? That's arbitrary)
If however the conclusions are inexorably bound to the concerns (in order to protect human society we must value human life), then they're not arbitary. They may be *subjective*.
"The attribution of value to human life is completely arbitrary. "
It's not arbitrary, it's an consequence of the fact that we're human, and the simple that fact that humans that don't value human life either kill themselves or are psychopaths on which a functioning society cannot be based.
Attributing value to human life is probably the LEAST arbitrary thing in human civilization.
"doesn't hire those that don't"="only hires those that do"
It's a basic logical transformation. If you leave out the 'only' you completely miss the meaning of strict criteria described.
And the way you transformed it previously, doesn't only fail to take that into account, but almost completely reverses the meaning.
The meaning is that he would NOT want to work for a company that only hires employees that work in their spare time. You transformed it wrongly.
"I was just trying to remove all negatives."
Well, that's impossible, unless you use antonyms or expressions like "refuse to" -- in which case you merely hide the negatives, you don't remove them.
"It's easy to defend the rights to freedom of speech or of assembly. Those can be rationally derived from the fact of one's existence. "
Hardly. You're merely accustomed to rights only referring to issues of Liberty. Here in Europe we are also accustomed to rights referring also to matters of Equality, and social Solidarity as well.
A right to broadband access (even if it meant publically provided free broadband access) is no different conceptually than a right to a public free education - a right pertaining to Social Solidarity.
Try to exercise your free speech loudly enough in the middle of night, when people are sleeping, and you'll be arrested for disturbance of the peace, as it's likewise considered that people are also entitled to peace and quiet.
You really think you understand where negative rights end? Imagine the person who buys all the property around your home and fordids you to cross into his property. Let's see how well your "right to travel" works then.
If you consider property to be a "negative right", then certain other negative rights become merely theoretical and can be violated in practice by people owning the air you breathe, and the earth you walk upon. Even freedom of speech can be violated in the name of "intellectual property".
The distinction between positive and negative rights is to some extent arbitrary, as even the hardest core of negative rights need be protected and supported with positive rights that will ensure that other people won't abuse *their* negative rights.
Liberty is violated in practice when Equality is absent. Equality is violated in practice when Solidarity is absent.
You need to transform a triple negative into a single negative. So the proper translation is: "He wouldn't want to work for companies that only hire those who code in their spare time."
I haven't seen anyone who in this thread called themselves African-American.
It's called personal responsibility -- if *you* use the word "African" stupidly, then it's you who are to blame, not anyone else, nor can you transfer the responsibility for the idiocy.
I've not studied the history of those populations closely, but if you want a first guess, it'd be that they were *very* isolated islands -- thus none of the trade that made possible for e.g. Greeks to get the alphabet from the Phoenicians or that made it possible for Japanese to get their alphabet (and other inventions) from the Chinese.
It seems to me that for the best results you need the geographical sweet spots where there exist natural borders enough for security but enough contact with other civilizations that you are challenged by knowledge of them and are able to enhance your own with their inventions.
"Note that Japan is a barren rock without any natural resources. "
It has a huge amount of sea, same as Ancient Athens, same as the Roman Empire, same as Phoenicia and Venice and Great Britain and America, but unlike most of the African nations. (Egypt had its river).
History tells us that it's the sea-abundant civilizations that created the greatest amounts of culture -- contrast Athens to Sparta, Venice to Prussia, America to the Soviet Union -- and yeah Japan to Africa.
One of the reasons is because the sea-bordered nations have *natural* borders, thus they can spend less of their time in border-defense or neighbour-conquests and more of their time in other pursuits.
Barren rocks prosper when they have lots of sea around them. Jungles and savannahs don't. It's geography, not skin-color, that forms national destiny.
As for the IQ difference, you have it backwards: it's an advanced civilization that creates the IQ difference, not the IQ difference that creates the advanced civilization.
So what if I want to kill every black person in the world, not because I hate them, but because I love them and want to take them out of the misery of being black? No hate here, therefore it's not racism to want to kill every black person in the world, right? I only want to take them out of their misery.
Or (to use a more realistic example) owning black slaves in the American South was likewise not racist. They didn't *hate* those black people they owned as slaves, they just wanted to use them for labour. It was merely greed, not hate, therefore it wasn't racist at all, according to you.
Thinking that racism is about *hate* is the stupidest comment I've ever seen on slashdot -- it disqualifies the vast majority of human racism throughout human history (including ownership of black slaves) from being called such. Racism is about racial inequality -- expressed, preserved or utilized, by word or deed.
"No, I'm saying that believing that you have a right to someone elses property or creation without being expected to adhere to their terms is ok,"
If I want to use Einstein's E=MC^2 equation in my scientifc calculations, I must agree to his terms? Or don't scientific theories count as creations?
But let's go back to art.If I make a painting and display it, some people will photograph it. Some people will make copies -- either of those photographs, or with paint and canvas. Some people may put those photos on the Internet. They may even choose to gift those paintings of theirs to more people.
Same with statues. Same with buildings. And lastly, same with music.
And yet I'm guessing you would frown at a law that would ban the photography of statues or buildings or even paintings without the author's express permission.
And if you indeed would oppose such a law, your argument collapses.
Let musicians earn their money same as painters or sculptors do.
Do you hold the same belief for the Boston Tea Party? Unethical to take hold of that tea?
"I don't agree with your terms, so I'm going to steal your product to spite you!" isn't the answer.
It always has been the answer. When the rules imposed from above fail to seem legitimate in the eyes of the population, the population no longer follows them. If you sell bread to a starving population at too high a price, the populace breaks open your warehouses and takes it for themselves.
[quote]the Christian Bible is true, and there is every indication that it is,[/quote]
Other than the universe being six thousand years old. And other than Noah's flood. And other than rainbows not existing since always, but instead having been made into existence since the flood of Noah. And other than the tower of Babel. And other than lots of other things, too, which are about as unscientific as any other mythology.
[quote]you will stand before God at the judgment and then you will care. [/quote]
Strangely enough you know what is the one thing that the bible doesn't say is required to be saved? Belief in the Bible.
You know why? Because there existed Christians for a long time before there even was a Bible.
So, even if your God exists, which I very much doubt, I doubt I'll be caring what was said in a compilation of books made hundreds of years after Jesus lived and died, and which God and his apostles themselves didn't seem to care about. (One would think it'd be easy for Jesus to instruct his apostles what to write and what not: Mohammed did after all)
"Bible says that God is eternal that is he has always existed"
Why do you assume I'll care about what the Christian Bible says, even to disbelieve in it?
I'm not burdening you with the Aztec tales of creation, to tell you you can only believe or disbelieve in them -- why? Because you most probably don't care about the Aztec tales of creation, or the Babylonian tales of creation, or the Chinese tales of creation. You probably don't care enough to even "disbelieve" in them.
So, please spare me the Judeochristian parochialism.
"It is something that should be true or false by definition."
I don't know anything about the definition of Big Bang including the idea that time began with it. As far as I know Big Bang is the name for the explosive expansion of all matter in the universe at some point in the past from a primeval dense condition.
That time originated there as well is just a theory, nothing definitional about it as far as I know.
Yes, I look at them and I see that their people were barbarians for thousands of years while the African nation of Egypt (and the Asian nation of China, let alone the Middle-eastern nations of Sumeria/Babylonia/etc) thrived and prospered, and produced great wonders of invention and technology and construction.
In short by your own argument, Europe is proven to be far genetically inferior to Africa.
Comparatively harmless. Tibet not included. Western Turkestan not include. Falun Gong not included. Tien-a-men not included. Aggression against Taiwan not included. Anyone who actually wants to access the Internet not included.
No, the only grief you care about, is when JEWS are involved.
Don't try to pass off antisemetism as some sort of insight in global politics. The "grief and destruction" supposedly surrounding Israel is a result of it being a useful anti-Western rallying cry for Arabs and Muslims in the middle east -- much greater grief and destruction (e.g. Darfur in Sudan -- which the Chinese support) goes unnoticed by you and them.
China is one of the main supporters of Sudan, btw. So much for "comparatively harmless". And Sudan in turn has supported the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda -- one of the most brutally murderous squads anywhere.
Slashdot Mirror
"The American Revolution was sparked, in part, by taxes of 2-5%."
Accompanied by NO REPRESENTATION. "Taxation without Representation is Tyranny" went the phrase. I certainly agree with that. But taxation *with* representation isn't tyranny. It's the democratic majority's right to determine by law what property is whose property.
If democracy didn't create such laws, there wouldn't be any property at all, merely possession.
All physical property depends on material resources which preexisted your birth, or any other human being's birth.
Therefore it's not a "natural right" to claim exclusivityover any material object - to call any material object your property.
Property is a legal right which people through their governments uphold, because it's a very *useful* legal right (as it incentivizes work and wealth-production, and defends us from each other's parasitism). But claiming it a "natural right" is merely a form of superstition.
I'm pretty sure that most people who had abortions valued their own human lives -- and as such valued human life in general (if not always in the specific case of a foetus).
This is a game of definitions. I believe you are misusing the word "arbitrary": I think you are using it where you should more properly be using the word "subjective".
The laws of physics are objective.
The value of human life is subjective.
The definition of the meter is arbitrary.
Society's desire to protect itself is not "arbitrary" - it's a necessity for a long-lasting society, and therefore not arbitrary, based on the the basic human desire for survival (which again is not arbitrary, but a fundamental part of our genetic makeup).
Something is arbitrary only if the same people having the same concerns could reach a completely different solution. (e.g. should we use the symbol "+" or "-" to signify addition? That's arbitrary)
If however the conclusions are inexorably bound to the concerns (in order to protect human society we must value human life), then they're not arbitary. They may be *subjective*.
"The attribution of value to human life is completely arbitrary. "
It's not arbitrary, it's an consequence of the fact that we're human, and the simple that fact that humans that don't value human life either kill themselves or are psychopaths on which a functioning society cannot be based.
Attributing value to human life is probably the LEAST arbitrary thing in human civilization.
"doesn't hire those that don't"="only hires those that do"
It's a basic logical transformation.
If you leave out the 'only' you completely miss the meaning of strict criteria described.
And the way you transformed it previously, doesn't only fail to take that into account, but almost completely reverses the meaning.
The meaning is that he would NOT want to work for a company that only hires employees that work in their spare time. You transformed it wrongly.
"I was just trying to remove all negatives."
Well, that's impossible, unless you use antonyms or expressions like "refuse to" -- in which case you merely hide the negatives, you don't remove them.
"It's easy to defend the rights to freedom of speech or of assembly. Those can be rationally derived from the fact of one's existence. "
Hardly. You're merely accustomed to rights only referring to issues of Liberty.
Here in Europe we are also accustomed to rights referring also to matters of Equality, and social Solidarity as well.
A right to broadband access (even if it meant publically provided free broadband access) is no different conceptually than a right to a public free education - a right pertaining to Social Solidarity.
"Free speech does not impose anything on anyone."
Try to exercise your free speech loudly enough in the middle of night, when people are sleeping, and you'll be arrested for disturbance of the peace, as it's likewise considered that people are also entitled to peace and quiet.
You really think you understand where negative rights end? Imagine the person who buys all the property around your home and fordids you to cross into his property. Let's see how well your "right to travel" works then.
If you consider property to be a "negative right", then certain other negative rights become merely theoretical and can be violated in practice by people owning the air you breathe, and the earth you walk upon. Even freedom of speech can be violated in the name of "intellectual property".
The distinction between positive and negative rights is to some extent arbitrary, as even the hardest core of negative rights need be protected and supported with positive rights that will ensure that other people won't abuse *their* negative rights.
Liberty is violated in practice when Equality is absent. Equality is violated in practice when Solidarity is absent.
You need to transform a triple negative into a single negative. So the proper translation is:
"He wouldn't want to work for companies that only hire those who code in their spare time."
I haven't seen anyone who in this thread called themselves African-American.
It's called personal responsibility -- if *you* use the word "African" stupidly, then it's you who are to blame, not anyone else, nor can you transfer the responsibility for the idiocy.
I've not studied the history of those populations closely, but if you want a first guess, it'd be that they were *very* isolated islands -- thus none of the trade that made possible for e.g. Greeks to get the alphabet from the Phoenicians or that made it possible for Japanese to get their alphabet (and other inventions) from the Chinese.
It seems to me that for the best results you need the geographical sweet spots where there exist natural borders enough for security but enough contact with other civilizations that you are challenged by knowledge of them and are able to enhance your own with their inventions.
"Note that Japan is a barren rock without any natural resources. "
It has a huge amount of sea, same as Ancient Athens, same as the Roman Empire, same as Phoenicia and Venice and Great Britain and America, but unlike most of the African nations. (Egypt had its river).
History tells us that it's the sea-abundant civilizations that created the greatest amounts of culture -- contrast Athens to Sparta, Venice to Prussia, America to the Soviet Union -- and yeah Japan to Africa.
One of the reasons is because the sea-bordered nations have *natural* borders, thus they can spend less of their time in border-defense or neighbour-conquests and more of their time in other pursuits.
Barren rocks prosper when they have lots of sea around them. Jungles and savannahs don't. It's geography, not skin-color, that forms national destiny.
As for the IQ difference, you have it backwards: it's an advanced civilization that creates the IQ difference, not the IQ difference that creates the advanced civilization.
"Calling the Egyptians 'African' is a kind of stretching"
Bullshit.
If what are you talking about black people, then say "black people". If you want to use the word "African" then Egyptians are included by necessity.
So what if I want to kill every black person in the world, not because I hate them, but because I love them and want to take them out of the misery of being black?
No hate here, therefore it's not racism to want to kill every black person in the world, right? I only want to take them out of their misery.
Or (to use a more realistic example) owning black slaves in the American South was likewise not racist. They didn't *hate* those black people they owned as slaves, they just wanted to use them for labour.
It was merely greed, not hate, therefore it wasn't racist at all, according to you.
Thinking that racism is about *hate* is the stupidest comment I've ever seen on slashdot -- it disqualifies the vast majority of human racism throughout human history (including ownership of black slaves) from being called such. Racism is about racial inequality -- expressed, preserved or utilized, by word or deed.
"No, I'm saying that believing that you have a right to someone elses property or creation without being expected to adhere to their terms is ok,"
If I want to use Einstein's E=MC^2 equation in my scientifc calculations, I must agree to his terms? Or don't scientific theories count as creations?
But let's go back to art.If I make a painting and display it, some people will photograph it.
Some people will make copies -- either of those photographs, or with paint and canvas.
Some people may put those photos on the Internet. They may even choose to gift those paintings of theirs to more people.
Same with statues.
Same with buildings.
And lastly, same with music.
And yet I'm guessing you would frown at a law that would ban the photography of statues or buildings or even paintings without the author's express permission.
And if you indeed would oppose such a law, your argument collapses.
Let musicians earn their money same as painters or sculptors do.
That is unethical.
Do you hold the same belief for the Boston Tea Party? Unethical to take hold of that tea?
"I don't agree with your terms, so I'm going to steal your product to spite you!" isn't the answer.
It always has been the answer. When the rules imposed from above fail to seem legitimate in the eyes of the population, the population no longer follows them. If you sell bread to a starving population at too high a price, the populace breaks open your warehouses and takes it for themselves.
[quote]the Christian Bible is true, and there is every indication that it is,[/quote]
Other than the universe being six thousand years old.
And other than Noah's flood.
And other than rainbows not existing since always, but instead having been made into existence since the flood of Noah.
And other than the tower of Babel.
And other than lots of other things, too, which are about as unscientific as any other mythology.
[quote]you will stand before God at the judgment and then you will care. [/quote]
Strangely enough you know what is the one thing that the bible doesn't say is required to be saved? Belief in the Bible.
You know why? Because there existed Christians for a long time before there even was a Bible.
So, even if your God exists, which I very much doubt, I doubt I'll be caring what was said in a compilation of books made hundreds of years after Jesus lived and died, and which God and his apostles themselves didn't seem to care about. (One would think it'd be easy for Jesus to instruct his apostles what to write and what not: Mohammed did after all)
So, no.
"Bible says that God is eternal that is he has always existed"
Why do you assume I'll care about what the Christian Bible says, even to disbelieve in it?
I'm not burdening you with the Aztec tales of creation, to tell you you can only believe or disbelieve in them -- why? Because you most probably don't care about the Aztec tales of creation, or the Babylonian tales of creation, or the Chinese tales of creation. You probably don't care enough to even "disbelieve" in them.
So, please spare me the Judeochristian parochialism.
"It is something that should be true or false by definition."
I don't know anything about the definition of Big Bang including the idea that time began with it. As far as I know Big Bang is the name for the explosive expansion of all matter in the universe at some point in the past from a primeval dense condition.
That time originated there as well is just a theory, nothing definitional about it as far as I know.
"Why is it so hard for people to understand that there is no "before the big bang"? Time was created at the big bang."
That's certainly an interesting hypothesis. In what way do you propose we test it out?
"Look at Germany, France, or Great Britain"
Yes, I look at them and I see that their people were barbarians for thousands of years while the African nation of Egypt (and the Asian nation of China, let alone the Middle-eastern nations of Sumeria/Babylonia/etc) thrived and prospered, and produced great wonders of invention and technology and construction.
In short by your own argument, Europe is proven to be far genetically inferior to Africa.
I'm a man, and I don't give a damn about "fast cars".
And I also consider you to be a sexist pig. That you are sexist against BOTH genders doesn't makes you any less of a sexist, only doubly so.
Comparatively harmless. Tibet not included. Western Turkestan not include. Falun Gong not included. Tien-a-men not included. Aggression against Taiwan not included. Anyone who actually wants to access the Internet not included.
No, the only grief you care about, is when JEWS are involved.
Don't try to pass off antisemetism as some sort of insight in global politics. The "grief and destruction" supposedly surrounding Israel is a result of it being a useful anti-Western rallying cry for Arabs and Muslims in the middle east -- much greater grief and destruction (e.g. Darfur in Sudan -- which the Chinese support) goes unnoticed by you and them.
China is one of the main supporters of Sudan, btw. So much for "comparatively harmless". And Sudan in turn has supported the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda -- one of the most brutally murderous squads anywhere.
Only a moron would see the USA as the best-fitting sample to that description. Or even in the top hundred best-fitting samples.