Phi for All

Absolutely, now that it has almost total control. Everything we hear praises capitalism and reviles any other economic approach to any situation. All it had to do was make us believe even a little bit of socialism or communism was bad. Plus, Americans in general tend to identify with situational stances. They claim they're liberals, or conservatives, when the truth is that our decisions are pretty varied and across the board (how many "conservatives" out there NEVER do anything new or innovative? Thought so.). So I think a lot of Americans identify as being capitalists, and this makes it particularly easy for capitalism to worm its way into areas it shouldn't be. My opinion? We should test some truly socialist programs that haven't been invaded by opportunistic capitalist lobbyists. Can we come up with a kind of welfare or healthcare or community system not motivated in the least by profit?

! Moderator Note pittsburghjoe, I'll explain the predicament before we decide whether to let you go as a member or not. You keep opening doomed threads, claiming things you have no evidence for, such as the above. But we have experts and professionals who try to show you that you're wrong, or that you've misunderstood a concept. But you seem to think you can rewrite science without studying it deeply, by just applying what makes sense to you. You think the professionals (like Dr Swanson of the US Naval Observatory) who work with and apply these concepts have been misled by their hidebound thinking. But again, you support yourself only with your waving hands and your incredulity. We aren't going to change our rules about evidence to support assertions. And make no mistake, you aren't challenging mainstream science, not without support of any kind. You're just spitting into the wind. You need to decide if you'd like to change your behavior and stay and learn, or find someplace else to test out your guesswork. The ball's in your court now. We'll decide after your next post.

Oh, boooooo! This isn't Facebook, it's a science discussion site.

A hate magnet doesn't create the hate, so that's not an excuse if he draws yours out of you. I don't think he lets anyone off the hook. Worse, it seems like once his hooks are in you, he pulls you down to his depth in the muck. I think McCain and Ryan could have stopped all this with a firm stance, even after the nomination. I seriously can't look at either of them now. I used to respect McCain quite a bit. Are they all now figuring out how to cozy up to Putin? How to make their bases think Russia has secretly been our friend all along? I guess they figure these people voted for Trump, so maybe they'll believe just about anything.

! Moderator Note Off-topic posts split to Trash. Please stick to the topic.

tar has daughters, iirc. How does an American man look himself in the mirror when his answer to "What should your daughter do if her boss grabs her by the pussy?" is "She should look for another job" or "Her boss is a job creator, so he's more important than a mere worker". This idea that the boss can do what he likes is the bane of modern America, and many workers have ended up doing morally questionable things (*cough* Wells Fargo *cough*) just to keep a job. And of course we have MigL, who doesn't care either way because he's Canadian, but certainly enjoys it when women are being demonized. There's a well-ground axe in his closet. And now we see him identifying with a Trumpian ideal of vacuous, stupid women who don't have time to vote but find time to march. Trump is a toxic magnet, bringing out the worst in people who don't see the dangers of his tarnished populism.

I went the opposite. I learned enough about guns to know I enjoyed being accurate with one, which made me realize I never wanted to use one to kill anything. I thought this topic was going to be about firing a rifle parallel to the ground, while simultaneously dropping a bullet straight down from the same height, asking whether they hit at the same time or not.

I remember picking my jaw up the first time I heard a Trump supporter calling Hillary a liar. When I mentioned the three things Trump had already lied about that particular morning, it was dismissed as "he was given the wrong information". Which was another lie (and some real head-in-the-sand thinking), because Trump doubled down on all three later that day. I don't think Trump supporters care about their face-to-egg ratios. They consider fraud and lies to be the mark of a savvy businessman, grabbing pussy to be the mark of a real man, and white people to be deserving of anything they can get their hands on.

It doesn't sound like he has a scope. I'm betting "the tiny bit on the top of the gun" is the front sight, the fixed fin on the tip of the barrel. You calibrate that with the rear sight, typically somewhere between your trigger and your forward hand. The rear sight can go up and down, or side to side for windage.

And it's not "the wealthy", or even wealth that's the root problem here. I know people with extreme wealth who understand about pulling their own weight, who know that the job worker is just as important as the job creator, who know that happy employees who make a fair wage stay longer, and cost the same as unhappy employees making crap but turning over constantly. It's the people who think cheating on taxes is smart. It's the ones who want everyone to pay for airports, but don't think they should have to pay for public pools/schools because they never use them. It's the ones who want two sets of everything so they don't have to mingle with their lessers that cause good social programs to fail. Going back to public power would also put a halt to the practice of profiting from lobbying. Right now, energy companies can spend a few million on lobbying efforts that give them billions in incentives. Another area where we're subsidizing successful companies at taxpayer expense.

Capitalism is like planting kudzu. If you need to cover a large area with growth, and provide an anchor to protect against erosion, you couldn't pick a better plant. But if you don't carefully tend it (regulate it, tax it), it takes over everything. This is a no strawman zone. Nobody said profits were evil. The idea is that profit has its place, mainly in areas where it's OK for profit to be the priority. But in many areas, we're better served as individuals and as a country by focusing on what we're funding, and doing so with public monies. I completely agree with cutting off subsidies for successful businesses (or businesses that would fail if we stopped propping them up). It shows how messed up we've let matters get when, for instance, the US subsidizes the sugar industry which purposely charges us the highest prices in the world. And in energy, profit has been growing while the consumer gets charged more heavily. That's not market economics, because they aren't fairly competing with each other.

Raising the price of corn to make ethanol gets rid of some of the world's poorest people. Another quarter million a year through climate change further reduces the number of people wanting a handout. You don't have to help people when they're dead. It's all about getting the less wealthy to pay the necessary taxes so the wealthy don't have to. This is called "being smart". This is called "good business".

So when all but a few of the snake handlers tell you about a snake so dangerous it scares even them, why do you believe the snake oil salesmen who are saying it's just a normal snake and perfectly safe?

This works well with the uberwealth mentality. It helps maintain the illusion that creating the jobs is orders of magnitude more important than working the jobs.

I can't figure out if you're just moving the goalposts again, or if you really believe the women's marches were made up of those who didn't vote. Either way, it seems to show that you and Trump agree about women and their behavior in general.

Yeah, we know how you feel about Obama. But the DOJ released a report last year. Private prisons don't work, and they make the system more dangerous and cost far too much. It's dumb to use a capitalist growth business model on something you don't want to grow (like prisons). And when we're talking about the nation's power (which we really are - check the title), the lure of profits are too great. So much of what we do is based on our electricity, and on keeping our buildings warm. Power is so intrinsic to modern daily life that, like walking on the sidewalk or driving on the roads, it's something we should fund ourselves so we're not also having to pay profit to a private company. I would also argue that a private power company always does what's in its own best interest, which may include actions that aren't in the consumer's best interest. For some reason, during deregulation under Reagan and Clinton, the doors were purposely left wide open for scams and predatory business practices. In some states, it's possible for one private energy provider to change your service if they have your account number (which they typically get by claiming to be from your current provider).

May be? You should seriously get your reason checked if you think the women in those marches didn't vote. Jesus H Christ, you aren't a stupid man but this is such a stupid stance. I've changed my mind about relocating to Canada.

I knew you were a closet Trumpet. You haven't fooled anyone with your denials. This is one of the saddest things I've ever read from you.

Those are all excellent examples of the ways many people misuse anecdotal evidence to confirm their own biases.

He gets used a lot as a misunderstood scientist by those who don't understand him. Definitely a guy who learned the box so completely he could think well outside it.

For a dollar, I can put you in touch with this physicist. Actually touching him costs more.

They only speak to those clever enough to figure that out on their own.

I've seen this argument many, many times over the last dozen years. It's almost always put forth by those who want the loosest possible rigor applied to their own "creativity". We're less rigorous than Physics Forum, and more rigorous than many other science discussion sites. Quit trying to drag them all down to a mediocre level.

farolero has been added for six months. Posts that don't make sense waste everyone's precious time. Too many people asking what you're on about. Let's get it together, mod queue folks. Posts that make sense get approved!

Newt Gingrich alluded to this (although he was grateful, not concerned) last summer, when Putin Trump was lying about the crime rates. He stressed that if people FELT crime was on the rise, that was more important than the reality that it wasn't. He went as far as implying that feelings ARE fact. This tactic can help justify a whole lot of miserable, ignorant misthinking anywhere. In our media and our politics, it's unconscionable.