this is a fine example of what a year locked up does to a body.

sure. willing to listen to the p o s s i b i l i t y of corona being manufactured, but have some hard evidence. please. in a country billions +, origins of swine, bird, and ABC123 lettered viruses - it's not unreasonable to expect a lab to be located in a region where the pandemic started.

as it is, not versed in immunology (nor psychology or 'why are the following me') so rely on those who know (and don't have stock in Alcoa). that and the experiences of a lifetime being ginned up preparing for the next life-altering bug.

herpes, aids, penicillin-resistant gonorrhea/syphilis/chlamydia/TB, cjd, zika, lyme, west nile, ebola or the plethora of viruses, of eastern origins, that could become the next Spanish Flu.*

all those diseases have natural origins.

so, yeah. this pandemic wasn't a surprise. no more than Hurricane Katrina (why did they build that bridge over Lake Pontchartrain) or why the ere-orange administration left a 'play book' for Virus X.

it was foreseen, it happened, and could happen again. much more likely another flaming arrow from natures' quiver. (shivers given via a quiver?)

Occam's razor, in essence (should have led w/that).


* even new strains of hepatitis caused waves for a while and there was a bit of time, a virus in the NW USA was akin to airborne aids but disappear as quickly as it came and schistosomiasis has come closer to our shores - - - AND NOW -https://www.livescience.com/mystery-brain-disease-cluster-canada.html that hopefully isn't the precursor to zombie-itis.

Don't mistake me, im not unreasonable. Im sure we probably could find someone who didn't add an asterisk and say "IF no one does anything" as an attempt to get ratings. As someone with extra time on his hands who was watching the news nearly constantly though, I didnt see that.

That said, still don't think the claim holds up. Even if there was halfhazard use of that study as a headline creator at times, he's using it as a justification to say basically that there definitely WERE going to be these deaths, and trump stopped them. That is simply not true. If even one single person decided to wear a mask, those numbers drop.

That and there are degrees of good and bad jobs being done, it's not binary.

Closing down the country? good.
Closing it down earlier? better.
Not restocking the emergency stockpilke when warned? bad
Blaming obama when he is the one who fired the pandemic team? asshole
Funneling money for small business relief into his own company and his son in laws? criminal
Opening too soon? bad
Finally encouraging people to wear masks? okay, but could be better

etc.

------------- also ----------------

my cousin just died
39, 5 kids
she had "fluid on the lungs"
but it's not determined yet the cause
like im saying my mom just called me 1 hour ago
im tryin to find a fucking picture of her on her husband's facebook
but all i can find is shit about not wearing masks and how obama is trying to stop trump from blah blah blah

Did donald trump kill my cousin? absolutely not.
Did he help spread propaganda that encouraged her to not wear a mask and break social distancing because 'MERICA!? yes And he's currently trying to force the RNC to accomodate 50k people in one small space, to boot.

She was 39, 5 kids

I hope they start with him. ;-)

So, he thinks Russia has no churches!?! He thinks Venezuela is religion free?! Lol. What a maroon.
"If" they ever get power? Like 2008, when thousands of Christians were hunted like animals and murdered in the streets and organized religion was outlawed in America?....oh, wait....

UnChristian "Christians" like him are why people are fleeing religions like rats on a sinking ship.
The church is a bastion of pedophiles, racists, misogynists, and charlatans. I, for one, would support legal prosecution and even execution of the leaders of these evil cabals and most vile perpetrators from them, just like I would active members and leaders of NAMBLA, and the forfeiture of all church assets like any other criminal organization would see, they have each destroyed far more than one life, it's not unreasonable to think they should pay with their own. Just think of the dent that could make in the national debt and the criminals that would remove from our communities.

Even I, however, don't advocate (anti) religious warfare, what he's suggesting. I believe our legal system, properly and fairly applied, could easily and righteously eradicate most organized religions if only people didn't turn a blind eye towards their undeniable institutionalised crimes and sins.

Also, shouldn't any Christian hope they would be martyred, isn't that a free ticket into heaven in their belief system? Didn't Jebus tell them to turn the other cheek, not to strike first?

Upvote for exposure, not agreement

Devil's advocate:

First up, If we're looking for "something we can't imagine", by definition we are unable to search for it.

Second, there's every possibility that aliens ARE very similar to us. There's a principle known as the Mediocrity Principle that states that if you pick a thing at random from a set, it's more likely to common than unusual. In this case, we are picking from the (hypothetical) set of life-sustaining planets, and using the only example we're aware of: Earth.

It's not unreasonable to assume that Earth is typical of life-sustaining planets. There doesn't appear to be anything particularly special about it.... it's a rocky planet in the "Goldilocks zone" where water is liquid. We've found plenty of those.

So there's actually a good possibility that life on other planets could face the same evolutionary pressures and arrive at the same solutions.

Aliens might not be that different at all.

OK, a few things.

60 km/h is about 37 mph and although I don't know the exact speed limit on that street, it's not unreasonable to assume it's 50 or 60 km/h.

In the video, the light turns yellow approximately 1.5 seconds before he enters the intersection. He is going 54 km/h at that time. This means he is approximately 23 m from the intersection when the light turns yellow.

According to nacta.org, the safe stopping distance for an average driver at 35 mph is 136 ft or around 41 m.

From the Ontario Highway Traffic Act: Every driver approaching a traffic control signal showing a circular amber indication and facing the indication shall stop his or her vehicle if he or she can do so safely, otherwise he or she may proceed with caution. R.S.O. 1990, c. H.8, s. 144 (15).

Also from the Ontario Highway Act: No driver or operator of a vehicle in an intersection shall turn left across the path of a vehicle approaching from the opposite direction unless he or she has afforded a reasonable opportunity to the driver or operator of the approaching vehicle to avoid a collision. R.S.O. 1990, c. H.8, s. 141 (5).

At current levels, yes, but I wonder if they were projecting forward to 2100.

It's not unreasonable to expect that US GDP would be 10 times bigger in 2100. That would only require an average growth rate of >3% per annum (historically, GDP Growth Rate in the United States averaged 3.21 percent from 1947 until 2017)

@worm
tort reform.
which is not unreasonable,considering it spawned its own cottage industry:ambulance chasers.
and i can agree,in principle,for catastrophic insurance.

but i still think if you are going to do it,don't be a pussy about it.
single payer all the way and we already have a system in place to accommodate single payer.

I think the argument is not that his behavior is stunning etiquette, but it is understandable and his frustration is relatable. Optimally he would've just sat in silence, or driven around to the other entrance, but all things considered, her behavior was more unacceptable. Or to put it another way - this was three minutes out of their respective days. There may be an infinite number of circumstances on either side that we don't see, that would swing our opinion either way. However, if we ignore their emotional states, and just look at the principle, she was dead wrong.

If a restaurant or movie theatre wants to kick you out in the middle of a meal, you can't stay. If a hotel wants to kick you out at 2 am (and lets you pack and take your stuff), you can't stay. That's why they can call the cops to get you out if you refuse to leave - because they have the presumptive right to decide who stays and goes. You have no right to call the cops and ask them to stop the owner from kicking you out, because you have no fundamental right to stay there.

I am not going to say that you're trolling, and your arguments are not unreasonable or dickish, but you're wrong. (In principle) you have a number of potential recourses that you can choose when a proprietor asks you to leave. (in principle) refusing to leave is not one of the options you have any right to exercise.

We can come up with scenarios where it could be argued that you should be allowed to refuse to leave:

1. You're staying at a ski lodge and you will die if you are kicked out into the cold. Then we're no longer talking consumer rights but emergency / health and safety rights.

2. If you leave the premises, you would lose all your other means of recourse, for example if you don't have contact or identifying information for the business you're at. In that case you can ask for that information, and then leave.

In principle, however, sticking around isn't an option, and there's no sane reason why it should be an option. If the business in question doesn't have a valid reason for kicking you out, you get to sue them afterwards.

Slippery slope fallacy.
"If we allow gays to marry, what's next? Can I marry my dog?"

No-one is talking about banning guns. I wouldn't support that myself. I have friends who are hunters and target shooters.

But be reasonable; you can have a gun for target shooting or hunting or even "home defence" (if you're really that paranoid), but you don't need an AR-15 or anything with a high capacity magazine and it's not unreasonable to make sure that people who own guns aren't complete nutjobs.

NZ is in the top 15% of gun ownership rates per capita (22 guns per 100 people), but our average annual firearm homicide rate for the last 30 years or so is ~0.2 deaths per 100k people.

Compare that to the USA. The US tops the chart of gun ownership with 112 guns per 100 people. So the gun ownership rate is 5 times that of NZ, but the average annual firearm homicide rate is 4 deaths per 100k people. That's 20 times the number of murders. Even if you allow for the higher gun ownership rate, you're still 4 times worse than NZ.

And the difference is simple: we have sensible gun ownership laws.

I saw a great post the other day.
"The conservative mind:
Abortions? BAN THEM!
Gay Marriage? BAN IT!
Marijuana? BAN IT!
Guns? eh, banning things never works"

But hey, you're gonna need those guns for when Donary Trumpton ushers in a tyrannical dictatorship. Good luck with that; let me know how you get on with an AR-15 versus a predator drone.

"Going only off of that vid, I'm inclined to take the managers side on this one."
I agree that there's probably more to this. I hate videos without context. That said....

"There's an air of entitlement about the way they handled the whole thing. "

Sorry, but "entitlement" is exactly the right attitude when you're paying for a service. You don't have to be a dick about it, but it's not unreasonable to expect to get what you pay for.

"That manager doesn't come across like a guy being an asshole for the sake of it "

Really? "My dad owns this place" guy doesn't come across as an asshole? Sorry, but he seems like a spoilt little shit to me.

"If so, he's a braver man than I and should be commended for putting his self respect ahead of a mere job!"

Again, it depends on what actually happened to set this off, but from the video, this isn't a "mere job" for him. He's not some guy working there for a paycheck until he gets something better, he plans on owning the place, and as such, he needs to pull his head out of his arse and learn how to deal with customers.

"Either way the two filming should probably try to find a little perspective."

I didn't think they were particularly rude or abusive.

A-Where did you speak about abuse?! I told a story of abuse (My mother in law being forced to have sex with animals, beaten burned, raped, etc.) And your direct answer (to her reliance on the church DUE TO THAT ABUSE) was "c) get through it with the help of family and friends like literally millions of others have done. " Ie., her abuse CAN be gotten over in your expert opinon. I say fuck that. It cannot be gotten over more so than a physical injury like brain damage, since it started so young and destroyed her thought process in life. In a way she is a socialized feral child (In a way, but I know there are huge differences.) People like me and Newt, thankfully, didn't fully get brain-fucked and so can work on social issues.

(Irrelevant topic; did you know abuse can cause schizophrenia without genetic factors? Amazing... (Carlson 2011).)

B-It is not unreasonable when you get into a public conversation on a topic that you comment directly on.

C-Yes, tell rape victims you know their plight, I am sure they will acknowledge your lack of knowing...I mean I can understand Doctors with years and years of study. Or here is a better analogy. Pat a black man on the shoulder who's child has been shot by a racist cop and say, "I know the feeling bud."

D-If you have to explain why what you said was different than those examples, it wasn't different enough.

Grocery shopping has become too complicated lately it seems to me. Used to be not all that long ago that you just got what looked good at the big chain grocery store and then made the odd trip to specialist shops for particular things on occasion. Whole Foods does have some good stuff, but it's way too expensive to just buy everything there. Trader Joe's has decent quality and prices but very limited selection. The local hippy organic grocery store/coop is in a similar situation to Whole Foods but with different stuff, and then there is the still the big chain grocery store with good prices on things that don't really vary much in quality. Oh, and of course there are still the delis and butcher shops and whatever else for the particular things they do well. Also, they went and knocked down the Pick 'n' Save that was three blocks away and are building a Metro Mart, which in my experience is exactly the same thing but with fancier decor and higher prices.

I have like five different grocery lists now. So, the end result is that I actually have access to much higher quality food at not unreasonable prices and yet somehow I'm ending up eating frozen pizza a lot more than I used to when it was Pick and Save or nothing.

How is anyone making excuses for the police here?

So fucking what if he was trying to provoke a reaction? His reasons for filming the police like he did don't come into it at all. So what if the officers didn't like it and so what if he did it for this reason.

I don't see how any of this is relevant. This is a video of a person acting completely legally and within his rights and being arrested just because the police didn't like it.

So what if it's provoking, the police should be trained to be able to deal with a provocative situation. You know what would have ended this? The police doing their jobs and ignoring him. That's what should have happened.

Being rude isn't against the law. It's not OK for police to arrest someone for being rude. The only thing this guy was doing was filming the police and people think that's wrong? Or he didn't answer their questions? He's allowed to do that. It's OK. How can you say he was acting like a tool? He did nothing wrong.

The police are supposedly trained individuals. They shouldn't be reacting to provocation, especially when it's so passive as this example. This guy is hardly pushing his luck here. He made no threats to the officers, he didn't do anything even remotely violent or threatening he just exercised his rights. So the police didn't like it, so what?

Fucking apologists. The law is what it is and the police should be held to a high standard regarding it. They should do their job. Let's get this straight, what they did here was arrest someone just because they didn't like what he was doing, even though what he was doing was perfectly legal. That should disgust you, it really should. It shouldn't be OK because you think the guy was being a bit of a dick. That's not relevant because being a bit of a dick shouldn't get you arrested. It's only an excuse if you think that it's not unreasonable for the police to arrest people they just don't like.

Here's a hint: in order to create life, you don't need a seven. If you did you wouldn't be reading this. We exist, therefore by definition life in the universe is possible.

That's simply the fallacy of false equivalence. Yes, life in the Universe is possible, but that doesn't mean your favored theory about how life arrived in the Universe is possible.

Now, I'm perfectly willing to grant that it might be extraordinarily improbable.

The probability has been calculated, more often than not, at many, many times greater than the number of atoms in the Universe. There has been no scientific proof provided showing that abiogenesis is possible. It is simply a faith that many scientists and atheists have that it *must* have happened that way because of evolution. Abiogenesis because evolution is not a theory of origins, it is blind faith.

And as for god? Well, we know for certain that life exists, so it's not unreasonable to assume it might exist elsewhere. But we have zero empirical evidence for god. None, zip, zilch, nada. Does that mean god definitely doesn't exist? No, I can't prove that.

You know that life exists but what you don't know is how or why. To rule out at the least a possible designer is simply personal bias; there isn't a logical reason to do so. There is plenty of positive evidence for Gods existence, there isn't any for abiogenesis. Faith in God is reasonable, faith in abiogenesis is simply blind faith.

Is it probable that god exists? No, it would violate everything we know about the universe. That doesn't mean we're not wrong, but you'd think that something as powerful as a literally omnipotent entity would leave some evidence of it's existence.

As Dawkins said when asked what he would say if he died and met god, "why did you go to such trouble to hide yourself?"

A God existing does not violate anything we know about the Universe. I think you're confusing mechanism with agency. Just because we understand the mechanics of something does not rule out an agency behind it. It would be like taking apart a car and then saying that because we understand how the car is put together that gasoline does not exist.

The bible says that everyone is provided evidence of Gods existence, and that people suppress the truth because they love their sin. It's not really about evidence; I know atheists who have had out of body experiences who deny they have a soul.

No. Not everyone thinks like a theist.

I have no idea whether life exists on other planets or not. I can theorise about the probability of it, but that's as far as I'm willing to commit.

As for the nonsense "roll a seven on a six sided die" argument... I really don't know if you're trolling or just genuinely have no understanding of logic, math, probability, statistics, etc.

Here's a hint: in order to create life, you don't need a seven. If you did you wouldn't be reading this. We exist, therefore by definition life in the universe is possible.

Now, I'm perfectly willing to grant that it might be extraordinarily improbable. The video tells us that the latest evidence is that there are around 20,000,000,000 sun size stars and probably about 4,000,000,000 earth like planets. Now, the video gives the odds of life on each one at 0.1% (and then somehow comes up with 1 million instead of 4 million, but I digress).

So we have 4 billion planets that might possibly have earth like life. But let's say that abiogenesis is really, really improbable. In fact, let's say, it's 1 in 4 billion. We've been testing out the various abiogenesis theories for a while now, but I doubt we've conducted anything like 4 billion separate experiments, so it's really no surprise that we haven't observed it.

But it might be even more unlikely. Maybe it's 1 in 400 billion! Seems pretty unlikely, but let's roll with it. There are still 200 billion galaxies out there. Even if only 1% of them are like the milky way that's still 8 billion billion potential life bearing planets. I don't think it's a stretch to say that some of them could have life.

You don't need a seven, but maybe you do need an edge, or a corner!

Do you understand the difference between what I think is probable based on observed facts and "taking something on faith"?

And as for god? Well, we know for certain that life exists, so it's not unreasonable to assume it might exist elsewhere. But we have zero empirical evidence for god. None, zip, zilch, nada. Does that mean god definitely doesn't exist? No, I can't prove that. Is it probable that god exists? No, it would violate everything we know about the universe. That doesn't mean we're not wrong, but you'd think that something as powerful as a literally omnipotent entity would leave some evidence of it's existence.

As Dawkins said when asked what he would say if he died and met god, "why did you go to such trouble to hide yourself?"