JustinW

I read something about this this morning in the news. It seems that Iraq is providing fighters to support the rebels in Syria. I didn't see it as a formal governmental alliance by Iraq as much as just finatic groups calling their fundamentalist friends to battle against the Syrian government. Al Queada and the Muslim Brotherhood have openly called for support of the rebels. So even if we do get into this mix, which side would we be more confortable supporting? It seems that one side or the other in this conflict would be hypocracy on our part.

Yes I've read a little on the gospels of philip and thomas. It's hard to come to an understanding when things are written in parables. The Nag Hammadi library has some of these translated gospels. It is supposedly the closest thing to the words spoken by Jesus. They must have had a different understanding of language back in those days because I can't even come close to understanding the meaning of half of it.

Maybe civilized is where we went wrong? I can understand the sentiment. I have thought about this several times while growing up in the sticks. The sound of cars on a near highway that didn't used to be there would make me angry at times. But on the turnabout to that thinking you would also have to wonder what we would be like without the advancements we've made. Would we be just as mean as that silverback would be if someone made the wrong move in his territory? We wouldn't be as knowledgable, but does that sort of thing really matter in the long run?

I think it is a good idea, but one ultimate hurdle to cross would be government allowing such transparency. It seems that at least throughout my lifetime, and even more so in the early 2000's, that there has been a feeling about government that the only information you get is what they think you should get. Seemingly not even on national security matters. The White House has gone as far as to hide some of their ideological intentions in the recent past, and probably before, now that I think about it. Maybe once a national discussion platform is installed the government might open their doors a little wider to let us take a peak.

I think Captain pretty much correct on this. It's like watching a football game. You can see which way the player should have gone, but the player himself doesn't have that overall perspective. Ultimately what is to keep this form of internetal government from just going with what is popular at the time? What is to keep our nation's policies from going from one extreme to another very quickly? Like Captain also said about the average guy on the street. . .Poloticians may have their faults but at least they're not me.

I'm beginning to understand why Moontanman feels as strongly as he does against fundamental christianity.

MAN... I would have crapped my pants. I'm not quite understanding your question. Are you asking if we will ever have any reason for such interactions? If so, I say because it's f**ing cool. If that wasn't the question you intended though please elaborate.

iNow, I think IM Egdall was asking the reason for adjustment between the two data scales. Why is it necessary to adjust such data? Why can't we use the raw data without adjustment? And, because I couldn't find this info, hasn't there been more extreme changes in a shorter time period in the past when examining the RAW data? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Public_opinion_on_falsified_global_warming_research.png just sayin'.

It's a 24hr clock. If it was a regular clock with 12 numbers I would say it was 12. The first symbol can only be 0 or 24. The second symbol is 7. If you're reading the time provided by the line I would agree with the 19 part, but would still have to say that it is either 00:19 or 24:19. Of course I'm not familiar with Russian so if I'm wrong about the way this thing reads please explain how.

No it is 00:07 , which is 7 minutes after midnight. Still don't understand the reason for symbols though.Is the point being, the smaller circumference the more accurate the clock?

My first thoughts on this are two things. First why would they have to have their own satellites when they could just as easily use our own. And second, If they are from a planet outside of our solar system how would they even know that we have satellites. Like Ivan touched on above, you have to take into account the speed of light, and how fast information can travel over that long of a distance. Unless they had a much faster way to send and recieve information it would take thousands of years to even be aware that we were capable of satellite techknowledgy.

Some claim that He was as a child. That He would play mean tricks on those that He disliked and in one story actually pushed a boy to his death. I've read a little of the gnostic writings. I particularly liked the phrase "if you have ears you had better listen". I use it every now and then with my kids. Some of it drove me a little crazy with the whole read between the lines expectations. They claim that those who know TRUTH will never taste death, but yet they never tell you what the truth is.

When put that way it makes a little more sense. I was thinking more strongly about those who believe in the infinite multiverse theory, but even then when looked at from your point of view makes more sense.

I believe I understand your paradox thinking and it is a hurdle. Also I wasn't necessarily talking about the Christian God or any denomination for that matter. Maybe I should have used the word creator instead. Even though it is a parodox, if there are infinant possibilities then there would be a way around it. We just can't fathum one yet that could be applied in our current realm of reality.

I wonder how this affects the averaging of the whole country, and maybe this so called crisis isn't as bad as some would like it to seem. Even though I still believe that junk food does have some bearing on the healthcare system I wonder just how much and also am weary of the overall accuracy of the stats. Man I hope there's not a sleep walking epidemic. The reason I was arguing against your examples was because it didn't fall into the same kind of scenario. Let's take the car scenario. A better example of the relation between the two would be what I was thinking earlier along the lines that junk food was the big vehicles while cars were the health food. A proper relation would be taxing big vehicles and subsidising the smaller vehicles. But you don't tax big vehicles then turnaround and subsidise the smaller vehicles with it. That would be like taxing Peterbuilt and using that money to subsidise GM. Does that sound reasonable? It doesn't to me. And you don't think there is other ways to do that? With all the inventiveness that we've had in the financial sector this past decade someone is bound to have that rabbit in there hat. But I would have to admit that I have no answer to covering the cost that needs to be cut in order to boost the health food market. Uh Oh Phi, I think A Tripolation has sniffed out another one of those pesky corporations. I wonder how many congressmen would bank on a surge in health food sales. That is an interesting thing to think about.

What I don't get is that most of the reasons I have gotten on why atheists are atheists is because God is irrelevant due to the fact that he has no bearing on reality. He is unprovable and holds no logical basis for belief so therefore isn't relevant. But the part I don't get is that most atheists believe in extra terrestrial life due to the immense distance and infinant possiblities of the universe. So I can't get around the fact that so many atheists believe in infanant possibilities and relate that fact towards multiverse theories and possibilities of alien life forms, but neglect the fact that if there are infinant possibilities that a God is bound to be one of them. For those that do believe in infanant possibilities, wouldn't this inturn make God relevant? Is my thinking correct on this or did I get some different concepts confused?

iNow, You just reminded me of something. I'm Obese. I forgot until you laid that article down again. I was at a fit test for work one year and it was the first time someone had told me I was obese. To look into a mirror I couldn't tell. No one else thought so and I doubt they were trying to spare my feelings. It's just that as skinny as I've been my whole life it was sort of shocker to find out that I was in the obese category. (don't worry I'll get over it) The point of my story here is that I think the percentages are inaccurate coupled with an inaccurate rating system. I would never consider myself obese, but that mass index sure did say so, it must be right.

My first point with the my rant at the beginning of the thread was that we need to change the system if we don't want to pay for it's use when we disagree with the reason it is being used. I don't like to think that our eating habits can become a rule of law. What then. . our sleeping habits? True, but one could also argue that by doing so they insure that they have a road to drive on. It would be a better example if you could find a situation where heavy trucks were getting taxed and there competitors were getting subsidies by that tax. That would be closer related to the junk food tax situation. If you eliminated the tax on healthy foods it might eliminate the need to add a tax to cover it in the long run, but I do concede to your point on this though. I should have thought that part out a little more. Ah, touche. But where? What part of the health food industry would this subsidy affect? Not that I would agree with doing this no matter what area it help the industry, but curiousity has me.

They do it cigarettes, but do they use that money to subsidise a competitor of cigarettes? Or do the alcohol taxes get used as subsidies for non alcoholic beverage companies? I don't see it as the same thing.

Abusing the health care system. . .I'm going to have to think about this. The thing about the other examples of incentive programs is they are tax breaks. They are not adding a tax to motivate people to make the decisions that they want them to. It would be like taxing every book except the bible because the government felt that people needed an incentive to learn better morality. Probably not the best analogy I know. But wouldn't an incentive program in favor of health food be more balanced if they were to cut taxes on health food instead of add taxes to junk food? I would think that that would be a more acceptable position and possibly a better motivator rather than a seeming punishment. Yes I would be against it. Whenever we let a government beauracracy favor one company over the other by rewarding one company with part of the profits of the other, I'm against it. In this analogy with the cigarette; you would think that if it gave smokers the same affect but without the health problems that it wouldn't need a subsidy to compete. I would be in favor of giving the new and improved cigarette a tax break though. Same incentive but without taking extra money from the pockets of people. You've got a decent point here, but an easy solution is not always the best. The two are not comparable. A counter for corp. advertising would be the government counter advertising, not racking up more cost on it's people to punnish bad behavior. I don't hear anyone arguing for a tax BREAK incentive instead of a tax HIKE incentive. Which of the two do you think would be more effective? I think the break would be more incentive and look a whole lot less like a penalty for bad behavior. Yeah we did kind of bugger up that corn ethonal project didn't we. I've thought about this a couple of times throughout this thread so I'm going to go ahead and ask. Is there some reason that health food needs a subsidy? You would think that a tax cut incentive would do the job of boosting sales and production. All the while you wouldn't be publicly punnishing people. Who would of ever thought that people would think of fining people for being fat. It sounds absurd just saying it. iNow You've got a good point there too. But why stop at taxing junk food? After people start eating more fruits and veggies the next item on the list will be pesticides. We can then tax those who buy fruits and veggies grown using herbicides and such, then give that money to subsidise organic products. Then after that we can go after the big bad meat products. Someone might realize that fish can help fight off certain health risks while red meat contributes to some health problems. So we can then tax meat products and use that to subsidise fish products. This could go on and on and on. Why start in the first place? And if we do start we might as well go all the way. You can come up with a lot of products to tax once you start taxing things for being linked to some sort of health problem.

It wouldn't be that way if we wouldn't have subsidised health care in the first place. I do remember what Phi told me a while back, and still agree, that no one wants to see a single mother with kids go without. But this parenting of government to control behaviour isn't like that. It's like our country wants to be grown adults who still live in there mother's basement. (Instead of your mother making you a sandwhich, you can now go down to the local "trough" and have the government make one for you. If they say it's okay first, we can't forget to get their approval first. ) Phi, Sorry Phi I don't see it as an incentive program. The only incentive goes to those who need it. Where is the incentive for the rest. Oh wait. . . It would have to be in the reduced costs of health care, right? Maybe. Read back through the beginnings of this thread where people talk about government run food bars and despensaries instead of grocery stores or restaraunts, and mandating that a doctor has to chose your menu, and what amounts to a fine if you deveate at all from that menu. I would go on a big rant about this, but I'm rather speachless at the moment due to the blatant disregard for personal freedom. If I could only find the time. Maybe arsenic isn't found on the labels but we are talking about sugars and calories and what not, aren't we? You can easily distinguish the healthy from unhealthy by looking at a nutrition label can't you? Okay you got me there. It does make more sense, but I don't think either one is right though. We need to pay taxes to run the programs that benifit society, but I don't agree with taxing to manipulate peoples behavior. What was it that John said. . . Stalinistic!. . . I think that is a good descriptive word that describes the path that this type of behavior can lead to. The more you depend on someone else to make your choices for you, the less you depend on yourself. And it's hard to get the control back once it's gone. Either way, it's not right. I did wonder what you were going to say about the sugar companies though. I can agree with this point on advertisement manipulation, but the manipulation through advertising is not the same as mandated manipulation through taxation. You have a choice not to watch those advertisements, you don't have a choice not to pay a tax once instituted.

What one might think of as perfect, another would surely disagree. Perfect is a matter of personal opinion. If someone claims that their God is perfect then they are not lying or even willfully ignorant for that matter, they just see it that way. If I said that something was perfect, and someone else said that it wasn't, neither one would be lying because it is a matter of opinion.

Santalum, Like I said, hypothetical parents. I don't know about you but I stopped needin' a wet nurse when I started wipin' my own arse. If people that need to regulate their behaviour to keep from harming themselves don't care about themselves enough to do so, why should we feel obligated to. This not only amounts to helping those that aren't even willing to help themselves, but also amounts to punnishing those that do make the right choices for behaviours of those who don't. iNow, I can see that, but there is a method to my madness. The reason I do view personal liberty as a top priority is because once it's lost it's too damn hard to get back. And as how that is the case there isn't a balance, the proper balance should be in the ability to take it away. If it was just as hard to take away liberty as it is to gain it back then people might not look at these types of issues with a shrug of the shoulders. As a matter of question I usually view these types of taxes as greed by the government. Someone is trying to juice the books somewhere. It really doesn't seem likely that sugar is the main cause of these problems with weight related health issues. Does any of the information differentiate between people that are overweight directly because of their sugar intake to those that could have other causes for weight gain? I also don't agree with this (if you can believe it). How do justice, honesty, and respect come into play when talking about personal liberty? Compassion, decency, and humility do need to take a back seat if the cost of achieving those "feelings of self satisfaction" is the loss of ones ability to freely make choices. Has anyone ever asked why the poor, weak, and vulnerable are the way they are? I can tell you it's not from good behavioral choices or sound decision making. At what point in a persons life do they stop being responsible for their own choices and the populace starts to be responsible? JohnB, Good point. Wasn't he also the one that said "one mans death is a trajedy, but a million is just a statistic"? swansont, Arsenic and lead are poisonous. If you start labeling things like sugar to be poisonous where would it end. I think you could probably find adverse health effect connection in any food item. Where would you draw the line? Phi, It's called a nutrition label and it's found on most food items. Also the other analogies you've mentioned are like apples and oranges. Different subjects for different reasons. And how many people do you think a tax on sugar would affect? And how would a regulation of sugar benifit companies who use that sugar in their products? Not to mention that some of those synthetic sugars are worse for you than the real thing. But it is that way, because isn't the market in large part people's choice. The market IS the people and a direct reflection on the desicions that they make. So whether we are talking about a choice of the individual or the choice of markets the "parental government" analogy still seems correct to me.

Am I the only one on this forum that looks at this as a blight on personal freedom and liberty? Why not tax the air we breathe and give the money to combat co2 emmisions? Lets start taxing people's flatulance like they do livestock in Ireland. Is there some line that could be considered uncrossable when it comes to regulating and taxing for the greater good of society? If so what is it, and why is that the line? People say that the world is getting fatter, but has anyone considered that the ratio of people starving or going hungry might have dropped at a rate that corrolates with this gain in weight? Has anyone considered that most of the people that are unhealthily overweight have more reasons than just what they eat? Hey here's an idea that we can add to the food tax... Let's add a tax to people who DON'T excersize. THEY are obviously exponentially more unhealthy than people who do excersize, at least at probably close to the same ratio as fat:skinny. Why not go that route? Where do you want to draw the line on the control that a government can have on what people do with themselves? If everyone is so pissed off to have to pay into a system because of people's behavioral eticate then, by god, change the damn system. Don't keep choking people's wallets to prevent bad choices. It's beginning to look like people think of the government as a hypothetical parent.

Wouldn't a theory of relativity still hold true no matter what speed is the basis for relativity?