tjohnson

Now why would you say that??

You sound like a very responsible parent. I wish I was as disciplined as you.

I think the solution in the long run is more likely to be educating people away from statism. As was mentioned above, I think government is unavoidable but our best chance is to have better people in government. Humans evolved from tribes to countries - now you are suggesting we go back? There are reasons why "stateless" societies are unstable and invariably become states and these reasons have to do with the decidedly symbolic character of the human species.

No, I haven't studied where, intellectually, Korzybski came from, I have my hands full trying to understand where he was going to.

Of the 619 titles in the bibliography of Science & Sanity there is no mention of Brentano. This is from his foreword.

I'm going to guess you aren't poor.

Oh, you want to know what I believe. I think it's insane that someone can make millions of dollars a year while others hardly enough to live on. I believe this is obvious regardless of these statistics. But do you believe that there is a causal relationship between someone making "millions of dollars a year while others hardly enough to live on" and crime? Also, do you believe that there is a causal relationship between someone making "millions of dollars a year" and "others [making] hardly enough to live on"? In both these cases, I don't think there is such a causal relationship -- at least not based on the inequality alone. I.e., I don't believe a huge income difference causes crime or that some make much more because others make much less. (Of course, this is not to say, in the latter case, that some differences might not be causally related, but just to state that this is not necessarily so.) Well, let me hypothesize. Maybe when you have a wealthy class and a poor class one of the ways the wealthy class tries to control the poor class is by putting them in jail?

Oh, you want to know what I believe. I think it's insane that someone can make millions of dollars a year while others hardly enough to live on. I believe this is obvious regardless of these statistics.

What kind of problems? You have to use some statistic and none are perfect. Statistics is not about "causal relationships", it's about correlations. It suggests some sort of mechanism is in play but only further investigation could pin point it.

here's an interesting site that talks about the relationship of income disparity to various other social issues. http://www.equalitytrust.org.uk/why/evidence/imprisonment

Yes, encouraging the power motive rather than the achievement motive, makes sense.

They probably would vote for him again but what does that mean? Income disparity is a huge problem. Check out this thread http://www.rational-skepticism.org/news-politics/income-inequality-914-goes-all-in-t5346.html People who are desperate will vote for anything if they think it will help their situation. The US has arguably had the most free market system in the world for many years and even so it has got into the current state of affairs. Now you will argue that it isn't "true" free market but why would I want more of something if it doesn't appear to be working? What about 'social democracy', that's an interesting concept. There doesn't have to be only 'socialism' vs. 'capitalism', this is a false dichotomy.

I personally don't think it is possible to have a totalitarian state in the US - the people would rebel. The US does not have a state controlled media, a single party, restriction of discussion, mass surveillance and state terrorism, IMO, nor do I think it will in the near future.

Yeah, just teasing you.

LOL, where's the decimal point in "thirteen"? 13.0 ---> 1.30 Schmuck! Ba'al Chaztaf Yeah, but you didn't write 13.0, you wrote; So it's kind of hard to misplace the decimal point in "thirteen".

LOL, where's the decimal point in "thirteen"?

Yes, but I think George wants to know why a member would log in anonymously - a much harder question to answer!

The best way to avoid socialized medicine is to not get sick.

That is correct. The A-10 (or "warthog") was the plane that delivered most of the DU shells to their targets (mostly tanks and other vehicles). Since DU is thirteen times denser than lead the DU shells were a deadly kinetic-energy-kill weapon. Ba'al Chatzaf FYI, the density of Lead is approximately 60% that of DU. Lead is around 13,350 kg/m3 and DU is about the same as Uranium around 19,000 kg/m3 Okay, but what is the weight difference and how important is weight to an aircraft? Also, how would weight affect the velocity of the projectile? Velocity is extremely important at the point of impact. Of course there is the obvious reason for using DU instead of simple U? --Brant Beats me, I was just wondering why Ba'al said it was 13 times denser.

That is correct. The A-10 (or "warthog") was the plane that delivered most of the DU shells to their targets (mostly tanks and other vehicles). Since DU is thirteen times denser than lead the DU shells were a deadly kinetic-energy-kill weapon. Ba'al Chatzaf FYI, the density of Lead is approximately 60% that of DU. Lead is around 13,350 kg/m3 and DU is about the same as Uranium around 19,000 kg/m3

I think those kind of things are funny because of their "randomness". I guess random is the new slapstick??

Yeah, I don't know if I'm getting it either. Is this shark having his dick sucked by another shark and finding that it's not all that pleasant?

My guess is that life and the planet have to evolve together. A planet already billions of years old could probably not be populated by an organism from somewhere else, unless it was engineered by intelligent life (terraforming). So if the ecosystem is going to evolve it has to start at a very rudimentary stage, albeit not exactly the same as Earth. But there are physical restraints, like the mass of the planet needs to be large enough to keep the atmosphere from drifting off into space for example and as you mentioned, moderate temperatures and pressures etc. (Mercury is too close to the sun and has wild temperature variation)

That is truly inspirational Tony.