Phi for All

This right here is the slick sales pitch Turnip uses (darn spellcheck!). Is it beyond belief that our entertainment has been aimed at painting carpetbaggers in a favorable light as well? Think of all the novels and films about the Wall Street anti-hero doing whatever it takes to rise to the top. This fits right in with the GOP platform of not giving anybody a dime unless they can pull themselves up by their own bootstraps (and then they don't really need the dime, unless they're white). This narrative seems responsible for changing the American Dream of being prosperous with a home, two cars, two kids, and some pets, to one where you have to have more than others if you want to be successful, and in that pursuit morals will only slow you down.

The view from here looks like evangelicals defended Trump and claimed they believed what he said from the beginning about this affair, but are STILL defending him when it turns out he lied, several times, and had his lawyer lie, several times. Their original reasons for sticking up for him proved incorrect, yet they still show support. How is that not hypocritical? In the past, many politicians have been ousted for having affairs while married, with most evangelicals at the forefront waving torches. Why does Turnip get a pass from them? Why are they suddenly crying forgiveness? I agree with iNow, this is tribal rigidity at work. Trump has NONE of the positive qualities normally associated with the religious right, but apparently he resonates due to all the negative qualities he shares with them, like racism, fear, scientific ignorance, and intolerance.

Wow, so you really think Trump has more class than Obama? That Obama was crude or lacked compassion? I guess they really hated Obama on FOXNews. Such a shame, I really weep for this country.

Class used to be more important than status in the Presidency. Sophistication more than snobbery. Integrity more than ratings. Compassion more than crudity. Intelligence more than intuition. Sensitivity more than sensationalism. We used to have leaders instead of commanders. And if we paid in more than other countries, well, we also got to sit at the head of the table, almost always. It seems like that's going to be one of the biggest casualties, giving away power for nothing to countries like Russia and China, who anyone with a brain can see are poised to take maximum advantage from our mistakes.

There's the problem in a nutcase. We shouldn't have one side shielding possible criminal activity from investigation while the other side wants accountability.

Do you think they'd have started out differently aligned with him if the original In Touch magazine interview with Stormy Daniels from 2011 had been published and available to his opponents in the primaries? The evangelicals are doubling down rather than admit to a mistake, but I don't think Trump could have questioned Ted Cruz' faith due to lies and dishonesty if Trump himself was suspected of doing porn stars a few months after his son is born.

A common problem with those who don't like structured study is their tendency to misunderstand how imagination works. In children who aren't educated, imagination is mostly wishful thinking and fantasy. In adults who have experience, imagination is better grounded and thus more effective. Critical thinking is the best channel for imagination there is, and critical thought is hardly natural. It must be learned through structured study.

And I think most people intuit that this is the right way to operate, the human way. Yet too many idolize the razzle-dazzle stories of business wolves devouring their competitors, or thrashing them soundly as if it were a rugby match instead of people's livelihoods. Americans are weird. We know it was wrong for Wells Fargo to rip off its own customers the way they did, but it's not wrong enough to put the CEO in jail. I keep waiting for some thief to cite the Wells Fargo defense, where you pay back a portion of what you stole and agree to step down and go steal somewhere else.

It's probably necessary to define "good salesman" at some point. Is a good salesman the one with the highest dollar totals at the end of the year, or the one with the most customers who would do business with him/her again? I think the image of a ruthless businessman is at odds with the image of a good salesman. Do you revere the salesperson who tricked you to get your money and sold you a lemon? Why not, he was just being ruthless the way Trump would have? Or does a good salesman try to make sure the deal is good for everyone, and not just himself? That's how I learned it, but that's not what extremist capitalists practice.

Audio may be the best method for delivering dry exposition in the manner of a lecturer. Like a 101 course, you sit ready to take notes on the parts that seem important. Herbert didn't try to cover it up with frills the way some writers do, and he didn't start from the beginning of time the way Michener does, so I have to give him some credit for that honesty. He knew he was describing a complicated backstory, and he just expected us to grab our Wellies and slog through. And I enjoyed Dune after the first 50 pages, and would say it was worth the slog. I was sooooo happy several years ago when I took a contract that had me commuting longer, which seemed to justify getting audiobooks from the library and listening to them on the drive. I was sooooo bummed out when I discovered listening is NOTHING like reading for me. I don't know what it is, maybe the distraction of driving, or the narrator's need for enunciation that slows it all down so I end up skipping around inside my head, but after a few chapters I realize I need to rewind and listen again, having missed some important bit that's left me confused.

It's also going to hurt the very people Trump claims he cares for when gas prices rise at the pump due to half a million fewer barrels of oil per day from Iran (goodbye to any gains you made from the GOP tax cuts!). But raising gas prices will help him push more drilling, and make the extremists he really cares for happy.

And once again, the US leaves its seat at the leadership table like this is a real estate deal gone bad. To me, this is a showcase of Trump's biggest faults. It shows his hypocrisy in using fake news to promote his agenda while blaming others for it, his ignorance about foreign policy, his petty need to destroy everything Obama built, and his insistence on making snap decisions emotionally without considering counsel or context in order to gaslight everyone into thinking he knows what he's doing.

Exactly. I prefer the more modern style where information is exposed as needed, and assumes the reader is smart enough to figure out the jigsaw without the writer doing all the edge pieces.

The first 50 pages expose the history and politics of Herbert's universe like an intro level course lecture given by a professor in a monotone. In that way, Herbert is like a mortgage lender who wants the interest paid before you start in on the principal.

This is the way I was thinking, and I don't have alligators. Tell you the truth, I think an alligator would be more potentially fatal to me on dry land than a bull moose, but it would scare me more to know the moose was in the vicinity. Is it the height? I'd be looking down on the alligator, but the moose would be looking down on me. Waaaaay down. Many folks tend to think of the nastiest places to meet up when they think of large predators (cornered by a lion, surrounded by a pack of dogs, in the water with a gator or shark, between mama bear and her cub, etc), but our high intelligence allows us to avoid many dangers just by staying away from encounters like that, or by taking major precautions. We can also tend to invest some of our human traits in animals, imagining them to be tenacious, unrelenting, vengeful critters. Very few animals besides humans are willing to die for anything, and none are willing to do so on principal alone.

It's inside your wallet, and it's called money, AKA the cardamom pod of all evil.

I think you're stretching your definitions to include cows, horses, and pigs. They may be capable of killing you and eating you (if they had nothing else), but they aren't generally a threat when you "step out your door", as zapatos put it.

Rabid racism feeds off these sources, and the GOP uses them to deter organizations trying to help minorities. The lynching of ACORN was done in this same style, with some misinterpreted information coupled with relentless repetition of the misinformation. Trump is a master at deceiving his base while the rest of us goggle at his lies and ignorance. How many times is he going to be allowed to repeat that we're giving Iran billions of dollars, without some reporter from FOX pointing out that it was Iran's money we seized before, and are now giving back? The slick sales pitch of Trump is made possible by the media who lets him shock rather than inform.

I can't admire tactics that pervert capitalism in this extreme way. I don't think being "ruthless" is a good quality in business. I think ruthless people have portrayed it as a necessary ingredient in modern business, but it's really all the negative aspects we all complain about wrt modern practices. The decoupling of middle class wages from productivity was caused by these extremists. The mortgage crises, the worst of the pollution, the abuse of consumer protections, all the ripoffs and scams are run by businessmen like Trump who consider themselves effective because they're ruthless. They crave admiration because without it, these are the types of carpetbaggers communities used to tar, feather, and run out of town tied to a rail. Virtually every US news outlet is aimed at profit, and Trump makes them money whether you like him or hate him (if he's like Howard Stern, the folks who hate him spend more time reading/watching/listening about him than those who like him). I don't think Trump is nearly as popular as you think, but he's sensational, entertaining, and he gets more air time than anything else in the world because ignorant, powerful, and ruthless are a compelling combo to many Americans.

... we would have stopped looking. It's a great thing that science doesn't look for perfection, but instead looks for the best supported explanation. Hopefully you read what Klaynos posted about what a theory REALLY is, because you don't seem to understand what one is. This concept is one of the most powerful in all of science, and it's important that we use it properly.

... and since science isn't looking for definitive answers, it doesn't rely on faith, and thus can't justify your use of "either way". There's only one "way" that uses faith as its primary belief system.

Excellent points. We're a package deal. You have to look at all the resources we have to fully appreciate humans. And if we make big mistakes, that's how we learn big things. Hopefully we can apply our intelligence using what we learned to fix what we broke.

Very well. Let's start with the questions Strange, Studiot, and I have asked about your idea specifically. You've replied to the general lack of accepted terminology (there is no model in your paper though you mention it several times; models are just about all maths), so now please reply here as well: Also, you never answered me about basing your idea on laws of creation you made up yourself. Shouldn't you spend some time supporting those laws, rather than just assuming you've gotten them right? Also, we'd all appreciate you dropping the "general abuse" charges. There's been nothing personal in attacking the extraordinary claims you've put forth.

Thank you. I recognize people who fell in love with science AFTER they had their best chance to study it in school. I'm one of them. When smart people like you learn science from popular media (instead of following a curriculum designed to peel back the layers of the onion), you have to stitch together what you know, and since you're missing a ton of knowledge, you use wishful thinking to make a wild ass guess about the stuff in the gaps in your knowledge. This is the stuff you can't support rationally, the bits of your idea that have no evidence, so you're forced to wave a wand and make it so, redefining several well-established concepts in the process. But this gives you an idea that makes absolute perfect sense to nobody but you. To you, it seems like you've done what nobody else can. But science is a methodical, plodding tool that inches forward in sure, trustworthy steps. The grand leaps of intuition written about in pop-sci articles with such vivid drama are actually conclusions drawn from mountains of evidence gleaned through trusted procedures and representing the combined works of many scientists. I really hope you stick around to learn. Michio Kaku led me here long ago, but the awesomeness of mainstream science taught me how to correct as much of my ignorance as I can, every day I'm alive.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43984180 Trump lost Ty Cobb today, his top lawyer for the Russian collusion enquiry. Is it telling that Cobb decides to retire a week after Mueller's questions for Trump come out? My imagination tells me if he thought he had a chance to successfully defend the POTUS from these charges, he'd jump at the chance to make this his last great case.