America needs healthcare reform. We can provide it without increasing the deficit.
Failing to act will allow costs to pile up due to inefficiencies in the system. Failing to act will allow Americans to continue going bankrupt due to an inability to pay for reform. As the President has said, "The time for bickering is over."
I hope this speech will give healthcare reform the push it needs to get through the door.
It's not capitalism which is using up our resources, it's individuals. People want stuff. They trade stuff they have for stuff they want more. People build machines to extract oil from the ground in order to trade that oil for other stuff they want. This is the natural state of things.
Saying you want to do away with all that is like saying you want to do away with human greed. Sure that might sound nice, but there's no practical way to make that happen. I know you've suggested some kind of educational program or something like that to try and teach people not to be greedy, but I really don't think that would work. If there's an advantage to be gained by behaving selfishly, some people will always take it, even if they know it's immoral. If you disagree, I suggest you spend some more time chatting with the likes of Pyg or JoeCavalry.
So, if we can't get rid of selfishness, we do the next best thing -- we regulate it. Pigovian taxes, antitrust laws, environmental regulations, these are all ways of dealing with the fundamental problem of people pursuing their own short term interests at the expense of society's collective long term interests.
On a side note, I'm far from conviced that elimination of human greed would be a good thing. Greed is a powerful motivator, which capitalism harnesses in order to benefit society. You see, while free trade does promote inequality, it still leaves everyone better off than they would have been without it -- even those at the bottom. In the words of John F. Kennedy, "A rising tide lifts all boats."
I believe that treating the problem more objectively with the use of the scientific method is the best way to find a proper way of organizing scarce resources at the moment
You've just described the field of study known as Economics.
Have you ever talked with a Canadian or a Brit asking them their honest truth about the health care? I have and they hate it.
I think you're lying. Even if you aren't, you're wrong. See this Gallup poll.
Percent "very satisfied" with healthcare:
US: 6%, Britain: 7%, Canada: 16%
Percent "very dissatisfied" with healthcare:
US: 44%, Britain: 25%, Canada: 17%
Have you even taken a look at what taxes would be if Obama got what he wanted? Last estimate I saw was $37,000 for each American. That would be a Marxist economy taking over 70% of every paycheck that is made.
I'm sorry, but you have clearly pulled those numbers from the depths of your rectum. There's no way in hell Obama wants to tax $37,000 from each American. I assume you got that from some dumb YouTube video that didn't account for progressive taxation or something like that.
Obviously we can pay for universal health care, we'd just need to raise taxes or cut other spending to do it. It's just a question of priorities. Are we willing to take a little bit from everybody in order to keep poor people from going bankrupt if they get hit by a bus?
We can and will pay down our national debt. It's getting high but is far from unpayable. Republican strategists know this, but are choosing just to yell and scream apocalyptic nonsense in order to score political points. It's pretty disgusting really. We need to be having a constructive debate about how best to improve the lives of the American people, but all we're seeing is bullshit like this ad which says little more than, "We're all gonna die!!!"
I believe the ad is below (YouTube search does suck, just use Google, then you can click on the video to jump to the YouTube link).
I agree with their refusal to air it. It's just one blatant deception after another designed for the sole purpose of scaring the American people. Shit like this should be illegal.
Well maybe he doesn't have a concrete plan right now, but he's the freakin' head of the Fed. If anyone knows how to put together a program to do what he's talking about it's him. I guarantee you that we'll be seeing concrete plans before long.
I think you may have misunderstood the term "mixed economies"... A mixed economy is an economy that mixes socialism and capitalism. All the first world countries have mixed economies. I wasn't referring to an intermingling of economies.
Also I don't think we can completely eliminate scarcity with our current technology. I was just wondering if we could organize what we do have in a way that made everyone better off.
That said, I think I agree with you that a global government could help things substantially. Although I disagree that socialism is a better way of organizing resources.
Politicians encouraging sub-prime loans was only one of several causes of the housing bubble. And, in turn, the housing bubble was only one of several problems that caused the recession. Even if politicians didn't encourage companies to behave benevolently, the larger systemic problems still would've bitten us eventually. Again, I suggest you watch that interview with Bernanke.
I think government saving companies from themselves is a bad idea. Government should set the rules of the game, but it shouldn't be one of the players.
Not sure what you're saying. You want government to more aggressively regulate large corporations?
I think a better answer is just to create a system that will allow big companies to fail without destroying the economy. This is the solution proposed by Ben Bernanke.
Below is a clip, you can watch the whole interview here.
I think the way things are organized in most first world countries is fairly close to optimal given the state of things. That is, a regulated free-market for most things, and government run programs for those situations where the market doesn't work. I hear intelligent people complain about our current system from time to time, but I've never heard of any reasonable alternative.
Because we were running out of space, I've decided to stick my response to your latest argument up here.
the government was given by others the right to imprison us, kill us
The government is given those rights by the majority of the people. If enough people decided to do away with government, then we could do that.
You have been defending the idea that no, we are totally free
No I haven't. The two positions you offered in this debate create a false dichotomy. I don't think people are human livestock, but that doesn't mean I think we're totally free.
governments will arrange their laws in order to have better productivity, the same way as farmers managing their cattle
Cattle don't have human rights. Cattle don't get to vote.
Governments don’t want to die
A government is not a sentient creature, it doesn't make sense to say it "wants" something.
Sometimes, however, they have to compromise their nation’s well being for the economy, and they have been doing so, if they think that the end justifies the means and that benefits will come on the long run.
Right, but if the end truly justifies the means, then this is a good thing.
to pollute the air they breathe
Government does not pollute. That's corporations. Government prevents excessive pollution.
We are all slaves to capitalism
Slaves don't get human rights. Slaves can't vote.
My point of view is that the market and the economy ruthlessly rule us all.
Maybe, but the market and the economy emerge from the inescapable tension between selfishness and cooperation.
yes, I believe it’s totally possible for us to see the advantages in not being selfish
Sure we can see the advantages. But we'll never be able to eliminate selfishness. Certainly not while scarcity remains a problem.
Capitalism’s assumption that, for example, people need incentive to do something productive, ignore the success of initiatives such as Wikipedia and Couch surfing
Yes, this is a good point. People can be altruistic. A few things though:
1) How are these organizations funded? By voluntary donations. People donate resources they have obtained while working within the capitalistic framework. These organizations don't address the fundamental problem of allocating scarce resources.
2) Not everything can be done voluntarily. Who would do the unpleasant jobs if they didn't have to? Yes someday technology will eliminate those jobs, but that day is not yet here.
3) These are both examples of public goods. Couch surfing pulled in $779,538 in donations last year. The Wikimedia Foundation pulled in $7 million in that same year. Compare that to the National Science Foundation which had an operating budget of over $6 billion for the same year. We have here an excellent example of the free rider problem in action. Our power to do good vastly increases when we take a small amount of money from everybody through taxes.
The whole idea that people face tradeoffs, and therefore they must have something to offer, also needs to catch up with technology.
Even with technology we still face tradeoffs. Wikipedia's servers consume a share of the world's resources. Also, time is a finite resource. If you read Wikipedia for an hour, you have given up the possibility of using that hour for something else.
Personally, I believe it’s a matter of time until capitalism collapses.
Maybe. As scarcity is reduced there is less of a need for capitalism.
It’s just not sustainable, simple as that.
Government regulations can make it sustainable.
I think we have to start looking towards sustainable ways of producing goods for everyone, without destroying the planet and, why not, without human intervention so we can be free to do other things.
I agree. And regulated capitalism provides us with a platform atop which we can achieve this.
You say people like me annoy you for just complaining without providing an alternative.
Let me be clear. You don't annoy me at all. I have nothing but love and admiration for you and people like you. Manipulative videos which do nothing but turn people cynical toward their most promising source of salvation are what annoy me.
I know it doesn’t work, you know it doesn’t work
It obviously works quite well. The fact that you and I are able to have this conversation is a testament to that.
We have to start making people aware that we are living in an unsustainable and unfair world
I don't think this will be a big revelation for most people.
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Here are a few relevant links I would like you to take a look at:
I say economics is the study of how scarcity can be profitable, and of how to create artificial needs (artificial scarcity) on people
I think you do not understand Economics very well. Check out these ten basic principles, which have been established through many years of rigorous study. It's not about right and wrong, it's just about explaining the way things are.
It's true that in some cases corporations create artificial scarcity. In economics this is an example of market failure and the best way to fix it is through government intervention. Despite what the conspiracy-theorists like to claim, government is a friend of the people, not the enemy. It is through government that we can collectively work toward a better future. Take the U.S. National Science Foudation, for example, which carries out scientific research financed by taxpayers.
Can the market be sustainable in a global level?
With proper government regulation, yes.
one of the most evil ideas supported by the market is that of supply and demand
The laws of supply and demand follow logically given the fundamental assumption of economics: rational self-interested actors exchanging goods and services. Yes this is an over-simplification of humanity, but simplifying problems makes them easier to study. It's like solving physics problems without considering friction.
We can forget about regulating marriage, regulating what people consume, what they wear, where they can go
Ok, these all sound mostly reasonable to me. However, none of these are the critical functions of government that I listed in my initial argument.
Why can a bird go wherever it wants without answering to anyone, whereas me, just another animal born in this planet, have to play by rules made up by people who were here before me?
Well, technically you could. You could wander around, living like a hunter-gatherer if you chose to. I think we can agree though that the benefits of society provide us with a more attractive alternative.
I agree that we should try and make the world better. But regulated capitalism is the best way of organizing society. No, it's not perfect, but there's really no point in criticizing our current system without offering a viable alternative. Without exchanging resources in a free market, how are we going to divide them up?
Personally, I think that the idea of government we have today, centralized in other people's hands, does suck.
The modern idea of government does suck, but it sucks less than any of the historical social arrangements.
And I also think market sucks.
The market is good. It has historically proven itself to be the most effective way of organizing scare resources.
A system which requires competitiveness so people can have access to the basic necessities of life
There are no first world countries like this. Basic necessities are provided through various welfare programs.
I read your blog post about evolution and whatnot. I agree that we can and should restrain our primitive impulses. But we will never escape the fundamental truth that behaving selfishly can be very profitable.
I do think regulations could be much less than now,
Which ones would you get rid of?
Like it or not, people left to their own devices will very often make lowsy decisions. I favor the soft paternalistic approach to government advocated by these guys. Guidance without overreach.
Can food, for example, be a public good?
Food is far from a public good. In fact supplies are not keeping up with the growth in population.
Vertical farming looks cool and promising, but it's very pie-in-the-sky at the moment. From the Wikipedia article: "The detailed analytical work needed to establish the feasibility of vertical farming has not yet been done." "the energy needed for artificial lighting and other vertical farming operations might outweigh the benefit"
Economics is based on scarcity, on creating scarcity, on exclusion.
Economics is the study of how people deal with scarcity, not of creating it.
"Avarice and usury and precaution must be our gods for a little longer still. For only they can lead us out of the tunnel of economic necessity into daylight."
- Keynes
Monetary policy is about keeping the economy growing at a stable rate. A growing economy is good for everyone. The intent is not to erode workers' earning power, that's just an unfortunate side effect. We can mitigate that effect by redistributing some of the wealth through progressive taxation.
This video is promoting the central assumption of libertarianism: "Government sucks". If government sucks, what does that imply? We should have as little as possible. How do we provide the benefits of government when we have a minimal government? The market magically takes care of that. This is the libertarian position. This guy doesn't like to state his position flat out, because it's less seductive to his audience, preferring to focus instead on demagogic government bashing. Here is another video where we explicitly argues for libertarianism.
it's very easy for you to sit on your high horse and look down on people who, on your view, are too naive to understand the complexities involving a government...
What? That's not what I said at all. I said libertarianism is naive because it assumes people are angels and that we'll all be better off without regulation. I make no claims about anyone's ability to understand government.
Coming to a debate with the preconception that your opponent is naive...
I didn't have that preconception. That was my conclusion after watching the video and considering his argument.
I think we should ask these kinds of questions more often
We ask these questions all the freakin' time, at least here in the United States. Small government is a core demand of the Republican party.
I think all these questions are worth asking, don't you?
Of course.
To me, your previous argument sounded pretty similar to those used by religious people
What's your point? That my argument is based on blind faith? Not at all. The benefits of government I listed follow clearly and logically. It would take too much time to argue each point, so I'll just do one: Government provides public goods. This is necessary due to the free rider problem. This truth is widely accepted in economics.
I'm not saying I have answers, or maybe not even better alternatives...
This is why I get so annoyed. I constantly deal with guys who rant about the evils of government. Not because they want what's best for mankind, but because they are selfish bastards who want to take all they can for themselves and to hell with everyone else. They never have an alternative solution, they just want to tear down the one thing that stands between us and the solitary, poor, nasty, brutish state of nature.
I'm not saying you or Molyneux are like them, I'm just explaining my motivation for deriding the libertarian argument.
I'm just honestly looking for a solution.
A more direct Democracy based on internet communication platforms like the one we're using now is the best idea I've got.
I've seen this guy's stuff before, and it always annoys the hell out of me. Classic naive libertarianism. "If we just had minimal government the market would make everything sunshine and roses."
Democratic governments protect human rights, provide public goods, prevent monopolies, maintain national security, enforce laws, regulate the economy, protect the environment, etc. These things are very important for the well being of society. Government is supposed to compel people to do stuff they don't want to do, for the good of society. Yes, government has problems, but the alternatives are all much worse.
Government is the one thing that prevents us from becoming human livestock to the most powerful 1% of society.
I won't even get started on the tons of ridiculous distortions and bad logic in the video, cuz that would take all day.
we're there to get the Taliban and specifically Osama, that's all, then we need to get the f--k out.
The problem is that killing Taliban members won't accomplish much. The unstable political situation combined with radical Islam is the problem. Unless we can stabilize the region, new jihadist groups will rise up.
And as far as Iraq, who knows, I don't even know what we're still doing there
Eh? You do know we're in the process of pulling out, right? We've withdrawn troops from major cities. The remaining troops are there to train Iraqis and ensure things don't go back to how they were.
Yeah, but both will require extensive nation building which will cost tons of dollars and lives. The current strategy is to empower the sane people so they can resist the radicals on their own. Iraq is almost there. Afghanistan is just getting started.
I know of no evidence that shows Cheney was corrupt. See FactCheck for a debunking of common misconceptions.
There are a number of regulations to prevent lobbyists from having excessive influence. Also, not all lobbyists work for corporations, some are working for the public. Lobbyists are a necessary part of the political process because there is simply not enough time for lawmakers to chat with everyone who wants to talk to them.
The FDA is a joke, huh? Seizing animal feed, discovering bacteria in teethers, examining Xolair for links to heart attacks... these are all things they've done in just the last few days. That doesn't sound to me like a corrupt agency. You've just offered a couple of cherry-picked, unsourced examples and damned the whole organization.
they are run by corrupt politicians who are in the pockets of the corporations
I don't buy this. America is a Democracy. If there's proof of corruption a politician is going to have a very hard time staying in office. Just look at Nixon. Look at Blagojevich.
the people have no rights/control of corporations
Yes we do. We've got the EPA and the FDA among many other regulatory agencies. We've got legal authority demonstrated by the antitrust laws that broke up Microsoft.
Well I do agree that an international agency with the power to enforce peace would be the best thing. I actually created a debate along those lines. But that is way easier said than done. It seems almost impossible that all of the world's great nations would relinquish that much power. And it's a lot of power to give up. Whether this international agency enforces peace through military force or extreme economic isolation, it must have the power to devastate any country. Further it must have a widespread ability to monitor the activities of each nation to ensure that no one is developing WMDs in secret. And it must wield all this power without becoming totalitarian. A daunting task to say the least.
I just don't see nukes going away any time soon.
States, because they make the laws and have control of the military which can enforce those laws.
Corporations exist because the public wants them to exist. The public wants them because they are the most efficient way of turning raw materials into consumer goods.
That's an interesting argument, but I think you're greatly overestimating the power of corporations. In a democratic country, power ultimately lies with the people. The people create the state, and the state commands the military, which it can use to enforce the people's will over corporations. Sure large companies hold more sway than the average person -- they can manipulate people through advertising and manipulate corrupt officials through bribery. But they don't have more power than a big group of pissed off voters. It's overly cynical to say they are pulling the strings of government. Did industry elect Obama to push for global warming regulations?
Why is it that once scientists predict something based on past data, the same must occur in the future no matter what?...We don't know.
What are you talking about? Scientists aren't claiming to have magic crystal balls that see the future, they're just drawing conclusions from the available evidence. Obviously when deciding future actions we have to look at past data in order to make an educated guess as to the best course of action.
I honestly don't think human beings have caused as much effect as before our time, what with volcano eruptions, meteor strikes, and the countless amount of animals with flatulence issues. :) lol
And you're basing this view on what exactly? Are you not aware that the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere far exceeds that of any time in history? Do you not understand how the greenhouse effect works? Have you looked at any of the information andsoccer has provided here and in other debates?
Well, the executive position is the most important one at the company, and you only have one person filling that role. You get the most bang for your buck by making that spot ultra-competitive with really high pay. And like I said to andsoccer below, if you look at a company like McDonald's with a lot of minimum wage employees, the employees account for over 90% of labor costs while all of the executives combined take less than 10%. Paying executives less would not significantly impact their operating costs.
A hundred years from now people will say, "I'd be extremely upset if I could never press a button again, or feel the gentle rolling of a scroll-wheel under my finger..." just like people once said, "I'd be extremely upset if I could never hear the impassioned voice of a storyteller, or gather around with my friends to hear a new tale..."
Well you can't really say "the economy" or "the environment" because you need to look at issues on a case by case basis. For example, offshore drilling would probably provide more benefit to the economy than damage to the environment, so we should do it. On the other hand, global warming is a serious threat due to rising sea levels and because it could cause widespread crop failure. In this case we should take action to prevent it even at (short-term) cost to the economy. Failing to do so would cause much damage to the environment and be worse for the economy in the long run.
Ok, it's not that those jobs aren't valuable, it's that anybody can do them. They should be paid less because supply exceeds demand. By paying garbage men above market wages, we as a society have less money to spend on everything else. We are allocating our resources inefficiently, and are all worse off because of it.
Not really. Economic damage is bad, but it can't wipe people off the face of the Earth the way nukes can. Nuclear devastation is straightforward and easy for people to understand. Economic devastation is much less tangible and as such is less likely to deter people. How many post-apocalyptic movies start with nuclear war? How many start with economic collapse?
Yeah, the filtering systems could use some perfecting, but it's only a matter of time before we come up with some way of dealing with problems like the one you mentioned. The first solution that pops into my head: Allow the sorting order to be different for each user. Then, allow users to flag other users as "smart" so that their votes, arguments, and debates are weighted more heavily.
Also, the Kindle was designed to be readable outside in the sunlight.
I think all books, e or otherwise, are nearing obsolescence. I posted my thoughts a while ago in this debate.
Basically anything books can do can be done in much better ways through technology. When information is filtered through up/down voting or something like that you can get the wheat without having to slog through the chaff; this can make information exchange much faster. You can have an idea be commented on by many people very quickly by posting it on the internet; this leads to stronger ideas. You can process digital text through computer programs to quickly find a particular sentence or do other cool things. The list of advantages that digital content has over books goes on and on.
If we could somehow enforce a mutual disarmament, that would be great, but I don't see how we could. All it would take is one country building one in secret to ruin it. How could we know for sure no other country was working on one in some hidden underground bunker?
Also, some people do argue that nuclear weapons do more good than harm. This is because if two countries have nuclear weapons, they basically can't go to war without wiping each other out. This is an effective way of enforcing peace. Obviously it's risky, but the presence of nukes is the biggest reason we haven't had any wars between major countries since WWII.
McDonald's employs about 400,000 people in the United States. Let's assume the majority of them (300,000) are minimum wage.
Federal minimum wage is $6.55, giving a worker an annual income of $13,624.
$13,624 * 300,000 = about $408,720,000 paid to minimum wage employees.
The CEO, James Skinner, made about $14 million last year, counting bonuses and all of that.
So if my (conservative) calculations are correct, only 3% of U.S. labor expenses go to the CEO. Even if we include the other executives, over 90% of labor expenses would go to employees. Paying executives less would not significantly impact their operating expenses.
It's simple: if a company has to pay its employees more, than they have to raise their prices in order to maintain profitability. This is why minimum wage is bad for the economy.
So you may be making more money, but that money is worth less because minimum wage has led to increasing prices.
There are numerous examples of fairness in the real world. Just the other day I was out with some friends and one of them dropped his wallet without realizing it. Some stranger came running up and returned it to him. If people never behaved honorably there would be no civilization.
No, companies wouldn't pay third world wages. The reason third worlders don't get paid more is because they have very few educational opportunities. Thus there is a very large supply of unskilled labor which leads to a proportionally low demand by companies. We in developed countries don't have that problem because we have the option to do skilled labor, thereby shrinking the supply of unskilled labor.
People should get paid according to the amount a value they have added. Low skill jobs don't add much value and should be paid as such. Minimum wage is basically just a twisted form of welfare. If we want to address income inequality, we should do it through progressive taxation and straightforward welfare programs, not by distorting the labor market.
Look, here's an example: Say I can print a bunch of newspapers for $5 in total costs. If I can get somebody to deliver them to people's houses, I can get $10 in revenue. It will take 1 hour to deliver them. I can't make a profit unless I pay somebody less than $5 to deliver them. So with current minimum wage laws, I can't make a profit selling my newspapers, and that delivery job won't get created.
Minimum wage laws don't make sense in the new globalized era. If companies can't find cheap labor here at home, they'll find it overseas. By getting rid of minimum wage laws we could allow companies to hire more people thus reducing unemployment and improving our economy.
Well thinking like that results in nasty collateral damage. It's not worth blowing up a building full of 100 civilians to kill 1 enemy combatant.
What do you mean nothing is fair? If people agree to behave in such a way so as to maximize the benefit for all, you have fairness.
From Wikipedia's Evolution FAQ:
Q: But isn't evolution unproven?
A: Proof has two meanings: in logic and mathematics, it refers to a proposition that has been shown to be 100% certain and logically necessary; in other uses, it simply refers to a proposition that is well-supported (much like the colloquial meaning of fact).
In the first sense, evolutionary theory is not proven. However, this is because nothing in the natural sciences can be proven in the first sense: empirical claims such as those in science cannot ever be absolutely certain, because they always depend on unproven assumptions about the world around us. To call evolution "unproven" in this sense is technically correct, but meaningless, because propositions like "the Earth revolves around the Sun" and even "the Earth exists" are equally unproven. Proof is only possible for a priori propositions like "1 + 1 = 2" or "all bachelors are unmarried men", which do not depend on any experience or evidence.
In the second sense, on the other hand, evolutionary theory is indeed "proven". This is because evolution is extremely well-supported by the evidence, has made testable confirmed predictions, etc. For more information, see Evidence of evolution.
Q: How could life arise by chance?
A: If by "arise", one means "develop from non-organic matter through abiogenesis", then this is a question that is not answered by evolutionary theory. Evolution only deals with the development of pre-existing life, not with how that life first came to be. The fact that life evolves is not dependent upon the origin of life anymore than the fact that objects gravitate towards other objects is dependent upon the Big Bang.
On the other hand, if by "arise" one means "evolve into the organisms alive today", then the simple answer is: it didn't. Evolution does not occur "by chance". Rather, evolution occurs through natural selection, which is a non-random process. Although mutation is random, natural selection favors mutations that have specific properties - the selection is therefore not random. Natural selection occurs because organisms with favored characteristics survive and reproduce more than ones without favored characteristics, and if these characteristics are heritable they will mechanically increase in frequency over generations. Although some evolutionary phenomena, such as genetic drift, are indeed random, these processes do not produce adaptations in organisms.
If the substance of this objection is that evolution seems implausible, that it's hard to imagine how life could develop by natural processes, then this is an invalid argument from ignorance. Something does not need to be intuitive or easy to grasp in order to be true.
All of the examples you gave as benefits of college (knowledge of research, asking questions, and class discussions) could be obtained by simply having these experts communicate with students via a system like the one we are using here.
You would save a lot of money by not needing buildings in the real world. Everyone, rather than just a classroom full of people, would be able to benefit from a professor's insights.
I don't know if I agree with everything he did, but he did cut taxes a lot. Most economists would say that tax cuts are generally good for the economy because the free market allocates resources more efficiently than the government.
He didn't cut spending enough to compensate for the drop in revenues though.
Well in my argument I was talking about undergraduate colleges. But the same logic applies to professional schools. Do everything online that you can. Real world experience can be obtained through internship level programs. If they need a central building to cut up cadavers or whatever, then ok, keep that in the real world.
That's one way of interpreting the question. But I'm looking at it from the societal level rather than the individual: "Is college currently providing enough value to justify the massive resources we're pumping into it?" If you look at it that way, I think the answer is clearly no. The services it provides can be provided in better ways.
"Psychologists have spent decades studying the relation between wealth and happiness," writes Harvard University psychologist Daniel Gilbert in his best-selling "Stumbling on Happiness," "and they have generally concluded that wealth increases human happiness when it lifts people out of abject poverty and into the middle class but that it does little to increase happiness thereafter."
Ok, I think you're right: College, at this point in time, is worth the cost for most people.
Still, right now the average tuition for one semester at a public four year university is $6,585. Multiply that by 8 semesters and that's $52,680 for an undergraduate degree. On top of that, you forgo the money you could have earned working full-time over the course of those four years. Now that's a hell of a lot of money.
At some point (soon, I think) the cost is going to overtake the benefit, and people are going to be demanding some alternative means of extracting that value. There are already potentially better ways to get all the value that college provides. Web communication platforms like this one have the potential to do a better job of educating people than universities ever have. The hard part is convincing people to look for new ways of structuring society.
Most people aren't autodidactic in ability or discipline.
Maybe not. But then, why do people learn in college? Because they are incented to do so via the earning power a degree will bring. A certification process would have the same effect.
Sitting in a lecture hall with a hundred other students while a professor reads a Powerpoint presentation isn't any improvement over reading a well designed website.
interdisciplinary universities are more cost-effective...
I'm not sure what you're saying here, but it sounds like "universities are cost-effective because students pay tuition." Well that's not cost-effective, that's just offloading the cost onto the students. In my argument I was suggesting that we could have one social structure that exists for the purpose of transitioning adolescents into adulthood and another that facilitates public research, rather than one institution that does a mediocre job at both.
It signals that... [you] can add to whatever institution you enter.
Well that's a rather vague benefit, isn't it? If we want people to have a broad range of knowledge, than that can be incorporated into the aforementioned certification process.
I agree that we should take action, but I don't think "setting an example" is a very good argument. I would phrase it in more realist terms: Bringing down our carbon emissions will give us the high ground in compelling China and India to do the same. We could apply economic sanctions, for example. But we're not going to be in a good bargaining position while we're still the #1 carbon emitter in the world.
http://www.createdebate.com/debate/show/
It was a weak argument.
Btw, if you want to find an old argument you can just google "{a few words from the argument} {username}" and it will usually turn up. I found this one by googling "senate minority report republican propaganda jessald"
I'm gonna say no. This article makes a pretty good case, imo.
You can easily learn stuff without college, via books and the internet. Sure college provides some nice social opportunities, and universities conduct useful research, but if we want to do those things, we should create separate institutions that are far more cost effective.
The one reason to go to college is to signal competence to potential employers. I think we should replace degrees with some kind of certification process for various professional fields.
Developing countries like China and India have long said they will take action against global warming if the US does as well. Global warming is indisputably happening, and looks like it will cause big problems. The bill passed by the house is an important first step in addressing this problem. The people who opposed it are either selfish or foolish.
I don't think he's a moron -- quite the opposite actually -- but it's a simple fact that an atheist would almost definitely not be elected President of the United States. Thus, any politician will have an incentive to delude themselves and avoid thinking about the question too much. So I would say he's not a moron or a liar, he's simply choosing not to seriously question his faith.
No, the initial force could have been non-intelligent, like in my river example. You're just stretching the word "God" to mean "any possible initial force." In conventional usage, "God" means "Intelligent being who created the universe."
Well, first, soy is not a good example, because soy is a complete protein. Indeed you could replace the crop entirely with soy to yield a greater amount of protein. The only problem with soy is that it may have health complications, the research isn't clear.
Second, you're assuming the two crops would contain no amino acid overlap. This is most likely not the case. A more real world example would look something like this:
Crop A:
100% Amino Acid 1
30% Amino Acid 2
Crop B:
30% Amino Acid 1
100% Amino Acid 2
So you could end up with a greater than 50% protein yield by combining crops. You'd have to know the exact amino acid quantities of each possible crop to come up with an optimal combination.
Third, the crops would have additional health benefits aside from just the protein: high fiber, low fat, vitamins, etc.
Fourth... ok, I'll stop now.
/facepalm
No, it's not remotely that simple.
If you look at the full report there is a clusterfuck of pluses and minuses relating to the raising and consumption of meat. It's not at all clear what the best answer is.
Among the issues: ruminants like cows are less widely used than chickens because chickens are much more economically efficient.
Also, land used for feed could be used for crops better suited to humans. The protein yield would be higher and amino acids more diverse.
I'm still waiting for that citation about grass and cows, btw.
I would like to see a citation to verify that. How much grass does a cow require? How much free grass do we currently have? Are grass fed cows as economically viable as grain fed cows? Are they as nutritionally adequate?
Here's the most comprehensive report on the issue of livestock that I know of:
http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/
There is way more information in there than I'm capable of digesting in one sitting, probably even in ten sittings, but I did find this snippet:
"In fact, livestock consume 77 million tonnes of protein contained in feedstuff that could potentially be used for human nutrition, whereas only 58 million tonnes of proten are contained in food products that livestock supply. This is a result of the recent trend towards more concentrate-based diets for pigs and poultry, with nutritional requirements more similar to humans than ruminants."
You do realize that animals use up more resources than plants, right? Your first two paragraphs make an excellent argument against eating meat because "having a bunch of cows on a farm" is much less resource efficient than growing soy or what have you on that same farm. Cows don't live on air, you know.
As for getting milk from cows on a farm, I disagree with you that they would need to be "trapped in a box." Providing humane conditions may raise the price of milk a bit, but not prohibitively so. Also, because they aren't "cycled" nearly as quickly as animals which are bred to be used as meat, much less suffering occurs, and it is thus a big step up from killing them for meat.
Animals kill each other because they lack the mental capacity to do anything else. We as humans are capable of choosing not to cause pain.
Animals could never compete with us for resources. We've got guns. If a vegetarian had to make a choice between a human dying and an animal dying they would kill the animal. (Well, maybe some fringe lunatics wouldn't, but the vast majority would...)
Practically all of the meat that we eat comes from animals that we breed. Hunting is something done mainly for recreation and is outside the scope of vegetarianism.
1) Combining multiple plant foods gives you the full range of amino acids. You should be eating a variety of plant foods anyway.
2) Dairy products contain complete proteins.
3) Protein powder works too.
There are no negative consequences at all to excluding meat from your diet. In fact, studies have shown forgoing meat makes you less likely to die from a heart attack:
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/70/
"We... compare the death rates from common diseases of vegetarians with those of nonvegetarians with similar lifestyles... In conclusion, vegetarians had a 24% lower mortality from ischemic heart disease than nonvegetarians, but no associations of a vegetarian diet with other major causes of death were established."
http://www.eatright.
"It is the position of the American Dietetic Association and Dietitians of Canada that appropriately planned vegetarian diets are healthful, nutritionally adequate and provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases."
Yeah, I think this is definitely true.
There are still some problems though -- it's too easy to manipulate the system. If you could somehow ensure that one person could only have one account, that would be a big step forward. Maybe tying an account to a social security number would work...
I think it's only a matter of time until we get the kinks worked out. In fifty years we'll be passing legislation through some much improved, open source version of CreateDebate.
Actually they're not banning anything religious. They're just not allowing any new purely evangelical shows to be added. It's obviously the right thing to do. Tax dollars going toward the promotion of a religion violates the separation of church and state. I don't see why you would be supporting such a thing.
Your money is going to them because they are a public good and thus suffer from market failure due to the free-rider problem. In other words, supply isn't keeping up with demand because donations are insufficient.
On a side note, PBS is consistently rated the most unbiased news on U.S. television.
Also, when you divide the amount of government funding by the number of taxpayers, you're only paying one or two dollars a year.
The FCC is important for national security. For example, the government can take over the airwaves in the event of an emergency. Also, somebody has to coordinate frequency allocations so broadcasters aren't stepping on each other. Both of these create the possibility for government meddling in the media, yet both serve as good examples for why the benefits can outweigh the risks.
1. There's absolutely no reason why we can't put in some instant cut off clause if you're worried about that. You should think more productively, asking "How can we make it work?" rather than just saying, "It'll never work."
2. So you're acknowledging that for-profit news has problems, but at the same time saying they do good as a side effect. Looking at their regular news, they seem to be heavily biased toward "Threat! Danger! Fear!", but the same gos for all for-profit news. Fear = ratings. I will admit that some bits of real news do make it through though.
Still, there's no reason why public broadcasting can't operate alongside them. Where on Fox News (or all of cable news for that matter), can you find as in depth coverage as PBS' Frontline? You can't, because that's not where the easy money is. On PBS you get it for free, online, with no commercials.
1. What's your point? People can become apathetic to anything. People can become apathetic to corrupt for-profit news. The bottom line is if people decide the news agency is bogus, they can vote to cut funding.
2. Let's look at the top video on foxnews.com right now. It's got Bill O'Reilly and Barney Frank arguing about... some nonsense. Some sound bites about terrorist photos, some sound bites about gay marriage, and a bunch of he said, she said bla bla bla. There's no serious attempt to inform anybody about anything going on here. It's just verbal fighting, the modern day version of the Roman Colosseum. It's no wonder people watch it; people have always been attracted to that sort of thing.
By saying "MSNBC bashes conservatives" and "CNN has reporters give opinions" then you agree with me that there is a problem with the idea of news for profit. They're trying to cater to a specific audience in order to make money. They're sacrificing integrity for ratings.
Well, the bastard inside me wants to argue that factory farming is inextricably bound to the modern concept of meat, so it is impossible to discuss one without the other.
But instead, I'll take a more conciliatory approach and acknowledge that yes, I have nudged this debate along a slightly different trajectory than the one you originally intended. But the issue of factory farming is very closely related, and at the same time much more important. I'm taking a pragmatic approach to improving the lives of animals. "Are hardcore vegans right" wouldn't have made for a very interesting debate anyway, as you can tell by the fact that this debate had fallen off the charts before I kicked the hornet's nest with my initial argument.
I clearly stated my position in the first argument I posted to this debate, which you can currently read there in the top-left. It can be succinctly stated as, "Meat, as we currently obtain it, is morally unacceptable." I have never wavered in this position, and I don't understand why you think I have. I can only guess you're imposing invalid assumptions on my arguments.
No, I don't fully agree with believe, but our views have a lot of overlap. You could say we've formed a coalition for the better treatment of animals.
I could say the same sort of thing about you. There are many people on your side of the debate saying, "Who gives a shit? It doesn't matter what we do to animals, they're just animals. Nature should go unquestioned. Vegetarians are stupid and unhealthy." If you really want to improve the conditions in which animals are treated, why are you on the side of these people? Or does it frustrate you that I'm lumping you in with the extremists?
You'd have to grow fruits and vegetables one way or another, because man cannot live on meat alone.
Are you seriously comparing buying from a farmer to exploiting animals in factory farms? We humans have this concept known as an "economy", in which "money" is exchanged for "goods and services". Frankly, I'm surprised you've never heard of it.
I could see something like that working...
Pick 100 random people, with basic filtering (people must have graduated high school, no serious criminal record, etc.). Give them all the same campaign funds; disallow fund-raising of any kind. They campaign for a while and then we vote for one of them, possibly via a tournament style voting scheme.
...Actually that sounds like a pretty good idea.
Your argument doesn't make sense because the vast majority of the animals we kill are bred in factory farms. Understand? We're not talking nature here. We're creating them, subjecting them to a life of suffering, and then killing them. Can't you see that this is wrong?
"how do we know that there is no possible bias?"
Independent watchdogs. Voting to cancel funding. There is still potential for bias, but there is much less than in for-profit news.
"Greed takes away the want for ideological bias."
Buuuullshit. Greed creates an incentive to tell people what they want to hear, not what they need to hear. Soundbites and vitriol = high ratings = advertising $$$ = misled public = failure of Democracy.
The free press has worked pretty well, but only because they have resisted greed, not because of it. Fox is showing news agencies that ideological shilling is the way to profit.
You're an idiot.
Stop spewing bullshit. It's bad for America and it's bad for the world.
Well we can set it up in a way that recognizes the threats of government influence and works to minimize them.
The BBC is essentially an independent, non-profit corporation. There are only three connections to the government: 1) The appointment of the BBCs governors, 2) The law which directs a certain amount of tax revenue be sent to the company, and 3) The government can prohibit a program from being aired. They have no power to alter stories.
These powers are all ultimately checked by the voters. If they see that power is being abused they will become unhappy and will vote against the abuser.
And if you think this is not good enough, we could further limit government influence. Our version of the BBC could strip powers 1 and 3, so that the only connection to the government is the funding. I think we can agree this would keep government influence down to nearly zero.
I have been thinking about this, because it's clearly important. Obviously a totalatarian government is a horrible thing that we must constantly stand vigilant against.
But your argument is like saying we shouldn't use chainsaws because they make it easier to cut off your arm. Say we have a tree that needs to get cut down. As long as we use it like responsible adults, taking proper measures to ensure safety, there is no reason not to use a chainsaw.
The fact is that government is a powerful tool that can be used to greatly enhance the quality of life for all of us. Yes, it can be dangerous, but so long as we have checks and balances, and fair elections, we should use it to improve our lives.
Also, on a side note, the British have been running the BBC for almost a hundred years now without turning into a fascist dictatorship. People seem pretty pleased with it actually.
I ran across this article which explains the economic concept of public goods. The second half of the article is a very interesting case study focusing on the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).
My understanding is that everybody pays a small licensing fee through taxes and in return gets radio, television, and online news completely free of advertisements. Public funding also frees the company from having to turn a profit which in turn allows them to be more impartial.
This sounds like a very good idea to me. With American media becoming more and more about high ratings, often at the expense of journalistic integrity, I think this is going to become a more and more attractive option.
