State of the Union Address

[Tsukiyumi]

Let me just add that I shouldn't have even gotten involved in this discussion; I despise capitalism unless it's severely regulated, and so my bias renders any explanation of how the current system works moot. You could get into fiduciary details about investment, and loans, and free trade, and market trends; I understand them well enough, and even if I understood them completely, I'd still argue against them because I believe at the root, the system is fatally flawed and is not a viable future for a productive, positive society.

Some people think it's great, and that's fine, but I disagree at the most fundamental level. It's like an atheist arguing with a religious fundamentalist: you can both make great points, but in the end, the discussion is fruitless because both sides' opinions are too deeply rooted. Apologies for wasting our time.

[Mikey]

Well, I had part of deeply detailed reply begun, but I guess that this last comment sort of renders it moot. Let me just say that yes - there is corruption in the system... because there is corruption in EVERY system, and will be until the robot overlords finally come and take all the decision-making abilities out of the hands of us mere humans. However, it is ridiculous to say that just because there are human failings within the system then that means that the market system is manipulated and controlled by the Illuminati, or the Stonecutters' Guild, or whatever shadow organization sitting in their star chamber. It is also ridiculous to despise a whole class of people simply because of their positions as executive officers or because they make more money than you or I.

I know a guy who, while not a CEO, COO, or CFO, was a pretty damned high-up mucky-muck in a Dow Index company. He oversaw a lot of people, sometimes reported directly to the directors, and his involvement was in watching lines and collecting debts from deadbeats - in fact, to ensure debt flow was consistently less than a week late, and empowered to impose all sorts of penalties for distributions late by even as a little as a few days. Further, his work saw him arm-in-arm with various attorneys, including one who was most noted in his native country for springing a famous known criminal based on status and legal technicalities. Guy sounds like one of those typical scummy, slimy corporate officers, right?

Well, he wasn't. In fact, my dad joined the army (pre G.I. Bill) in order to earn enough to pay for his B.S., then worked his way through Columbia to earn his M.S. and M.A. in order to eventually attain the position that he achieved. He worked for Dun & Bradstreet, which for many moons has been an overseer and reporter of fellow large corporations and conglomerations. His collections were strictly in the field of commercial collections, ensuring the proper flow between corporate debtors and creditors, often to ensure the proper balance between assets and liabilities - which work saved Lord-knows how many jobs in other companies during his career. Oh, and the scumbag lawyer who got a famed criminal off? Matsuo-san was a wonderful man who invited me and my family into his stateside home many times, and was quite a generous and caring family man himself. The case he was famed for in Japan, though, was getting Paul McCartney released in the 70's when he landed in Tokyo with half a lid in his pocket. If you have already decided to hate a class of people, you can make the facts spin any way you want and don't need to let them enter into your judgement.

BTW, I won't get into a detailed thing here, because nobody cares and because I'm no trained economist myself; but the root of the recession to which you refer was none of those types of investment entities - it was the retrading of private mortgage fund interests under false ratings, mostly funds based in Scandinavian housing. That is the very basic root, at any rate, and things like hedges may have stilted any possible bounce-back but couldn't have been the cause of the issues.

[SteveK]

Well it is a fact that the disparity of income increased dramatically in the last 40 or so years in the US, with all the negative effects this has on an economy.

So.....how would you counter that without raising minimum wages? (Assuming one is opposed to the rich getting richer.)

Why is income disparity automatically a bad thing? If the richest 1000 Americans became citizens of Austria, I can't imagine that any harm would come to you as a resident of Austria or that I would benefit as a resident of the United States.

Society. Take it or leave it isn't an option; you can't just go live off the land somewhere; it's all owned by someone. The options are take what they give you (and like it) or fuck off and die.

That isn't remotely true. To live the lifestyle I enjoy I need to earn a good salary, but people who don't earn good salaries don't starve to death in the U.S. They might not have as many luxuries as I do but it certainly isn't a case of fucking off and dying.

http://www.heritage.org/research/report ... erty#_ftn3

[Tsukiyumi]

Why is income disparity automatically a bad thing?

Five-person families living alone in 30-room mansions while kids live on the streets. Yeah, what's wrong with that?

Society. Take it or leave it isn't an option; you can't just go live off the land somewhere; it's all owned by someone. The options are take what they give you (and like it) or fuck off and die.

That isn't remotely true. To live the lifestyle I enjoy I need to earn a good salary, but people who don't earn good salaries don't starve to death in the U.S. They might not have as many luxuries as I do but it certainly isn't a case of fucking off and dying.

http://www.heritage.org/research/report ... erty#_ftn3

Disregarding the fact that your cited source there is a conservative propaganda machine, and their figures are blatantly wrong (100% of poor households with children have a refrigerator... really? I recall a number of times living in a car or van where we did not have a refrigerator. After we got our 21 foot travel trailer that we lived in for the next 8 years, we didn't have a fridge for at least 4 months before my parents saved up and bought a used one. I guess that so-called data doesn't factor in homeless people or people in trailers/cars/vans etc. Funny to leave that out of a study on poverty), I guess I didn't make the point clear enough. Or maybe you read it out of context.

Allow me to rephrase: You either play their game and conform to their system, or... well there is no option. Their game, their rules. You can't go set up your own society somewhere without having money first, as everything on the planet is now "owned" by someone.

In college lately, I keep being told that I and my classmates need to develop skills to "get ahead in the corporate world". Why? I have no interest in participating in that crap, and my choice of career does not require that I learn those skills. But it's mandatory, so now I've got to write "professional" emails, and draft a cover letter for my "professional resume". Bullshit that I will need even less in the future than knowing how to calculate the volume of a sphere. At least the latter has an actual use outside of the fantasy construct world of capitalist business.

On the above statistics you posted, I can prove right now that they are propaganda bullshit: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/NEWS/usa ... s_ST_U.htm

How many of those 1.6 million homeless kids in America do you suppose owns an xbox that their family hasn't sold for a few nights in a motel or for gas? Of that number how many of the 168,000 families living on the streets or in shelters owns a refrigerator? People don't take kindly to you hooking up a fridge to their outlets, and they're awful hard to lug around in a shopping cart.

Your reply really had nothing to do with my post's intent, but let me just say this: Even disregarding the fact that our alternative to participating in the current establishment is to fuck off and die (because there is no other option - society is a construct that we are all forced to participate in), your point is what? You can always be homeless if you don't want to play their game? That's fantastic. So glad that someone else can decide how I live my life, even though i never agreed to it.

[Mikey]

So you're saying that if you don't want to be a part of humanity, you can't be. I'm not sure I get what you're saying here. As far as society being a construct, that might be true nominally but it's the only way for humans to live. Like a number of other animals, humans are gregarious; society is an inevitable outcome of that fact. What one may deduce that you'd call "artificial societal norms" or somesuch are in fact evident in animals that are generally not considered sentient, or sapient, or self-aware. I've heard you knock monogamy before as an artificially-imposed more that abrogates our nature and is forced by the ego on the id; how then would you explain wolves, who are monogomous for life? Similarly, how would you explain societal behavior - not just labor-sharing, but things like fostering, parental assistance, caring for the injured or infirm, etc.?

The point of all of this is that society isn't imposed upon us, it's a natural and inexorable fact of our existence. Society is not "a construct that we are forced to participate in (sic,)" any more than is our skin a construct we are forced to wear. If you mean that the current society in the First World has flaws, well, sure; I dare you to name anything involving people in the history of ever that doesn't. Since we're talking about economic culture, I'd like to know what your better alternative is. Socialism in its purest form as an national economic policy? I believe someone called Kerensky tried that in 1917. Didn't work out too well, as I recall. Communism? Sure, that promulgated a phenomenal quality of life for the everyday people of the Soviet Bloc, didn't it?

Sometimes things suck. That fact of itself sucks, but there it is. When my doctor says that his professional opinion is that it is dangerous - foolhardy, even - to go to work, but my disability app is denied because the SSA considers the fact of sudden, random, and unannounced unconsciousness to be "not a problem," it sucks. Is the SSA a product of our system? Sure. Does it make sense to blame the fact that I live in a society? Of course not, that would be batshit insane. In fact, the very existence of the SSA is product of an administration whose ideas were as left-leaning for its time as you are for yours, so that denial of common sense would actually be a product of the changes you'd make to improve things! Funny, in'it?

[Tsukiyumi]

So you're saying that if you don't want to be a part of humanity, you can't be. I'm not sure I get what you're saying here.

I'm saying that as individuals, our ability to choose our own destinies has been slowly eroded away to the point where we are living in a society with a disturbing number of parallels to feudal Europe or Japan. Choice itself, is in fact, mostly illusory. we choose what color of shirt to wear (except at work!) and what radio station to listen to in the car, but the big, self-determining choices? Not so much, unless you are in a position of wealth and/or power.

As far as society being a construct, that might be true nominally but it's the only way for humans to live. Like a number of other animals, humans are gregarious; society is an inevitable outcome of that fact. What one may deduce that you'd call "artificial societal norms" or somesuch are in fact evident in animals that are generally not considered sentient, or sapient, or self-aware.

Again, I must need to clarify: society in of itself is not only inevitable, but advantageous to both the individual and the species as a whole. What I'm referring to is our current quasi-feudal, uber-consumerist police state system.

I've heard you knock monogamy before as an artificially-imposed more that abrogates our nature and is forced by the ego on the id; how then would you explain wolves, who are monogomous for life?

That would be genetic, IIRC, just like in a number of bird species and others throughout the animal kingdom. We do not have such a genetic equivalent, and monogamy is yet another social construct force-fed to the masses, and widely considered (subconsciously at least) to just be "the right way".

Similarly, how would you explain societal behavior - not just labor-sharing, but things like fostering, parental assistance, caring for the injured or infirm, etc.?

First, those things are not always part of a culture; I'll use the Comanche as an example, as I'm the most familiar with my tribe. Labor sharing was pure logic; two sets of hands are better than one, and two pairs of eyes might mean the difference between an individual starving, or the group feasting. After a child learned to walk, the entire community raised the child, and the parent had a lot less individual contact than modern white society deems normal. Elderly people who could not contribute were usually left to die. All pure logic, no emotional consideration (which was to our great detriment, I believe).

Societies cannot be based entirely on logic any more than they can be based entirely on self-interest. Either way leads to eventual collapse and destruction.

The point of all of this is that society isn't imposed upon us, it's a natural and inexorable fact of our existence. Society is not "a construct that we are forced to participate in (sic,)" any more than is our skin a construct we are forced to wear. If you mean that the current society in the First World has flaws, well, sure; I dare you to name anything involving people in the history of ever that doesn't.

Bacon cheeseburger. No flaws there. I mean that for the first time in human history (over the last century or so), people's ability to self-determine has been steadily undermined by the invasive culture we are born into. the income gap is not just widening; it's exploding outward. This means less people in our current system will ever have the opportunity to achieve their dreams, or even to live as comfortably as our grandparents did. There's only so much capital to go around, and when it's hoarded by a select few, the rest of us have to spend our energy fighting for the remaining scraps.

Since we're talking about economic culture, I'd like to know what your better alternative is. Socialism in its purest form as an national economic policy? I believe someone called Kerensky tried that in 1917. Didn't work out too well, as I recall. Communism? Sure, that promulgated a phenomenal quality of life for the everyday people of the Soviet Bloc, didn't it?

Extremely high level of personal freedom, social programs to level the playing field completely (not this half-assed crap the Tea Party calls socialism but isn't), highly regulated capitalism transitioning eventually to a resource-based economy. Logic and emotion do not have to cancel each other out. They can work side-by-side in a yin-yang type synergy where the needs of the many can be met, but not at the expense of the needs of the few, or the one.

[Mikey]

I'm saying that as individuals, our ability to choose our own destinies has been slowly eroded away to the point where we are living in a society with a disturbing number of parallels to feudal Europe or Japan. Choice itself, is in fact, mostly illusory. we choose what color of shirt to wear (except at work!) and what radio station to listen to in the car, but the big, self-determining choices? Not so much, unless you are in a position of wealth and/or power.

I'm all for cynicism, but I think you're at a point at which the cynicism has overtaken the point which it's supposed to be making. My wife was pre-law, had her LSAT's, worked for a tort attorney, and was in general all set on her path to a legal career. Now she's an educator, on her way to an Ed.D., and recently invited to regularly present at a UPenn seminar/research tank regarding parental involvement in education and ASP's. Sounds like a choice to diverge from the path was present. My sister-in-law at various times entered a convent, and then left the order. My sister - and MBA by education - left the fiscal world, while her husband left a long-standing position as a comptroller for a manufacturing concern in order to start a home-improvement and contracting business. You don't want to be part of a corporate structure, right? And here's the interesting thing... you're not. Good thing you don't have that choice.

What I'm referring to is our current quasi-feudal, uber-consumerist police state system.

It's funny to see that term while thinking of how unlike a true capitalism our system really is. As to the other comment, it's hard for me to remember some of the older folks in my synagogue while I was a kid, and recall the tattoos of numbers on their forearms, and then think of this as a police state.

That would be genetic, IIRC, just like in a number of bird species and others throughout the animal kingdom. We do not have such a genetic equivalent, and monogamy is yet another social construct force-fed to the masses, and widely considered (subconsciously at least) to just be "the right way".

If it's genetic for the wolves, or the musk oxen, or the elephants, or the dolphins, then why would you consider it otherwise for us? Now, I'm not going to get into some Chomsky-esque discussion of inborn language mechanism or something; but the attachment of ethics or mores to that behavior is just as likely - more likely, IMHO - to be a rationalization after-the-fact of behaviors that are innate to our nature as gregarious animals rather than causes of those behaviors... rationalizations which are simply the product of consciousness, and our being self-aware of those behaviors which drive us anyway, and our attempt to define or explain them. I.e., monogamy or fostering or feeding the elderly or what have you are behaviors in which many of us would engage, and then we ascribe morality or ethos or social norms to them to explain why we do them. Sure, there are variations; in the tribe from which my wife descends, the bloodiest conflicts were against those who were the most closely related in genetics and language. Some cultures value their elderly more than others. Etc., etc., ad nauseum. What you'll find, though, is that the basic tenets that sprung when civilization began - whether at Harappa, Jericho, or the American isthmus - were "constructs" that arose to simply delineate or even just follow the gregarious-animal behaviors that were prevalent in pre-civilization society.

Bacon cheeseburger. No flaws there.

Sure there are. Bacon cheeseburgers are like sex; some are better than others, but it's very rare to find one that's truly bad. However, the very deliciousness of a bacon cheeseburger makes one want to eat it often. That leads to a poor body-fat distribution, atherosclerosis, myocardial infarction, hypertension, COPD...

This means less people in our current system will ever have the opportunity to achieve their dreams, or even to live as comfortably as our grandparents did.

My grandparents came from more socialized systems. The fact that they had to work hard and learn English sort of paled in comparison to the alternative of staying where the were and get comfortable wearing yellow stars and one by one being herded onto cattle cars to go be slaves for a few months and then starved and killed.

There's only so much capital to go around, and when it's hoarded by a select few, the rest of us have to spend our energy fighting for the remaining scraps.

Except if you or I became one of those few, we wouldn't do much differently. Now maybe I'm the one being overly cynical, but I will never believe differently until shown differently.

[Mikey]

I had another part ready in response to the last statement of Tsu's post, but Chrome ate it (again.) However, I believe I am done with political conversation for a bit. I was involved in the following exchange this morning in the locker room of the YMCA, after my son's swimming class while an older gentleman was holding forth about how Obama is likely to declare martial law(!) -

Me: "It's hard to imagine a sitting president declaring martial law during peacetime without some extenuating circumstance."
Him: "Well, what if Texas secedes?"
me: "I frankly don't see that happening... the talk of it has been by fringe groups, and in any event I don't think that would require a nationwide declaration of martial law."
him: "It could! They have a legal right to secede, you know."
me: "That makes no sense. How could they have a 'legal right' to secede?"
him: "Of course they do!"
me: "I fail to understand how a legal right could be granted to abandon the body that hands down legal rights."
him: "(unintelligible muttering...) freedom... (muttering...) this is 'Murica..."
me: "But if they seceded, they wouldn't be in America, would they?"
other elderly gentleman who had been listening and chuckling: "If there was an American legal right to leave America, why did we fight the Civil War?"
original crackpot: "... I've got to meet my nephew."

[Tsukiyumi]

To be fair to the looney tune, Texas does have the right to secede; it was in the original charter when we joined the union. We were the only state that was an actual country first.

I'm all for cynicism, but I think you're at a point at which the cynicism has overtaken the point which it's supposed to be making. My wife was pre-law, had her LSAT's, worked for a tort attorney, and was in general all set on her path to a legal career. Now she's an educator, on her way to an Ed.D., and recently invited to regularly present at a UPenn seminar/research tank regarding parental involvement in education and ASP's. Sounds like a choice to diverge from the path was present. My sister-in-law at various times entered a convent, and then left the order. My sister - and MBA by education - left the fiscal world, while her husband left a long-standing position as a comptroller for a manufacturing concern in order to start a home-improvement and contracting business. You don't want to be part of a corporate structure, right? And here's the interesting thing... you're not. Good thing you don't have that choice.

So, I could go build a house in the woods, and hunt and fish for food, build my own tools, and all for free? Nope, The land is "owned" by someone, the game (besides being scarce) is regulated; I'd have to pay fees and get licenses, pay property tax even if I owned the land... no choices there.

Hell, trying to commit suicide is illegal in this country - that's about the most fundamental choice people can make: whether or not to live.

It's still just the illusion of choice: I don't want to pay rent, or I don't want to work 40 hours a week? Sure, I can choose not to, but the results are that I'd be homeless. It's the same as saying "do this, or we hit you in the nuts with a sledgehammer." If those are your two choices, there is really no choice at all.

It's funny to see that term while thinking of how unlike a true capitalism our system really is. As to the other comment, it's hard for me to remember some of the older folks in my synagogue while I was a kid, and recall the tattoos of numbers on their forearms, and then think of this as a police state.

Do you really want to play that card with me? There are 14,000 full-blooded Comanche left in the world as of the last census; we were wiped out systematically, rounded up and put in concentration camps by whom? That would be the United States government.

Wiretapping, email surveillance, 24-7 camera monitoring, indefinite detainment in secret facilities, execution by drone or otherwise without trial, surveillance drones in American airspace, rampant police brutality, secret police, forcible disarmament of the population, internment camps, double standard laws, private armies... nope, not a police state at all. We've still got our free speech though, right?

If it's genetic for the wolves, or the musk oxen, or the elephants, or the dolphins, then why would you consider it otherwise for us?

I don't "consider" it otherwise, it is otherwise. We are not genetically wired for it. It is a social construct, just like suppressing the desire to kill or injure your rivals as a male (something we are naturally wired for).

Sure there are. Bacon cheeseburgers are like sex; some are better than others, but it's very rare to find one that's truly bad. However, the very deliciousness of a bacon cheeseburger makes one want to eat it often. That leads to a poor body-fat distribution, atherosclerosis, myocardial infarction, hypertension, COPD...

That is not a problem with the burger, it's a problem with people and their lack of willpower. The bacon cheeseburger, as a concept, is flawless.

My grandparents came from more socialized systems. The fact that they had to work hard and learn English sort of paled in comparison to the alternative of staying where the were and get comfortable wearing yellow stars and one by one being herded onto cattle cars to go be slaves for a few months and then starved and killed.

See my above comment. The US government took my people's surviving children and washed their mouths out with lye soap when they spoke their own damn language. My point was the fact that the generation in question were paid a higher equivalent wage for their work, no matter how you twist the numbers. They also weren't required to own a computer and pay an internet bill just to keep employment or go to school.

Except if you or I became one of those few, we wouldn't do much differently. Now maybe I'm the one being overly cynical, but I will never believe differently until shown differently.

Hell if I would. Believe what you want; I'd use that capital to tear down this system and replace it with one that has a future.

[Deepcrush]

Short and simple of this is something I heard some years back, it is as close to verbatim as I can remember.

"There is no limit on your choices, there is no break down of free will. You can do whatever you choose to do and it isn't a matter of you can't do it. Its just a matter of you not being willing to do what is needed to get there. You don't have to like your choices, you do have to live with them and sometimes die for them."

Lcpl, 1st Marines, 2001, May-ish... I think.

Life isn't what you think or what you want, Life is what you do with it.

[Tsukiyumi]

I agree with the sentiment there; if someone chose to they could say, gun down a bunch of people. Terrible choice, but you can make it.

My point is that the vast majority of (legitimate, non life-ending) choices we have are already defined and/or decided by someone else. We just get to choose what brand of corn flakes to buy.

[Mikey]

To be fair to the looney tune, Texas does have the right to secede; it was in the original charter when we joined the union. We were the only state that was an actual country first.

I didn't know that, I'll admit; but once a state secedes, talking about its right to do so being legally authorized by the government with which it is no longer affiliated is a bit ridiculous.

So, I could go build a house in the woods, and hunt and fish for food, build my own tools, and all for free? Nope, The land is "owned" by someone, the game (besides being scarce) is regulated; I'd have to pay fees and get licenses, pay property tax even if I owned the land... no choices there.

Sounds like the issue isn't one of choice at all; sounds like you're pissed that someone else got there first. Let's say you went to build your house in the woods, and started hunting, fishing, farming, or whatever on the surrounding land. Now let's say I decide that I want to do the same thing, but your house is already there. Did you just abrogate my ability to choose how to live? According to the logic you presented, you sure as hell did. According to the real world, nope. That's the same thing as you claim to be abrogation of your choice.

Do you really want to play that card with me? There are 14,000 full-blooded Comanche left in the world as of the last census; we were wiped out systematically, rounded up and put in concentration camps by whom? That would be the United States government.

Wiretapping, email surveillance, 24-7 camera monitoring, indefinite detainment in secret facilities, execution by drone or otherwise without trial, surveillance drones in American airspace, rampant police brutality, secret police, forcible disarmament of the population, internment camps, double standard laws, private armies... nope, not a police state at all. We've still got our free speech though, right?

Yeah, I really do want to play that card. Of my wife's ancestral tribe, approx. 12,000 remain - which figure comprises three different tribal groups which tend to be lumped together based on linguistic kinship. So, in truth approx. 4,000 - 5,000 remain, and only regained their status as an independent nation following a double appeal of a suit levied against them by - of all people - the Cherokee Nation, which sued to declaim their status and take whatever land was left to them. So, you don't need to lecture me about what happened to the NAN's. As to the rest - yeah, it all sucks, and I'd wager I've been to more marches, phone and mail campaigns, congressional representative harangues and harrassments, etc. than most folks you know. I'm not ignorant of any of the evils that have been done in this nation in the name of the gub'mint. If you're going to tell me that any of it compares in magnitude or in the actual degree of evil to what happened to the Jews, Catholics, communists, homosexuals, or other involved groups during the Holocaust or pre-war Germany, then I'll call you an ignorant misinformed knucklehead at best and a misanthropic liar at worst. Like I said before, sometimes things suck - and things get FUBAR when us imperfect humans are involved. Call those things wrong if you want, and I'll stand by you and say it with you. Call this a police state when you can look all over the world and see what true abrogation of individual rights are, and I can't.

I don't "consider" it otherwise, it is otherwise. We are not genetically wired for it. It is a social construct, just like suppressing the desire to kill or injure your rivals as a male (something we are naturally wired for).

That is one man's opinion, not evidence. It is not otherwise, no matter how many people feel like they need justification to live otherwise. Don't want to be monogamous? That's fine with me, and you don't need to create some pop-psychobabble to justify yourself. Just leave my wife alone. You'd be correct in asserting that many of the forms created to deal with marriage, monogamous, or closed-loop polygamous situations are social constructs; but to say that the behavior is goes against common sense. Why would a civilization evolve such constructs if they didn't speak to the way the constituency lived? Again, suppressing the desire to kill your rivals both has precedence among the "lower" animals, and is an innate part of civilization; how long do you think the first farming conclave comprising a few clans of former hunter-gatherers would have coalesced into a culture if the people were predisposed to killing each other?

That is not a problem with the burger, it's a problem with people and their lack of willpower. The bacon cheeseburger, as a concept, is flawless.

Wrong. If the burger were flawless, there would be no innate property that would make it unhealthy to eat three a meal, three times a day. If you have the willpower to avoid that, then great - but there is still a lot of unhealthy shit in that burger (BTW, plug for Jersey - try a Trenton burger sometime [topped with pork roll and cheese] and you'll never go back to bacon cheeseburgers.)

See my above comment. The US government took my people's surviving children and washed their mouths out with lye soap when they spoke their own damn language. My point was the fact that the generation in question were paid a higher equivalent wage for their work, no matter how you twist the numbers. They also weren't required to own a computer and pay an internet bill just to keep employment or go to school.

Yeah, and that same U.S. government took in my family when everyone else - including the lauded Nazi fighters, the British - told them, "Krystallnacht? Herded into concentration camps? Oh well, we have nothing for you, so we're going to send you back, K?" BTW, they weren't paid a higher equivalent wage, and there was always each generation's internet - whether it was literacy, or radio, or TV. My grandfather lamented the days when it seemed like "nowadays," people needed automotive transport to get to work.

Hell if I would. Believe what you want; I'd use that capital to tear down this system and replace it with one that has a future.

I'd like to think that of everyone I know, including myself. Unfortunately I know too many people to believe it.

[Deepcrush]

My point is that the vast majority of (legitimate, non life-ending) choices we have are already defined and/or decided by someone else. We just get to choose what brand of corn flakes to buy.

Nonsense, if a choice at anytime was made for you and you don't like it. Then it remains your choice to do something about it. Free will cannot be taken, it can only be given or given up on.

[Lt. Staplic]

To be fair to the looney tune, Texas does have the right to secede; it was in the original charter when we joined the union. We were the only state that was an actual country first.

Texas doesn't have the right to secede. This is a bit of folklore, most of which I've seen attributed to Perry. Everything I've seen has pointed out that there was no provision for succession written into the Texas Constitution, nor the treaty of annexation. (http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/quest ... ted-states)

I also found a source, here, that has a Supreme Court Ruling that Texas is once and for all a member of the union and as such has no legal right to secede.

[Tsukiyumi]

Sounds like the issue isn't one of choice at all; sounds like you're pissed that someone else got there first. Let's say you went to build your house in the woods, and started hunting, fishing, farming, or whatever on the surrounding land. Now let's say I decide that I want to do the same thing, but your house is already there. Did you just abrogate my ability to choose how to live?

Yes, that is exactly the point I'm making. In the example, my choice has invalidated yours. Now your choice is limited to either leaving (which invalidate your choice altogether), or attacking me (in which case one or both of us would likely be killed - therefore invalidating the choice). A third option would be to try and negotiate, but the point made by the example is simple: other people's choices do invalidate or co-opt your own, and people with more power make larger choices that co-opt the choices of everyone else in vast quantities.

According to the real world, nope.

The "real world" is the grand canyon; the pacific ocean - the real world is the cosmos. The sum of human society is a fictional construct designed to concentrate power over other humans in the hands of a few. It is no more real than the power we give it by abrogating our right to self-determination.

I'm not ignorant of any of the evils that have been done in this nation in the name of the gub'mint. If you're going to tell me that any of it compares in magnitude or in the actual degree of evil to what happened to the Jews, Catholics, communists, homosexuals, or other involved groups during the Holocaust or pre-war Germany, then I'll call you an ignorant misinformed knucklehead at best and a misanthropic liar at worst. Like I said before, sometimes things suck - and things get FUBAR when us imperfect humans are involved. Call those things wrong if you want, and I'll stand by you and say it with you. Call this a police state when you can look all over the world and see what true abrogation of individual rights are, and I can't.

Just because we are "police state lite" doesn't change the facts; everything I listed there is happening right now, and all are the signature of a police state or one that will evolve into one in the near future.

That is one man's opinion, not evidence. It is not otherwise, no matter how many people feel like they need justification to live otherwise. Don't want to be monogamous? That's fine with me, and you don't need to create some pop-psychobabble to justify yourself. Just leave my wife alone. You'd be correct in asserting that many of the forms created to deal with marriage, monogamous, or closed-loop polygamous situations are social constructs; but to say that the behavior is goes against common sense.

Okay, apparently, we haven't identified such a gene yet: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/ ... onogamy-g/

Studies seem inconclusive. It works for voles, so it must be the same in humans? Not exactly compelling.

I'd argue that the behavior is based on simple possessiveness and jealousy. "Can't have my flint knife. I need that fer skinnin. Can't have the woman. I need that fer makin babies."

Why would a civilization evolve such constructs if they didn't speak to the way the constituency lived? Again, suppressing the desire to kill your rivals both has precedence among the "lower" animals, and is an innate part of civilization; how long do you think the first farming conclave comprising a few clans of former hunter-gatherers would have coalesced into a culture if the people were predisposed to killing each other?

We haven't done a great job of suppressing that one, but I was arguing that the choice to control that impulse was a choice that lead to a society just like monogamy was a choice that helped build a society. Less wars, I imagine.

Wrong. If the burger were flawless, there would be no innate property that would make it unhealthy to eat three a meal, three times a day. If you have the willpower to avoid that, then great - but there is still a lot of unhealthy shit in that burger (BTW, plug for Jersey - try a Trenton burger sometime [topped with pork roll and cheese] and you'll never go back to bacon cheeseburgers.)

Everything in moderation, nothing in excess. - Socrates.

Even drinking water will kill you in excess quantities.

BTW, they weren't paid a higher equivalent wage

Adjusting for inflation and cost of living, they were. By a considerable margin. http://finances.msn.com/saving-money-advice/6952105

I suppose if you live in the middle of nowhere, your rent would be a lot cheaper, and that link doesn't take things like the internet into account.

...there was always each generation's internet - whether it was literacy, or radio, or TV. My grandfather lamented the days when it seemed like "nowadays," people needed automotive transport to get to work.

Funny thing - you do. You can't get anywhere here without a car, unless you live right next to your job. It's part of what is expected now, and is therefore part of the cost of living. Just like internet access.

Hell if I would. Believe what you want; I'd use that capital to tear down this system and replace it with one that has a future.

I'd like to think that of everyone I know, including myself. Unfortunately I know too many people to believe it.

The only person you ever truly can know is yourself. I know myself better than I'd like.

My point is that the vast majority of (legitimate, non life-ending) choices we have are already defined and/or decided by someone else. We just get to choose what brand of corn flakes to buy.

Nonsense, if a choice at anytime was made for you and you don't like it. Then it remains your choice to do something about it. Free will cannot be taken, it can only be given or given up on.

In some circumstances, you can try to do something about it, and then be sent to prison or killed; in both scenarios, free will goes out the window in any appreciable sense. Either way, choice is nullified by other people's choices.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KagHQ34Ay4