Sisyphus

Have they finally turned outright partisan? Or do you buy the justification here:

Anything that sounds like "mad science" will be treated as such at first. Hence, nuclear power, cloning, genetically modified food all produce completely irrational fears in people. The best thing to do is to just ignore all the stupid evangelicals, hippies, and the like, and quietly continue the work in the background, let people benefit from the technologies, and grow accustomed to them. The "outrage" will take care of itself, most of the time.

I wonder about this, the wisdom of voting for a third party. If the Republicans and the Democrats think you have your own party, and furthermore make up the base of that party, they're not going to bother courting your vote at all. If, however, you make it clear that your vote is up for grabs, that you'll vote for whichever party more closely represents your views, then all of the sudden it becomes worthwhile for the major parties to listen to you, because being the more libertarian party could actually win them an election. Just food for thought... Also, there's no way Democrats use as many dirty tricks as Republicans. Not inherently so, by any means, but just because of the current leadership. See the 2000 Bush v. McCain primary for the ascendancy of this sort of thing.

But the crash of 1929 was caused by a lack of physical, tangible wealth. Or rather, it was caused by a ridiculous distance between what actually existed and what people thought existed, hence a whole economy built up on credit, on promises that couldn't be fulfilled, on nothing. It was "consumer confidence" that caused the crash.

^-- I can sympathize. Unless I have some specific reason for paying attention, I'm generally oblivious to people around me, off in my own world, often muttering to myself and lurking around and acting generally creepy. Sometimes I'll be staring off in to space doing this, and people think I'm staring at them and freak out. Or, at least, so I'm told by my friends who like to watch the spectacle unfold and tell me about it later.

Hehe. Unfortunately, PETA crossed the line into religious zealotry a long time ago. It doesn't matter what any new information says, they're too committed to change their minds. "Of course animals can feel pain." Oh, sorry! I didn't realize you were sure about it.

Wow. I think the author should live in New York for a while. Everyone completely ignores everyone else (with the exception of avoiding physically colliding), and it's not the slightest bit uncomfortable.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1895

I'm 22.

Again, morality doesn't have anything to do with whether it is genetically human. But "genetically human" is not "human being," the former being a scientific category, the latter being a moral category. The fact that it's not unique doesn't change the fact that it's unique? Do you at least understand why I'm having a little trouble with that one?

Well I have listened to his show a few times, and I personally heard him say that twice. As in, "silly liberals, if you melt ice in water, the water levels go down! Morons!" And while that is true, nobody is saying it isn't. The problem is with Antarctica (which is a continent, not an iceburg, Rush), and Greenland. Anyway, my point was that he says grossly inaccurate things fairly often. That he doesn't retract them isn't really a badge of honor. It just means that if you don't know any better, you think he's careful with his facts, and you believe the B.S. he spouts. Hey, he never took it back, so it must be true! More often, what he will do instead of saying he was wrong is just deny that he ever said it in the first place. Hell of a guy. Oh, and there's a difference between a crazy hippy, sputtering with rage (good ratings!) and a reasonable liberal who's done his homework (makes Rush look bad!).

Talk to crazy people - you might learn something. Or, you might get stabbed with a syringe. Either way, it builds character.

Pssst. Identical twins share the same DNA.

Doesn't he say all the time that "if the ice caps melted, the oceans wouldn't rise?" How is that not unambiguously false? He says false things all the time. Just because he doesn't retract them, doesn't mean they weren't wrong. It just means nobody is holding him accountable. Or, at least, nobody who can get past the call screeners. Also, if most of his rhetoric consists of strongly implying that things which are false are actually true, without ever actually commiting to a lie, then, um, is that better? EDIT: HERE is a fun list of Limbaughisms. Note that they're all quoted from only the 1993/1994 period.

It's definitely not that simple, but there is also definitely some truth to that. However, it doesn't really work on the individual level. "Not participating in it" is distinctly against my personal interest in the event of a recession. I'm spending money I can't afford. And, since the whole idea of capitalism is based on individual interest, it is a rather pointless suggestion unless you're willing to ditch the whole model.

In what sense are you using "technocracy?" As for communism, I don't think it can really be instituted, per se (the Soviet Union was hardly "communist"), but perhaps there's a point in socialism. As in, the government creating work and offering jobs to pretty much anyone who wants them, guaranteed. Like FDR's New Deal, which I think was over all a good thing.

Seeing as how the structuring of morality is the only justifiable reason to pick one definition over another, then I don't really see why you think that's not enough. You seem to think the first instance of completed DNA has some special status. You even say it's the "only logical point." What logic is that, exactly? How could there be any? The definition of something is whatever we assign to it. It can't be "wrong." In this particular case, it just happens to lead to some unfortunate effects if you a) fail to see that it's arbitrary, and b) try to apply rigid moral rules about our relation to it.

Human remains? Genetically human, not a human, but used to be. Braindead vegetable? Same thing. Except in that case, the thing you're talking about is still biologically alive. But not a living human being, I don't think, no. A "human" that, through genetic defect, never develops a brain? Human. But not a human, and never was, not any more than those skill cells I scrape off are a human being.

I'll just deal with the parts addressed to me, to prevent wildly branching complexity... It is living - if half or all of it were dead it would lose the potential to combine and become a person. And it is human, just in a different stage. The stage before its two genetic halves unite. NOTE: I say this not because its what I believe, but to highlight the arbitrary nature of the whole debate. No, because there are non-arbitrary reasons for picking relativity over simple Newtonian mechanics. If there were not, then it wouldn't matter which we picked, and we would regard them as equally valid theories. Here, it is also abitrary, and so from a purely scientific viewpoint, one definition is just as good as another. However, it MATTERS which one we pick, since we're basing real decisions that hugely affect (unambiguously) human lives on our arbitrary definition. Exactly. EXACTLY. So it's back to "potentially human = human," then? Earlier you said a separated egg and sperm was not a human because it was only potentially so. You said the deciding factor was the unique genetic code, and my skin cells have that, and so does my twin brother. I'm not trying to play "gotcha," here - my point is the same as it was, to show the difficulties, contradictions, and arbitrary nature of ANY definition. I'm not in agreement with bascule, for instance, since I think his definition is arbitrary as well. Scientifically, neither is superior, since it's not a scientific question. From a humanitarian standpoint, however, the definition of "being capable of suffering," which is not derived from nature but which we select ourselves, is VASTLY superior.

OK: The first occurence of my genetic code existed in the form of a zygote, the "seed" which, working in conjunction with my mother's body, eventually became a human being, that is to say, me. Or, alternatively, half of my genetic code existed in the form of an ovum which developed inside the fetus that would become my mother, which in turn was inside the uterus of my grandmother. The other half developed many years later inside my father. I guess that second way is sort of awkward, but it does kind of underline the arbitrary nature of drawing the line of "where life begins." I suppose fertilization is as good a place as any, and more intuitive than most. The problem is when you start attaching moral significance to the arbitrary choice, at which point it does become important, because all of a sudden you have to weigh it as a being with its own moral end, in opposition to other concerns, like alleviating the suffering of beings who are actually capable of it (suffering, that is). Hence, it's important to define "human" in the moral sense as something which actually relates to morality analogously to a full-grown human, which a blob of cells does not. As long as you remember that it is, at root, still basically an arbitrary decision, you shouldn't run into trouble. As for genetics, sure, it's genetically human, but so are the skin cells I shed every day by the hundreds, and I don't grieve for them. And if I had an identical twin, I would still consider us two different people and not one, despite our having identical DNA, because DNA is not everything.

Eh. The first cancer cell that mutates has unique human DNA, but I don't think anyone would call the tumor a human being. Not a perfect analogy, but you get the idea.

No, I haven't seen it. Yes, I know there's already a (completely speculative) topic about it. But I just saw a short review of it that I thought was interesting, by Scott Tobias, that maybe answers some of the questions we had back then.

I'm just trying to think, is there any form of prosthetic which is in any way superior to the organic component it replaces? I can't think of any. When that inevitably happens, it will be an interesting milestone.

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=f5f9386c-83ff-4634-9452-eb0d385921ba Now, I'm all for deflating pseudoscience, but I think this guy's assumptions are seriously flawed. He assumes that every time a vampire feeds, a new vampire is created. However, many versions of the story have it that most of the time vampires simply kill their victims, and only rarely create another vampire. Also, it's assumed that all vampires survive and regularly feed until there's literally no food left. I see no reason to assume this, since a)vampires might not actually need to feed at all, and b)if vampires, why not vampire hunters, thinning the herd? As for ghosts, the main assumption is that they move they way they do out of physical necessity. However, if a ghost is truly incorporeal and is some residual effect of a mind, its image might well move like that person moved in life, and it's a very basic intuition that the ground is to be walked upon, more basic than walls being impenetrable. In conclusion, this is flawed in addition to being utterly silly, and I would kill to get tenure at Central Florida University.

Excellent post, dak. If any of this was legit, it would be a very simple matter to shut them down by bringing a lawsuit, or just showing their evidence to the relevant authorities. The fact that they're relying on carefully produced propaganda to go directly to the public and start a boycott, well, I can't help but think it's just PETA as usual...