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Okay, just to clarify things a little more, I'm going to post a table of what a person's income, tax liability, and post-tax incomes would be under a $10,000 grant and a 40% sales tax (by my calculations that would be about what you'd need to tax to have a balanced budget if you axed social security and medicare/medicaid).

I think the problem is that people confuse equality of opportunity with equality of outcome. For example, it is not sexist that more men are executed them women, because more men are guilty of committing crimes. Likewise it is not sexist that men become Putnam fellows (ungodly awesome mathematicians) because women have a greater variance in their mathematical ability then men do.

At 2/9/09 05:28 PM, Proteas wrote:

So... what incentive is there to work hard and make gobs of money if after $50k a year I start to loose that $10K bonus check?

You don't lose the $10,000 bonus check! It's just that after you earn $50,000, 20% of your income becomes equal to the $10,000 bonus check, so you start paying more in taxes than you get.

As I said earlier, there is a constant economic incentive to increase income.

If you like living in public housing and subsisting on government cheese, sure, because that's about what you'll be doing making that much annually.

Yeah, exactly. That's way its a safety net. No one wants to live on $10,000 a year, but you aren't going to starve to death.

Less than that, actually. If you're between the ages of 15 and 18, you get every dime of tax money back at the end of the year in your refund.

... and just how, pray tell, do you intend to get people to support this idea?

As I already said, Mike Huckabee who did quite well in the Republican nomination proposed a smaller variation of this idea. And there are loads of economists behind it (I think Milton Friedman first proposed it). And I'm pretty sure Der Low supports it.

And that incentive would be...?

If you make an additional $10,000, you get to keep $8,000 of your additional income. That holds at ANY income level.

At 2/9/09 01:39 PM, IllustriousPotentate wrote: I prefer the FairTax system. It's a 23% inclusive sales tax. Each month, you get a prebate check for the tax you would spend on purchases made up to the poverty level. Stores already collect sales taxes, and the effort to add this on would be offset by not having to deal with W-2s and other income records. Moreover, it will be harder to evade paying taxes, and income from black market (drugs, etc.) would be taxed when it is spent.

Yeah, so it's sort of a weak negative sales tax. If they maybe doubled or tripled the size of the prebate and raised the sales tax to more than 30%, and didn't give people allowances for having kids - then I'd be all behind the Fair Tax.

At 2/9/09 02:06 PM, thedo12 wrote:

what about online purchases?

Yeah, they get taxed too. Also you have to remember that the 23% is inclusive. So if you buy a $1.00 piece of candy, you pay 30 cents in taxes, but 30 cents is only 23% of the total amount that you spent. And the inclusive figure makes more sense than the non-inclusive figure because we use inclusive numbers for income tax. If you make $100,000 a year and pay a 50% income tax, no one would say that it's really a 100% income tax because you pay $50,000 in taxes and get to spend $50,000 on whatever you want.

At 2/9/09 12:19 PM, thedo12 wrote:

ok, well if thats the case then I dont have a problem with it, as long as you replace traditional welfare insated of having this along side it.

It seems like the only welfare that we have today is social security and medicare (correct me if I'm wrong about this), and they cost about half the amount that a $10,000 grant would cost. Which seems really strange to me, because I don't see anyone getting payments that approach $10,000 per year. How much do old people get anyway?

At 2/9/09 12:16 PM, BetaOrionis wrote: This idea actually looks very good, and I refuse to believe that our government will do something this smart. Is this legislation being seriously considered?

The FairTax initiative (supported by Mike Huckabee) gives everyone a grant, and then imposes a flat sales tax, but the grant is way smaller than $10,000. It would be like $2000 per person plus $1000 for each child. Unless your family is huge, it's a lot smaller than what would usually be proposed under a negative income tax.

Also we already have an earned income tax credit, but I'm pretty sure that that's a lot smaller than what is normally proposed as a negative income tax.

I think that a change to the welfare system this radical would be unwelcome by many. For instance, what would we do with the people whose medical conditions eat up more than 10K a year? I'm more or less in favor of killing them off, or making their families make-up the difference, but it just doesn't seem politically viable.

I know that one Republican strategist, Murray, proposed that you could give people $10,000, but require that at least $3,000 or so be spent on health insurance.

Or you could cut down the size of the grant and then create a universal healthcare program. That would make sense.

In the interest of making things more precise, I decided to actually calculate how high you'd have to set the flat tax to give each American adult a $10,000 annual cash grant.

There are 242 million American citizens over the age of 15 (close enough to adult for these rough calculations), and paying all of them $10,000 would cost 2.42 trillion USD. The US Federal government's annual tax revenue is about 2.5 trillion USD. So you'd need to collect 4.92 trillion USD to pay for the grant and maintain current spending. The gross national income is 9.78 trillion, so by my calculations, you'd need to set the tax rate at 50% to keep a balanced budget and a $10,000 grant. That seems awfully steep to me, because that way any person making over $20,000 (which isn't a lot) would start to pay net taxes.

I've heard some Republicans propose the negative income tax with the stipulation that medicaid, social security, and medicare get axed (after all, who needs that support if you already have $10,000). Optimistically, we could cut the federal budget in half, but you'd still need like a 38% flat tax to support the negative income tax plan. But that's still a lot.

At 2/9/09 10:53 AM, thedo12 wrote:

maybe its like that were you live, but were I live welfare bums are rampant, and gving everyone 10 k a year minimum would just put that number up.

Yeah. I don't doubt that. But the idea is that even if you make no money (i.e, you're a bum) and take a minimum wage job that pays like $10,000 a year, then you'd have a total income of $18,000 (pay $2,000 in taxes and get a $10,000 check). So you'd keep $8000 of your extra $10,000 of work.

In contrast, with traditional welfare, you might lose benefits as you make more money, and not actually have a strong incentive to work more. Make no mistake, the negative income tax is a form of welfare, so it has all of the potential negatives of welfare. But it tries to work out some of the kinks with traditional welfare by making it so that people don't actually lose benefits as they make more money.

I think a better idea would be to make it so people making less then 50,000 a year dont have to pay any taxes, that way they actually have incentive to work.

The problem with that is that people would try to make 49,999 a year so that they don't pay taxes. The idea behind a negative income tax is that there is a constant incentive to increase your income, but the tax is still progressive.

At 2/8/09 11:08 PM, thedo12 wrote:

you get 10,000 a year from the government if you dont work at all ?, shit id just get 3 roomates and a apartment and we could sit around playing xbox all day.

That's a decent point. I know a few experiments that were run showing that although some people worked fewer hours, very few people turned into total freeloaders.

$10,000 is enough money to survive, but I don't think that it's enough to really live life as most people would want to live it. You can't own a decent house and raise a family on $20,000 a year (unless you have insane credit, of course).

At 2/8/09 10:59 PM, Korriken wrote: under that plan, I think ill refuse to ever make over $49,999 a year so I'll get a check instead of having to pay taxes.

terrible plan.

I think I described it poorly. The amount that you pay is 20% of your income minus 10,000 dollars. Everyone gets the 10,000 dollars and pays 20% of their income, no matter how much they make. The thing is that once you make $50,000, 20% of your income catches up with the $10,000 dollars, and you start paying the government taxes instead of getting a check.

The Negative Income Tax is a plan that would create a flat tax, and then give every US adult citizen a large guaranteed income (or whatever you want to call it). So for example the tax rate might be set at 20%, with a guaranteed income of $10,000 per year. If you make less than $50,000 a year, then you get a check from the government every year. If you make over $50,000 a year, then you pay a net income tax.

So for example, if you make $100,000 a year, then you pay $10,000 in income taxes. If you make $200,000 a year, then you pay $30,000 in income taxes.

The real benefit of the negative income tax is that it keeps a constant incentive for people to work. For every $10,000 your income increases, you get to keep $8,000. This stands in stark contrast to traditional welfare programs where you might not see a linear increase in your net income as you make more money.

So, Newgrounders, what are your thoughts on this?

In effect you can pay people to vote by promising people tax cuts or whatever. Which is obviously a huge problem with democracy in principle.

At 2/6/09 01:00 PM, SeaBoundRhino wrote: Do you feel religion was necessary in the foundations of morals? If we were an atheist society since we were intelligent enough to contemplate such questions would are morals and ethics be effected? Or would we still think things like murder and rape are wrong?

Yeah, and I don't think that religion is really the result of high or low intelligence. I remember reading an interview with the Unabomber (the brilliant math professor who lived in the woods like a hunter gatherer) and he said that he developed his own religion independently.

So I don't think that primitive societies were religious because they weren't intelligent. I think that they were religious because it made sense given their lifestyle. To a farmer who's success is largely determined by weather patterns that are entirely outside of his control, a cyclical religion makes a lot of sense.

I think that, while religion mightn't be right nor wrong, it was necessary to create the basics of community and morality. I doubt we would be ripping each other apart, but the idea of a structured law system as complex as we have today would be fairly distant. We would have a general idea of what is right and wrong but the influence of religion is great enough to have quite a serious effect.

The major advances in legal systems weren't motivated by religion, even if they had religious aspects.

Or, if the world were to suddenly become atheist, with no exceptions, would are morality change? Or would we still have a clear idea of right or wrong similar to what we have now?

People would probably just make up a new religion. It's human nature.

I sort of think that global warming and environmentalism is a sort of new religion that's picking up ground. Sure, it uses some actual facts, the same way that a lot of the events in the Old Testament were real historical events. But there are also religious beliefs like the idea that the world is going to end, or that humanity is bad for the environment, or that we shouldn't build nuclear power plants even though that would fix global warming very quickly.

At 2/4/09 03:59 PM, Tomsan wrote:

The money argument is false because there already is a large division between people in world (just for the record). what do you mean by docile? eradicating criminal aggressive genes will not lead to docile people at least not in the way I define docile. You are highly extrapolating the possible effects of eugenics, but that is way to little reason not to do it.

If, every year for 50 years, you removed the genes that cause people to be in the top 2% of aggression, the average person would be quite docile by relative standards.

valid point, but is this a good enough reason NOT to do it? if there is the possibility can you denie people to make the decision if technology allows it. anyways this discussion is besides the point, the main reason to do it is saving lives. The difference in e.g. IQ would be large in the beginning or the transition phase, but eventually everyone would be genetically engineered. the whole argument is flawed in my opinion anyways since I am a hard determinist, so your 'destiny' will be set already.

I don't know if there is a hard upper limit on how intelligent you can make people through genetic engineering.

eventually eugenics, if allowed to develop, will lead to this yes, no harm in it though. more importantly we need it to let the human race prosper and not be submissive(?) to disease and hunger.

It is already within the facilities of wealthy nations like the United States to not be submissive to disease and hunger.

I dont follow the example. As far as I know we know to little to significantly change personality by GM. Sure we can make them less aggressive or musical, but that has nothing to do with independent thought.. nothing

Well, if you took away the genes that made people more aggressive or uncooperative, then you'd be taking away their ability to think independently.

Independent thought is more than just the ability to go through the motions of logic and reason, it is the ability to take information and form ones own conclusion. If a person is so loyal and docile that they cannot bear the thought of disagreeing with someone else, then they are not able to think independently, no matter how strong their reasoning skills are.

to counter your example. Lets say you come from a poor family with low intelligence. your family was never able to compete with middle class. now you have the chance to change your childs faith by giving him/her an advantage, or more precisely give them equal chances (because the rest will also be modified). Why wouldnt you do it? there is nothing immoral about it, its just the next 'evolutionary' step.

This sort of assumes that there is a ceiling on how intelligent you can make people using genetic engineering. If no such ceiling exists, then there is no reason to think that genetic engineering will make people equal.

sorry for the bad writing; I am tired

Don't feel bad. I'm writing this at midnight or something : p

At 2/4/09 11:15 PM, TimeLordX wrote: Anybody see Gattaca?

I think that Gattaca was an intellectually dishonest film, because while all of the characters went on and on about how good genes were at predicting life outcomes - it turns out that the genetically unaltered main character is really capable of doing better than everyone else!

If the genes were so bad at predicting future abilities that someone with bad genes could end up succeeding at a top scientific post, why did they use genes in the first place? It makes absolutely no sense.

At 2/4/09 03:41 PM, Drakim wrote:

So does really expensive education compared to public education these days. You are sounding like like a commie who wants to bring everybody equally down to the bottom, so we can all be equal and happy.

I have more reasons for opposing genetic engineering than "It makes people equal" (which it does). If all it did was make people less equal, then I'd probably argue that the positives of genetic engineering outweigh the negatives.

Don't worry that you'll have tons of genetically flaws such as inheritable diseases, because everybody does!

If we could use genetic engineering, but only to remove diseases, then I would undoubtedly support it. But my suspicion is that people will start using it remove small imperfections, and then to completely change people in fundamental ways. I'm afraid that there won't be any point where we'll stop.

That's pure speculation. Since human modification is not yet possible, you best not start to make claims about how expensive it's going to be.

Right, but my point is that even if it costs nothing (or effectively nothing), some people will not do it for obvious moral/ethical reasons.

There are already tons of things like this that you can do. I mean, it's pretty universally accepted that starting to read for your children at a young age helps them develop their intellect. Children who had poor parents who didn't have time for this can't in any way "fix this" when they have grown up. What's the difference?

I'd be surprised if reading to your kids at a young age actually affected their adult IQs. More likely, intelligent parents are more likely to care about their kids, and those kids inherit the genes for intelligence.

Then you must also ban selective marriage. Because if all the tall people start marrying each other and no short people, then the genetical differences in humanity is going to increase, until you have a "short race" and a "long race.". Marriage must be forced to be random!

The effects of selective breeding, at least on a short timescale, are much smaller than those of genetic engineering (otherwise, there would be no reason to do genetic engineering in the first place).

As the late psychologist Herrnstein pointed out, the heritability of intelligence is a measure of the relative equality of our society. Likewise, the amount that a person's own efforts plays in one's life outcomes is a measure of the relative genetic equality of our society.

Then people of high intelligence must not be allowed to marry. They will get a very intelligent child who will have an unfair edge over other children.

The heritability of intelligence is somewhere around 0.50 (which as I mentioned earlier, depends on how you pick your sample), which means that the genetic differences in human populations do not entirely determine one's lot in life. Genetic engineering would make the heritability of intelligence much, much larger.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inheritance _of_intelligence#Regression_towards_the_
mean

Also IQ regresses towards the mean of the population, so if intelligent people don't reproduce at a much faster rate than the rest of the population, we wouldn't have effects like those that we'd see from mass genetic engineering.

Not if the child's dream is to be a boxer. >:o

Seriously, how many of those parents will there be?

So you want to ban this thing, because that people might have a dangerous opinion in the future (according to your standard) about the usage of this technology? I'm sorry, but that reeks of elitist "I know better than mankind combined" thinking. Is it not up to a society to decide what should be allowed in that society? Do you think they in the future will accept things like "we can't allow this technology, because people 400 years ago decided it would be immoral"?

The problem is that people won't have a real choice about whether or not they want to accept genetic engineering once it becomes widespread. In a world where everyone is selected for docility and intelligence, having a normal (in our reference frame) kid would be widely frowned upon, and could very possibly be illegal.

As a society, we have to make a collective choice about whether or not we want to open up Pandora's box, because once we do, it will affect everyone and there will be no going back.

What's going to happen when other countries allow such things anyway? According to your theory, then it will be neglect to not move out of country to help your children reach their fullest potential.

That's a real problem with banning genetic engineering. Indeed, banning genetic engineering in the US might actually make it stronger by ensuring the dominance of countries with fewer ethical scruples.

The only way around this problem that I can think of would be an international, popular movement against genetic engineering. There are already a number of movements against genetic engineering, namely the Catholic Church.

I'm sorry, but banning things in such a manner, especially for possible problems, is not going to work. I mean, you can't even ban drugs over there properly, :o

Well, yes. It would have to be a popular movement. But I am optimistic that that is possible. It has been known for quite a while that intelligence is heritable, and that eugenics on a national scale could work. But it is not done in modern countries, not because it cannot be done, but because the general populace feels that the moral problems with state eugenics outweigh any possible benefits.

At 2/4/09 03:18 PM, poxpower wrote:

So I just want to say: let's stop with this shit already. The reason these men seemed to brilliant is because everything around them was SHIT and history has exaggerated their feats and reputation. I bet you everything I own that there's 50 people alive today who are smarter and more talented than Einstein and you'll NEVER hear about them.

I don't disagree with this entirely. There are probably a good number of people who are smart as Newton around today, but who don't get the attention because most of the ground breaking discoveries have already been made.

But you have to admit that discovering something like calculus is a LOT harder when you don't have Matlab or graphing calculators. Or really strong education for that matter.

At 2/4/09 01:22 PM, Drakim wrote:

Doesn't this apply for vaccines today? You weakling, you aren't even immune to various illnesses like me!

No, genetic engineering increases the gap between those who are modified the most and those who are modified the least. And it won't just be because some people can afford modifications and some can't. It will also be because some people will simply not want to go to the fullest lengths to make their children as docile and intelligent as they can. Those sorts of ethical alms will help to contribute to a disparity.

Wat.

Because the genetic differences between modern humans are fairly small, a lot of life outcomes have significant environmental factors (consider that the correlation between IQ and grades is something like 0.50). But if you increase the size of the genetic differences than the ability of one to control their future outcomes through their own efforts or actions decreases.

As the late psychologist Herrnstein pointed out, the heritability of intelligence is a measure of the relative equality of our society. Likewise, the amount that a person's own efforts plays in one's life outcomes is a measure of the relative genetic equality of our society.

Why do you only think about genetic modification as in terms of individuals? It's like you only see it as a tool for personal gain or something. What about things like saving the human race from a plague? D:

No, quite the opposite. I think that people will select for intelligence and non-violence, traits which allow a person to best function as a part of a modern society.

And what about gene modification for non-humans. Making food production cheaper and easier, for example? Wouldn't that be good for the human race at large, including individuals?

I'm not really opposed to this. We already treat animals like garbage. My only fear is that using genetic engineering on animals will provide an impetus for using it on humans.

Come on, less capable of independent thought? This is starting to sound like bullshit. Give any sort of justification to these claims!

Think about it this way. If you decided that you wanted to not send your kids to school, and teach them that the Earth is flat, etc. you'd be considered a pretty poor parent, right? In fact, your actions would actually be illegal in the state of California.

Now, let's say that in the future, where genetic engineering is very common, you decide that you don't want to select kids who are more docile and intelligent then you'd get naturally. Surely then, people would see you as a bad parent? In the long run it might even be considered neglect.

At 2/4/09 01:14 PM, Drakim wrote:

But by that definition, we'd have to define a small machine who's job is to survive (let's say we have a balance robot that walks on a line), as having free will.

A small machine who's job it is to survive? You mean like a human?

Humans are just very complex thinking machines.

And such a robot acts upon pure math. He gets data and processes it according to a pattern/system, and gets output. The same question will always get the same answer.

It's not like human thought isn't deterministic. Few would argue that a single neuron is not deterministic, but for some reason people think that a network of billions of neurons becomes non-deterministic.

To some extend, you would have to say that free will is nothing but the response an agent does to the environment he is in. But how can we call it "free" when the response is predetermined by what environment that is applied?
Interesting, but I don't know how relevant. Freedom in society feels like a diffrent topic.

I think that having freedom is different than not being predictable. If I could give you a certain set of inputs, and predict what you'd do, you wouldn't lose your freedom. And likewise, if I had no clue what you were going to do, you could still have free will.

Free will is the extent to which one acts in their own rational interest. There is no other satisfactory definition. A person who is not physically pressured to make a decision, but has electrodes planted in their brain forcing them to make one choice or another is NOT free. A person who is genetically engineered to not care for their own rational self interest is NOT free, even though they are making their own choices.

Interestingly enough, though, we have to accept that more freedom is not necessarily a good thing. If people were more free, much of the freedom would be used to exploit others and take away their freedom. In fact, I've thought that there might exist an "Iron Law of Freedom", in which freedom increases as population increases until some definite point where the trend reverses. I don't if such a curve exists, but it'll be something to explore if I have time.

At 2/4/09 10:34 AM, Der-Lowe wrote:

At 2/4/09 07:33 AM, AudioGmez wrote: When u think about it REALLY hard then u realise omg the war in iraq is the beginning soon evryones gna be doing this shit

Yeah, because the first war in the history of mankind was the Iraqi one.

Ironically enough the first organized war in the history of mankind probably occurred where modern Iraq is today.

Genetic modification is a bad idea for the following reasons:

1. It creates a disparity between those who have the most modification and those who have the least. Don't pretend that the differences would be trivial. A person with an IQ of 100 is not going to be able to compete with a person with an IQ of 130 in performing any complex job.

2. By increasing the genetic disparity in human populations, it reduces the ability of an individual to control their own destiny.

3. It gives humans the qualities that allow them to succeed in our society, and makes it more or less impossible for us to create any different sort of society. For example, today many humans enjoy nature because it is part of being human. But if we start changing what it means to be human to the ends that people lose the little inconveniences to society that make our lives enjoyable.

4. We WILL lose our freedom as individuals, because people will be genetically engineered so that they function better in society. People will become more docile, and less capable of independent thought, and anyone who makes a child without those properties will be seen as guilty of neglect.

At 2/4/09 12:40 AM, poxpower wrote: It's badass and only a retard would oppose it.

You can't be serious.

At 2/2/09 10:08 PM, rainmaker wrote: Before you lump all religions together like that, check out the Unitarian Universalist Church, where I will be attending once I'm in college.

I'd be a unitarian but the lady at our school kind of, um, creeps me out.

I'll probably go Catholic if I get the time.

At 2/2/09 10:04 PM, rainmaker wrote:

At 2/2/09 10:02 PM, Al6200 wrote: Oh yes, and as for the comment about electing actors, I have only one thing to say:

Reagen

I thought about that, but I didn't actually think he looked good enough at that age for it to matter.
Maybe a pornstar should run? Evan Stone's fiasco at the Super Bowl is nice publicity :)

The thing is that you'd need to have a male model as the running mate, so that the ticket is balanced and appeals across a broad spectrum. I could see it working...

At 2/2/09 08:50 PM, Christopherr wrote:

At 2/2/09 06:40 PM, Al6200 wrote:

I agree that economics is a good preparation. Bush Sr. was our last president who had an economics background, and by no small coincidence I consider him to be the best American president since Teddy Roosevelt.

I haven't seen someone say that in a long time, why?

I say that he was a great president because he realized that America had to make serious sacrifices to fix its economy (like higher taxes, less wealth) even though it doomed him as a politician. If you look at a graph of America's trade deficit, you'll see that it got smaller under Bush Sr.

No, don't get me wrong. I was asking you what use it was.

I do like the mindset it gives, but it is equally important that one have the right knowledge to apply the mindset to.

Fair enough. But some of the knowledge that you need is technical.

At 2/2/09 08:57 PM, aninjaman wrote: One of our best presidents was a hat salesman.
I say is there any real way to tell?

Heh, yeah. I don't know about that. I mean, if I become president you could say "The great president AML was a fry cook", even though I was only a fry cook part time for one year and I wouldn't consider it my primary education background.

Oh yes, and as for the comment about electing actors, I have only one thing to say:

Reagen

At 2/2/09 06:38 PM, Shini-gami1234 wrote:

USA: economical crisis.
China: one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
China the winner

thats my opinion

I think you're simplifying it a bit too much. The US has a long history of choosing lawyers and businessman as leaders, and overall we've been pretty successful.

I study at a international Business school in Holland and we have a lot of people from china in our school, also in my class and I doubt Chinese people will chose the speaker, their culture is different, they don't look at somebodies charisma or appearance. they judge on ones qualities and content. so i deff think an engineer would win over a good speaker

Indeed. At my school the Chinese students tend to dominate academically, but part of that is probably because only top Chinese students can go to American tech schools, but most of the American students are only above average.

At 2/2/09 06:40 PM, Christopherr wrote: Everyone should have good knowledge of the history of their country, regardless of profession. It's a key to making educated political decisions.

Agreed.

But if I had to pick between the two choices, I would choose history, law, and economics. In order to effectively lead a country, you need to know what previous leaders have done and how things worked out. You also need to know how a massive economy works and what your decisions will do to it.

I agree that economics is a good preparation. Bush Sr. was our last president who had an economics background, and by no small coincidence I consider him to be the best American president since Teddy Roosevelt.

Aside from that, what use is an engineering degree when you're making policy?

I'd argue that it makes you accustomed to looking at issues in a systematic and creative way. I mean, designing a new computer chip requires an appreciation for concepts like safety and redundancy, which probably explains why engineers are less likely than other majors to identify as liberal.

Nevermind the fact that some major policy issues require technical knowledge to understand in a mature way. You're not going to understand education if you don't know anything about statistics and you're not going to understand energy policy if you don't know what energy is. You could argue that they'll appoint people who do understand the issues in depth, but how are they supposed to make logical appointments if they themselves don't understand the issue?

At 2/2/09 11:28 AM, mayeram wrote:

Where did having the punishment fit the crime go in this country?

While I believe that white collar justice needs to be more severe, there is a problem with your assumption that their jail time should be proportional to the money they stole. Part of the crime that the homeless man committed was making people feel unsafe to walk on the streets. Safe streets, in general, are more important than completely honest financial institutions.

Think about it this way. Would you rather I stole $500 from your bank account electronically or walked up to you on the street and grabbed $500? They'd both be bad, yes, but surely the later would be less pleasant and more discomforting.

At 2/2/09 05:57 PM, Psycho-Medic wrote: You have a skill then you have your advisers fill in the stuff you don't have. Lawyers generally work on their speaking and persuasion skills more than engineers do, which is why I would assume that it's easier for them to be elected into office.

You're probably right. If China were a democracy, they'd probably elect more public speaking times and fewer introverted policy makers. But it's possible that China just has a different culture, and that they'd elect engineers if they had the choice. In general technical skills are more prestigious in China then they are in America.

In the US, most of our civilian leaders or lawyers (Clinton, Obama) or businessman (Bush), apart from the occasional celebrity (Reagen). But in China, all of their top leaders are engineers. Wen Jiabo studied mechanical engineering and geology. Hu Jintao studied hydraulic engineering. Jiang Zemin studied electrical engineering.

Is the American approach or the Chinese approach better? Is it more important for a leader to have a strong understanding of history and laws, or an understanding of how to design and build systems? Is there some middle ground between these two approaches desirable?

The Will Farrell movies looks unbelievably awful. Why did Matt Lauer ask if he was spending his own personal money on his research? Shouldn't it be obvious that most research funds come from the government, companies, or universities? Why did Will Ferrell respond by saying that it was funded by the tax payer? Wouldn't he want to make himself look better by saying that he got federal funds, or something of that sort?

The whole trailer was an exercise in foregoing logical writing and characterization in favor of cheap jokes.

What I find really ironic is that someone can declare themselves a communist and still get taken seriously in American academia (and to a less extent the public at large), while anyone who says that they're a Nazi is immediately discredited and pushed out of mainstream society. But in reality communism did far more damage to the world than Fascism. They are not even on the same order of magnitude.