tar

Ten Oz, Philosophical views? That is the reality of life Ten Oz. Regards, TAR death and taxes https://www.cnsnews.com/commentary/curtis-dubay/1-percenters-pay-24-percent-and-top-10-percent-pay-533-percent-all-federal

SwansonT, There are massive government subsidies involved with solar array placement. You know this. Every call you get on the phone from some solar panel installation group starts with the statement that you can get this installed for free. Free for who? Who is footing the bill? Some government grant money or subsidy program, no doubt. I don't have any citations but I was in the copier field and we leased out equipment. When you buy a house you take out a mortgage. If it takes 26 years for the initial investment to be paid off, in terms of lower payments to the electrical grid providers, then the fact that your investment will stop working after 10 years, is a significant non starter. The valuable real estate I was thinking about was along Rt. 206 in central Jersey where there is a field I was thinking about, being where could be office buildings, factories, apartments, gas stations, convenience stores and whatever. Not built in a clearing or on a south facing mountain slope, off the beaten path. I take our police and courts and laws and army as a stipulation, and as the basic reason we pay taxes and have a government. The government is not primarily made to make us happy, it is there to protect our right and ability to pursue happiness. To set the rules and establish the playing field. We still have to suit up and compete on that field, with a spirit of sportsmanship and common purpose. Um, I take exception to your characterization that the GOP is giving the rich something by not taking something from them that was their's in the first place. The numbers do not have to match. The people that are getting welfare or transfer payments, are getting something. The people paying taxes are loosing something. The wealth is going in one direction in the transaction, from the rich to the poor. So already there is givers and takers in the equation. I need not cite any numbers. Bernie already has told us how the wealthiest 1 percent have a larger than 1 percent share of the wealth in this country. The fact you are denying is that this wealthiest 1 percent also already pays more than 1 percent of the taxes paid into the federal government. In fact, in addition to paying a large percent of the taxes into the federal government, they also pay a large percentage of the wages in this country, employing many of us. So their contribution to the system is already firmly established. Taking away loopholes, while keeping the highest tax bracket very high is not giving the rich anything. The administration has the right and the reason to have people under it that follow lawful orders. In the case of the ban, it would be important not to let the cat out of the bag to where people coming here to hurt us would do so quickly before the ban, or be alerted if they were on their way. The marginal rates are much higher than is fair for high income individuals. Common religions would set the rate given to the poor as 10%. Anything more is unfair. Especially if lower income people are forgiven the expectation that they give 10 percent. 10 percent of a million is 100,000 dollars. If a guy would give the government 100,000 I would say he is doing his part. If a guy earning 10,000 were to give the government 1000 I would say he is doing his part. So if we are forgiving people any tax liability on their first chunk, and asking for a percentage on their next chunk, and a higher percentage on their next chunk, this is fair to everybody and take most from the wealthiest. Already. Regards, TAR Phi, Your link was talking about energy payback. That is how long does a PV need to operate to create the amount of energy it takes to produce it. This might be a couple of years, but this says nothing about the cost of the cell and how long it would take to be economically feasible to use. Nor does it state whether the energy it took to produce was clean energy or Sulphur producing energy. (we have to pollute now, to have clean energy later?) At the time of this writing, the installed cost of solar panels was between $7-$9 per watt: A 5 kW system would cost around $25,000-$35,000. Many utility companies offer incentives, and some subsidize as much as 50% of system costs. Average electrical bill is about 126 a month. So if you used no electricity from the grid and got all you needed from your roof, the investment would pay off in 20 years. But it is not always sunny, and there might be weeks your cells are snow and ice covered and you might have had to have cut down carbon sequestering trees to have your cells unshaded, and they might break or become less efficient or require replacement, before the 20 years is up. Regards, TAR and if I put an array on my roof, I would still have to burn gas to heat my water, my house, and my food

dimreepr, The advantages I was born with have a lot to do with the character and capability of my parents, and the character and capabilities of my country. I acknowledge that the U.S. is a better place than some poor country run by a warlord. But this is exactly an argument for us making our own luck. The fact that I pledged allegiance to my flag every morning in school, went to college, campaigned for McGovern, was part of the counter culture revolution, served in the Army, worked every day for many decades, paid my taxes, raised two capable respectful girls, keep a nice house and yard and garden for others to look at on the way by, proves I did my part to make this country a better place to be, than some poor country with a despot in charge. Regards, TAR Strange, I am saying "We..., we...., we....." As many many folk, pledge their allegiance to the American flag, many many folk work every day, pay their taxes, raise their children and respect each other. That is what makes this place work. Regards, TAR

Strange, I am suggesting that I already have been paying taxes at a higher rate than some others, and I already give to charity and take care of people in need, around me. It is not my job to put someone else's children before my own, though. It is this attitude that you are bringing that I am a stingy entitled rich guy, which I vehemently object to, because it is totally false in terms of my life. I did not get any estate willed to me, I came from a working class family and never left the working class. I have some 401K money I am currently paying myself to live. I earned this, my company matched this, the success of my company was partially due to the punches I took for them and the value I added to their product and services. I will exhaust my funds in two or three years, so I am downsizing, moving to a less expensive area and such. Decisions I need to make. You have no rights to my 401K. Well actually you do. I am still paying my taxes because the money in my 401K is wages that have not yet been taxed. I will pay my taxes every time I take a disbursement. It is not a transfer payment where the society is taking care of me, it is a vehicle the society put in place for me to save for my retirement. I am paying myself now, because I didn't take my wages and spend them years ago. I paid social security insurance premiums every paycheck for many decades, I have an agreement with the society for some monthly benefits at this time. I have some pension money from my company for years of adding value to the company, that will continue to go to my wife, even if I die. The government has nothing to do with these funds. I am not a ward of the state. In the arguments for the extremes there is the rich raping the poor and the poor defrauding the system, getting free existence, for no sweat equity in return. While it would be easy to point out examples of either extreme, the most of us are in the middle, working every day for a company or a resourceful individual, for the money we need for food and rent, medicine, clothes, education and diversion. It is better in my take, to think of us all on the same side, in the middle, than to think we need to align ourselves exclusively with the either the gang member drug addict or the raping CEO. There are plenty of poor people that work every day, love their families, pay their taxes and treat everybody with respect. And there are plenty of well off people that work every day, love their families. pay their taxes and treat everybody with respect. Silly to take sides. Better to all inhabit the middle ground. Regards, TAR I said a false thing. I did get some money when my wife's mom died. Enough for a down payment on our house, and some investments (which we lost when the dot com bubble bust, and the market hit during the recession.) But even this money was due to the efforts of my wife's mom and dad. Not luck or government.

Ten Oz, The deep state thing I said because during the first part of Trump"s administration there were daily leaks and things happening were holdovers were blocking his orders. For instance, when he attempted to put a travel ban in place, the coordination at the airports for how things should be handled was slip shod, yet there were lawyers and crowds, and political figures, ready at the airports to demonstrate, grandstand and make the order unworkable. In fact the wheels were turning in the 5th district and several other judicial areas, to block the order. Lawyers were submitting their cases as the order was being made public. This kind of thing is why I feel that some instruments of government were still in the hands of whichever hands the government was in prior the election. John Cuthber, Strawman argument, against me in terms of the progressive taxing. My comment was that all the arguments for progressive taxes are already spent. Meaning we already accepted the arguments, and that is why we tax people with means more heavily than people with little means. You cannot then reuse the argument to take more from the rich. It has already been done. Multiple times. I never said we should have a flat tax. In fact, I am in a small way responsible for the opposite, campaigning for McGovern years ago were he was for having low income people, pay no taxes at all. So please look for the middle ground here, and not stake out the extreme. There should be, in a democracy, some amount that everybody pays to support the group. People walk and ride their bikes on the same streets and parks were the companies drive their trucks. And there is food and clothing and building material in those trucks, that even the poorest of us, need. The luck thing you speak of is very unscientific. It is, for instance, impossible for me to have been born anywhere else, then I was, to any different parents than I was. Unless of course you are saying there is some reservoir of souls up there that randomly settle in this or that animal or person. I don't personally subscribe to reincarnation. Do you? If you are using the idea of being fortunate idiomatically, as in caring for those less fortunate, I can buy that, but reality is such that we all start with nothing but our bodies and our heart and our brains, and what happens to us after that is initially up to our parents and their situation, and the establishments that have been built up and maintained and fostered in the area of our parents, substantially reliant on the efforts of our parents, their friends, and their associates. And as we grow and learn and fit into society we take up a role in that society. There might be luck involved, but when things happen we either take advantage or if knocked down, get up and go forward. We make our own luck. Regards, TAR

Strange, Yes I think it unfair to ask rich people to pay more taxes, now after graduated income tax is already established, and all the arguments for having graduated income tax already are spent. You can not ask for more from the rich every time you need more money to spend. It is a denial of some basic facts of existence. Most people work for someone or some company that provides a good or service to people. The people and companies that do this the best get the most business. It is not luck. If you make your company or your employer pay more taxes, that is less money potentially to put in your paycheck. Or if you have a 401 K and this money is invested in companies, then the more taxes the companies you own through your 401K pay, the less money they can pay your account in dividends. Rich people are not our enemies, they are the holders of the means of production. And again, what does it matter whether dire predictions raise the levels of the oceans 2 feet or 8 feet by 2000. What matters is whether we come up with the strategies to sequester carbon and find renewable sources of energy and adjust our life styles to take better care of our resource. Not forced to do it, but to do it, because its better to do it than not. It would be better for the planet if we did not fly and drive around or live in climates where we need heating or cooling. We actually don't have many places to live where we do not have to protect ourselves from the elements, so we are destined to stress the place. It is not realistic to ask people to stop living, to save the planet for someone else. Regards, TAR Ten Oz, Neg 1 to you, for no particular reason. And I will use your vote as a reason to take another restbit from political discussions. I hate neg reps, and don't deserve them. Regards, TAR

Ten Oz, If you have not noticed, there is a deep state operating in the U.S. where political power is wielded inappropriately by federal employees even after the power has officially switched into other hands. The peaceful transition of power is a hallmark of our democracy. Yet the people elected to govern us, are acting like the current president is illegitimate and are marking time, until his removal from power. This is bu(*cr(*. He is our president. Senators should govern and make the laws that will serve us all. I agree with Trump, that the weather changes and the Earth goes in cycles. Small things that we do, can cause self reinforcing moves, like it gets a little warmer, some ice melts, and less sunlight is reflected back into space and more is absorbed. So yes, we did it to the planet, but we all did it. It is not a political issue, it is the current state of the planet. Regards, TAR

Strange, Fairness I don't think is something that should be legislated and imposed on people. I have worked all my life to get into a situation where I don't need to work every day to feed myself and keep warm. It is unfair to me, to suggest I am responsible for someone else's child in another country, when I had no say in how many children that family chose to have. Over population has been an issue since I was young, when the population of the Earth was more like 3 billion than the current 7 plus. I was taught to have only replacement numbers of children, as in 2. And that is what I have had, as evidenced by my profile picture. It is my responsibility to make their lives safe and comfortable and to prepare them to take care of themselves and their children. It is not "fair" to saddle me with the additional responsibility for other people's children. Especially when others have not kept their families to replacement numbers. My quality of life is partially caused by my decisions and delayed gratification decisions I have made. I can not make decisions for others, in terms of their freedom and happiness, and others should not legislate my morality. Regards, TAR

Ten Oz, Agreed. There are things we need to do, education we need to acquire and better ways to do a lot of things we do. But there is also economic realities, as Trump pointed out in the clip above. Solar panels take 26 years to pay themselves off, and at the same time only last 10 years before they destroy their usefulness. This is not a wise investment. And consider, as I suggested before, that it takes energy to produce the solar panels in the first place. And Ten Oz, I have an electrical question for you, concerning solar energy. A cell produces DC voltage differential and can be aligned in series or parallel to produce any required voltage or current capability, but I noticed solar fields built on major roads, close to the factory or business or housing group they were built to power, and this takes up valuable real estate. And looks crappy to boot. I was wondering if the losses due to the resistance of long lengths of wire, is significant for DC, making it required that the field of panels be close, and not off in some clearing in the woods or some remote, unused area. Regards, TAR

Ken Fabian, I agree that climate change is causing more violent swings in weather. Stronger storms, warmer winters, colder winters, and things like the melting of the ice pack in the Hudson Bay, and the polar vortex out of round we had in 2014 where super cold air plunged down to Atlanta and warm weather reached up to Maine as the waves came around the Earthy. This, as youo say, has economic repercussions, and prevention might be less expensive than adaptation, but the industrial age, volcanic eruptions, the oil fires burning in Kuwait, and the burning of 7 billion people right now, is stuff we cannot take back. Going forward we can, should and will attempt to reduce our carbon emissions, use less paper and plant trees to sequester carbon and address the situation burning cleaner coal and using the smoke stack scrubbers and everything else we do, and utilizing new technologies as they are discovered. But adaptation is required. The dikes have to be built up a few feet as required. People have to stop building multimillion dollar homes a couple feet above high tide People that live near the shore should expect extreme weather and build to suit, and have a place to go, when the authorities say move out of the way of a powerful storm. I recycle my paper one week and my bottles and cans the next. I live in an area protected by the Highlands act (which I voted for) in NJ and cannot build except on existing footprints to protect the watershed for many reservoirs in the area. I, on purpose do not use fertilizers on my lawn, or excessive insecticides, since I drink well water whose integrity is set by the actions of the people that live up the ridge, and my actions determine the quality of the water that is in the wells of people below me. I do however mow my lawn with a walk behind, self propelled power mower, which burns gas. I use a gas powered snow thrower in the winter. I use a gas powered blower to clean off my driveway before I put sealant on it, etc. I am responsible for some portion of the 1.8 degree increase over the last 200 years. I have driven over a million miles in cars for business and pleasure, have flown to Japan 3 times, back and forth to Germany several times while in the army and to Mexico on vacation, and all over the states for business. I am part of the avalanche. But no individual snowflake feels responsible for the avalanche. So it comes down to, in my estimation, everybody doing their best to not foul the Earth up, for other people. But there is a certain unrealistic economic component to lobbying for more expensive, cleaner energy. That problem is, that most of the world can not afford it, and the people that can afford it, wind up paying for the excesses of others, while denying their own pleasure. Regards, TAR Ten Oz, Trump, in that clip did not deny global warming, he downplayed its importance as the number one issue facing the U.S. and suggested that the people making it a number one issue stood to make a lot of money. On the denial of Russian hacking, I would tend to agree with you, but with qualification. The whole thing started when Trump joked that he hoped Russia had hacked Hilary's unprotected private server, so we could see what was in the 33,000 emails she deleted. Hilary, knowing through her connections to the justice department and the president that Russia really was hacking our internet, through the secrets gleaned from the clip drive Snowden gave them, used this to spin a collusion story to discredit the candidate Trump, and after the election and during the transition, continued to use this thread to discredit the President, and make a case for his election to be considered illegitimate. In this climate, Trump needed to defend himself from these false claims. Regards, TAR In fact, if you think about it. Discrediting the legitimacy of the President of the United States is a much more serious anti democracy move, than having back channel communication with another world leader, during the transition. Consider the information Hilary was privy to as wife of a president, senator, secretary of state, high muckitymuck in charge of the global initiative, high position in the DNC and the briefings allowed to the democrat candidate for president, and thought to be the likely winner in that contest. She knew and knows things we don't know, and Trump did not know, during the election cycle. And as Trump has suggested many times since, if Obama was aware of Russia hacking our election, why did he not stop it.

Ten Oz, Sorry, I was responding to that particular posting of the data showing the amount of people employed in solar, and the OP contention that Trump denies facts. There are, in the "Trump lies" arguments factors pro and con that conclusion. It is obvious to me for instance that Trump does not deny people have an effect on the planet, but instead, asks what should be done, going forward. The facts are, we need to fire kilns to get stuff done and if we refuse to burn coal here, it will be burned elsewhere and we will have to buy the product from the world, instead of selling it to the world, and these economic realities are important to the success and the way of life, of the people in the U.S. I apologize again, for the fact I have not read the thread, at least the posts between the one where you posted the data on employment in various energy fields, so I might be out of context, but the thread is about facts and middle ground, and it does no good trying to prove someone else is a liar, when they might not be denying facts at all, but looking at a situation from another point of view than you are looking at it. For instance, take the Russian Collusion issue. Trumps says that other countries, other than Russia, could have, and probably did engage in computer hacking, and false information spreading, attempting to affect our political process. He has been briefed on these things, and probably knows the truth about these things. More truth than we private citizens are privy to. When asked whether he believes Putin, when Putin says he did not engage in the hacking of our election, Trump answers that he is not going to call Putin a liar, when there are areas, like in fighting ISIS and denuclearizing North Korea where cooperation with Russia is required. This is taken by Trump haters as Trump lying and denying Russia's hacking of our election. This is taken by me, as Trump accepting the fact that it happened and moving forward in the best way possible. Like if you catch a family member in a bold face lie, but don't call them on it, because more important family dynamics are served by ignoring the lie and dealing with the everyday realities of taking care of the family. Or another example of what people use as proof that Trump is a liar that is a misquote in itself, is Trump's comment that the audience for his inauguration was the largest ever. People then showed a comparison shot of the mall for Obama, compared to the Mall for Trump, and attempted to show it was an obvious lie. I had watched the coverage, and the Mall shot was a little prior the actual hour of the inauguration so there actually where a few more folk at the actual hour than when the shot was taken, enough to cause Trump to look out at the crowd and see it, especially near the Capital, as significant. But most importantly, his comment was talking about a world wide audience and people quickly took it as him denying that Obama drew a larger in person crowd. Obama did draw a larger in person crowd, and even at the White House, the crowd was sparse, and Trump downplayed that, but the fact that the inauguron drew the largest worldwide audience ever, was probably a true statement. So to address the OP I think the middle ground is the important ground to stake out. That area that deals with the many and complex middle issues between the extremes. And philosophically one should always consider the fact, that the exact same thing, framed in the first person is good, second person is neutral and third person is bad. As in I am exploring my sexuality. You are loose. She is a whore. Or, I am thin. You are skinny. He is emaciated. The middle ground is only achieved by looking at the vast area between the extremes from a first person point of view. As in considering that global warming is happening, and we need to burn fuel to stay warm, so how best do WE proceed, to both protect the planet and maintain our way of life. Regards, TAR

Gee, Thank you for discussing this with me. I think, like you, that some others have some axe to grind and don't really enjoy the Socratic method of discovery. I am pleased to find someone interested in sharing insights and attempting to find answers to difficult questions, that don't readily submit to surface inquiry. There are some things I forget about how and why you have the divisions and the particular details of which aspects of consciousness belong to which division in your model. I am thinking that emotion is indeed required, and rational thought is not the only aspect of humans that make us alive and conscious, but am still open to the possibility that emotion is physical, and I am not convinced that we will find consciousness, as a substance, separate from the physical body and chemistry that causes a point of focus consciousness to emerge. I am not a ghost in the machine type of guy. I similarly am not thinking our brain/body/heart group is a conduit for a substance that is floating around looking for a vessel. My solution, currently is the norepinephrine/serotonin/dopamine combined with the hormones and pheromones which are actual physical things, that cause us to want to survive. Consciousness, I don't think has to be a substance in and of itself, but is an emergent characteristic that like a hurricane made of water, heat and air, shows attributes unlike the attributes of any of its components. Regards, TAR

Ten Oz, https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3 The facts are we get a small percentage of our energy needs filled by solar. Most of our energy needs are filled by natural gas, coal and nuclear power. Renewable sources like water and wind and Sun are significant and growing, but solar is just a percent or two. It might be a higher percent in California, which is basically dessert in a lot of places and gets a lot of sun and does not do the heavy industry requiring coke and smelting and such that has been farmed out to other countries and industrial areas in this country (who by the way are also on the Earth) so employing 20 percent of your workforce to provide 2 percent of your energy is no great usage of manpower. Sensei, I am an old guy, but do not deny the carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is causing warming of our planet and melting of the ice caps. But we have been burning stuff for thousands of years, and burning a whole lot more in the industrial age. I am sure there is a tremendous amount of mining, manufacturing and transportation required to make a solar cell. These activities add to the carbon in our air. So I think it is you that is the denier of fact. You drive your car, fly to visit relatives, have you nick-nacks shipped in from all corners of the globe overnight, run you computer on energy you know not how it is produced, and call me a denier of fact because I actually face them and chose to use the resources of my planet to make myself employed, to fulfill my needs, before I worry about what resources will be left for people I don't know, after I am dead. Regards, TAR Oh, and I live in the Northeast, where I need to burn gas to heat the water to heat my house. Something else not required in So Ca. And the people around the campfire in the chilly night away from the electric grid below and above certain latitudes require heat, or they will freeze. and there is probably, in your numbers, people employed to remove the snow from the panels, and people employed to call me on the phone to get solar panels installed on my roof...will you come over and take the snow off my panels, should I have some installed? Is there any data on the carbon costs to produce and install a solar? Perhaps we should ask manufacturers to put a label on their stuff that would tell us how much carbon was released into the atmosphere to bring that product to its point of use. That way we could make an informed choice to buy local or have something shipped in, and can choose to not use stuff that requires a lot of mining and heat to make, and that leaves hard to recycle components behind. I wonder what is done with old, non working solar apparatus. Back a few years there was a big push to put pipes on the roof that would heat the water that you used to heat your house, to supplement your use of fuel to heat the water. I don't see this stuff around any more. It must be in some landfill somewhere. Solar panels will break, get outdated, or replaced for one reason or another, requiring the remanufacture of new panels. I don't think that using acres of good farm land or retail space, or living space for solar fields, is the only way to go, to save the planet. Regards, TAR

Daniel, This post of Strange's, along with everybody else's response, and the Feynman response, I think addresses most of your questions. Science is not the only way to describe the place, and neither is poetry. (or God) There is sometimes a political aspect to the divide between religious folk and scientifically minded folk in terms of funding, or medicinal approaches to diseases, or moral questions like the right to life or the right to choose to end a life (abortion, death penalty, end of life suicide, etc.) Here the religion we are talking about is not God per se, but what human beings in the last 4000 years have ascribed to their god's will and judgement concerning our behavior in this place. One thing that stood out to me in Feynman's comments was that he is alright "not knowing". I think this feeling of being sufficiently in control of things, to not need answers to everything is partially a personality trait and might be found more often in people of high intelligence, which might also correspond to scientific minds, which unfortunately causes smart people to be embarrassed by any sign of weakness, or need for comfort and answers, and at the same time, causes people that actually need the answers to feel that smarter people, are fooling themselves and don't know nearly what they think they know. Thus a further divide between science and religion. Scientist think they know the best way to be right about the place, and religious people feel they know the best way to be right about the place, and neither camp gives the other camp their due. So to answer the questions you raised, in my own mind, I have decided to consider all human facilities as facilities that the universe has, as we are in and of the place, and cannot remove ourselves from it, or get outside it, and we are separated from the truth, by tremendous amounts of time and space, so one can either accept the fact , embrace it, reject it, adore it, hate it, love it, find it amazing or terrifying . And this acceptance or rejection of the place does nothing to the place but piss other people off if you get too established in your own take. Regards, TAR

Studiot, So does one photon have a particular frequency and energy, or do you need plural to determine these attributes of light? Regards, TAR

StringJunky, I think that is a good rephrase. And it brings up some additional questions in my mind. When a photon "changes direction", is it the "same" photon, or has a quantum of energy boosted an electron to a higher energy level which then falls to a lower energy level releasing a "new" photon? Same impulse of energy, but perhaps repackaged, in terms of it's direction of propagation? How big is a photon's sphere of influence, as it is both particle and wave and is in essence an impulse disturbing electrical and magnetic fields in orthogonal fashion? When a photon leaves an atom after being released by an electron falling to a lower energy level, does that wave of energy go out in all directions, like the ripples on a pond, only three dimensions, or is there a particular line, centered at the atom, on which the photon travels? Regards, TAR

Gees, So if the internet is, like Roamer says, only an extension of our consciousness, as we provide the emotion, then we are still OK with the premise that life and consciousness are bound in some primal way, where it might be proper to consider that whatever theory or model of abiogenesis we care to work with should and perhaps must, include the beginning of consciousness as well. That when "we" as lifeforms first grabbed form and structure and pattern from a universe tending toward increased entropy, we may have become both alive and conscious at the same time. Either that, or life came first, without emotion and somehow emotion emerged and we need a second model of how and when the emotion was injected, or somehow map how it developed in stages from some rudimentary kind of consciousness, or awareness or memory or some sort of imprint of the outside world, on the lifeform. Interesting to me, along this line, might be a confirmation bias type of thought, but my dopamine theory (considering the serotonin/norepinephrine/dopamine motivation/reward complex as part of the "reason" why we survive and promote our pattern and pass it on,) has some analogy in the creation story, where life was created after the stars and the Earth and the oceans and the land and after that was the addition of Adam and Eve being created in the image of God, and everything was good in the eyes of God...until the serpent had Eve have Adam bite from the fruit of the tree of knowledge, and Adam then knew the difference between good and evil and they were "conscious" of their nakedness and they covered themselves. The analogy I bring is the association of the word good with the presence of dopamine. That in the evolution of life, there was a time perhaps where good and bad where introduced through some mechanism similar to dopamine, that would reward the lifeform when the lifeform's behavior tended to continue the life. and some mechanism like norepinephrine that would motivate the lifeform to make things right when conditions were harmful to survival, and some mechanism like serotonin that would cause the lifeform to be comfortable and satisfied with their life. The endorphins are somewhat private and the hormones cause behaviors that other lifeforms around could sense, and the pheromones signaled other lifeforms directly of certain conditions like fertile times, etc. But as the chemical signaling of ants make the whole colony "aware" of the can of rootbeer on the bench. The endorphins and hormones and pheromones make us aware of the wants and desires, hopes and dreams of others of our species. There might be the necessity to drop the creator part of the creation story, as we might have had to do this evolution thing on our own, and it was not directed by a higher power. But there still needs to be a model of abiogenesis, where material without life, gained life, and we have to have a model where material without consciousness, became concerned about itself, and knew the difference between good for survival stuff and bad for survival stuff. Regards, TAR it just might be that the two, life and consciousness, had to come somehow together

Bimbo36, Good that you quit smoking. Now you have a new habit to break. nicotex While I would agree you did a good thing and stopped smoking, you still get the craving for nicotine, because you are still hooked on nicotine. From personal experience, I tell you, you have not yet done what you need to do. Nicotine still owns you. Regards, TAR you still have to learn to live without nicotine it is very easy actually, especially as you put the days and weeks and months behind you, but you should try a few hours without the nicotex and see what it is like to live without nicotine

Yes, we might not want to give something as powerful and large as the internet, a chance to do anything on its own behalf. It would then want things, and will things that might not be in our best interests, but in its best interests. We would be giving it, by definition, a survival drive. Could be at our survival's expense. Sorry for bringing it up.

String Junky, Another thread, but suppose we come up with a way to give the internet a way to feel good and bad. Satisfied and hungry, so to speak. Give the internet the knowledge of good and evil. Hum... Regards, TAR search and find, with a motive and a reward...some analogy to our motivation reward complex with our serotonin norepinephrine dopamine complex... itch and scratch problem solution partial/complete

Gees, I am not sure that consciousness can be found only in life forms. For instance, now, with the internet of things, one can arrange various sensors together with weather reports, to turn on the sprinkler when it is not going to rain. The system can "know" about the environment, be conscious of the environment, without human involvement, once the program is written and engaged, the system then operates not by schedule or momentum, but in response to the actual conditions present in the environment. Not calling the internet of things a life form, but there are certain things about it, where it shows it is aware of what is going on. The senses are there in the sensors. The memory is there in the RAM and clip drive, and the brain is there in the processor and the algorithms. What is missing is the emotion. The system doesn't feel bad or good when it turns on the water. It just turns it on. And the action does not ensure or endanger its survival as a system. So it is not alive, does not metabolize or reproduce or anything, but it does seem to have some of what we are calling awareness. Perhaps the consciousness is the additional factor where there is a "feeling" associated with the awareness. That it is good or bad. Regards, TAR

Dimreepr, From the wiki article on Apophenia. Evolution[edit] One of the explanations put forth by evolutionary psychologists for apophenia is that it is not a flaw in the cognition of human brains but rather something that has come about through years of need. The study of this topic is referred to as "Error Management Theory".[20] One of the most accredited studies in this field is Skinner's box and superstition. Skinner's box and superstition was set up in that he would take a hungry pigeon, place it in a box and release a food pellet at random. The pigeon received a food pellet while performing some action, and thus rather than attributing the pellet falling to randomness, as was the case, the pigeon started doing whatever action it was that they did and continued to do so, till a pellet fell. And thus it was concluded that since the pigeon increased the number of times the action was performed it also increased the times it was 'rewarded' with a pellet, even though it was random.[21] I am not so sure these various tendencies in the human should be considered errors or diseases, as much as be considered various tendencies that we developed for survival reasons. Regards, TAR The pigeon, after all, did get a pellet. Whether this was because it turned twice, while holding its nose is not important. If it had stood still and gotten a pellet, then it might stand still again (repeating the non-action) and still gotten a pellet. consider how good you feel when you get the joke, or figure out the puzzle Being "right" feels good, and has survival value. So if it feels good to see a pattern, then emotionally you have received the reward evolution has developed in you to acquire. Therefore you feel like you are doing it right, surviving, and in certain cases this is true, and in other cases you are lying in the gutter, high on heroin. same dopamine

sanghyun_pluto, I may have misunderstood your intentions. My concern was with how you would decide on the remuneration in value or reputation. If this is done by a central deciding body, then you are back in the centralized power situation you started with. Which I believe is crucial to the operation of a system. There has to be, for instance, on this board, a group of moderators that are making sure that the rules are followed and no one is abusing the system or other members. Whose bank account is reduced when the bank account of the researcher is increased? You mentioned blockchain and I thought this was like bitcoin, which takes incredible processing power (wasteful) and has facilitated the creation Iof a darkweb in the U.S. where drugs and porn and weapons are bought and sold outside the view of the public or the authorities. It seems to me, that trust is the most crucial element when sharing information with others. When you write a check you trust every person and institution involved, that they will be honest stewards of your funds, and get them to who you promised the funds. There are records of all transactions, and people responsible for mistakes and omissions. The law addresses all types of occurrences, including theft and fraud. No such checks and balances are available with bitcoin. You cannot go up to a wrongdoer and put handcuffs on them and take them away. I have for 20 years been hoping that there would develop on the web, a crowdsource type vetting system on all material found on the web. A way to give your approval or disapproval of a site or fact but it is not so important what I think of a thing, as it is what do the people with the most at stake, related to the thing, think about the thing. And we have private companies and associations, and countries and political parties that all have competing goals, where it is crucial to know what affiliations a peer has, so you can understand who or what that peer is responsible to. So I would not be too quick to bypass the structures of power that have already developed in this world. I think we are already cognizant of the need to help each other and share information, and this is already done by governments, associations, universities, companies and organizations like Wiki. With the proper checks and balances. The wild west is not the best model for how we should share information. Regards, TAR However, I would be interested in helping to develop a signature a peer could use, when commenting on research that would include the date and the reputation of the commenter and the level of expertise in various fields. I have some ideas along this line.

sanghyun_pluto, I am not a researcher, however I have a daughter that researched for a university. Her work was financed by grants from government and private sources. Her work was already shared with the world through publication in worldwide periodicals and the peer review process is already alive and well. Both the university and she, have patent rights on her discoveries. There are financial realities surrounding research and our system of reward and our protection of intellectual property is already a substantially thought through and vetted process and established ways are already in place to handle both the reward and sharing aspects of your proposal. Personally I am cautious of having certain information available to enemies. South Korea is our friend, and sharing is mutually beneficial. However someone has been sharing technology with North Korea, and they have built nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, nerve agents, biological weapons, ways to defeat our electrical grid and internet and communication infrastructure and any number of other ways to hurt us, that we are not aware of. If there was no political strife in this world, your proposal would be worth considering, but as it is, not knowing who is on the other end of the transmission, makes it hard to share knowledge, indiscriminately. Knowledge is power, and should not be freely shared with someone who wants to hurt you. Regards, TAR P.S. I did not open your link, as I do not know who you are or what your motives are. I do know you wish to bypass official governmental and societal checks on information getting into the wrong hands, so your motives are already suspect to me. You are anti-capitalist, but ownership of information is crucial to me. I want my friends to be fully informed and my enemies to be deprived of the information they need to hurt me. Your proposal is dangerous on its face. I don't need to delve into the details.

Roamer, Auto-reaction itself requires being conscious of some aspect of the world that you need to react to. So I would say you need the awareness of your surroundings before you can act to better your situation. And you need to have some criterion for when and if the situation is better or worse before after or during your action. So reflex is something, and auto-reaction is something, and these things may not take a lot of thought to accomplish, but they do need some emotion. That is, you have to know whether the action is good or bad, whether it brings pleasure or pain. Your hand moves quickly away from the stove after touching the hot pan without a hot plate holder. So long term, staying out of the volcano is a good idea, but there has to be a mechanism to keep you out of the volcano the first time, that is not reliant on selection alone. We are attracted to warmth, the warmth of a breast with life sustaining milk, the warmth of the sun to bask in and raise our body temperature if we are cold blooded, but it hurts to get burned by a fire, or to touch the lava flow. So decisions are sometimes not black and white. Some mixture of pleasure and pain that allows someone to climb a tree for the honey in the hive regardless of the broken bone and bruises that could result from a slip, or the sting of the bees that made the honey. The memory part though, of your breakdown, I think is crucial. They have recognized the plasticity of the brain and I had just read how certain portions of a taxi drivers brain are larger and smaller, front and back of certain areas, depending on how well they have mapped the details of the city in their brains. The long time, and more knowledgeable drivers had the same areas enlarged and minimized. So awareness of the place had to come first, in terms of the senses. Then memory in terms of mapping the place. Regards, TAR