Telling that you respond to my tiny, eight word comment, and not to the excellent, more verbose comments of BRM and GSF.

You compared/related two completely different things. While new influenza vaccines are required every year because of new strains constantly evolving, the influenza vaccine doesn't cause these new strains. Yes, science can indeed come back to bite us in the ass, but, so far, vaccines haven't, certainly not in the way antibiotics have. P&T never claimed vaccines were perfect (in fact, no one had claimed it when you raised this red herring). They are simply espousing the ridiculousness of the anti-vaccine movement when taken against the incredible amount of good vaccines have done for mankind, even if the claims of said movement were true. They weren't defending a thesis. They were simply, and succinctly, making a "big picture" comparison of universally known vaccine benefits and claimed vaccine detriments.

BTW, has anybody heard anything new as far as this research is concerned? I damn near cried when I watched this talk. It just blew me away. Then, recently, I read this, which seemed to be something similar. Is quorum sensing just smell?>> ^Yogi:

I never said it was a vaccine. Did you see how I started a new sentence...and I put an "even" there after the ellipsis because it's a different subject related to the vaccine subject. In other words sometimes our science tends to come back and bite us in the ass.

@mgittle :
Interesting about the Plutonomy Report. It seems pretty straight-forward to say Plutonomies like the US, the British Empire, and the Roman Empire brain-drain the rest of the world. That's why the young creator of Chatroulette recently moved to Silicon Valley, instead of staying in Russia,* same as Google's Sergey Brin.

I remember a study from a few years ago that concluded when human were migrating out from Africa, each group that kept moving to a new location had slightly higher novelty-seeking genes than the group that stayed... fascinating... with the end result being in places at the end of the longest migration paths, like the Americas and the Pacific Islands there were significant differences. However, the paper connected that with higher rates of attention-deficit type learning disabilities in those areas, rather than with higher rates of entrepreneurship.

Ultimately, though, there are myriad differences between groups, so looking at just one trait or theory, as seems to be done in the Plutonomy Report, isn't necessarily very helpful in the big picture.

@mgittle :
Interesting article about time perception. I think it's a good reminder to practice mindefulness in daily life... and I see they mention the Dalai Lama in that article

@mgittle

"Limiting your reply to the only thing that was really off-topic...how convenient for you "

Ha. Glad you have a sense of humor about it. I think once one debater has given a pro, and the other has given a con, there are diminishing returns to going deeper. I think as long as people's basic temperaments can't change, debating the details generally doesn't help much.

"If there's purpose to human civilization, what is it and who defines it?"

I think we can define the purpose in the big picture, or in the small picture. In the small picture, people will probably give a variety of answers, but in the big picture, things are determined by the larger structure within which our species exists.

Give people control of their brains and you fix economic inequality. Until you give people control of their brains, you're just playing around with band-aids and pretending things might work out.

Advance medicine and you save millions of lives this year and every year for as long as human civilization will exist. Eventually, you cure the disease of aging, and things fundamentally change.

Get closer to human level AI and things fundamentally change.

I could give predictions for 2020, 2030, 2050, etc, but there are already great books on these topics. Kurzweil gives good overviews of the field. His predictions from 1999 for 2009 were pretty accurate. It's useful to have an idea where we're going. These things are beyond the control of hippies and religious fundamentalists to shut down.


People who want everything to stay the same forever are going to be disappointed.

>> ^NetRunner:

>> ^chilaxe:
"Those at the bottom are no less worthy simply because they werent born with the talents a particular society rewards, Rawls argues."
Right, all the STD-collecting hippies at Burning Man make just as large a contribution to society as the founders of Google or Youtube (on which this video is hosted).

I think you missed the point Rawls was making -- STD-collecting hippies became STD-collecting hippies largely due to factors not of their own choosing. Even if they did, it's not their fault they came to live in a society that calls them STD-collecting hippies and not greatly revered spiritual leaders worthy of great respect and admiration.
It's an argument against the libertarian argument that economic inequalities that arise through free exchange carry some sort of moral force that's beyond reproach. It's an argument against the Ayn Randian philosophy of saying that people who won't bend to the will of the market morally deserve to starve and die.
It's ultimately an argument that demands we respect the basic dignity of every human life, and their ability to freely choose how to use that life, even "STD-collecting hippies".

Interesting response, Netrunner. I do disagree on some points.




1. "STD-collecting hippies became STD-collecting hippies largely due to factors not of their own choosing."

--This isn't an abstract subject to me. I work 60 hours a week and in my off time, instead of doing stupid things, I do thinks like read everything and re-build my personality every month. That's the only reason most of the people at my 10 year high-school reunion were comparative simpletons.

2. Even if they did, it's not their fault they came to live in a society that calls them STD-collecting hippies and not greatly revered spiritual leaders worthy of great respect and admiration.

--Problem solving and labor contribute to the world. It's not arbitrary that we don't reward people for smoking pot.

3. It's ultimately an argument that demands we respect the basic dignity of every human life, and their ability to freely choose how to use that life, even "STD-collecting hippies".

--Yes, people can do whatever they want, but asking serious people to subsidize the loafers in my high school class doesn't reasonable. (I do literally subsidize them; I pay far more in taxes for our local roads etc. than they do.) Indeed, the only reason we're talking right now on computers and doctors can re-grow our organs is because society in the past didn't treat dumb things with respect.



In the big picture, I think the problem of unequal contributions to society will be solved once we build the technological ability to have greater control over the brain. Loafers and STD-collectors are a temporary phenomenon.

The song's lyrics (and title) are both a tribute to Ayn Rand's novella Anthem, who deeply influenced Neil Peart - Rush's lyricist - at the time:

Know your place in life is where you want to be
Don't let them tell you that you owe it all to me
Keep on looking forward, no use in looking 'round
Hold your head above the ground and they won't bring you down

Chorus:
Anthem of the heart and anthem of the mind
A funeral dirge for eyes gone blind
We marvel after those who sought
New wonders in the world, wonders in the world,
Wonders in the world they wrought

Live for yourself -- there's no one else
More worth living for
Begging hands and bleeding hearts will
Only cry out for more

[Chorus]

Well, i know they've always told you
Selfishness was wrong
Yet it was for me, not you, i
Came to write this song

[Chorus]

From a Q&A with fan questions in 1993:

Q. It's fairly well known that you've been influenced to a great extent by the writings of Ayn Rand. Knowing that her philosophy places a great deal of emphasis on individualism and creative integrity, particularly in the realm of art, how do you reconcile this with the fact that the music of Rush is written collectively? What happens if one of you has your heart set on a particular part, but the other two are dead-set against it?

Eric Simpson
Miami Springs, FL

A. Well, I saved this one until last, and you can see why! Eric and other people often send long lists of questions, and I hope they understand that I just can't justify spending half a page on a complex answer for each arcane question (for myself or for the general reader) so I have to be selective. Since I'm giving my time to this as a service to others, I go about it in my own way -- like the selfish bum I am.

Sometimes I choose questions which a few people have asked about, but which are unlikely to appear in an interview; sometimes I choose questions I think are interesting; sometimes I head off a growing myth and debunk it for you; other times I just say "what the heck" and answer any old one. So okay...

For a start. the extent of my influence by the writings of Ayn Rand should not be overestimated -- I am no one's disciple. Yes, I believe the individual is paramount in matters of justice and liberty, but in philosophy, as Aristotle said long ago, the paramount good is happiness. My self-determination as an individual is part of the pursuit of happiness, of course, but there's more to it than that.

In this particular example, working together with Alex and Geddy is a more important part of my pursuit of happiness than is my attachment to any line of lyric or phrase of music. Thus the conflict you describe would not arise -- if we disagree on such a detail, we work on it until it satisfies everybody, and if (very) occasionally one of us has to sacrifice a petty preference, they hey -- it's no big deal. Especially when you compare such an issue against the satisfaction we get from the big picture, the sum of our work together, it would be foolish to sacrifice long-term happiness for a small difference in taste.

I've said before that in regard to my own work, the lyrics, I am more often excited by the input from the other two than I am disappointed by it, and I certainly never feel compromised by it.

And there you can see how complicated it is to identify and pursue happiness, and how complicated it can be just to answer one question (out of twenty submitted by the curious Mr. Simpson, though others often rival him.)

You see what I'm up against...

Bye for now,

N. Peart

November 4, '93, Toronto

>> ^volumptuous:

Ubuntu?
Yeah, I'll just do that. Because you know, I don't need things like Adobe CS4/5, Logic Audio, Pro Tools, Ableton Live, Max/MSP, Final Cut, Color, Motion, Lightroom and basically every other piece of software I use for my professional and fun purposes.
After scanning around some Ubuntu forums and finding out just what a nightmare it is to run any of my required software, I called a friend @ JPL, and one at Oracle to ask if my summation was correct, and they said "for what you need, Ubuntu makes zero sense". Yep, there you go campion.
Why are we talking about Ubuntu? Oh right, to show that we don't need sweatshops to live our wetern lifestyles. Which for me, (aside from about 1/2 the tech I own) is absolutely true.
I work from home, my GF takes mass transit. We have a massive garden where we get most of our food from. We buy all other food from locally grown, sustainable sources (mostly south central farmers market). We make all of our own cleaning agents, use soap nuts for washing clothes, recycle all water, harvest rainwater, solar dry food, hardly ever use a heater, have no A/C or central air. We use canvas bags to shop with, compost 100% of all food waste, recycle or reuse all plastic/paper/glass etc. Our combined trash for a full month is 1/2 of a normal small plastic bag.
I DO NOT buy Nike products, have never bought anything from WalMart, don't buy fastfood (aside from the ocassional In-n-Out) and we both study the source where all of our merch is made. In this ugly web of global corporate confusion, it's not always easy to find out where every piece of every camera or MIDI controller or PS3 you buy comes from.
It is very easy to "vote with my wallet" although I am not so naive to think it makes a dent on the big picture. But a lot of people would rather just scream "just buy Ubuntu and the world is saved" that's a load of bullshit.


Ubuntu. If you need it, write it. That's how Linux works.

I know I could google, and I will, but what are your tips for making your own cleaning products as I'm quite interested in doing that.

In reply to this comment by volumptuous:
Ubuntu?

Yeah, I'll just do that. Because you know, I don't need things like Adobe CS4/5, Logic Audio, Pro Tools, Ableton Live, Max/MSP, Final Cut, Color, Motion, Lightroom and basically every other piece of software I use for my professional and fun purposes.

After scanning around some Ubuntu forums and finding out just what a nightmare it is to run any of my required software, I called a friend @ JPL, and one at Oracle to ask if my summation was correct, and they said "for what you need, Ubuntu makes zero sense". Yep, there you go campion.

Why are we talking about Ubuntu? Oh right, to show that we don't need sweatshops to live our wetern lifestyles. Which for me, (aside from about 1/2 the tech I own) is absolutely true.

I work from home, my GF takes mass transit. We have a massive garden where we get most of our food from. We buy all other food from locally grown, sustainable sources (mostly south central farmers market). We make all of our own cleaning agents, use soap nuts for washing clothes, recycle all water, harvest rainwater, solar dry food, hardly ever use a heater, have no A/C or central air. We use canvas bags to shop with, compost 100% of all food waste, recycle or reuse all plastic/paper/glass etc. Our combined trash for a full month is 1/2 of a normal small plastic bag.

I DO NOT buy Nike products, have never bought anything from WalMart, don't buy fastfood (aside from the ocassional In-n-Out) and we both study the source where all of our merch is made. In this ugly web of global corporate confusion, it's not always easy to find out where every piece of every camera or MIDI controller or PS3 you buy comes from.

It is very easy to "vote with my wallet" although I am not so naive to think it makes a dent on the big picture. But a lot of people would rather just scream "just buy Ubuntu and the world is saved" that's a load of bullshit.

Ubuntu?

Yeah, I'll just do that. Because you know, I don't need things like Adobe CS4/5, Logic Audio, Pro Tools, Ableton Live, Max/MSP, Final Cut, Color, Motion, Lightroom and basically every other piece of software I use for my professional and fun purposes.

After scanning around some Ubuntu forums and finding out just what a nightmare it is to run any of my required software, I called a friend @ JPL, and one at Oracle to ask if my summation was correct, and they said "for what you need, Ubuntu makes zero sense". Yep, there you go campion.

Why are we talking about Ubuntu? Oh right, to show that we don't need sweatshops to live our wetern lifestyles. Which for me, (aside from about 1/2 the tech I own) is absolutely true.

I work from home, my GF takes mass transit. We have a massive garden where we get most of our food from. We buy all other food from locally grown, sustainable sources (mostly south central farmers market). We make all of our own cleaning agents, use soap nuts for washing clothes, recycle all water, harvest rainwater, solar dry food, hardly ever use a heater, have no A/C or central air. We use canvas bags to shop with, compost 100% of all food waste, recycle or reuse all plastic/paper/glass etc. Our combined trash for a full month is 1/2 of a normal small plastic bag.

I DO NOT buy Nike products, have never bought anything from WalMart, don't buy fastfood (aside from the ocassional In-n-Out) and we both study the source where all of our merch is made. In this ugly web of global corporate confusion, it's not always easy to find out where every piece of every camera or MIDI controller or PS3 you buy comes from.

It is very easy to "vote with my wallet" although I am not so naive to think it makes a dent on the big picture. But a lot of people would rather just scream "just buy Ubuntu and the world is saved" that's a load of bullshit.

It amazes me how stupid enforcement officials can be at times. Specifically when very large numbers of them focus on a very small number of individuals who won't submit to their whims. There was a video of a dozen TSA people following around a guy who was video taping at an airport. They always talk about "terrorism", all the while displaying massive tunnel vision by focusing on a harmless, but vaguely suspicious individual. So all eyes are on some goober with a camera, which leaves nobody watching the big picture.

terrorists are not going to make themselves conspicuous.

every time I wear a leather motorcycle jacket through the airport, I get "randomly" selected for extra screening. If I leave that jacket at home, I'm never selected for extra attention.

>> ^RedSky:

My take on the ending:
http://i.imgur.com/wtzBE.gif


If only... But that's TV for ya. You only need to keep the viewer hooked till the next episode. You can completely mess up the big picture and it won't even matter that much. If the writers were any good they'd write movies.

Federal Income Tax is theft by degrees-I ain't filed in years-Come and get me babies-tag my collection of stuff,I own no property, no vehicles, no assets, no bank accounts-Just yer average American here.....

And what of the interviewer's knowledge of the big picture and his trip to show all his friends how uneducated he is regarding the workings of the government like these passionate lackeys in the ssme sinking ship.-A better reason to march on Washington?
Full disclosure-Classified documents pertaining to the NSA,CIA,UFOs',Covert ops,rigged elections,systematic undermining of the infrastructue...the list of valid reasons to protest the government is extensive-Look for the word to get out on many of these issues, before 2015-Stick around, the worlds' gonna get interesting very soon.

Bush and his family belong in the Hague in a plexiglass cubicle, then in bodybags. Obama needs to drop a major nut,and stop pussy-footing around trying to pretend he's a leader. Like one of the interviewed says here, "I've been brainwashed my entire life"

Earth to Humans, You all have!

>> ^TheFreak:
I don't get the resentment here towards overweight people. The airlines, all airlines, have been squeezing us tighter and tighter into those cabins for years. On some flights you can't even extend the food tray anymore. Add to this all the restrictions on luggage and the "dog and pony show" security measures we deal with and flying has become an absolute insult.
And now...in light of what the airlines have done to pack us in like cattle, you're going to blame the overweight guy next to you? That's absolutely absurd. Did the overweight guy shrink the seats when you weren't looking?
Southwest airlines is now selling a service that no longer 'serves' a significant portion of the population. How is that reasonable? Cost saving measures are understandable in this economic environment but if you redesign your product to the point that it no longer works, you've lost sight of the big picture.


Amid skyrocketing fuel prices and planes becoming more expensive to fly because the population is increasingly overweight (studies have calculated the numbers), the airline industry constantly has companies going bankrupt.

If consumers want more space, they're free to fly on more expensive airlines or fly first class.

The basic rule of economics is that nothing's free.

I don't get the resentment here towards overweight people. The airlines, all airlines, have been squeezing us tighter and tighter into those cabins for years. On some flights you can't even extend the food tray anymore. Add to this all the restrictions on luggage and the "dog and pony show" security measures we deal with and flying has become an absolute insult.

And now...in light of what the airlines have done to pack us in like cattle, you're going to blame the overweight guy next to you? That's absolutely absurd. Did the overweight guy shrink the seats when you weren't looking?

Southwest airlines is now selling a service that no longer 'serves' a significant portion of the population. How is that reasonable? Cost saving measures are understandable in this economic environment but if you redesign your product to the point that it no longer works, you've lost sight of the big picture.

>> ^rougy:
Non-wage compensation has certainly increased much more than 9%.
So what kind of compensation are you talking about?
And for whom? For how many? Most Americans don't get any compensation at all other than maybe sick days. A very large portion of our work force receives no compensation whatsoever and they never have.
And again, what are the real numbers here and who are the real beneficiaries? To claim that the average compensation has risen but neglect to provide a break-down of that data renders it meaningless.
Elizabeth Warren's claim is that the middle class has been "hacked at." That's different from saying rich people make too much money, which, even if it's right, doesn't decrease the standard of living of the middle class.
Isn't it obvious that the money that is getting funneled to the rich is the money that would have otherwise been distributed to the middle class?
Furthermore, I think it's obvious that our health care costs are rising at an expedited rate unrelated to any rise in sickness or real costs.
Our health care costs are rising because the insurance industry itself has seen fit to write its own check.


Healthcare costs are skyrocketing in every single country in the world that provides socialized medicine. You're getting stuck because you're only looking at the country of your nationality.

Elizabeth Warren has a made a mistake. We can say 'it can be argued she meant it this other way in which she'd be at least partially correct," but her job is to make statements that are accurately worded and best fit the data. An outsider to this issue would find it surreal that she would refuse to talk about the complete picture of "compensation."

The burden of proof isn't on reasonable skeptics. She needs to prove that there's reason to intentionally not look at the big picture. If skepticism turned out to be wrong in this case, I'd certainly admit it. Would her defenders admit it if she turned out to be wrong?

"If something is true, how can it be illegal?"

Food for thought.

Don't know the big picture here...heard he was stirring up shit...but I can't stand fundamentalists be they Muslim, Christian, or Jew.

Any third-party, observationist Dutch wanna chime in?