Here's a thought experiment:

Imagine a power technology emerging that makes the cost of electricity virtually zero and the supply virtually endless.

Since the emergence of life, the task of survival is the quest for energy in one form or another. Most of the critical advancements by humanity have been driven by the need to acquire, distribute and store energy. When you're sitting at your computer being productive for a paycheck, you are serving the same goal as prehistoric hunter-gatherers, you're just doing it via a much more complex system of acquisition and distribution.

The more efficiently we acquire energy, the less effort it takes to satisfy our individual energy needs and the more time we have for other pursuits such as culture and exploration.

What happens when the effort necessary to acquire a life's worth of energy approaches zero?

Prehistoric humans must have shoved them up cats' butts.

Not all cultures denigrate women's ability to do things. @radx told me that in Germany, this whole thing is a non-issue, since women are perceived as being strong.

So it depends on the culture, yeah? Yes, maybe men have always insulted each other ( that is an assumption, unless you have prehistoric records -- ha!) during competition by calling them weak.

Not all cultures call men weak by saying that they are like girls.

So we are back to this insults girls and can inhibit their social growth.

Because not only are you calling men weak, you are calling girls weak.

Does that make sense?

Those Aurora model sets shown here....Remember these from the 70's, always thought they were funky-cool. Went to Ebay expecting to find very few and found over a thousand listings-Model kits were big-time disposable-kidincome toys when I was younger-

Clicked one (prehistoric cave bear), two monkeys had placed bids of over $25US....for an empty box!!

EEEEE EEE EEEEK!
Evolution in Action

Hetero men love breasts, because prehistoric men... loved breasts. It must be true, Jimmy Carr said so.

>> ^direpickle:

>> ^criticalthud:
now if you are looking from a paleontologists point of view, the most aggressive section of the world in terms of active worldwide dominance and aggressive economic systems, has been europe/eurasia and it's offspring (the united states).

Citation needed.
>> ^criticalthud:
Hence in Europe, you have a place where prehistorically, the less advanced, less rational and more aggressive neanderthal inter-bred with the more advanced cro-magnon to a greater degree than anywhere else in the world.

Oh my god citation needed!


given man's propensity to stick his dick in whatever hole would have it, the burden is really on you to disprove the assertion.

>> ^criticalthud:

now if you are looking from a paleontologists point of view, the most aggressive section of the world in terms of active worldwide dominance and aggressive economic systems, has been europe/eurasia and it's offspring (the united states).

Citation needed.
>> ^criticalthud:

Hence in Europe, you have a place where prehistorically, the less advanced, less rational and more aggressive neanderthal inter-bred with the more advanced cro-magnon to a greater degree than anywhere else in the world.


Oh my god citation needed!

now if you are looking from a paleontologists point of view, the most aggressive section of the world in terms of active worldwide dominance and aggressive economic systems, has been europe/eurasia and it's offspring (the united states).

Hence in Europe, you have a place where prehistorically, the less advanced, less rational and more aggressive neanderthal inter-bred with the more advanced cro-magnon to a greater degree than anywhere else in the world.

>> ^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.

Haha, if Heaven & Hell are real and the flying spaghetti monster accepts aborted fetuses into heaven without condition - then I really wish my mom would have aborted me. And anyway, whatever happens, complete annihilation of consciousness & being or turning into space rays, dark matter or something, whatever it is - I'm sure it's better than living on this amazing planet that is being totally ruined by a bunch of prehistoric sheep.

It was an ordinary day at Dinosaur High
When Stegosaurus raised his hand and called for high-fives
Tyrannosaurus saw this and got pissed
Because his tiny wrists
Caused his high-five to miss
And he was like "Fuck this!"

Oh Yeah! Oh yeah! It's an old school Dinosaur Laser Fight!
Oh Yeah! Hell Yeah! Just a classic Dinosaur Laser Fight!

It was a futuristic prehistoric throwdown
But it was quiet because in space there is no sound
Did we mention that this took place in space?
It did. So shut your face
Also, there were robots and sharks

Oh Yeah! Oh yeah! It's a goddamn Dinosaur Laser Fight
In space! With sharks! It's a balls out Dinosaur Laser Fight!

It's fucking science!
Just ask Albert Einstein. He invented space.

...and then a bunch of fuckin aliens from Mars
Showed up all ripping solos on V-neck guitars
The dinos, sharks, and robots saw they came in peace
So they killed them with lasers
HOLY SHIT!

And then they had a giant laser party
A Dinosaur Laser Party!

FUCK!!

>> ^marbles:

I don't think speeding is necessarily a victimless crime. But prostitution is. Gambling is. What’s your point?


My point is victimhood isn't part of what constitutes a crime. My larger point is you're constantly using "is" when what you mean to say is "should be". A crime is a violation of law. You may believe that there shouldn't be laws against activities that don't have a particularized victim, but that doesn't mean prostitution isn't a crime, it means you think it shouldn't be a crime.

It's the difference between telling someone "I am the richest man in the world," and "I should be the richest man in the world."

>> ^marbles:
We are biologically programed to seek life. A newborn naturally suckles a nipple and instinctively holds his breath under water. These are not learned behaviors. We are entitled to life. Property is an extension of life. It’s the representation of the inherent right to control the fruits of one's own labor. Surely a prehistoric man believed he was entitled to control an uninhabited cave he found, an animal he killed or captured, or anything he built or created.

So anything you feel entitled to, you're entitled to?

Moreover, primitive man had lots of impulses -- rape women that were caught their fancy, steal from people too weak to stop them, kill people they didn't like, etc. Then you get to the more grand delusional impulses, like "I speak for the Sun god, so do as I say or he'll burn you for eternity after you die".

The feeling of entitlement to enclose and deny the use of portions of nature to others likely only came about after agriculture, and even then largely in the form tribal land ownership, not individual ownership.

>> ^marbles:
Ok, I’ll bite. If you deny 100% self-ownership (i.e. the philosophy of liberty as described in this video), then that leaves only 2 other options. Option 1: Universal and equal ownership of everyone else (i.e. Communism) Option 2: Partial Ownership of One Group by Another (e.g. Feudalism) Option 1 is unachievable and unsustainable. Option 2 is a system of rule by one class over another.

It seems to me that there's a lot more than 2 options. Over here in my way of seeing the world, property is just a social convention. I am my body, I don't merely own it.

Ownership is meaningless when there's no one else around. Ownership is meaningless if there's no societal impetus to adhere to the convention of property.

So on the score of "self-ownership", I mostly think your relationship to your body is qualitatively different from the relationship to inanimate objects you might acquire through labor or other economic interactions. Taking my property is stealing, taking my body is kidnapping. Damaging property isn't the same as violent assault on a person. Trespassing is not equivalent to rape.

>> ^NetRunner:
The only thing we're trying to do is get you to broaden your perspective a little. We're being polite about the fact that you seem to think us evil (or perhaps just stupid) for believing what we believe, and we're trying to help you understand a little bit of why we think the way we do, and see that maybe we're not monsters after all...>> ^marbles:
LOL@“We're being polite”
Why are you talking in “we” and not “I”? And if it makes you feel better by putting words in my mouth or thoughts in my head, then fine. But that's not why I dismissed your claim that this is only the “objectivist/libertarian definition of liberty”.
I think the crux of the problem is you like to label everything instead of just accepting it for what it is. Political issues and figures are full of delusions and deceptions. You do yourself a disservice by putting everything into one ideological box or another. I know plenty of “libertarians” that don’t have a problem with the patriot act and plenty of “progressives” that don’t have a problem with the cold-blooded murder of OBL. The political false dichotomy left/right survives because of people like you and, ironically, the guy warning about black and white thinking.


I used the pronoun "we" because I think that paragraph was descriptive of several of the people who engaged with you here, not just me.

I think you misunderstand my meaning when I labeled it as being "the objectivist/libertarian definition of liberty", I'm mostly just pointing out that the definition you're presenting is just one view of the concept, and not the defining conception of liberty. I'm not pigeonholing it and dismissing it, I'm just saying that the proper phrasing here is "This is what liberty is to me", not "This is what liberty is, and anyone who thinks otherwise is wrong".

My view of liberty is no less valid than yours, and if you assert that it is invalid without demonstrating even a rough working knowledge of what I (or even liberals generally) actually believe, then it's you who's pigeonholing and dismissing things, not me.

As far as "the guy warning about black and white thinking", I'm mostly just in favor of thinking. It seems to me that if you go around believing that there are some simple, arbitrary rules that govern all of human morality, and refuse to entertain any skeptical critique of the nature or validity of those rules, then that's not thinking.

>> ^NetRunner:
Violating the speed limit is a crime. There's no victim.I don't think speeding is necessarily a victimless crime. But prostitution is. Gambling is. What’s your point?
>> ^NetRunner:
I'm a human, and I have a mind. I have no earthly idea what you think natural rights are, or why I should care about them.

I have my own reasons for what I believe, and how I approach the concept of rights, and it's clearly different from yours. How can that be possible, if "natural rights" are wired into us?We are biologically programed to seek life. A newborn naturally suckles a nipple and instinctively holds his breath under water. These are not learned behaviors. We are entitled to life. Property is an extension of life. It’s the representation of the inherent right to control the fruits of one's own labor. Surely a prehistoric man believed he was entitled to control an uninhabited cave he found, an animal he killed or captured, or anything he built or created.
>> ^NetRunner:

This is really the crux of the dispute in all your myriad conversations on this video. You seem to think anyone who asks you to think about what you're saying is just trying to trick you somehow.Ok, I’ll bite. If you deny 100% self-ownership (i.e. the philosophy of liberty as described in this video), then that leaves only 2 other options. Option 1: Universal and equal ownership of everyone else (i.e. Communism) Option 2: Partial Ownership of One Group by Another (e.g. Feudalism) Option 1 is unachievable and unsustainable. Option 2 is a system of rule by one class over another.
>> ^NetRunner:
The only thing we're trying to do is get you to broaden your perspective a little. We're being polite about the fact that you seem to think us evil (or perhaps just stupid) for believing what we believe, and we're trying to help you understand a little bit of why we think the way we do, and see that maybe we're not monsters after all...LOL@“We're being polite”

Why are you talking in “we” and not “I”? And if it makes you feel better by putting words in my mouth or thoughts in my head, then fine. But that's not why I dismissed your claim that this is only the “objectivist/libertarian definition of liberty”.
I think the crux of the problem is you like to label everything instead of just accepting it for what it is. Political issues and figures are full of delusions and deceptions. You do yourself a disservice by putting everything into one ideological box or another. I know plenty of “libertarians” that don’t have a problem with the patriot act and plenty of “progressives” that don’t have a problem with the cold-blooded murder of OBL. The political false dichotomy left/right survives because of people like you and, ironically, the guy warning about black and white thinking.