I understand what he is saying, and aside from all the course language, he has a point.
(because youth today is far too "entitled" and he's right as to how they got that way.)

BUT

His argument falls apart because the economy has changed. If the economy was the same as it was even 20 years ago (never-mind 35-40 years ago in the 70s) and this attitude of youth existed, then I'd completely agree - but it isn't. Today's economy says I can't feed my family and own my own house, even with two full-time incomes in the household. I work damn hard, I'm not a slacker.

I may not run my own company but, my job, as it is today, and would have been 20 years ago, would have paid the bills and allowed some extra cash to take my family on a holiday once a year. My wife would have been able to stay home with the kids, at least part-time.

I bought a house. It cost me $400,000. Ten years ago, the same house was valued at $140,000-170,000.
Twenty-one years ago, when my house was built, it cost $100,000 brand new. Wages, on the other hand, haven't changed all that much. As I left high school, people with good jobs were making $19-25 an hour working at the mill. Today, the wages are much the same. No one is making 300% more for the same job they were doing 20 years ago. So why has housing gone up, why has everything gone up(fuel, food etc.)? The truth is I can't afford a $400,000 house, no regular person can, but what choice do I have, the cheapest rental I could find was $200 more than what my mortgage payment is.

It's the economy, it's the banks, It's globalization, It's International Trade, It's Corporations buying up all the little guys and then jacking up the prices, paying employees less and paying all the politicians to stay out of their way.

His analogy about seeing Mr. Rich and respecting him in the old days and slamming him today also doesn't stand. Today, very few people own their own business and are successfully wealthy. Most small businesses are barley hanging on, operating in the shadows of the companies like Wal-Mart. Most small businesses need to barrow money to set up shop. These businesses pay more tax and interest than they ever did.

In the sixty's to late eighties, both of my uncles owned their own businesses. They were very successful and made a decent living and had many employees. Life was good. That bubble popped in the late eighties to nineties not because business was decreasing but because new governments raised business and property taxes to the point that, they both had to close up their shops. Taxes more than doubled over night and the interest on banking skyrocketed.

So Adam's rant is fun. It makes a good point about entitlement and winy brats wanting reward without working for it but that's it. It doesn't explain Occupy of the financial state every one is in now.
Period.

I witnessed a Dozer start up today and the smoke stack made this Toroid of exhaust rise into the air for sixty feet.

It was effin neat !

I even audibly made a *science notation.

Is that Philip Moriarty from Sixty Symbols?

Yeah, Starcraft Two is so fantastic that if I get home and its not too late to play Starcraft Two and Im stoned, Ill either watch replays or watch Starky which both can be amazingly entertaining. But for some reason Starcraft Two is one of those games I find impossible to play stoned. The amount of brutality involved in a multiplayer game really requires intense attention to detail for ten, fifteen, thirty... sometimes sixty minutes. Its a mindfuck too... because when Im stoned the game feels faster and I feel like Im playing slow.

So I was definitely surprised when I beat a silver while I was stoned and so I asked them Are You Stoned? Haha. Its a funny replay.



>> ^Enzoblue:

Can't emphasize how much the storyline is ignored amongst the hardcore starcraft community. The game itself is the best all-encompassing competitive game I've ever played on a computer.

The final sixty seconds of this is brilliant!

>> ^ptrcklgrs:
Obama is the one bailing everybody out.


Bush is the person who bailed out Wall Street. Or were you not watching the news that day? Obama just continued the bailouts. It's not really fair to blame a problem that was snowballing for so long on the person who became president right after it happened. Bush had eight years. Not only did he not do anything about the housing bubble, but he set us up to spend six-billion-dollars-a-month on the fruitless wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Only to have Obama catch Bin Laden.

I'm willing to entertain the idea that the Democrats are responsible for our predicament as well. But focusing on the left-right controversies is exactly what the people in power want us to do. Because it prevents us from discussing the real issues. We can just sit around blaming each-other forever as far as they're concerned.

When my father graduated high-school, he learned the floor-covering trade. (carpet,vinyl,etc...) His first job paid him three dollars an hour and it was enough to support a family of four. Back in the sixties, three dollars would get you a six-pack of beer and a pack of cigarettes with a dollar left over. Now, three dollars won't even cover the gas I spend to get to work, not even one way.

And people can spin the numbers and facts any way that they want. Just as I've done here. But no matter how you spin it, the fact that there is a problem is glaringly obvious to most people. Even if we don't see it the same way. You obviously think there's a problem as well, but I just can't buy that we live in a society where working hard brings success, not anymore.

And you know what? If people keep protesting in numbers like this, they're going to make a change for better or worse. You don't need to be organized or even "right" to have an effect. The power lies in the numbers, not the message. It's the same for the Tea Party. Wouldn't it be great if we could come together and use those numbers for something positive?

>> ^ptrcklgrs:
Special cleaning crews are being brought in to clean up after the trash messes left all over by the "99%" costing the city $$$.


And one last thing: Who do you think was responsible for cleaning up Boston Harbor in 1773?

If you wanted to know, you'd have found it on Google in less time than it takes to stick your foot in it even further on the Sift. You're too lazy to talk to. I'm done.>> ^robbersdog49:

>> ^messenger:
Nope. You're a lazy idiot. You've been told by people who know better, and you can't even be bothered to Google it or check Wikipedia. Or maybe you think facts just obscure things.>> ^robbersdog49:
Last time I looked the UK is in Europe and I can tell you right now the period isn't the thousands separator. Where the hell are you getting this info from? I've never seen a comma used as a decimal point, not in France, Spain, Germany or Belgium (the other european countries I have actually been to). You are wrong.
I'd love to know how you're 'checking' your facts before compounding an error.


Huh?
Which bit of this don't you understand? Fact is that numerical notation is the same here in Europe (I'd write one million, two hundred and eighty two thousand three hundred and forty five pounds and sixty eight pence as £1,282,345.68). Show me how you're checking your facts and I'll show you where you're going wrong.

>> ^messenger:

Nope. You're a lazy idiot. You've been told by people who know better, and you can't even be bothered to Google it or check Wikipedia. Or maybe you think facts just obscure things.>> ^robbersdog49:
Last time I looked the UK is in Europe and I can tell you right now the period isn't the thousands separator. Where the hell are you getting this info from? I've never seen a comma used as a decimal point, not in France, Spain, Germany or Belgium (the other european countries I have actually been to). You are wrong.
I'd love to know how you're 'checking' your facts before compounding an error.



Huh?

Which bit of this don't you understand? Fact is that numerical notation is the same here in Europe (I'd write one million, two hundred and eighty two thousand three hundred and forty five pounds and sixty eight pence as £1,282,345.68). Show me how you're checking your facts and I'll show you where you're going wrong.

ETA: It seems where you're going wrong is you don't seem to know that the UK is in Europe. Well it is. I'm willing to accept that other european countries may work differently, although I've never noticed it when I've travelled in europe.

>> ^Ryjkyj:


It's really just a matter of perspective though. Compare a bee with a slug. Bees are way ahead of slugs as far as visible complexity, yet to us, they're complete idiots. Even if we do rely on them.
And humans have been around for what? Maybe fifty-thousand years? Yeah, we've done A LOT in that time. But what could we do with another fifty-thousand? What about a million? (If for some reason we overcome the astronomical probability that we'll destroy ourselves) I don't really think there's any telling what we could do.
Not to mention the fact that everyone just assumes that aliens will be some sort of humanoid or even just act human or share any of our characteristics at all. Sure, here on Earth, life is carbon-based. But then why does everybody just assume that if we encounter life, it will also be carbon based? Answer: because we can't possibly understand how it could work any other way. And not because we just assume, but because we looked and it seems impossible according to the laws of chemistry. But that doesn't mean we're right just because we can't see the answer.
What about this: math is an abstract concept like you say. But the system most of us use is based on the power of ten. The digit repeats and a new one is added at the tenth place. Could that have something to do with the amount of fingers we have? Well what if the alien in question used a system that repeated at the ninth place? Their whole system would follow different rules. What if they used a system that had an individual symbol for every number up to two-hundred fifty million, seven hundred sixty-seven thousand, eight-hundred and fifty-three? What if they were so evolved that powers didn't even make a difference and they could fill a quadratic equation with numbers that were all based in different powers?
And if they were a race (another human term) whose individual bodies consisted of different, interchangeable parts, then math would be essential to their existence. It would be as natural as eating. To a species like that, we would look like childish morons playing with our own snot. Even though we use separate, distinct powers to program computers.
And that's just assuming that our aliens only understand things as far as the three dimensions we live in. What about a fourth dimensional alien that only communicates through careful waves of sulfur emission? To us, it might just be a giant blur that smelled like shit. You know what we'd do? That's right, we'd light it on fire.


I will admit that a species that has absolutely no comparable experience with us would be a problem. There's a mad, wonderful chapter in Greg Egans Diaspora that discusses the idea of complex creatures that have evolved in multi-dimensional space. I don't recall the exact maths, but they essentially live "rotated" into extra dimensions. I'll grant they will pose a challenge.

But it's not unreasonable to assume that some life forms would have evolved on a similar ecosystem to ours. We're already comfortable in working outside base 10, and there are some smart people who are working out establishing common symbol patterns based on fundamental mathematical principles. I don't care if you can interchange your head with your elbow, or you reproduce by thought, 1+1 =2. That does not change. Same for Pythagoras' theorem, prime numbers and so on.

My overall point is that something that is smart enough to figure out all the problems of going out into space will figure out how to communicate with us.

Or more likely, simply harvest the planet for resources. They're bound to be low on food and fuel by then

>> ^ChaosEngine:

Much as I love Neil DeGrasse Tyson, I feel he's wrong on this. I've said it before, but I think our ability to understand abstract concepts such as math should mark us as sufficiently different from the other species on our planet.


It's really just a matter of perspective though. Compare a bee with a slug. Bees are way ahead of slugs as far as visible complexity, yet to us, they're complete idiots. Even if we do rely on them.

And humans have been around for what? Maybe fifty-thousand years? Yeah, we've done A LOT in that time. But what could we do with another fifty-thousand? What about a million? (If for some reason we overcome the astronomical probability that we'll destroy ourselves) I don't really think there's any telling what we could do.

Not to mention the fact that everyone just assumes that aliens will be some sort of humanoid or even just act human or share any of our characteristics at all. Sure, here on Earth, life is carbon-based. But then why does everybody just assume that if we encounter life, it will also be carbon based? Answer: because we can't possibly understand how it could work any other way. And not because we just assume, but because we looked and it seems impossible according to the laws of chemistry. But that doesn't mean we're right just because we can't see the answer.

What about this: math is an abstract concept like you say. But the system most of us use is based on the power of ten. The digit repeats and a new one is added at the tenth place. Could that have something to do with the amount of fingers we have? Well what if the alien in question used a system that repeated at the ninth place? Their whole system would follow different rules. What if they used a system that had an individual symbol for every number up to two-hundred fifty million, seven hundred sixty-seven thousand, eight-hundred and fifty-three? What if they were so evolved that powers didn't even make a difference and they could fill a quadratic equation with numbers that were all based in different powers?

And if they were a race (another human term) whose individual bodies consisted of different, interchangeable parts, then math would be essential to their existence. It would be as natural as eating. To a species like that, we would look like childish morons playing with our own snot. Even though we use separate, distinct powers to program computers.

And that's just assuming that our aliens only understand things as far as the three dimensions we live in. What about a fourth dimensional alien that only communicates through careful waves of sulfur emission? To us, it might just be a giant blur that smelled like shit. You know what we'd do? That's right, we'd light it on fire.

"The latest disaster for the solar system is that the United States has decided to go to Mars. And, of course, later we intend to colonize deep space with our Salad Shooters and Snot Candy and microwave hot dogs. But let me ask you this: What are we going to tell the Intergalactic Council the first time one of our young women throws her newborn baby out of a seventh-story window? And how do we explain to the Near-Stellar Trade Confederation that our representative was late for the meeting because his breakfast was cold, and he had to spend thirty minutes beating the shit out of his wife?

Do you think the elders of the Universal Board of Wisdom will understand that it’s simply because of quaint local customs that over 80 million of our women have had their clitorises and labia cut off and their vulvas sewn shut in order to make them more marriageable and unable to derive pleasure from sex and thus never be a threat to stray from their husbands’ beds?

Can’t you just sense how eager the rest of the universe is for us to show up?"

- George Carlin

I don't know what I'm going to do when I move back to America. Right now I live in the land of trappists (Belgium) where the best beers costs about $.90 per bottle in the grocery store. I love Westmalle, though I can never decide between the dubble or the triple.

In reply to this comment by Skeeve:
Haha, some other Trappist drinkers eh? I'm a big fan of the Westmalle Tripel myself. Though, considering its cost over here, I'm more likely to be drinking the Rutting Elk Red from the Grizzly Paw Brewery in Canmore, AB.

Turns out that spectator paint drying also has its fans. http://videosift.com/video/Sixty-Symbols-Watching-paint-dry

The same thing has happened to me a few times in the last week or so... not sure what's happening.>> ^RFlagg:

Regarding the Atlas of Creation, a VideoSift search would have gotten the same result: http://videosift.com/video/Professor-Merrifield-and-the-Atlas-of-Crea
tion
What is odd about the Wobbly Earth video, when I tried to Sift it, 50 minutes after it was already sifted, SiftBot said it wasn't sifted yet, but after submitting and getting to the final check for Dupes part, it came up... this is the second or third video I've started to submit that wasn't sifted yet but turned out to be sifted with the same embed... Siftbot missed the John Stewart/Ron Paul sift a bit ago too though both used the same embed.

Even tea party supporters, by a nearly 2-to-1 margin, declared significant cuts to Social Security "unacceptable."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704728004576176741120691736.html

Sixty-four percent [of Tea Party supporters] believe that the president has increased taxes for most Americans, despite the fact that the vast majority of Americans got a tax cut under the Obama administration. Thirty-four percent of the general public says the president has raised taxes on most Americans. (Not pertinent to this discussion, but hilarious regardless since Obama is apparently some socialist out to raise everyone's taxes.)

62 percent [of Tea Party supporters] say programs like Social Security and Medicare are worth the costs to taxpayers.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20002529-503544.html

So... they're big on balancing the budget, but don't want to cut these social programs, but think we have to cut spending. *scratching head*

We should just magically pay for them and balance the budget I guess by cutting spending on other programs that don't amount to a hill of beans.

And FYI, I don't mean to pick on Tea Partiers specifically. Most supporters of any political party or faction doesn't understand the federal budget, etc. They want everything without paying for it.

>> ^bobknight33:

Get you head out of the sand. your so wrong its embarrassing.
>> ^longde:
Bullshit. Here's what really happens:
Democrats: Borrow, but raise taxes to pay off debt
Republicans: Borrow, lower taxes, pass costly entitlements, start huge costly wars
Teabaggers: Refuse to pay debts; refuse to borrow; OK with spending on costly entitlements; cut entitlement for "less deserving" groups to save cost
>> ^bobknight33:
Democrats say We should keep borrowing money and create more debt.
Republicans say We should keep borrowing money and create more debt.
Tea Party say Stop borrowing and stop spending.
Which group has the right answer?