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how are you all holding up for hurricane ian?

i know i am piss scared right now, i have mild Lilapsophobia (Fear of Tornadoes or Hurricanes) and just wanted to check in with you lot to see if your all, all right. Your friendly neighborhood anarchist, Wheelson 12:15, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Forgive me, I honestly don't mean to make light of your situtation. But, how is Lilapsophobia different. Everyone is afraid of tornados and hurricanes, and for valid reasons, they're fucking terrifiying. So, what's different in people with Lilapsophobia? Do they run away to somewhere safe? Cardinal Chang (talk) 12:31, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

people like me with Lilapsophobia, it causes us to feel more fear and panic than normal people do, this is due (and this is what my therapist told me) due to the trauma of the loss of life of those who are killed in the storm who are close to you (my cousin and friend for me personally) it can cause more severe fear then most will experience, and yes if people like me can help it we run like the fucking wind. if you have and more questions ask me on my talk page. Your friendly neighborhood anarchist, Wheelson 12:41, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

I had a brief read up on it, it sounds horrible. And now with this Ian fella throwing a tantrum with the atmosphere, it must be even more of a hell to experience. Hopefully you'll come out of this episode fine. Cardinal Chang (talk) 15:36, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

thanks friend, hope you have a good one Your friendly neighborhood anarchist, Wheelson 17:04, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

I had an old roommate who was very bothered by storms. They would always stay in the basement at the first first sign of a thunderstorm and no sump-pump was ever as inspected as the one in that house. I've never been bothered by them personally. As long as I'm not fearing for my phone's integrity I'm fine with high winds and rain. MirrorIrorriM (talk) 18:25, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Ian's impacts - a (rising) death toll of 84, and $47 billion in damage. That's impressive. Andrew5 (talk) 20:32, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

Damage total removed on Wikipedia for being speculative, deaths up to 108. Ten thousand are missing. Andrew5 (talk) 18:52, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Religious Education - Thoughts?

Any RW members with kids might be able to provide some pertinent input here but anyone can pipe up with suggestions (though I have pretty much already decided on my own Ace McWicked style of resolution nonetheless some may be able to temper my...err...peculiar idiosyncrasies). So the situation is after several years of travel, living and working in different cities and overseas travel I have returned back to the beach city I once lived in to be nearer my daughter as she approaches the tender age of 9. For the last 5 years my ex-wife has been seeing someone who has taken a hand in the raising of my child. I don't give a fuck about that - it was an amicable split after all, both of us deciding it wasn't working and get around a lot myself so no problems there. However in recent months, the more I spend my time with my daughter the more overtly religious she seems to becoming. Firstly my ex-wife wanted to send my daughter to an evangelical college which I visited to chat with the Head of Curriculum and then swiftly put my foot down and told my ex-wife there's no fucking way I am sending my little girl to a fucking evangelical high school (the HoC got all shifty when I started asking about science education and didn't answer my questions). Now she (my daughter) talks about getting christened, has asked me "Daddy, do you mind if I believe in God?" and most recently, just a few hours ago in fact, I left my office to go see her in a speech competition in which she referenced "God telling us to look after all the animals" which is not only from Genesis but also holds pretty close to Dominion theology. Now my ex-wife, like me, isn't religious (though I am much harder an atheist than her) so she is getting some influence from somewhere in my absence as a more hands on father - which I am becoming now. I think it is coming from the new boyfriend. Now, the Ace way of doing things is tell him to stop fucking evangelising to my daughter or I'll toss a Moray Eel in the shower cubicle with him when he least expects it. Yes I would have to catch the eel first and break into his house - but it's doable. Then I'll have to unwind the festering nonsense in my daughters head and I am extremely direct with my daughter but I don't want to cause a clash of ideologies in her head which will just confuse and possibly upset her.... so thoughts? I like my way but open to suggestion. Aceⁱ⁹ 23:55, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Of course, now that you've entered this into cyberspace, if he gets assaulted with a moray eel this conversation becomes admissible evidence for assault.

I think part of it has to do with the custody agreement you had at the time of divorce. It doesn't sound like you had joint custody, so I'm not sure how much right you have to say in how she's raised. On the other hand, I get the impression that the boyfriend is going to use the religion to try to cut you out of your daughter's life forever, in which case yeah, that's definitely a screwed up situation. I also don't know what's going on with child support or anything like that, but if he's insisting on taking on a fatherly role against your desire, you might be able to get your child support payments reduced. CorruptUser 00:08, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Under NZ Law I share a 50% guardianship and custody role which means no major decisions regarding school, health (like vaccinations for example) nor anything else pertinent can be decided without my input so no issues there. Also I would never reduce my child support as it is solely for my daughter and goes into a bank account in her name which I have access to. There is no alimony in NZ so all my money goes to my daughter. But I can't be there to decide what happens in the home so I only see two options - tell him to fucking stop or produce a clash of ideologies. Kids believe in god all the time as the don't have the knowledge necessary to make sense of the world in any other way - but if she is being taught about a specific god then we have problems. Aceⁱ⁹ 00:19, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

I gotta say, Ace Fucken McWicked having a kid go religious is evidence that if there is a deity, She has a sense of humour. RagingHippie (talk) 05:47, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

I believe that there are "deities", because if we can simulate a universe, the odds dictate that we are the ones in the simulation, and all simulations have a creator, and whoever created the simulation are effectively creator-gods as far as we are concerned. God exists, but all religions are wrong. Atheists and theists are equally miserable, hooray! CorruptUser 06:18, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

I don't think it's worth going to jail for that. As an Atheïst myself I can understand that it's frustrating to see a fundie trying to brainwash someone that is dear to you, but it's not worth going to jail for (Kenneth might have too much fun with that, for starters). Isn't there a law in New Zealand that you could use for suing this guy for brainwashing your daughter? Or maybe hire a private detective to find out what the fuck is going? Arcadium Trancefer (talk) 09:24, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Never mind the PI - I am on top of it now. Aceⁱ⁹ 19:28, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

While I understand that she is presumably getting this from the boyfriend (assuming that she hasn't picked it from the local culture/school which I assume to be largely secular) I don't see any problem with exposing here to the other side. You say that you are concerned this may cause a "clash of ideologies" in her head. Well, so be it. I would guess that she is able to cope with contradictions.

In fact, I would suggest you go even further. Thake her to a mosque, a synagogue, a scientology lecture (well, maybe not that), but my point is that the more you expose here to different religions the more she will understand that they are all equally batty. Bob^{"Life is short and (insert adjective)"} 09:54, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Well things got significantly weirder overnight. Without going into details I've made the discovery this is less about a religious conversion and more of a "fuck you and here's a middle finger while I'm at it" towards me personally rather than an attempt to turn my daughter to the dark side to matters of faith. Ho ho ho - if only people knew what they were dealing with. I fuck you, you don't fuck me. Aceⁱ⁹ 18:56, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

"I fuck you, you don't fuck me"

I feel like that's the worst version of the Barney song I've seen yet. CorruptUser 19:13, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

I can do worse... Aceⁱ⁹ 19:28, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Yeah but not unintentionally. CorruptUser 19:39, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

Don't forget that your daughter may be collateral damage in this battle. Bongolian (talk) 07:10, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

Forget about the boyfriend Ace and consider how much time you are prepared to spend with your daughter. The more she knows about you the better she can understand your POV. My children never asked my permission to believe in God, or gods. The thing most obvious about belief is that it eventually must be an individual choice. If my daughter asked me such a question I would say "believe in God if you must. Simply believing will not, in itself, be harmful. Only, do not punish those who do not believe as you do." UncleKrampus (talk) 21:32, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

If the boyfriend marries your ex-wife, he is going to spend a lot of time with your ex-wife and daughter. It's better to focus on being a good influence on your daughter through how you lead your life because actions speak louder than words. You can only spend so much time with your daughter given your situation. So make them count. The Coptic Guy (talk) 02:48, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Traditional Maori eel pots work a charm, especially combined with a stink bait. Don't make the mistake of leaving the pot in the stream overnight, else you'll need some guns to pull it back out, jam packed full with twenty eels. I eat well on camping trips :) Kauri0.o (talk) 20:58, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

They took 'er elections

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/ginni-thomas-meeting-house-committee-investigating-jan-6-riot-rcna49967

It's been almost 2 years. 2 YEARS!!

I am now 100% sure that conservatives are not only insane in the membrain, but a bunch of attention whores aswell. Fuck, is Trumpism contageous? Arcadium Trancefer (talk) 08:41, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

Be fair. Congress was looking into "Russian collusion" for the entire Trump presidency. It's a case of different diaper, same shit. CorruptUser 13:55, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

You know better than to engage in whataboutism, come on now. And didn't they find evidence that they did attempt to interfere with the election, they were just too incompetent to actually achieve anything? It had some standing, unlike accusations of election fraud from Trump supporters, which have absolutely no standing despite dozens of appeals and lawsuits. Comparing RussiaGate to MAGA supporters complaining about utterly non-existent election fraud is a false equivalence. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 16:15, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

There's A LOT of difference. Election denial is trying to instate the loser into power, the Russian investigation wasn't intended to do that. The most they could do is impeach Trump on it. Don't you dare give them legitimacy by comparing the two since currently, that "same shit" election denialism is leading to the real possibility of our elections being overturned since the Republicans can't fathom the idea they can lose elections. Ryan1257 (talk) 18:33, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

This is also why I've never gotten why both conservatives AND leftists think RussiaGate was a hoax or something. There was attempted Russian interference in the 2016 election, they just couldn't indict Trump on anything. It wasn't baseless and there was a legitimate federal investigation done to examine the issue. Compare this to election denialism today. Denying the legitimacy of the 2020 election is entirely baseless. There have been countless reviews and recounts, along with lawsuits that have all come to the same conclusion. Equivocating these two as equally as wrong is dangerous. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 19:03, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

The thing is, it's well known and quite well documented that Russian online trolls didn't target *just* the right-wing / Trumpers, there was plenty of disinformation from Russian troll farms (and others) that targeted the online left wing and other types that believed everything they saw. So it's not exactly a plot by those Evil Imaginary Liberals to target conservatives, it was way more than that. I'm not sure exactly how successful they were per se at anything (other than successfully turning Facebook and Twitter into bigger steaming piles of shit than they already were), but Cory's comparison honestly is pretty stupid. One is Russia's attempt at ratfucking, the other is a ruse from a bunch of cry-baby authoritarian wannabes. Trump got in trouble with Congress regarding the Russia ratfucking mainly because he gave them the middle finger ("obstruction of justice") on investigations into it, and also notably dicked around with Ukraine aid trying to get dirt on Joe Biden. He didn't get in trouble for the Russian ratfucking per se.

It is honestly very strange to me why the commie lovers in the US today (and by that I mean the "Christian" nationalist / white supremacists who seem to worship Putin, people like Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes -- Ronald Reagan is probably rolling in his grave at this new "conservative" movement) actually admire Russia's government, which by any reasonable standard is severely dysfunctional (even before the war, but the war has made such painfully obvious) and was an economic mess even before the war. I mean, what do they see in it? I have no clue. Racism and sexism damages their brains, I guess, that's the only thing I can think of. 8.19.62.205 (talk) 15:31, 1 October 2022 (UTC)

You kidding? Reagan would be clapping at this shit. Reagan was a collaborator with foreign autocracies and dictatorships as long as they were conservative. Putin fits the bill. If Reagan was in Trump's position we'd be be on our hands and knees begging for someone else. Call it an exaggeration, but Reagan is one of the most evil, incompetent people in modern American history. If there's a problem in America present-day, you can trace it back to Reagan. Homelessness, the drug epidemic, impoverished black neighborhoods, homophobia in the military, HIV/AIDS, student debt, I could literally go on for hours. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 15:47, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

It was more of a "joke" considering how the USSR was the bête noire of United States politics during the 1980s (and before, but Reagan really escalated the military primarily to KO the Soviet Union). How times change, eh? Of course, the Republican party is currently a bit split right now on Ukraine / Russia (mostly in favor of military aid, but the rabble rousers -- we know who they are -- seem to cheer the Putin Russia). "You never know", but my guess is if Reagan was alive in the present-day, he would align with the neocon / defend-NATO side instead of the America First type crowd. Reagan was from my perspective more of a Barry Goldwater type, or a William F. Buckley type. You can say a lot about these folks on subjects ranging from racism to propping up autocrats (and the RW articles on both say a lot of not good stuff on these folks), but these folks oddly enough also tended to really hate the predecessors of modern Trumpism like the John Birch Society. (The irony is their politics, of course, actually was the crapola that enabled the "America First" type crud to bubble to the top in the present day, but that's a subject for another day...) 35.140.177.2 (talk) 17:24, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Yes, the Russians actually did interfere with US elections. Given that Trump was a well-known con-man, the notoriously liberal FBI thought he just might be a Manchurian candidate. Given the Justice Department was under Trump's thumb by then, was Congressional oversight unreasonable? Just crazy? UncleKrampus (talk) 21:51, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

In the eyes of a conservative any oversight on any Republican candidate is treasonous. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 15:42, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

brazil elections

of course the two worst possible candidates to lead the country would be the ones most likely to win! it doesn't matter who wins today (or at the end of the month, if there's a run-off); in the end, brazil loses. the country is poised to (figuratively and perhaps even literally) burn to the ground, regardless. i love my country (of heritage), but i hate the people who run it. maybe democracy will work better again in four years.

anyway, please excuse my rant above. just wanted to briefly come out of retirement to update you all on what's going on. G Man (talk) 20:32, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

I get Bolsonaro sucks, but I don’t know anything about Lula. Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano^{Make a Reservation} 23:28, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

@DuceMoosolini to be fair, there is a lot of false information circulating about him from the brazilian right. that said, lula's party (the worker's party, or PT) has been allegedly involved in various corruption scandals (e.g. mensalão and the notorious operation car wash; see the article on pt for more details). even though his own convictions were overturned, all those scandals still make him look bad even today. plus, lula has a history of supporting left-wing dictatorships in other areas of latin america (note: opinion piece. could not find better source. please feel free to fact-check.)

the point is, lula and his incompetent and corrupt worker's party are facing off a quasi-fascist. it doesn't help that lula is just about as polarizing as bolsonaro. brazil really needs better alternatives. we need moderate and more sensible leaders who don't profit off of dividing the country. even though i live in the states, what happens there still concerns me. G Man (talk) 03:12, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

if you want to know more, feel free to ask User:GeeJayK. he knows more about this than i do. G Man (talk) 03:16, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

If Bolsonaro wins, the Amazon will be totally razed — that's a corruption that far exceeds anything Lula did. There is currently an impunity from top to bottom with regard to converting forests to ranchland. At least with Lula, there's some chance it won't turn into farmland/wasteland. Bongolian (talk) 04:36, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

So, this is just America & France all over again (vote for the lesser evil)? Arcadium Trancefer (talk) 12:47, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

I would say the difference between Lula and Bolsonaro is distinct enough to go for Lula. Granted, I'm not Brazilian, I just try to keep up with international politics. From what I've seen, Bolsonaro is a brutal dictator that has violently suppressed civil rights for LGBT people, freedom of speech and expression, and so on over the past few years, along with keeping a consistent policy of "Fuck you" to the Amazon and the natives within it. He's just an asshole, and while Lula's track record is not perfect or even good, he's no Bolsonaro. This seems clear cut to me. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 17:10, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Lesser of two evils may be correct, but Bolsonaro definitely goes out of the way to be the bigger evil due to his flirting with ditching democracy, his destruction of the rainforest, his support of Russia, and his encouragement of hateful, right wing social values. Giving illiberal democracies one less strongman to ally is a net win in my opinion.Ryan1257 (talk) 22:53, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

"This seems clear cut to me."

no pun intended, right? G Man (talk) 23:35, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

I'll own it :P Ryan1257 (talk) 21:23, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

also @Ryan1257 i know i'm kinda latching onto one thing on your list, but i just want to illustrate the predicament the brazilian people face. lula is not that much tougher on russia, and many brazilian leftists even support russia and everything it does. if there's one thing you need to understand about latin american politics, it's that the left is often just as bad as (if not worse than) the right. polarizing populists are popular with both sides, after all. as such, many latin americans don't trust their governments, and many lat-am democracies are so flawed they're never more than one bad day away from a military coup. G Man (talk) 20:12, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

No doubt. I can't say how good Lula will be on other issues and I haven't read up on him as much as I have of Bolsonaro (since, again, I'm an American who doesn't follow Brazil politics), so I will concede to you that their is a lot of ignorance on my part. That said, I have seen the right-wing here rally behind him as a sort of modern-day, Trumpian Pinochet. This has me worried since I fear for what may happen if we get another MAGA president who is willing to support him if he's still in power. For example, if he decides to coup the government and set himself up as Brazilian Junta Part 2, the likes of The Democratic Party and other moderates would see such a move as a threat to Democracy's standing around the world and do what it takes to oppose and delegitimize such a power grab in a large regional power. The Magats on the other hand may not only celebrate, but aid the regime in getting itself established since they'd see such a figure as a great ally in their goal of supporting rightwing governments around the world (mainly by shielding them from things like sanctions). If Lula is in power, the magats would shelve such ideas since they don't have that kind of love for him. Lula may "support" Russia and other traditional left wing favorites, but at least he'll be held to higher standards and couldn't get away with the things a Trumpian wannabe dictator could by virtue of them not caring. Plus, the Rainforest would have a better shot at survival compared to a Bolsonaro presidency. Again though, I understand why both options suck, but in such a situation, you're not voting for a person, but a strategy for seeing the policies you want (or at least preventing ones you don't want).Ryan1257 (talk) 21:23, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

The worst thing about Lula isn't the fact that he's corrupt. It's not even the fact that he praises authoritarian regimes (even reactionary ones, like Iran, as long as they are anti-Western. The problem with Lula is the fact that he's incredibly incompetent. I'd still vote for him against Bolsonaro (I'll be in Canada during the runoff election), but trust me, he's appalling. Just check the economic crisis between 2014 and 2016 if you wanna know more. It's his fault. GeeJayK (talk) 13:39, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

technically, the recession happened under his successor's watch (which may have contributed to her controversial impeachment), but yeah, you're right; it is all his fault. this year's election reminds me a lot of a similarly polarizing one that took place in peru last summer (winter in s. america) in that an entire nation had to pick who was the lesser of two evils. it's a rather unfortunate predicament to be in, and it highlights the weaknesses of democracy in such countries. G Man (talk) 23:56, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

update

there will be a runoff in 4 weeks. stay tuned... G Man (talk) 02:11, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Oh great...this shit again? Andrew5 (talk) 01:12, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

do you think puerto rico will ever become a state?

i'm just wondering why it has not become one yet Your friendly neighborhood anarchist, Wheelson 13:06, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Puerto Rican statehood is seen a partisan democratic cause at the moment. Thus, it would take a sizable democratic majority in congress or a sea change in the GOP for it to happen.-Flandres (talk) 16:05, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

why is it not a state already though? considering it seems to have been an 'issue' for sometime AMassiveGay (talk) 17:24, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Racism is often seen as having something to do with that. (There is a quote I distantly remember from 1901 that literally talks about how "alien races are not compatible with Anglo-Saxon values.") A lot of logistical/economic/lingustic concerns about integration are often brought up.-Flandres (talk) 17:41, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Puerto Rico isn't a state for the same reason DC isn't a state. Puerto Rico being given statehood would be a blow to Republicans, as most Puerto Ricans aren't Republican. Additionally, keeping it out of statehood or any representation in America's political system means that Puerto Ricans LITERALLY pay taxation without representation, which is a Republican wet dream. It's free manpower for no cost to the federal government. There is no logical argument against Puerto Rican statehood. Puerto Rico would be the 31st most populous state, above Nevada and Iowa, and Puerto Ricans are federal citizens of the United States that contribute to the economy far more than they take out. Republicans don't want Puerto Rico to become a state because they understand that 3 million extra people to win over in the polls is a LOT. A lot of it is just racism too. I predict that we will see Puerto Rican statehood within the decade, considering how strong support for it is in the modern day. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 17:45, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

I suspect economics has something to do with it too. PR only has ~43% of the GDP per capita vs the 50-USA, and if it was a state it would be the poorest state by far; in this situation even the current poorest - Mississippi - would have an ajusted income level which was about ~40% higher than PR.

Therefore, unless explicitly stopped, PR would become a massive Federal money-sink regarding welfare/development funds. Now that might seem somewhat fair to you and me but it really doesn't to the politicians who will either have to have less goodies for their own states and/or higher spending overall. Who wants that? KarmaPolice (talk) 18:34, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

For it to become a state, we'd have to create another state to satisfy the GOP. The problem is, unless there's a lot of Republicans in The Pacific Islands (there aren't), we'd have to partition a new state out of an existing one, something the partitioned state would not agree to (unless California would like to get rid of the crazies in its state by making The State of Jefferson).Ryan1257 (talk) 22:14, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

'ever' is a long time, but it sure ain’t happening in the short term. Chef Moosolini’s Ristorante Italiano^{Make a Reservation} 22:25, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

@AMassiveGay There would also have to be a referendum in Puerto Rico itself after Congress gives the greenlight. I love my country but I admit that our legal system doesn't make sense a lot of the time. --Trans Zombie Queen (talk) 00:20, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Do you know what indirectly scares me? Ryan's comment. I'm sure it's inadvertent, but it shows how akin to a bowel obstruction American politics has gotten that a modern-day Missouri Compromise would have to be found to even consider the admission of PR. KarmaPolice (talk) 03:03, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

People automatically assume that Puerto Ricans would support the democrats in Congress and that is why the Republicans are not sympathetic to statehood for the island. This could lead to an inexorable deadlock by itself. But that is not the only political complication. The fact is, the Republican Party of Puerto Rico supports statehood, while the PR democratic party is pro commonwealth which creates a real brain teaser of a problem. Mainland republicans have to agree with the democrats and Island democrats have to agree with republicans. Nobody should hold their breath Ariel31459 (talk) 04:08, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I would also caution against assuming PR would support one party or the other. At the time AK and HI were added, the prevailing logic was HI would be Republican leaning and AK would be Democrat. Bigger thing is that PR doesn't want to be a state. They would certainly benefit financially, but they fear cultural infringement. Also America is still full of racists, so.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 16:50, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm curious. Can you name a major country that clearly has less racism than the US? CorruptUser 17:41, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

From what I can tell, the UK for starters. Our preferred discrimination is class. KarmaPolice (talk) 17:52, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

The US racism is explicitly colorism, but UK, France, Spain, Brazil, all countries with diverse populations, where racism isn't explicitly the societal divider.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 19:31, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Everything that sucks about being Black in the US can be said about being Pakistani in the UK. As for Black people in the UK, Black people are 4x as likely as the general population to go to prison, whereas it's something like only 2.5x in the US. CorruptUser 22:04, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

No, it's isn't. For (perhaps) a majority of the issues the Asian Muslim community faces is due to a) being Muslim, b) being historically very poor and c) a lot ending up in deprived areas of the country. Now, this don't mean their dusky skin and black hair don't generate racial hate (it clearly does), but the relative lack of racial hate towards British Indians (who look almost identical) casts doubt on that view. Why do the latter have less hate? - the answer is clearly classist in nature, as the Hindus/Sikhs originally hailed from the subcontinent's educated middle classes and have become one of the UK's 'model minorities'. Other stats point to the situation being different to the American one; such as the fact 'Black British' educational achievement appears to be at par or even edging ahead of whites when socio-economic rankings are taken into account.

One bit of key evidence (and not just anecdote) I'll cite is that of interracial relationships. Now, a decade ago the numbers of marriages which were 'mixed' in both the USA and UK was around 10%, however I feel this lowballs the British numbers because of our higher rates of cohabitation and the fact our non-white numbers are much lower (meaning that our racial exogamy is higher). In fact, for some groups (British Afro-Caribbean, for example) the rates of exogamy is approaching ~45% and rising; a situation which has led to some community leaders etc ruminating on fact said community may become functionally extinct by the 2060s (and trying to work out if this is a good, bad or one of those things). KarmaPolice (talk) 06:22, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

im pretty sure responses to decrying racism in one specific part of the world that involve 'other countries are racists too' with the ensuing 'you are more racist' 'no you are' does little to address racism in any location. its dumb on all kinds of levels. we do not compare like for like when we compare one country to another. games of oneupsmanship involving a single metric without context does not show who is the most racist and it certainly does not show who can rest on their laurels. its a game of denial and dismissal that justifies inaction on the grounds of some place is worse or everyone is racist. its game we should not be playing. as much as racism is repugnant wherever it can be found and common cause to be found amongst all who experience it, experiences are not uniform across all regions. the differing histories, cultures and traditions fundamentally effect how racism manifests in different countries. the differing legal and political systems, the differing racial groups, the differing levels of the visibility and recognition of problems and the challenges involved in combating racism all make it next to impossible and entirely pointless to say x is worse than y.

speaking of the uk and of the us as an example i most familiar with, i think there is a fundamental difference between a nation that exported slaves and one that imported them. there is a difference between a nation whose racial divide is the result of fairly recent mass immigration and one that was hard wired into it at birth. this makes the issues and challenges faced different. solutions will vary. it does not make one worse than the other, it just makes comparisons difficult. there are still similarities, like a refusal by too many to admit there is a problem in the first place, and some comparisons might have some useful purpose. but ultimately if your country is being accused of being racist, dont get defensive deal with the racists. if some other place is really more racist than than where you are, so what? still probably plenty racist enough. complaining about racism in uk adds nothing to the conversation about racism in the us, or vice versa and racism is still a problem that noone can really claim moral superiority. AMassiveGay (talk) 12:01, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

there is also something in the fact that my own country is failing hard in so many fundamental areas, its comforting and sometimes all that keeps me going is i can tell myself 'at least we arent as bad america'. plus the schadenfreude of seeing so exposed the lie of the usa being the beacon of democracy, equality, and liberty that was sold to world for so long and so aggressively that i think the us believed it themselves, is just too much to resist. petty i know, but i am what i am. AMassiveGay (talk) 12:29, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm honestly not sure how that "no other countries are racist too!" whataboutism really mattered to the conversation about Puerto Rico statehood to be honest.

Generally speaking, the barrier to Puerto Rico becoming a state (as I see it) is politics more than anything else. It's all about those feared Democrat Senators for those who call themselves Republicans.

(Of course, probably the big reason Puerto Rico is "assumed Democrat" at the moment is due to the Republican party embracing the racist "white grievance" vote.)

It is worth noting though that Puerto Rico has three major political parties and a handful of minor ones, none of which are "Democrat" or "Republican". So I'm not sure any assumed political fit is that solid.

This is yet another issue which the youth support strongly but the Boomers are meh on (relatively, there's overall support, but the support among Republicans is mixed). So we'll see what happens in a decade or two. 35.140.177.2 (talk) 13:02, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm unsure how you can make the claim that "Puerto Rico doesn't want to be a state" (Unless it's just PIDOOMA and you didn't spend 5 seconds googling). The referendum in Puerto Rico for statehood back in 2020 was 52% in support of statehood. It's a slim majority, but still a majority. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 16:08, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘there are a lot of factual inaccuracies and logical fallacies on this thread. first off, that "other countries are totally racist" whataboutism was completely irrelevant to this discussion. other countries are racist, too. so, what?

on the other hand, whoever said countries like the uk, france, spain, and brazil (especially the latter) aren't racist probably doesn't know much about those countries. sure, the racism in those countries doesn't quite compare with the level of racism in the us (e.g., there's no equivalent of jim crow in those countries listed, afaik), but that doesn't mean that racism isn't a problem in those countries. in fact, spain and portugal technically started the transatlantic slave trade. in addition, cuba (which was still then a spanish colony) and brazil were the last countries to abolish slavery, which didn't happen until the 1880s. i have a pretty hard time believing that racism disappeared from spanish- and portuguese-speaking countries overnight after nearly 400 years of slavery. (i mean, why do you think so many hispanic and latino americans, especially the white ones, are racist to begin with? you don't really believe the silly lie that "they can't be racist when they themselves are minorities", do you?) now granted, you might argue that their issue has more to do with colorism rather than racism, but that doesn't really make it any better.

so what was the point i was trying to make? logical fallacies are bad, but so are factual inaccuracies. that is all. G Man (talk) 22:47, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

however, just so we're clear, none of the above changes the fact that america (usa) is racist. i have my (rather strong) opinions on racism elsewhere, but they're irrelevant to the undeniabe reality of american (united statesian) racism. G Man (talk) 23:03, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Early Danish elections on the 1st of November

Frederiksen is doing this to avoid a "no-convidence" vote. @ApooftGnegiol, since you seem to know quite a bit about Danish politics (based on what I read in the Swedish elections thread a few weeks ago. I could be wrong about this), did you see this coming? Arcadium Trancefer (talk) 15:16, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

That a new election was coming seemed clear, but I had no idea whether it would be such a decision or the no-confidence vote. That much I got from @ScepticWombat, who kept more close track of Danish politics (and maybe will have more to say later about how things shape up with the parties). But after thinking more about it, in hindsight it seems like this was the most likely option.

I think this choice is a bit less personally humiliating for Frederiksen than losing a no-confidence vote, and that the less dramatic option was also judged to be best for the party's new campaigning. The announcement also didn't come at the first opportunity, in her opening speech, but the day after, a small choice which may be meant to tone down how pressing it is for her and the party. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 18:27, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Yeah, Danish news has pretty much been wall-to-wall election kickoff all day, although it was obvious yesterday that an election would be called today. Calling the election means that both the Social Democrats and Social Liberals can save some face (the former jumping without being pushed, the latter avoiding to oust a government they have backed until very recently and a PM they’ll almost certainly back after the election). The reason it was so obvious yesterday was that the PM was asked what her plans for today were and she became very flustered and wouldn’t answer. However, the campaigning has been ongoing for weeks, if not months, already, so this is really just putting the formal seal on it.

Personally, I would have preferred the election to have been called when intensive campaigning began, because the Social Democrats have been using the civil service to do de facto campaign work (e.g. by having the Ministry of Finance make some very slanted calculations on a Conservative economic proposal). This is in contravention of normal rules and practice, which has the Danish civil service retreat during campaigning, but because the election had not formally been called, the civil service continued serving the government in a way it usually doesn’t.

The Soc.Dem.s seem to be running on “safe and steady”, presenting themselves as “the safe choice”, especially given they are faced with two competing (Agrarian Liberal + Conservative) potential PMs from the other side of the parliament. Sadly, prominently among the “safety/secure” issues that the Soc.Dem.s have decided on is GOP/Trump style “bash the big city elites”. It makes sense electorally, because the votes lost in the medium/large cities are most likely to end up with parties that support a Soc.Dem. PM (the more leftist parties + the Soc.Lib.s). However, this game plan has been upset by a new, right(wing) party, the Denmark Democrats, which is branding itself on exactly this issue.

The polling shows a very tight race that might be decided on such margins as how many votes are wasted on parties that fail the 2% electoral threshold (this seem likely or certain for the Alternative, Free Greens and Christian Democrats and possibly even the Danish People's Party in some polls), or the “North Atlantic mandates” (2 MPs elected on the Faroe Islands and 2 in Greenland). The deciding seats might also end up being those of the new Moderates (headed by a former Agrarian Liberal PM), which might lead to some very interesting horse trading after the election. ScepticWombat (talk) 21:32, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Chemistry Behind the Origin of Life

https://scitechdaily.com/the-fountain-of-life-scientists-uncover-the-chemistry-behind-the-origin-of-life/amp/ Is this article accurate? The users in the comments section think that this is sci fi hogwash. Leibniz Enter into the rabbit hole 18:06, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

The title is hyped up, but it is a cool result, and there is no reason to think there is anything wrong with the study itself. It's overhyped insofar as peptides are not sufficient to get life, and there is some thinking that RNA could have served an early catalytic role before the development of enzymes. I'm not familiar enough with that literature to give any real evaluation, though, and the finding still seems pretty significant. The only critical comment that looks like it could be substantial is the one claiming that the statistics wouldn't work out, but as they provide no actual analysis, and there is no obvious reason to think they are a field expert, and some of the other comments are talking about Buddha and miracles, I would take the comments with a grain of salt. 𝒮𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓃𝑒 ^talk 21:17, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

The whole enterprise of abiogenesis research is the materialists equivalent of the search of the Holy Grail. The Coptic Guy (talk) 22:54, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Wait so what's the materialist equivalent of medieval French fiction in this analogy? Evolutionary biology? Namako (talk) 23:36, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I retract my last statement. There's historical accounts of the cup that Jesus drank out of for the Last Supper. There's no historical evidence for abiogenesis. The Coptic Guy (talk) 00:03, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

well that depends on what counts as "historical evidence" arguably the sudden appearance of microorganisms in the fossil record is evidence in of itself without making supernatural appeals. There is considerable experimental evidence to consider and plausible mechanisms that don't violate chemistry that make abiogenesis possible. Panspermia is considered the much weaker hypothesis with far less in support of it, the only other hypothesis being creationism which is supernatural and kind of a non-starter as a scientific hypothesis. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 02:50, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

@Coptic Bruh, why? Why do you want to complicate this? Leibniz Enter into the rabbit hole 03:20, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Speaking as a person who has done computer programming professionally, extremely complex systems don't arise through blind forces. The well-known software developer Bill Gates said: "But the mystery and the beauty of the world is overwhelmingly amazing, and there's no scientific explanation of how it came about. To say that it was generated by random numbers, that does seem, you know, sort of an uncharitable view. I think it makes sense to believe in God...". As an aside, I am not a fan of Windows XP Professional or Windows 8.1 developed under Gates. Windows 10 is very nice and this operating system was developed after Gates left Microsoft. The Coptic Guy (talk) 05:24, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Translation: "Speaking as someone with completely irrelevant authority...". You don't really need anything that complex to start the first living organism, life is kind of a somewhat arbitrary classification. All you need for life to get started is a single simple cell that lives, dies and metabolizes. We already know the chemical processes to which all those things happen -- it's the entire basis of molecular biology and bio-chemistry. There is nothing on principle that makes it impossible for biology to arise from chemistry, it is something that in fact happening literally all the time in every biological system. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 06:11, 6 October 2022 (UTC).

Life is kind of a somewhat arbitrary classification? Speaking as a person who is alive, I don't want to be dead tomorrow. The Coptic Guy (talk) 06:17, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

That doesn't mean much besides that you are an organism that desires continuing sense-experience and cognition. That does not make the classification of life any easier to define. Single cells are alive but they don't possess the desire to stay alive as you do. It's not a relevant requirement to being alive, and given that the classifications for life are constantly shifting, debated, and fuzzy I would say yes...life is a pretty arbitrary classification. Your moral value does not arise by you simply being alive. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 06:22, 6 October 2022 (UTC).

On programming and software as an analogy, large-scale things generated in an "evolutionary" way will be significantly less efficient than what can be engineered, though they may work for practical purposes depending on the context. Complex life forms are in many ways suboptimal, when looking at features and bugs that have arisen through evolution. Evolution has come up with many nifty features earlier on which have then sometimes become broken (like most animals losing the ability to regrow limbs, and beginning to age destructively, just to mention two big ones), sometimes compensated for and sometimes not, features sometimes reinvented on top of what's broken and sometimes not, and layers of inefficiencies and far-from optimal DNA "code" making up everything more complex than microorganisms. It's pretty much the opposite of intelligent design, from my own software engineering perspective.

Evolution on a small scale, corresponding roughly to the adventures of microorganisms (in a simplified way), can easily be played with in hobby software experiments. Here's a discussion of such an hobby project that I remember reading about in the 00s. There also exists games where the players direct the mutation of competing strains of replicating self-modifying programs which "live" in a more controlled subsystem within a larger program, to see which side wins out.

The really tricky thing is not evolutionary mutation, but the scale of "processing" at which complexity grows. Nature has provided more than just one or two orders of magnitude of "stuff happening" in time, also in environmental "space", and also in parallel processing, than computer experiments have and can in the near future. It has provided opportunities for things to emerge that would take far too long for human experimenters to be able to see within a lifetime on currently realistic computers. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 14:01, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Francis Crick, co-discover of DNA wrote in 1982: “An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going.” As time progresses, the plausibility of abiogenesis is getting worse and not better. In 2011, the SETI project was is related to the abiogenesis hypothesis as it often posited abiogenesis happening on other planets, was hibernated due to budget cuts. The resurrection of Jesus Christ has more evidence to support it than abiogenesis and the Apostle John said about Jesus that "all things came into being through Him" (John 1:3). The Coptic Guy (talk) 15:58, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Quote mining experts is just appealing to authority. No the resurrection of Jesus doesn’t actually have much in terms of concrete evidence for it as many of the supposed testimonies directly contradict each other and are all referenced second hand. We have evidence to how amino acids could develop within the early climate conditions of this planet, how phosolipid membranes generate in the ocean, and potential avenues to where RNA could be naturally synthesized. You don’t need much else to synthesize simple single cell life forms. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 21:48, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Putin is dealing with a lot

Obviously anyone with eyes outside of the propaganda bubble of Russian can see this invasion is going very badly for Putin.Institute for the Study Of War has been a very helpful resource to process publicly available information that I can't read. The assessment they published October 4th was particularly instructive:

ISW has identified three main factions in the current Russian nationalist information space: Russian milbloggers and war correspondents, former Russian or proxy officers and veterans, and some of the Russian siloviki—people with meaningful power bases and forces of their own. Putin needs to retain the support of all three of these factions. Milbloggers present Putin’s vision to a pro-war audience in both Russia and the proxy republics. The veteran community is helping organize and support force generation campaigns. The siloviki are providing combat power on the battlefield.

Each of these groups are essentially in conflict with each other, but they are also the groups that know how well the invasion is actually going. None of them are blaming Putin directly, instead directing their ire towards the military. The siloviki are particularly interesting, as the group is made up of the Wagner Group and Chechen mercenaries. But they are wasting resources attempting to break through a tactically insignificant region. Can't imagine this sort of disfunction from any modern Western military conflict.-RipCityLiberal (talk) 19:28, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

The microeconomics of student loans

(Trying not to get too technical here since even most economists abhor microeconomics.) Making this topic as I think pretty much everyone here is misguided on this subject. So, I was reading @DuceMoosolini's essay on US presidents. According to him, one of the good things Biden did was delaying student loan repayments. One of the bad things, not forgiving student loan debt entirely. I believe this is utterly incorrect (no hard feelings, you're essay is still very good). Once you understand that subsidies are just reverse taxes, things make more sense. Student debt forgiveness is an extremely regressive policy. Basically you're transfering money from the poor (ie. those who are not in college) to to de middle class (that actually goes to college).

According to a working paper from Sylvain Catherin (Wharton) and Constantine Yannelis (Chicago):

We study the distributional consequences of student debt forgiveness in present value terms, accounting for differences in repayment behavior across the earnings distribution. Full or partial forgiveness is regressive because high earners took larger loans, but also because, for low earners, balances greatly overstate present values. Consequently, forgiveness would benefit the top decile as much as the bottom three deciles combined. Blacks and Hispanics would also benefit substantially less than balances suggest. Enrolling households who would benefit from income-driven repayment is the least expensive and most progressive policy we consider.

According to this article by the Brookings Institute:

Whether measured by income or wealth, student loan borrowers are better off than other Americans, and widespread loan forgiveness is regressive. Some argue that loan forgiveness isn’t regressive when measured by financial wealth. But that’s because such measures exclude the very asset the person borrowed to buy—an education that increases lifetime earnings. That’s like assessing a homeowner’s wealth by counting their mortgage balance but not the value of their home.

For many borrowers, the amount they are required to repay on their student loans is far below the amount they borrowed because of income-based repayment plans and existing forgiveness programs. We can and should make these programs work better.

Accounting correctly for both human capital and effect of subsidies in student lending plans, almost a third of all student debt is owed by the wealthiest 20 percent of households and only 8 percent by the bottom 20 percent. Across-the-board student loan forgiveness is regressive measured by income, family affluence, educational attainment—and also wealth.

There's also a problem with incentives. According to economist Alex Tabarrok:

Suppose a student will make 150k per year for 10 years working in the public sector. If they have 200k in debt they pay 15k every year to the government for 10 years and then 50k is “forgiven.” But now the law school comes to the student and says ‘heh, I have a deal which will make both of us better off. We are going to raise the price of law school to 400k but don’t worry not only won’t that cost you a penny more than the 15k a year you are already obligated to pay it will actually cost you much less because we will pay your payments of 15k per year!’ This indeed is a great deal for the student who pays nothing and it’s a great deal for the law school which gets 200k more revenue immediately in return for 150k of payments paid out over the following 10 years. Win-win! Except for the taxpayer of course.

I'd also like to mention the Heckman Curve. According to the Nobel Memorial Prize James Heckman, government spending on education in children is usually better than on higher education. The reason is simple: the whole society profits when you go to highschool. When you go to college, you profit, the taxpayers don't.

Sorry for the long, convoluted post, if you guys wanna talk about it or if my post simply didn't make sense, just ping me. I'm a bit busy these days, but I'll see if I can answer. GeeJayK (talk) 22:12, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

But highschoolers can't vote tho. MirrorIrorriM (talk) 22:49, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Sure, but that's public choice, not microeconomics, another economic field for another long, boring, convoluted walltext. GeeJayK (talk) 22:52, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Parents can vote on their children's behalf, right? LongStylus (talk) 23:17, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

The ultimate problem as I see it is a very United States style root cause: A) Go "yeehaw free market!" when it comes to the US government directly supporting higher education, generally being fairly stingy on direct support of universities compared to other countries, and B) nonetheless, opening up government pockets for support for paying for higher education, in the form of generous terms on loans and grants. The result: the "free market" "worked" as one would expect and lapped up that government-aid-enhanced money, which influenced how a college could price their product. The result? We're the country with one of the most expensive average tuitions out there. Add to that problem C: there really wasn't any sort of quality control on who qualified for option B, so there were plenty of Useless University scams (many who seemed to spend more on their advertising budget compared to their education quality) that doled out paper diplomas and pressured students to take out huge, sweet government-provided aid to do so.

So yes, economically student loan forgiveness is regressive economically and really more done "for the politics". But it's basically a "analgesic" (it won't help rising tuition costs, it's just a little pain relief) on a deeper set of issues with higher education costs in the US, one that ultimately requires a deeper look than the current US political system can provide at the moment. 35.140.177.2 (talk) 23:24, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

this student debt issue could be side stepped entirely by having no tuition fees as was once the case in the uk, till 1998. (scotland still has no fees for the under 25, while wales and ni have fees capped. england is supposed to be capped, but england likes to set an example for the other countries of the uk for the shafting of its citizens so the cap keeps rising). pretty sure many european countries dont have tuition fees either. you used to be able to get a grant too, to help with living costs and for beer money. labour has a commitment to abolishing fees, but dont hold your breath. uk universities absolutely love foreign students as they get to charge full whack making students pay through the nose.

'The reason is simple: the whole society profits when you go to highschool. When you go to college, you profit, the taxpayers don't.' i find this a curious statement as i have always been given an impression that high levels of education benefit society as a whole. is this an argument purely from a financial perspective that sees no societal benefit for a higher education? google turns up many studies showing it leads to a greater cohesiveness in society and greater civic engagement. a greater percentage of the university educated vote than those without for example. if nothing else, surely the increased earning potential that comes with a degree means more taxes from higher wages? and thats aside from education is seen by many as a civil right and everyone should be afforded the same educational opportunities regardless of economic background. years ago that might have meant only highschool. these days though? ever increasing fees and ever increasing debt that results - particularly with the us's example - means less people are in a position to make the the most of the opportunity of entering into higher education. students from disadvantaged backgrounds are significantly less likely to get graduate jobs, an upper 2:1 or even complete their course. access without success is the same as no access at all. and it seems numbers of people entering higher education has been dropping the past few years.

economics makes my head spin, so i no doubt am reading this all wrong. but if student debt forgiveness is regressive, and transfers money from the poor to the middle classes is all true, it surely just means that a system that burdens students with an ever increasing amount of debt is broken to begin with? why is the conversation about forgiving student debt and not about preventing debts from being incurred in the first place? once upon a time in the us, universities with no tuition fees was the norm. some amount of state funding or assistance should still be the norm AMassiveGay (talk) 02:08, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I think citing James Heckman as a reason for the government not to invest in higher education is dubious. The point of the Heckman curve, and his work in general, seems not to be that society shouldn’t invest in higher education, but that early intervention is better than later remediation. Unless he has made a case for a zero(!) or negative(!) ROI on higher education, citing him, at most, shows that investing in high school, school, child, infant and prenatal care is even more important than investing in higher education. Indeed, investing in higher education is necessary for ensuring the skilled workforce that can deliver on such prior education and care.

Lifetime incomes can be deceptive when measured as averages (or even means), because of the old saw that “no one lives in an average” and such figures can be skewed by the astronomical sums that the very highest earners receive. This is further complicated by the effects of class and wealth being difficult to distinguish from the “pure” educational effects (elite universities are networking centres as much as educational ones). Conversely, you are more likely to a far higher rate of other serious problems further reducing the figures for those who don’t have a college degree, because it lumps together a very large group, including some facing serious structural problems.

Finally, the argument for general forgiveness is mainly about simplicity and thus low transaction costs, while regressive features could fairly easily be countered by more progressive taxation soaking up money from the high earning graduates. However, I agree with the point that student loan forgiveness doesn’t fundamentally change the system and is thus not a solution to anything but some immediate problems. It would either have to become a recurrent thing (kind of biblical, as in the original jubilee, come to think of it) or just one part of changing higher (and vocational) education and work in the US. ScepticWombat (talk) 05:24, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Like Gay, I find the 'secondary education nation profits, university education you profit' argument a load of BS for the following reasons...

1; There's no clear-cut line between the two 'types' of education.

2; It doesn't factor in non-university further education (such as vocational training).

3; The study doesn't seem to factor in other reasons (ie class and inherited wealth etc) when calculating wealth generation by university grads over non-grads.

4; It seems to ignore the societal benefits of having university grads, like in teaching and medical staffs.

5; It seems to ignore the economic benefits re multiplier effect of having more (supposedly higher-earning) graduates in the economy.

Now, I would agree with Heckman in that the state gets 'more bang for buck' in primary/secondary education than further, but this is partly due to the a) law of diminishing returns and b) schooling is a 'free' way to give parents 30 hours of childcare a week. However, Heckman seems to then leap over a lot of assumptions to get to their conclusion. The truth is this; an economy cannot escape the 'middle income trap' without a decent % of graduates within the economy; for they are the ones who a) drive intensive growth, b) provide a decent domestic market and c) provide political stability within democratic regimes. However, further education alone doesn't drive this; they need to be a) the 'right' kinds of grads and b) have the abilities to make use of their skills-base afterwards. This is often the failure of the mid-income nation (such as Egypt) - they produced the graduates, but didn't put in the other material factors to allow the country to harness the human capital they've invested or apparently even directed the investment to fit the demands of the society.

Tabarrok commits perhaps the cardinal sin of economists; that in assuming the uber-rational 'economic person' exists in real life. Now, a person may think 'I'll take X degree and that leads to Y career and then rake in the money' but very few lay it out akin to writing a business proposal for investment. Which is the problem with the original assumption - if the state is not recouping a positive 'return' on it's investments in further education, it's quite possible that it's simply not very good at getting it's cut, not that there is no cut to get.

They also totally ignore the simple fact that in many situations, the organisation which is 'denying' the state it's cut on further education is... the state. Simply put, the state (in various guises) often employs many graduates below their 'production value', such as teachers and civil servants. In this case, it's a kind of accounting move; the state has lower wage bills, but at the cost of lower tax receipts and (more fuzzily) lower general economic activity. This 'leakage' becomes even more pronounced by the graduates who shall be chronically 'underpaid' (when the costs of education are factored in) by the private sector.

The above posters nail the problems simply; that the American further education system is utterly disfunctional as a model. Let's look at it in a nutshell; the university 'sells' degrees of usually unknown 'value' and has almost no blowback regarding later actual value (or lack of it). All the risk costs are carried by the consumer themselves or the state as the guarantor of the tutition debt. There is no economic penalties for the university selling massively overvalued products or in private banks lending to pay for them. It's the worst of both worlds.

And I kinda agree (*gasp*) with the suggestion of the right-libertarians like at FEE in running the chain of student debt through the nose-ring of universities. The day they realise if their promises of six-figure graduate careers don't pay out they will have to settle the debt... well, it would be revolutionary. (If you'd like to be truly evil, also shift the costs of the Federal Pell Grants onto the colleges too). KarmaPolice (talk) 07:52, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

All I know is that I was lucky not to have as much student loan debt as most people do, and like a sucker I was financially responsible and paid all mine off according to the terms I agreed to. I only have limited sympathy for people who claim to be drowning in student loan debt (like my three siblings, who make plenty enough to be able to afford their payments but love bitching about it); it's not like amortization tables are some super secret code, the numbers are there if you take a few minutes to punch them in. I certainly agree with KarmaPolice about putting colleges on the hook for their graduation failures, to be sure, that's a pretty common sense solution, and I'm also definitely good with lowering interest rates to something more in line with mortgages. Plus, fund community colleges with their lower tuitions; I went through both high school and my first two years of college at them, and though it didn't end up helping me all that much a lot of similarly situated people without The Big A would really get a good head start. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 01:55, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Yeah, but there's plenty of graduates where their degree didn't economically pay off re: work. I don't know much about the American employment situation, but here in the UK there's plenty where the pay doesn't cover their 'cost of production'. And this cannot be completely the blame of the graduates themselves; what with the huge pro-university propaganda peddled by schools and so on.

America could take a leaf out of the British (well, English) book here; what with our student loans. Issued by a state-owned company, (traditionally) the interest rate was inflation-only, repayment rates scaled for income and full debt forgiveness at age 65. Now, we can dick about regarding the T&Cs but ultimately it's functionally a graduate tax slanted to capture the economic premium gained. I would also look to put this system for other further education, such as vocational training. KarmaPolice (talk) 09:16, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I would like to thank kp for bringing up the propaganda point. Most of these debates circle back to "you shouldn't get what you can't pay for" which ignores how most kids are taught that going from high school to college as quick as you can is the only path to a decent life. Growing up as a..."zoomer" the cultural environment was something like "if you can't start college within two years of graduating high school you may as well just hang yourself because you are going to be an unemployable parasite for the rest of your life." I didn't bankrupt myself in the end but I can see why other people would.-Flandres (talk) 15:12, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I do wonder why worrying about student debt for going to college and university is almost exclusively an American issue? Hm... Jokes aside, this should not be a debate. Plenty of valuable diplomas and degrees cannot pay themselves back financially. You can get a master's degree or even a PhD in a specific field, and then simply not find employment because there's so much competition in said field. I'll say, personally, that the cultural environment and pressures to "GO TO COLLEGE OR END UP HOMELESS" are very real. And by the way, the viewpoint that "only the middle class go to college" is complete bullshit. Poor people go to college too, they just go to college with money they don't have, and they end up in debt. The people most supported by student debt forgiveness are not your caricature of the "middle class college student", they are poor, economically struggling people that got screwed over because the only way they could afford to go to college was by taking out a loan. Your tax dollars pay for the economic relief of people in similar financial situations to YOU. If these "middle class" college students aren't struggling financially, why did they take out a loan in the first place? Why are they struggling to pay back the loan they took out without government assistance? "Personal responsibility?". ---Ozzyboo (talk) 16:45, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ For the record, I never said that the government shouldn’t spend money on higher education. Of course it should. That doesn’t change the fact that it is, in fact, a regressive policy. When the government invest one buck on a child, it will receive 6 dollars back when this children is an adult. That’s about 13% a year, better than any other investment I’m aware of. Now, the average tuition loan is around 32 k.

Who’s going to pay for your tuition? The tax wedge in US is of 30k. The government spends around 10% of its budget in education. In other words, you’ll have to pay 960 k in your lifetime just to break even (though you’re supposed to pay only 480 k). And I’m mixing local and federal government budgets, the result would be a lot worse if the federal government assumes the entire debt. Again, who’s going to pay for all this money? Those that didn't go to college are paying for your education. Do you think this is fair? I honestly don't.

If you guys want study on the Heckman Equation, I suggest this one:

https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w16201/w16201.pdf GeeJayK (talk) 21:20, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Who's gonna pay for it? To answer that, I want you to think about why you pay taxes, and what you want your tax dollars spent on. Tax dollars are spent (ideally) on social services and programs that help society as a whole. Saying "those that didn't go to college will pay for it, so it's unfair" is as asinine an argument against the government paying for higher education as it is for healthcare. Would you be saying "those that didn't get healthcare will be paying for it, so it's unfair" as an actual argument? Of course not, because such a statement is idiotic and makes no sense. I won't get particularly pissy if I pay more in taxes so my society can have a more educated population as a whole. We're in this together. You do not want your taxes spent on making sure more of your society is educated and has the opportunity to go to college? For what reason, because you don't want to pay more in taxes to help someone else living in the same society as you do? ---Ozzyboo (talk) 21:39, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

So, do you believe that poor people should pay for your education? Don't you think it's better to invest in alternative policies that affects the poor, not otherwise?

Also, since Karma mentioned multipliers, this article argues: "Dynamic complementarity, self-productivity of human capital, and multiplier effects imply an equity-efficiency trade-off for late child investments but not for early investments."

And while I'd agree that the American further education has it's problems, I wouldn't call it "utterly disfunctional" at all. America has 10 out of the 12 best colleges in the world. Tuition-free Germany has 3 on the top 100. GeeJayK (talk) 21:47, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

@Ozzyboo Paying taxes is not the issue here. Where the money is going is. I believe in consequentialism. What is better, a healthcare policy that saves thousands of lifes, or a healthcare that saves only one. Because by forgiving college loans you are spending less money on other areas of education that yes, do matter more. GeeJayK (talk) 21:50, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

@GeeJayK Right, and I believe that spending money on education so more people have the option to go to college (resulting in a higher rate of education) is a good thing DESPITE the negatives. Unless you can make the argument that the consequential results of having less people go to college are better as a whole, you cannot make a consequential argument for your position. I, on the other hand, can. Having more of the population with a college education results in more contributions to the economy in the long term. Even disregarding the fact that having an educated population is undeniably a good thing. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 21:56, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

So, do you have any study to back your claims? Because I posted at least three (and I can post at least a three others). Again, of course the government should spend on higher education, as it does. The problem is how the money will be mostly spent. On a regressive policy where those who didn't go to college pay for those that go or on policies that actually help society? The whole point here is one specifif policy (forgiving or not loans). Almost 5% of the American population is classified as "functionally illiterate". Do you see the problem here? By forgiving loans, you're denying these people the right to learn how to read and write, as by picking one policy you're not picking another one. GeeJayK (talk) 22:03, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I actually agree with GeeJayK. The Wikipedia article "Literacy in the United States" says "the United States could increase its annual GDP by 10%, adding $2.2 trillion in annual income, by enabling greater literacy for the 54% of Americans reading below a sixth-grade level nationwide." We should invest more in basic education rather than post-secondary education. And if we invest a real lot of money, we can make bilingualism more common in our society and boost the GDP even further. Young children learn languages a lot easier than adults. "Multilingualism" says "Switzerland's GDP is augmented by 10% by multilingualism." LongStylus (talk) 01:07, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ That makes sense. Coming from someone that speaks English as a second language, I always found weird in my trips to English-speaking country how people could only speak one language there. GeeJayK (talk) 01:53, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Why does it have to be one or the other, why couldn't there be investment into both? It's not as if there isn't other areas in the federal budget you could cut into to increase the pool for investment at all levels of education. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 02:25, 8 October 2022 (UTC).

That's actually an important point. To answer your question, as I've said a before, I do believe that the government should spend on higher education. My problem is with the specific policy of student loan forgiveness since, as I said, it's a regressive policy that, on average, takes money from the poor and gives to the rich. GeeJayK (talk) 02:29, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

In that case why not restrict loan forgiveness only for low to moderate earners and raise taxes on the higher earners? It seems only a problem if we decide to just blanket forgive all student loans without consideration to economic background. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 03:18, 8 October 2022 (UTC).

I actually thought about this possibility too. While this would be a far better option, we still have some shortcomings, such as the problem regarding the incentives I've mentioned. GeeJayK (talk) 03:24, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

The irony with the 'get to university or you've fucked up for life' mantra is that it's pretty obsolete a few of our worklives. The old view was that you'd get 'an education', which would give you 'a career' which you'd work in until retirement. Outside of a few specialities (say, medicine) the majority of folks won't follow this (in fact, a lot of people 'then' didn't follow this). We are projected to have longer work-lives, unscheduled career changes, more frequent work-breaks (caring or illness) and lastly, technological obsolescence of our skill/knowledge bases – and this one is going to get worse as we adjust to a future (or even a present) where many of the workforce are older.

This new paradigm for this new world is that of continuous learning. This is revolutionary not just for further education, but education in general; schools must teach less feats of memory, more on the skills to think, reason and learn. And further education needs to shift too.

I was considering the ramifications of my 'student debt chain through university nose-rings' yesterday, and came to conclusion; doing this gives the university a vested interest in helping their students succeed in their careers – something which despite the guff given, any uni grad knows doesn't really happen. Even more interestingly, it means the university has a long-term relationship with their alumni (and more than simply trying to tap them for donations) – after all, basically the university has *partnered* with the individual for their whole working lives.

Gee, when I said American eduaction was 'completely disfunctional', I meant *as a market*. Educationally, it seems to perform well enough, though I have some doubts for rankings (one, American universities skim off a lot of first-rate international students and two, they perform a lot of R&D stuff which in say Germany is hived off into research institutes etc which don't get ranked). I also have doubts the rankings miss key points, like their general societal utility (I mean, does America need more lawyers?). Lastly, there's the question on whether for the majority of Americans, the current university model actually works – for example, when compared to distance learning, modular continuous education or vocational. I cannot comment about the USA on this, but here in the UK a lot of employers merely see a arts/humanities degree as a kind of 'intelligence test'; perhaps we could look into providing a cheaper alternative to show them?

One aspect about costing we need to remember is to divide the living costs from educational. While many university towns have inflated living costs, those students would have those costs even if not studying (as they are alive). We also need to remember that for different persons the options are different; for example, some students will not have a 'family home' they could live at near-free instead of being in student-land. So to reach a more accurate figure, we should subtract those costs before working out the real cost of their sheepskin.

Dumb; I think your suggestion works best as the 'English Student Loans' model – it avoids simply taxing higher earners who didn't go as the same as those who did. Here is a at a glance view of the 'English model' which I think could be rolled-out to the USA without too much bother (well, save the political). KarmaPolice (talk) 05:46, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Claims about Trans people without proof (This is a Matt Walsh video so it is to be expected)

https://youtu.be/wMAG3v5zAKA

A mix of transphobic drivel and racism in one fucked up video. I tormented myself with 6 minutes out of 11 minutes. The video is painfully bad. I could picture an RW article with side by side rebuttals to his claims. Want to kill brain cells? Watch this video.

I first heard of Matt Walsh when he was ripped apart by Professor Stick --Trans Zombie Queen (talk) 23:39, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Gives you a depressing measure of the "Anti-Trans" movement when one of its stalwarts (the highly educated bigot, Stella O’Malley) willingly appears on a David Icke 'documentary' https://transsafety.network/posts/anti-trans-activists-on-david-icke/ Cardinal Chang (talk) 13:18, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

So much crying over a children's book, complete with the most brain-dead takes. But what can you expect from such idiots, to be honest. @Rationalzombie94 You lasted more than I did then, I quit at 4:16, couldn't stand him for much longer. Rabbitseatcarrots (talk) 15:58, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I would think the Rationalwiki article on Matt Walsh is enough to say "nope" instantly. He is well known for taking the Rush Limbaugh style of outrage and pushing it further, checking all the mad-white-male-and-dumb boxes along the way. Misogyny? Racism? HUGE transphobia? Homophobia? "The Left" as some kind of omnipotent devil? Yep. The vaguely pedoish vibe of some of his stances (defending Josh Duggar, questionable comments on teen pregnancy, etc.) also is quite a fit for his "scene". He's also a pretty proud ignoramus maximus, proudly blogging at one point on how much he hated school. Well, no shit, it shows. 35.140.177.2 (talk) 17:07, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Might I suggest using an Invidious instance instead of directly linking to the video, where he'll get a view count? Rockford the Roe ^{boop my snoot}_{praise Oscar Wilde} 16:35, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

My biggest problem with Walsh, as well as the daily wire in general, is his blatant denial of climate change's causes and solutions, second biggest is his insistence on religion above all else, and third biggest being the outright hostility towards all things LGBT. I'm sure y'all have different priorities, but that's just mine. CorruptUser 18:04, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm moreso worried about the near-genocidal rhetoric regarding LGBT folks. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 18:28, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

If you want to add some of said rhetoric to his page, please do so. CorruptUser 18:45, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Too lazy and sleep deprived to at the moment but I'll make a note. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 18:48, 6 October 2022 (UTC)

Apparently Media Matters did a piece on him the other day. Basically, he said some stuff about teen pregnancies back in 2007, saying that sixteen year olds getting aren't the biggest problem, but rather that sixteen year olds aren't married when pregnant. I dunno, maybe shotgun weddings should still be a thing, but then again, so should abortions in that case. It's especially jarring that Florida seems to believe that a 16 year old isn't mentally mature enough for an abortion, but somehow is mature enough for a baby. CorruptUser 13:27, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Matt Walsh has referred to LGBT people as "degenerates", and said that "biologically", women are most fertile between the ages of 16 to 18. All conservative claims of child grooming are just projection. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 16:50, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

IIRC, fertility peaks around age 18. That second bit about "biology" isn't far too from the truth, and I think his argument was that the problem wasn't teen pregnancy but unwed pregnancy. But if you truly were obsessed with avoiding unwed pregnancies, well, all those "degenerates" do a far better job of avoiding that then everyone else...CorruptUser 19:03, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

But you are not really this dense to not know that the intention behind such statements are really more about keeping women under the legal control of and being subservient to men.

Walsh will probably predictably say that marriage is between a man and a woman; that the purpose is to settle down and have a family by the way God intended; and that a woman’s role is for child rearing. He probably knows that teen pregnancy and marriage disrupts a young girl’s future education and career prospects and for him that’s probably a feature and not a bug.

Half of those things are the silent parts he wont say out loud; the dude probably doesn’t actually care about having more married people — especially not queer people. - Only Sort of Dumb (talk) 19:20, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Of course (and the rabid anti-abortion ideology is of the same vein), but it's being reported as Walsh practically advocating for pedophilia. CorruptUser 20:13, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

It's called "Internet bluster". But since Walsh is engaged in the same sort of hyperbolic bluster, I'll allow it. And Walsh does have a history of hand-waving other creepy crapola involving the underage (the worst being the hand-waving he did on Josh Duggar regarding the report that he molested some of his young kids, which actually I guess was worse than pedophilia, it was child molester apologia. But this also includes other incidents like attempting to blame the Catholic church abuse scandals on homosexuals, declaring that a 12 year old who was raped should carry to term, etc.) Walsh is very much is a stubborn, "traditional values" asshole who wraps everything in the cloak of the sort of Christian God where the Golden Rule somehow does not exist (eg "Republican Jesus", as such affliction is popularly known).

If one was truly concerned about teen pregnancy, the solution of course is easy access to contraceptives. Teen pregnancies are way down in the US from the early 1990s and the studies I've seen pretty much say contraceptives are the thing that caused the decline. I'll leave it as a reader exercise to Google Walsh's stance and idiotic bluster on birth control. 35.140.177.2 (talk) 20:34, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

@CorruptUser Not sure if you missed the "between 16 and 18" part, but Matt Walsh was making the argument that "BIOLOGICALLY", teen pregnancies are NOT a bad thing because it's what they're "BIOLOGICALLY" predisposed to do. Ignoring the fact that this is literally saying "teenagers (people who are not legal adults and have higher risks of complications from giving birth) getting pregnant is not bad because they're most fertile at that age (incorrect according to the ACOG)", which is an argument a pedophile child groomer would make (something Matt Walsh is ostensibly opposed to); arguments for the morality of something based entirely off of biology is a logical fallacy, and should not be taken seriously. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 21:22, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm a bit dense at time, but where did Twatthew Walsh say that 16 year olds getting pregnant wasn't bad, rather than just an uncomfortable fact of life?CorruptUser 22:01, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Do you think explictly saying "teen pregnancies aren't the issue, unwed pregnancies are" is not a moral defense of teen pregnancies? Also, this article quotes him multiple times word for word. It's not exactly an "unbiased source" but, like, worth a read if you need any quotes of him EXPLICITLY saying that it's normal and not a problem if they're married. ---Ozzyboo (talk) 22:11, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

Not necessarily, because multiple things can be true at the same time.

For example, I believe marijuana is a "Bad Thing". I also believe marijuana should be legal. How is this possible; am I pothead because they too want it legal? People have been smoking pot and other drugs since the dawn of civilization; did I make a moral defense of the ganja? No. Criminalization is worse than legalization, because it enriches the drug dealers, reduces the ability to have any form of safety or quality control, and turning relatively minor things into serious crimes effectively eliminates all due process as the State can convict just about anyone on something whenever they can't prove a real crime or the person just happens to be an inconvenience.

What you do have on Walsh from those statements is that he seems to think 16 year olds are adults, ergo it's a contradiction for him to say they shouldn't have other adult-things like transitioning. CorruptUser 00:10, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

If you listen to the relevant radio excerpt,0 you'll hear him say, "ideally, you would have 17, okay — I would see nothing wrong with a society like what was happening up until about 1950 where 17 year old girls are getting married, to 17 or 18 year old guys, that are not kids they are men, men, and, uh, and they're starting a family," among a slew of other comments that together make a pretty good case that he believes teenage pregnancy (particularly around 16-17) is a good thing as long as it is within a married couple. That his arguments about maturity seem to serve as the basis for an argument that he is hypocritical is true, but he also seems to be staking out an ethical defense of (intra-marital) teen pregnancy. In particular, it is difficult to get to "teen pregnancy is morally bad" from "there is nothing wrong with 17 year old girls getting married and starting a family". Presumably, if he thought it were morally bad, he would also think there is something wrong with this, namely, the moral badness of it. So this does not seem comparable to staking out the position that something is morally bad, but should be legally permitted. 𝒮𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓃𝑒 ^talk 00:43, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

So would it be fair to say, he isn't advocating that high schoolers bump more uglies than before, but that he just wants them to get married before junior prom? I know he's a Catholic; I don't know if he's against the existence of birth control or not. Eh, for me the issue of birth control, abortion, etc, comes down to there really isn't finite space on this planet and we can't keep a civilization if everyone plops out eight kids. CorruptUser 02:39, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Walsh has never explicitly come out against birth control as far as I can tell. His big schtick on this subject over the years (like many "values conservatives") has tended to be harping on government oriented health care plans paying for birth control. However... this to me is a "tell"... access to birth control is widely popular for obvious reasons, and none of this "guvment shouldn't pay for birth control" crowd can explain why birth control pills are So Special to be a target of these people's ire as far as coverage goes, compared to the zillions of other medications out there. Apart from that Old Time "Traditional Values" fundamentalist bullshit, that is. (This especially applies because estrogen / progestin have other medical purposes aside from birth control.) I guess it is difficult for the type of Catholic I suspect that he is (and alludes to in certain entries) to say "nay, everybody should Rhythm Method as the Catholic church used to decree!" without suffering huge blowback, as the vast majority of people know that modern contraceptives are effective and the ol'-time "spray and pray on the calendar day" is pretty much worthless bullshit. It is far easier for this type instead for this type to evoke Evil Government and The Left / The Liberal and Immoral Society and all of that, using a wee bit of the Gods of Libertarian / Ronald Reagan style "government always sucks (even though I am the government)" malarkey.

What to me confirms this "tell" to me is a hysterical blog entry he made ("men get free sex, women get cancer") referencing one study that came out (that he completely misconstrued) saying that birth control might make a very rare cancer slightly less rare, but still rare all things considered. He turned it into a hysterical tiny rant where the birth control pill became "poison, plain and simple" and of course share with all your Facebook friends because the bullshit idiocy spewing from a Walsh blog entry is somehow going to upset someone. (It's more like a sign of a tiny mind to me, personally). I cannot see this blog entry happening without him being one of those "traditional" Catholic types you encounter that are privately anti-birth control for Reasons, frankly. 35.140.177.2 (talk) 05:41, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Who is Hendricus G. Loos and does 'his' so called 'mind control' patents work?

English isn't my native language so expect some grammatical errors.

This is the most obscure thing in the Internet that I have found and 'he' has some EMF 'mind control' patents

most notable to conspiracy theorists is the patent US6506148B2. If you search 'his' name on reddit, you'll see some people posting about this. I put quotation marks on the word 'his' and 'he' because I saw in Quora about this so called 'person' is probably a pseudonym of CIA scientists from very real MKUltra Program researching mind control stuff. And another Quora page is about the feasability of the EMF 'mind control' device. And finally, there are many of his patents relating to EMF and mind control. Due to it's obscure nature, can someone confirm Quora's credibility about this patent? And/Or tell me who actually is Hendricus G. Loos? Thanks! Notable1984Agent (talk) 23:27, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

On talk pages, please sign your comments using four tildes (~~~~) or by clicking on the sign button: on the toolbar above the edit panel. You can also indent successive talk page comments using one more colon (:) for each line. Thank you. —cosmikdebris ^talk stalk 22:37, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

He seems to have been a real person, with a long career in plasma physics. Literally the first link from a duckduckgo search for his name gets you this, which has some of his papers, his work history, and where he was born and died. He filed the first of these inventions when he was seventy-two, which kind of suggests maybe he was getting a bit weird in his old age. Namako (talk) 23:48, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

I mean, you can stimulate nerve cells with magnetic fields, but this comes nowhere near "mind control". Calling Loos's patents "mind control" patents is an absurd stretch, and whether or not his devices would work at all, they would not even come close to achieving such an end. 𝒮𝑒𝓇𝑒𝓃𝑒 ^talk 00:08, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

It's weird. It seems to be about making nerves send fm signals (the manipulation of the title) by stimulating a bunch of skin receptors at once. As you say, it's pretty far from mind control. Maybe closer to a device for investigating nerve signal responses in an organised way. Namako (talk) 01:32, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

I know that EMF and infrasound waves are the most probable causes of ghost sightings(which is somewhat similar to the properties of the patent) alongside with the pheripheral vision in the dark and pattern recognision in random noises. So it is theoretically possible that they can control infrasound or EMFs to emotionally manipulate someone in a controlled environment with hallucinations or stuff. Fortunately we don't have any evidence of mind control plots. I mean why Mike Adams, Alex Jones and other Paranoid Quacks in the Internet if the Government are already doing this? And finally, it requires to be falsifiable. So it's nowhere near NWO 1984 Socialist Communist Scientism Illuminati Warmist Jewish Muslim Gay Agenda Mind Control Level Threat. Also I recommended to everyone to know about this in RW community or make an article about this because I dunno how to make one lol.--Notable1984Agent (talk) 04:13, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Edit: Looks like I exaggerated a bit on the "So it is theoretically possible that they can control infrasound or EMFs to emotionally manipulate someone in a controlled environment with hallucinations or stuff." part I think it's just no more than spacey stimuli stuff. e.g. jumpscares, pattern recognition, intuitions, etc. I guess...--Notable1984Agent (talk) 10:12, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Crimean bridge destroyed

Russia-Ukraine war live: three killed as huge explosion causes key Crimea-Russia road bridge to collapse

Good riddance. Nice to see that monstrosity partly destroyed. --Trans Zombie Queen (talk) 12:51, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

As the joke goes, it wasn't an explosion. It was a special fireworks operation, on the day after Putin's 70th birthday.

It is not clear whether the car or truck bomb explanation, from Russia, will hold up. Another idea from some commentators is that the explosion may have been prepared from below, by Ukrainian operatives traveling the sea undetected. Supposedly the large size and the shape of the blast point to that, which could be the case. That second explanation would be more embarrassing for Russia, as it would mean a larger failure of vigilance in the area on their part. (There's also even more possibilities, of course.)

Either way, it also seems like good timing for Ukraine if (probably the case) they want to keep the counteroffensive going at a high pace for some time ahead. It's an obvious step to limit inflow of troops and equipment from Russia. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 20:10, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

This is a very good step for Ukraine. Andrew5 (talk) 21:13, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

[EC] There's a counterargument (to the alternative explanation I mentioned, which is presented here), which is that a blast from below would very likely have been prevented, by the bridge it hit, from reaching beyond it to impact the train diagonally above which also went aflame. That's according to a Swedish ballistics expert who (in Swedish) points to a particular truck as probably having been loaded with 10-30 tons of explosives. It seems like a suicide bombing, which may or may not have simply used a hijacked transport of a type which Russia often needs. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 21:25, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

May have been a cargo which was planted onto that lorry - drivers generally don't question their loads and Russia is corrupt as hell...

Anyway, updates;

1 - The bridge was not 'destroyed', seemingly only partly damaged. The road side is (apparently) still able to take lighter vehicles. Rail seems to be a knockout though. This means that for now, it may be passable for cars and vans, but not say lorries, tankers and tanks/IFVs...

2 - It was a legitimate military target; it was the main land supply route to Crimea from Russia proper which was out of any risk (heh heh) of Ukranian forces. That stuff will now have to go by land via Mariupol (unsafe, overloaded already), sea to a Crimean port (slower, less capacity) or air (much less capacity).

3 - Ukraine has accepted responsibility for the attack.

KarmaPolice (talk) 00:08, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

The timing, waiting for the opportune moment when that train with fuel was also within reach, makes a suicide bomber seem more likely. It would at any rate require real-time monitoring and triggering for that to be more than a chance event. The ballistics guy also made the point that the explosive cargo, too -- except the detonator used to trigger the blast -- may have been part of a shipment from Russia. In other words, stealing the truck or bribing someone to hand it over may have brought the explosives. Further he claims that the color of the smoke (white, not black) suggested a "civilian explosive" such as dynamite or similar, which would also be used and brought in a lot by the Russian army for their own purposes.

It seems like vehicle traffic now goes in one direction at a time, in the remaining half of those parts of the bridge. --ApooftGnegiol (talk) 06:22, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

That effect could have been generated by a long range radio/phone controlled detonator and watching CCTV - the only way we are sure it didn't happen is via missile/drone strike (at least, according to the British explosives guy I heard). If the main charge was actually Russian, it suggests incompetence and/or mass complacency because security protocol should have said each load shouldn't be enough to cause that much damage by itself or if it couldn't be helped, should be escorted.

Though it is possible that the bridge is in fact, simply not up to the strengths it should be (so it *should* have held up, but didn't). I do vaguely remember hearing about problems with it during construction, and it's possble due to the endemic, chronic corruption and cronyism within Russia it used substandard materials and/or they cut corners. KarmaPolice (talk) 12:49, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

24 hours and I'll finally be 30

I honestly don't know how should I feel... 00:12, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not you, but to me a birthday is just a number to mark the inexorable march of time and entropy. Live your life to the fullest, if only to enjoy what time you do have here on this mortal plane, but again, you're not me. Alduin (talk) 00:16, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

In fairness, you are already in your 30th year. Your birthday is the end of that year, not the beginning. And since you were born on your birthday, tomorrow is actually your 31st birthday. CorruptUser 01:42, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

Age is just a number. Furthermore, base 10 is overrated. In base 12, arguably a better numbering system, you will be 26 years old! LongStylus (talk) 01:59, 9 October 2022 (UTC)

Four days ago I was finally 60. I feel the same as I did when I was 59. —cosmikdebris ^talk stalk 02:08, 9 October 2022 (UTC)