@hpqp
I am not at all ashamed of my verbose, self-indulgent dross, so here we go!

Something has to be extra-physical, as least based on our current model. I can fully accept that a brain by itself can receive sensory input, process it against memory, and thus act in a completely human way indistinguishable from a conscious human, but on its own can literally be no more "conscious" than a river flowing down a mountain. Our current view of the physical universe does not tolerate any rational physical explanation of consciousness. Any given moment of human experience - the unified sensory experience and stream of consciousness - does not exist in a single place at a single instant. To suggest that the atoms\molecules\proteins\cells of the brain experience themselves in a unified manner based on their proximity to or electrochemical interaction with each other is magical thinking. Atoms don't do that, and that's all that's there, physically.
I disagree that consciousness is subordinate to cognition in terms of value. Cognition is what makes us who we are and behave as we do, but consciousness is what makes us different from the rest of the jiggling matter in the universe.

A couple of posts back, you challenged my statement about abstinence education as demonstrating a lack of pragmatism. I didn't really address it in my reply, but I'd prefaced it with the understanding that it's not a magical incantation. I know people are still going to have sex, but I suggested that has to be a part of education. People have to know that you can still get pregnant even if you're using the contraceptives that are available. They have to at least know the possibility exists. It's one more thing for them to consider. People are still going to drive recklessly even if you tell them they can crash and kill themselves despite their airbags, seatbelts, and crumple zones, but that doesn't mean it's not worth it to educate them about the possibility. I fail to see how that's not pragmatic.

I didn't reply to your comment about adoption vs abortion because I'm not sure there's anything else to add on either side. As I've said, my beliefs on this are such that even a grossly flawed adoption\orphan care system is preferable to the alternative, even if it means that approximately 10 times the number of children would enter the system than have traditionally been adopted each year. (1.4M abortions annually in the US, ~140K adoptions, but there are several assumptions in that math that wouldn't hold up to scrutiny.) Many right and just things have unpleasant consequences that must be managed. (The typical counter here is that Pro-Lifers tend to also be fiscal\social conservatives and won't fund social services to care for these new individuals they've "protected" into existence. That's just another issue of taking responsibility for the consequences of choices. If they get what they want, they need to be held to account, but it's a separate issue. A related issue, but a separate issue.)

Criminalizing\prohibiting almost any activity results in some degree of risky\dangerous\destructive behavior. Acts must be criminalized because there are individuals who would desire to perform those acts which have been determined to be an unnecessary imposition on the rights of another. Criminalization does not eliminate the desire, but it adds a new factor to consideration. Some will decide the criminalization\prohibition of the act is not sufficient deterrent, but in proceeding, are likely to do so in a different manner than otherwise. The broad consideration is whether the benefits of criminalization\prohibition outweigh the risks posed to\by the percentage who will proceed anyway. Prohibition of alcohol failed the test, I expect the prohibition of certain drugs will be shown to have failed the test..eventually. Incest is illegal, and the "unintended" consequence is freaks locking their families in sheds and basements in horrific conditions, but I think most of us would agree the benefits outweigh the detriment there.

Is putting all would-have-been-aborteds up for adoption abhorrent or absurd? The hump we'll never get over is asking "is it more abhorrent than aborting all of them", because we have different viewpoints on the relative values in play. But is it even a valid question? They won't all be put up for adoption. Some percentage (possibly 5-10 percent) will spontaneously miscarry\abort anyway and some percentage would be raised by a birth parent or by the extended family after all. An initially unwanted pregnancy does not necessarily equate to an unwanted child, for a number of reasons. I do not have statistics on what proportion could be expected to be put up for adoption. Would you happen to? It seems like that would be difficult to extrapolate.

The "'potential' shtick" carries weight in my view because of the uniqueness of the situation. There is no consensus on the "best" way to define when elective abortion is "acceptable". Sagan puts weight on cognition as indicative of personhood. As he states, the Supreme Court set its date based on independent "viability". (More specifically, I feel it should be noted, "potential" viability.) These milestones coincide only by coincidence.
Why is it so easy for us, as you say, to retroproject? And why is this any different from assigning personhood to each of a million individual sperm? For me, it's because of those statistics on miscarriage linked above. The retroprojected "potential" is represented by "percentages". At 3-6 weeks, without deliberate intervention 90% of those masses of cells will go on to become a human being. At 6-12 it's 95%. This is more than strictly "potential", it's nearly guaranteed.

I expect your response will be uncomfortable for both of us, but I wish you would expound on why my "It Gets Better" comparison struck you as inappropriate. Crude, certainly - I'll admit to phrasing it indelicately, even insensitively. I do not think it poorly considered, however. The point of "It Gets Better" is to let LGBT youth know that life does not remain oppressive, negative, and confusing, and that happiness and fulfillment lie ahead if they will only persevere.
It's necessary because as humans, we aren't very good at imagining we'll ever be happy again when surrounded by uncertainty and despair, or especially recognizing the good already around us. We can only see torment, and may not see the point in perpetuating a seemingly-unending chain of suffering when release is so close at hand, though violence against self (or others).
This directly parallels the "quality of life" arguments posed from the pro-choice perspective. They take an isolated slice of life from a theoretical unplanned child and their mother and suggest that this is their lot and that we've increased suffering in the universe, as if no abused child will ever know a greater love, or no poor child will ever laugh and play, and that no mother of an unwanted pregnancy will ever enjoy life again, burdened and poverty-stricken as she is.
As you said, we're expecting a woman to reflect "on what would her and the eventual child’s quality of life be like", but we're so bad at that.
And all that quality-of-life discussion is assuming we've even nailed the demographic on who is seeking abortions in the U.S.
Getting statistics from the Guttmacher Institute, we find that 77% were at or above the federal poverty level and 60% already had at least one child.

On a moral level, absolutely, eugenics is very different debate.
On a practical level, the eugenics angle is relevant because it's indistinguishable from any other elective abortion. Someone who is terminating a pregnancy because their child would be a girl, or gay, or developmentally disabled can very easily say "I'm just not ready for motherhood." And who's to say that's not the mother's prerogative as much as any other elective abortion, if she's considering the future quality of life for herself and the child? "It sucks for girls\gays\downs in today's society and I don't think I can personally handle putting them through that," or more likely "My family and I could never love a child like that, so they would be unloved and I would be miserable for it. This is better for both of us."
Can we write that off as hopefully being yet another edge case? (Keep in mind possibly 65% of individuals seeking abortion declare as Protestant or Catholic, though other statistics show how unreliable "reported religious affiliation" is with regard to actual belief and practice.)

_{"Argumentation"? I have learned a new word today, thanks to hpqp. High five!}

tl;dw (wow, this YT jerk stretches out his video to maximal YT $$ length)

5 - H1N1 piggy flu
4 - H5N1 bird flu
3 - Marburg Fever (82% fatality, under 500 deaths worldwide ever)
2 - ebola (83% fatality rate, under 1500 cases worldwide ever)
1 - rabies (An estimated 55,000 human deaths occur annually from rabies worldwide) (If not treated which is 100% effective in first 2 to 12 weeks treatment protocol has 8% survival rate)

>> ^Reefie:

>> ^Yogi:
Great show, miss Frankie, BBC are a bunch of cunts that don't understand comedy.

BBC understand comedy, let's see there's Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, Red Dwarf, to name just several classic comedy shows known and admired around the world. Blackadder, Porridge, Absolutely Fabulous, Only Fools and Horses, Morecambe and Wise, One Foot in the Grave, The Two Ronnies, The Young Ones, Fry and Laurie, My Family, 'Allo 'Allo, Yes Minister, The Vicar of Dibley, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps, I could go on and on and on but I think I've established the trend... The BBC also spends a lot of money promoting new and established comedians performing at large venues like the Apollo, and also runs the BBC New Comedy Awards annual ceremony which is considered one of the highlights of the comedy calendar. Frankie is a gem and a fellow Scot so I'm biased in favour of him but let's not forget he left comedy behind of his own accord. Can't blame the BBC for that.
In fact if you're going to slag off the BBC the least you can do is come live over here for a year and pay your TV licence fee so a) you're contributing, and b) you actually have a leg to stand on if you're going to make ludicrous and offensive claims.


You're naming classic comedies that shaped the world...and do not apply in this discussion (The good ones, not the shit you listed). Just don't even bother making an argument next time if you're going to produce strawmen like this. Monty Python and Fawlty Towers are amazing...AND OLD! Really fucking old and were made at a time where the BBC wasn't run the way it's run now.

Frankie was constantly harassed and treated like shit on Mock the Week by it's Producers because they kept getting complaints from stupid people who think their opinion matters. Frankie was the funniest part of that fucking show, the BBC took him away, so YES they don't understand that saying offensive things is a comedians job. You don't have the right to not be offended.

I'm glad you're offended because you're fucking wrong. The BBC used to produce seriously funny shit...some of the most cherished shows ever. Now they produce crap, because it's an upside down pyramid of executives noting shows to death and killing the funny parts of others because some mother called in to complain.

You are whats wrong with humanity. You're a lowly wretch who defends morons who ruin things for the rest of us. Why don't you go work for NBC you evil monster.

>> ^Yogi:
Great show, miss Frankie, BBC are a bunch of cunts that don't understand comedy.


BBC understand comedy, let's see there's Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, Red Dwarf, to name just several classic comedy shows known and admired around the world. Blackadder, Porridge, Absolutely Fabulous, Only Fools and Horses, Morecambe and Wise, One Foot in the Grave, The Two Ronnies, The Young Ones, Fry and Laurie, My Family, 'Allo 'Allo, Yes Minister, The Vicar of Dibley, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps, I could go on and on and on but I think I've established the trend... The BBC also spends a lot of money promoting new and established comedians performing at large venues like the Apollo, and also runs the BBC New Comedy Awards annual ceremony which is considered one of the highlights of the comedy calendar. Frankie is a gem and a fellow Scot so I'm biased in favour of him but let's not forget he left comedy behind of his own accord. Can't blame the BBC for that.

In fact if you're going to slag off the BBC the least you can do is come live over here for a year and pay your TV licence fee so a) you're contributing, and b) you actually have a leg to stand on if you're going to make ludicrous and offensive claims.

>> ^GeeSussFreeK:

Wood fiber has about the same energy density as carbs, so it is essentially cooking a hamburger for your electronics <img class="smiley" src="http://cdn.videosift.com/cdm/emoticon/teeth.gif">

Burning wood isn't exactly "Green" though, so this is a clever marketing angle that is mostly untrue.

Edit, did some googling, and found their electrical output is about 2Watts (not enough to power most light bulbs), and they cost about 130 bucks. Those kind of cost to power ratios are WAAAAAAAAY out of touch of the needs of third world counties, you need kilowatts before you have any real needs met. If you ran this 24/7 for a year, the annual cost of electricity...not including the burning material is 7.42 dollars per KWH. The average cost of electricity in the US is about 10 cents per KWH, marking this as a third world solution is pretty shitty.


Actually, they have a bigger HomeStove as well, and neither it nor the CampStove are really meant to have a primary purpose of generating electricity - the main purpose is to cook things, and the surplus electricity is a nice side effect. According to this page: http://www.biolitestove.com/homestove/homestove-technology/ , the reason this is better than a regular fire or older rocket stove is fewer CO emissions (eco-friendly) and less smoke (health hazard) for cooking the same meals.

In India, there are tons of people with mobile phones, but the power grid is not reliable and there are frequent rolling blackouts. Of course, people could just wait for power to come back to charge their phone, but if you are cooking at the time, why not use the stove?

I think the high price of the CampStove is meant to help lower the price of the HomeStove for these other markets.

Wood fiber has about the same energy density as carbs, so it is essentially cooking a hamburger for your electronics


Burning wood isn't exactly "Green" though, so this is a clever marketing angle that is mostly untrue.



Edit, did some googling, and found their electrical output is about 2Watts (not enough to power most light bulbs), and they cost about 130 bucks. Those kind of cost to power ratios are WAAAAAAAAY out of touch of the needs of third world counties, you need kilowatts before you have any real needs met. If you ran this 24/7 for a year, the annual cost of electricity...not including the burning material is 7.42 dollars per KWH. The average cost of electricity in the US is about 10 cents per KWH, marking this as a third world solution is pretty shitty.

Yeh, sure, I don't disagree either. But you just don't see N. Korea pointing that discerning eye in their own direction. The cults of personality surrounding Kim Jung Il & Kim Il Sung beat the crap out of any shitty star worship MTV propagates. They just put a teenager in charge of their country because of what his father and grandfather did. Millions of N. Koreans die annually from not having enough to eat. They give any foreign visitor the 'Potemkin Village' treatment. Not to say the points made weren't credible, but showing the worse of American excess doesn't make that America. I don't watch any of the shit that video talked about and neither do you. We can turn it off.

woops QM you forgot to login to bobknight account. anyhoo,

wiki

Cartwright joined the Church of Scientology in the late 1980s. She has said that before becoming involved with the church she was depressed that she did not have a "committed relationship," and wanted to get married and have children. She "thought that maybe [she] could find a relationship by going to a church." Cartwright attended a barbecue at a friend's house and noticed that all of the attendees were Scientologists with "thriving careers." Cartwright was awarded Scientology's Patron Laureate Award after she donated $10 million, almost twice her annual salary, to the Church in 2007.




LOL they all had thriving careers because money is a prerequisite to this stupid shit... good analysis Cartwright

http://videosift.com/video/Inside-a-Scientology-Marriage

>> ^alcom:

@Sagemind: The validity of his Roberts' talk comes from the fact that the cumulative effects of human activities have a self-perpetuating momentum based on things like the methane contained in permafrost. The simple argument that we simply cannot afford to be wrong far outweighs the idea that his entire thesis must be thrown out because of a handful of appeals to popularity or "hearsay" evidence. This is not a court, or even a peer-reviewed research paper.
Ice cores reveal he annual accumulation of snow in the Arctic, Greenland and Antarctica contains isotopic markers of the temperature, so there are indeed scientific methods of measuring prehistoric temperatures.


Well said Alcom.

Sagemind, If you would take advice from a fellow skeptic, we do have temperature reconstructions going back more than 100 years. The instrumental record, from actual direct human measurement of temperature goes back just over 100 years, to around the late 1800's. That record graphs a rather consistent and linear warming trend from start to finish. More over, it records an increase of exactly the degree the speaker in the video mentions.

There is a trick to all this though. The temperature record going back more than about 100 years is measured with an entirely different methodology. It shows, again, as the speaker mentioned temperatures over the last few thousand years that has not varied very much.

There are people like the speaker who then put those 2 pieces together to declare proof positive that unprecedented warming began 100 years ago, right when man started burning fossil fuels. As I said, I'm skeptical myself. The other significant thing about 100 years ago is the change of methodology for building the graph and reconstruction of temperature. With 1 method, we have a fairly static graph, with another method we immediately have another. Any scientist worthy of the name would look at that and say the same, and investigate ways to rule out the methodology as the cause of the different results.

That's why I insisted on directing people to google scholar and looking at Mann's own work. He's the one that came out with the famous hockey stick graph that 'proved' man-made warming. All of his follow up work is showing more and more evidence that reconstructing the last 100 years with same methodology used to construct the last few thousand shows a much less scary picture.

But don't take my word for it. Don't take the speaker in the video's word for it. Don't even take Mann's word for it. Go look at the raw results in his article's and the other available related scientific literature. I promise I have and come back convinced it is looking like a good portion of the gloom and doom is merely an artifact of methodology change over at the same time as man started burning up fossil fuels.

@Sagemind: The validity of his Roberts' talk comes from the fact that the cumulative effects of human activities have a self-perpetuating momentum based on things like the methane contained in permafrost. The simple argument that we simply cannot afford to be wrong far outweighs the idea that his entire thesis must be thrown out because of a handful of appeals to popularity or "hearsay" evidence. This is not a court, or even a peer-reviewed research paper.

Ice cores reveal he annual accumulation of snow in the Arctic, Greenland and Antarctica contains isotopic markers of the temperature, so there are indeed scientific methods of measuring prehistoric temperatures.

Fucks me how anyone can have a problem with this...

People bitch about taxation to support public healthcare, but where the fuck do republicans think defense money comes from? The back of the couch? For a fraction of the annual spend on defense, the US could have a world class free medical system and no one's taxes would change. Sure, you'd have to cut back on a few imperialist invasions "peacekeeping missions", and you might have to relinquish the whole 'saviour of the world' title (how's that GFC working out?), but it's doable...

While the gov. is spending big on appearances, the people who pay the taxes are going without. That doesn't make sense to any rational person, but I guess rationality is not a thing teapublicans have been accused of...

@bobknight33

So you're conceding? You're admitting that health insurance provided by the Government CAN BE and IS less costly that Private firms?

Because you haven't made a valid argument, just Ad Homs and Red Herrings.

So what if Krugman wrote the article. The CBO's report still shows facts. That Admin cost are less than 2%.

To measure the administrative costs for Medicare, we first turned to the 2011 Annual Report of the Boards of Trustees of the Federal Hospital Insurance and Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Funds -- the document prepared by Medicare’s fiscal overseers.

The trustees’ summary listed total Medicare expenditures of $522.8 billion for 2010, of which $7 billion was characterized as "administrative expenses." That works out to 1.3 percent

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2011/may/30/barbara-boxer/barbara-boxer-says-medicare-overhead-far-lower-pri/


Dude, take off your FoxNews glasses.

From your recap:

1] Public insurance has lower Admin cost. Around 1%. i.e. tax dollars aren't wasted. FALSE No one can run a company at 3% overhead cost let alone at 1%. Name another program, private sector or government, that runs at 1% admin costs? Think about that % you stated.


2] Some government make primary care mandatory. This lowers the burden on insurance holders even further. Would be a good idea to have annual checkups to prevent sickness at early stages. This should be an agreement with you insurance provider, not mandatory via government decree.

3] Governments set the cost of health care at an affordable price. Meaning more people can pay out of pocket. Meaning the insurance pools pay out less, which means premiums are lower. --- False That's a grandiose leap of faith. Healthcare costs will rise-- The affordability rates will go higher once this program gets up and running. Obama care is already projected to cost double of its original 1 Trillion.

The Government does not know how to save money, only wastefully spend it.

>> ^GenjiKilpatrick:

@bobknight33
Do research. From peer reviewed primary sources.
You'll find that governments run lower administrative costs, 1%. As opposed to 3 up to 10% for private insurance companies.
Places like Japan have a mix of private and public doctors and hospitals so there's tons of competition.
The Japanese government focuses on primary care. Like some crazy socialist assholes, they make everyone go to the doctor regularly. You know, before they become too sick. Which cuts down on cost.
Not to mention, they have fixed prices for procedures. So say you need to see a So let's review

The only way to cut down a 800$ cost to #50% is to know how its calculated. That is what is involved in calculating that cost.
specialist. Instead of 800 bucks, the price is fixed at 350. A price everyone can afford. So many people don't NEED insurance to cover the cost.
So let's review:
1] Public insurance has lower Admin cost. Around 1%. i.e. tax dollars aren't wasted.
2] Some government make primary care mandatory. This lowers the burden on insurance holders even further.
3] Governments set the cost of health care at an affordable price. Meaning more people can pay out of pocket. Meaning the insurance pools pay out less, which means premiums are lower.
The result: Japan's health care system is in the top 10.
http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html
Japan's HCS = 10th
U.S.'s HCS = 37th
So, instead of repeating talking points you got from Fox & friends. Why don't you do some research and look for solutions.

>> ^renatojj:

>> ^deathcow:
Anyone who thinks this money is stupidly spent should be keelhauled. Defense and petroleum sucks those kind of funds from Americans in hours.
Huh, look at that. It seems "less stupid than X" passes as smart these days.
I guess in times of record high unemployment is when we need space exploration spending the most. You know, to boost morale!



"Passes as smart?" thanks

The USA defense budget could pay for this entire Mars mission.... in LESS THAN ONE day. The USA annual defense budget is more than the next 15 highest spending countries combined, and many of those countries are USA allies.

Yet... not the right time to spend any money on scientific efforts. We should probably cancel these stupid Mars programs and give Lockheed/Haliburton another TWELVE HOURS of defense budget. Understood... thanks for schooling me on what smart is. Go Romney?

>> ^RhesusMonk:

Absolutely would. We love stuff like this and like the annual pantsless subway ride specifically because we believe stuff like this could only happen in NYC.>> ^PlayhousePals:
Musta been tourists ... surely a true New Yorker would not succumb to such blatant frivolity [would they?] =oO



Good to know =o)