On 1/3/2012 8:55 PM, Darren New wrote:
> On 12/28/2011 3:18, Warp wrote:
>> And humanity is doing little to help
>> this, even though it's a very well known problem.
>
> The best thing to do about this is to have fewer children. I don't see
> that going down well anywhere except maybe China.
>
Actually, birth rates are lower among a) the educated, b) in cities, and 
c) among prosperous nations. Its higher in a subset of the later, only 
where a) there is poor education, b) its a rural area, c) its a poor 
neighborhood. Its really bad in places where a) is nearly nonexistent, 
or undermined, b) every place is rural, and c) its so poor that you need 
3-4 children, to make sure there is at least one survivor.

Stupidly, a lot of both religious people, and left wing flower power 
types a) have warped ideas as to what constitutes good education, b) 
hate cities, or believe you should have lots of kids anyway, and c) may 
not be poor enough to realize that their success at having 4-18+ kids is 
**not** normal for everyone.

Post a reply to this message

On Wed, 04 Jan 2012 20:35:57 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:

> Stupidly, a lot of both religious people, and left wing flower power
> types a) have warped ideas as to what constitutes good education, b)
> hate cities, or believe you should have lots of kids anyway, and c) may
> not be poor enough to realize that their success at having 4-18+ kids is
> **not** normal for everyone.

I don't know about the 'left wing flower power types", but from a 
religious standpoint, promoting large families isn't uncommon - 
especially where tithing is involved.  Think of it as 'increasing the tax 
base'.

Jim

Post a reply to this message

On 1/4/2012 8:51 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Wed, 04 Jan 2012 20:35:57 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>
>> Stupidly, a lot of both religious people, and left wing flower power
>> types a) have warped ideas as to what constitutes good education, b)
>> hate cities, or believe you should have lots of kids anyway, and c) may
>> not be poor enough to realize that their success at having 4-18+ kids is
>> **not** normal for everyone.
>
> I don't know about the 'left wing flower power types", but from a
> religious standpoint, promoting large families isn't uncommon -
> especially where tithing is involved.  Think of it as 'increasing the tax
> base'.
>
> Jim
Snort. Can explain where they get the absurd idea that you shouldn't tax 
the rich. Just produce more poor people, if you need more taxes, the 
money will magically appear in their pockets some how, never mind that 
you have 95% of it already in your own bank. Though, I suppose the ones 
insisting on going back to a "gold standard" have that one solved, you 
just ship off all the extra poor people to dug holes, looking for more 
gold you can steal.. uh, tax them.

Suddenly the apparent complete idiocy of these people makes sick sense...

But, yeah, you might be right about the left. Most flower power types 
tend to be over-pro environment, even to the point of not wanting, in 
some extreme cases, to offend nature by putting another human on the planet.

Post a reply to this message

On Thu, 05 Jan 2012 19:56:04 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:

> Suddenly the apparent complete idiocy of these people makes sick
> sense...

I found that was the way to understand the LDS Church here in Utah.  Big 
families, encouraged by the church, along with a strongly "recommended" 
10% tithe = lots of money for the church.  More followers = more money.

It's not very different from looking at businesses that focus on a few 
large customers vs. businesses that focus on lots of smaller businesses.  
Both *can* be successful, but a company that only focuses on the Fortune 
500 loses much more revenue when they lose a single customer.

> But, yeah, you might be right about the left. Most flower power types
> tend to be over-pro environment, even to the point of not wanting, in
> some extreme cases, to offend nature by putting another human on the
> planet.

Kinda like religions that practice celibacy.  Those tend not to grow a 
whole lot after a generation or two.....

Jim

Post a reply to this message

On 1/4/2012 13:42, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> (This took me an absurd amount of time to find, BTW. Unfortunately Google
> can't search images...)

... yet. ;-)

This is one of the reasons so many web comic have transcriptions at the bottom.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   People tell me I am the counter-example.

Post a reply to this message

On 07/01/2012 06:17 PM, Darren New wrote:
> On 1/4/2012 13:42, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
>> (This took me an absurd amount of time to find, BTW. Unfortunately Google
>> can't search images...)
>
> ... yet. ;-)

Oh come on, OCR is still an unsolved research problem. Plus I doubt they 
have the compute capacity necessary.

> This is one of the reasons so many web comic have transcriptions at the
> bottom.

If you mean "so many" as in "the cardinality of the complement of the 
set of comics that I read", then sure...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

Post a reply to this message

On 28/12/2011 11:18 AM, Warp wrote:
>    Why does it feel like the near future is going to suck hard? Let's see:
>
> - The climate is going so bad that in 50 to 100 years we will most probably
> be totally screwed, if not even sooner. And humanity is doing little to help
> this, even though it's a very well known problem.

I'm not so certain about this "doing little to help" part.

You could certainly argue "not doing ENOUGH to help". But I don't think 
it's accurate to say that nobody is doing ANYTHING.

Heck, we banned CFCs, right? And the hole in the ozone layer is actually 
shrinking now as a direct result of this. That's one small victory.

> - There's little question anymore that the global economy is going to crash
> hard in the very near future.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

> - We are going to run out of oil in the near fugure. We know this, and we
> know that when it happens, the economy will collapse even harder. The
> economic crisis of the 1920's will be child's play in comparison. Yet we
> are not doing anything about it.

Again, "not doing anything about it" is perhaps not an accurate summary.

Plenty of people seem to be looking into alternatives. It's just that 
oil is cheap, and anything new will be expensive.

It's difficult to believe that oil companies don't know that the oil is 
running out. It seems likely that when the oil becomes too expensive, a 
"format war" between different alternatives will likely result, and if 
so, it is incontrovertible that whoever ends up backing the right 
"format" will end up making a crapload of money. And every big oil 
company is going to want that to be them, not their competitors. So I'm 
sure they're all doing some serious homework right now. (Probably in 
secret, for the most part. Don't want to give the game away, right?)

> - One of the most influential countries in the world (a country that
> heavily influences the economy and politics of the rest of the world),
> namely the United States, seems to be going down hard in politics,
> science and education.

Yeah, I'm with you on that one. Perhaps it's only a vocal minority who 
are morons. I don't know, I'm not there.

That said, there was a time when England ruled [most of] the world. We 
had some of the greatest scientists and engineers the world has ever 
seen, we practically /invented/ industry, we had political control of 
vast amounts of land, and so forth.

Today, England is nobody. Great Britain is no longer great. We're just 
another unimportant European country that most people won't even notice. 
We no longer manufacture anything. We no longer design anything. We're 
just a nation of useless "service companies". (Douglas Adams' "useless 
third" of the population.)

There was a time when the USA ruled the world. Maybe that time is 
passing now also? Or maybe this whole thing is a minor hiccup. Who can 
say? (And who will be the next superpower? China? India? Korea?)

> - European countries have also been steadily going downwards in terms of
> freedom, democracy and the wellbeing of its citizens, also mostly for
> religious reasons. However, in this case the religion is not Christianity
> but naive multiculturalism. A revolution (to either direction of the
> political spectrum) is inevitable in the near future.

I do not share your pessimism.

Note that these words come to you from a pessimist of legendary 
magnitude. ;-)

> - Large companies, especially those ones having intellectual properties,
> and especially the American ones, are slowly trying to take over the world.

Yeah, it is slightly ridiculous how content producers seem to think that 
the way to stop illegal copying is to demand ever more power to control 
people's lives. Rather than, you know, make it easier to LEGALLY obtain 
said content.

Or, depending on how cynical: It's slightly ridiculous how content 
producers think that they can trick people into giving them awesome 
powers by pretending that such a thing is "necessary" in order to 
"combat piracy".

>    Sometimes I'm glad I don't have children. I don't have to worry about
> them growing in a world that is plummeting fast into total chaos.

I'm glad I don't have children, for a somewhat different reason... Every 
time I go to the shops and some little kid is standing there screaming 
"mommy, I want! I want! I want!", I feel a deep-seated urge to grab the 
kid and violently beat him repeatedly until only shattered bones and 
torn flesh remains. I gather legal authorities don't take kindly to this 
kind of behaviour. o_O

At any rate, dire predictions of doom used to worry me. After decades of 
hearing them, they now worry me somewhat less. ;-)

Post a reply to this message