I am of the personal opinion that the political system that we adhere to in the western world is outdated, outgrown and allows logic to be outnumbered.
Now i shall try to argue for this...please comment on / criticize everything in this post!
1: Outdated & Outgrown
I live in Denmark, and in my country the political system which is in place today was founded around 1850. The following uses Denmark as an example but can essentially be applied to any western world country.
In 1850 the purpose of the system was to give the modest man of the people a voice which could help him survive economically and physically(!), be a free person and feel in control of his own destiny. All this could almost only be achieved with a system where (almost) everyone is represented equally.
Nowadays physical survival is guaranteed if you dont have a fatal accident / illness or force your own death by the means of alcohol / drugs etc.. Economical survival isnt guaranteed, however society supposedly has enough capacity to help anyone in economical need.
The freedom proposed with the original laws was very basic and has long been achieved. We now have all the control over our destiny that anyone from 1850 could ever have dreamt about. Also our society is no longer in the need of more freedom but instead craves insignificant choices which attempt to make up for our lack of freedom.
Is it not odd that we hang on to the system when its purpose has been served?
We are not still using military equipment from 1850!
Politicians have always been afraid of changes. Therefore we will keep the old system until everybody (50% or more) agrees with me ( 
) or politicians are given a lot more (or a lot less) freedom. This ties in with the second section of my post:
2: The Illogical Outnumbering of Logic
Consider this image:
Imagine a highschool where every single students vote has the same significance as the head masters. Sure 99% of the people in the school are happy (the students!) but it isnt helping the population! Of course the teachers and headmasters votes need to be the majority. Otherwise all lessons will be voted against and none of the students will learn anything and therefore have a promising future.
The same is true for our society!
Dont you want lower taxes?
The experts may say that we need to invest Billions extra in helping the poorest or crime will become a plague in 20 years time. The experts may also say that we need to invest Billions extra in preventing pollution or global warming, a crippled ozone layer, acid rain (the list goes on) will seriously decrease life quality for everyone. Finally the experts may also say that we need to invest Billions extra in research into a renewable power supply or our country will be one big blackour by 2030. The experts are right!
The biggest problem with our political system arises from this. Either we allow everyone (the students) to have an equal saying and thereby make everybody happy now or we let the experts (the teachers) have the majority and thereby make everybody happy for the next 150 years.
Its not only our children's future, its our own as well!
If you gave a starving African family a hen, it is Illogical to expect them to feed it and thereby get a stable source of food for the next ten years. The hen shall die! (evil maniac laugh). Seriously though, the immediate need for food will far outweigh the africans logical mind and instead of living a life with just enough food to survive, they feast for one day and then die.
From this picture we must accept that people cant be expected to choose what is best for themselves --> they need experts to choose for them!
3: Conclusion: More power or less power to the politicians
The way i see it there are two possible solutions. One gives the politicians more power so they can make decisions the people dont like based the reasurance that the experts will vote for them in the next election and allow them to "stay in charge". The second solution (and my favourite) is a system where there are no politicians as such. Law suggestions can be made by anyone. Everybody can vote however it must be made so that the voting power is shared as such: Experts 45% - Ignorant People 55%. Thereby everybody have to agree to outpower the experts.
If you agree or disagree (yea, thats pretty much everybody ) then please post a reply, but please dont just dismiss my idea without any reason!
Lukas
PS: Im from Denmark so my spelling and grammar may not be perfect. This doesnt make my political message any weaker so i would like you not to comment on it please! Are you kidding, your English is way better than mine and its (supposed) to be my 1st language.
Nowdays I believe that people (ie. politicians) are too politically correct. For example the use of the term "half-caste" in the early 90's was accepted as a name for a person born of black and white parents. Then came along "mixed-raced" as the most acceptable term but now we have "dual-heritage"! Who the hell is going to say, "yes, I'm dual-heritage"? Nobody, thats who.
Also Politicians (and others that have alot of power) get away with too much. Look at Bush, Blair, etc and the War thats currently going on. And what about the Pedophile/Pervert ex-pop star Gary Glitter? Not only is he not going to be killed for his crimes (what a shame) but he also gets a leanient sentence for raping (at least) two girls aged 11 and 12 by paying them just over a measly £1000 in compensation. Nobody wants compensation for an illigal act committed against, they want justice, which the victims haven't yet got. If this happened in a MEDC instead of Vietnam then he would have been jailed for a very long time. He's just played on the familys weakness and injustice of not having a lot of money according to MEDC rates. Lets hope that he does try and escape from jail so he can be shot dead as a fugitive.
There are many other opinions that I have but these two fit into this topic that thats all I have to say on the matter.
| wumingsden wrote: |
| ...And what about the Pedophile/Pervert ex-pop star Gary Glitter? Not only is he not going to be killed for his crimes (what a shame) but he also gets a leanient sentence for raping (at least) two girls aged 11 and 12 by paying them just over a measly £1000 in compensation. Nobody wants compensation for an illigal act committed against, they want justice, which the victims haven't yet got. If this happened in a MEDC instead of Vietnam then he would have been jailed for a very long time. He's just played on the familys weakness and injustice of not having a lot of money according to MEDC rates. Lets hope that he does try and escape from jail so he can be shot dead as a fugitive.... |
Im sorry to say that i cant agree with you in any way here...
No matter how inhumane a crime a person has commited, killing him is the wrong punnishment. Not because its too harsh. He probably deserves to die. Nonetheless killing a person is immoral. Whether in vengance or not. Im not a christian but i believe the bible has a great many messages that should be listened to. In the middle ages we punnished people for stealing by chopping their left hand of. Shure they couldnt steal anything but 500 years have passed now and our society should be able to handle "evil" people in posetive way. We should help the weak NOT kill them!. Shure...lock him up for ever...we dont want him close our children...But killing him makes us criminals. That is my oppinion.
LukeI used to have exactly the same opinions as you until my friend was murdered. Maybe if one of your friends died because somebody took it upon themselves to do so then you'd have a change of opinions.
I do still believe in "protecting the innocent, not punishing the guilty" but not to the same degree.
And I also disagree how you call gary glitter weak. he is nothing, inhuman, vile, scum, vicous ~ every word that I can think of that means a negetive thing (if which I would have added would have consequented in my post being deleted).
| wumingsden wrote: |
I used to have exactly the same opinions as you until my friend was murdered. Maybe if one of your friends died because somebody took it upon themselves to do so then you'd have a change of opinions.
I do still believe in "protecting the innocent, not punishing the guilty" but not to the same degree.
And I also disagree how you call gary glitter weak. he is nothing, inhuman, vile, scum, vicous ~ every word that I can think of that means a negetive thing (if which I would have added would have consequented in my post being deleted). |
Im sincerely sorry about your friend wumingsden.
I cant begin to imagine how it feels and therefore cannot imagine what my oppinions could change to.
Weakness, i believe, comes in many forms, and one of them is not having a strong enough mind to resist the temptation to rape little girls (if this is a temptation). Not being able to see what is right and what is wrong (moral/immoral) is also a weakness. In those ways mr. Glitter is weak (imo).
I certainly dont believe in: "...not punishing the guilty". Of course the guilty must be punished for their wrong doings, but once they have paid their debt, stronger people, who have other things than revenge on their mind, should lead the way to a better life, as rolemodels not as partakers of yet another taking of a life.
(the taking of a life is puts you more in debt than anything else in the world, but it is not worth another taking of a life. That doubles the penalty, and hands it over to the whole of society)
I know im repeating myself...sorry...People have had this idea before. Rule by experts. Philosopher kings.
Here's why it rarely even makes it past the "what-if" stage:
The subjectivity of who the experts are and who the stupid people are. Notice how nobody who advocates such an elite-ocracy ever considers themselves to be one of the "stupid people". Everyone always assumes that either they are one of the experts or that the experts would agree with them. This is a natural human tendency, and it makes it hard to figure out who the real experts are.
So, politicians are in their own way experts at getting people to give them power. Experts in other fields don't necesserily want political power (except perhaps within the scope of their own fields, and not always even there). In a way, the political system (in the USA at least) is sort of a technocracy (which is what rule-by-experts is called) because the president is supposed to fill their cabinet with public policy, law, and economics experts, and there are many public and private think-tanks. Unfortunately, there is nothing to stop biases and personal loyalties from determining which experts politicians listen to. Come to think of it, maybe it would be a step in the right direction to require that some elected offices have academic degrees or IQ scores as qualifications.
A third approach to the ones you mentioned (despotism and technocracy) is anarcho-capitalism. Privatize as many government-run services as possible and make the government as small and inobtrusive as possible. People will still make dumb mistakes, but the market will duly punish them for their mistakes and there will be little or no tax money with which to subsidize grand but useless policy experiments. This has problems of its own, though, because the attention span of markets is very short (something like five years) and if something takes longer than that to be profitable or is inherently not profitable (like curing a rare but biologically interesting disease) nobody will want to do it.
But I'm not trying to discourage you. On the contrary, read everything you can about political science and economics. Continue developing your ideas. Especially ideas on how to convince enough people in the system we have now to switch over to a better one. Just don't fool yourself into thinking this is an easy problem you can solve with a few posts to FriHost and then go on to something else. This is a lifetime's worth of work for a lot of people.
Good luck, and I hope someday I'll be able to vote for you or your party. Unless of course your party fails to convince me of its sanity, integrity, and competence in which case I'll vote for someone else.
Dont wanna quote it all..waste of space so...
I would never think its an easy task! In fact, i am certain its an imposible task however i sitll enjoy voicing my ideas and discussing the matters with other people...
Your third approach is pretty much the opposite of anything i could ever believe in...It will create great inequality and also mean that all major investments in the countries future, (and the worlds future as a place habitable by homosapiens!) wont be made --> which links in with the "let the school kids decide" image which i attempt to create in my first post. People dont necesarely want that which is best for them!
On the other hand the "definition of an expert" problem is frustrating. I had all kinds of clever answers ready but you eloquence has made all of the useless 
Im actually not sure if this expert system is so clever (i never was), but im mearly searching for something better than the ancient system of equal representation (democracy...its so ancient, it means something in greek 
).
The problem with the US Technocracy (amd all similar) is that its still the politicians --> the "people" who rule. Allthough the experts to a certain degree will help the politicians convince people that the "tax raise" is good, the people still wont accept it just because of that...there will be no re-election and therefore the politicians still cant really make big decisions. Maybe a "makeshift" solution would be to change forced elections to every 10 years or something...thats so flawed i cant even begin to argue for it though...
Im clearly insane, and incompetent due to my young age, but if you ever dare to question my integrity you will not live to see the poles mealt! It's not your integrity I wonder about. It's that of disciples #2 through #3000.
To me, the assumption of democracy and of anarcho-capitalism is that some people will make mistakes, and suffer because of them... but if a sufficient diversity of strategies exist, the human race as a whole will keep surviving and progressing, because the few who do make good decisions will benefit from them and their way of doing things will be copied by others. Cultural Darwinism, you might say. Or memetic evolution, as Richard Dawkins (whose books you might enjoy) would say.
The weakness of the democratic assumption as you correctly point out, is that some mistakes are so bad that even uninvolved bystanders suffer from them. Pollution, economic inefficiencies, lousy legal precedents, wars, loss of biodiversity, the list is endless.
You're thinking about how to change the whole system, because you're assuming that if you don't change it, you're stuck suffering from its mistakes. What if you turn the problem upside-down? What if it turns out that you're more likely to succeed at finding ways to build alternative systems completely from the ground up and as shielded as possible from the main-stream system's mistakes?
In the future (if we don't go extinct first) this will obviously take the form of space settlement, where the relativisitc delays will be enough to shield us from each other's stupidity even if nothing else does. But there may be purely political and economic steps that can be taken toward this ideal even while we're all still stuck here together on one planet. And no, I don't think you're crazy or stupid. The crazy and stupid people are the ones who stubbornly cling to what they know and have nothing but scorn and hatred for new ideas.
I used to be very angry at them myself, but that didn't seem to change them, so now I mostly ignore them and try to find ways to work around them.
| Texas Al wrote: |
And no, I don't think you're crazy or stupid. The crazy and stupid people are the ones who stubbornly cling to what they know and have nothing but scorn and hatred for new ideas.
I used to be very angry at them myself, but that didn't seem to change them, so now I mostly ignore them and try to find ways to work around them. |
Yea...ignore them, anything else is SO frustrating its difficult to survive.
As to the "build a system from the ground" idea. Yea. Sounds great but concidering that there are no "test results" the effect on society will be difficult to judge without some serious socio-psycology, which im afraid im not skilled enough to pull of. 
And of course, if we do colonize space then everything will have to be rethought probably. For one, polution will probably be less of a problem, which opens the gates for greater commercialism which benefits (almost) everyone! | LukeakaDanish wrote: |
| I am of the personal opinion that the. |
phew! And I was worried you were using someone else's opinion.
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| criticize everything in this post! |
OK
mmm socialism
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| was founded around 1850 |
oh.. are you sure?
And the average income tax as a percentage is what?
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| person and feel in control of his own destiny |
feeling like god is fun
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| could almost only be achieved |
almost?
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| (almost) everyone is represented equally. |
that doesn't sound very fair or very equal... unless everyone else is equally mistreated?
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| Nowadays physical survival is guaranteed if you dont have a fatal accident / illness or force your own death by the means of alcohol / drugs etc.. |
So pretty much the way its always been? Don't die and you'll stay alive. Wooo you demnarkens are crafty.
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| Economical survival isnt guaranteed |
that's no fun. I want money for doing nothing.
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| however society supposedly has enough capacity to help anyone in economical need. |
great. I need money. But I really don't want to have to bother working. Can denmark help me live a care free life?
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| The freedom proposed |
What? Freedom is now only a proposal? And here I've been tricked into thinking it was an inalienable right. shucks.
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| We now have all the control over our destiny that anyone from 1850 could ever have dreamt about |
yeah, you've mentioned that but never bothered to explain it. Is it a secret?
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| Also our society is no longer in the need of more freedom |
So you're happy with opression? gotcha.
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| but instead craves insignificant choices |
I guess when you can't get what you want you have to settle.
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| Is it not odd that we hang on to the system when its purpose has been served? |
It's not fair to the system if you abandon it.
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| We are not still using military equipment from 1850! |
that's good. progress.. progress.. progress
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| Politicians have always been afraid of changes. |
only to their salary
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| or politicians are given a lot more (or a lot less) freedom. |
what happened to that equality thing?
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| Imagine a highschool where every single students vote has the same significance as the head masters. |
oh, anarchy!
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| Sure 99% of the people in the school are happy (the students!) but it isnt helping the population! |
getting what you want isn't always what's best for you. Its good that even you socialists realize this.
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| Of course the teachers and headmasters votes need to be the majority |
The easy way to effect this: only they get to vote.
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| none of the students will learn anything and therefore have a promising future. |
cool, denmark rewards ignorance? Can the USA ship you all our liberalists and fans of socialism?
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Dont you want lower taxes? |
YES! duh
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The experts may say that we need to invest Billions extra in helping the poorest |
It doesn't help them to give them money.
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| or crime will become a plague in 20 years time. |
that sounds like extortion. where are your facts?
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| The experts may also say that we need to invest Billions extra in preventing ..global warming |
global warming is a silly myth invented by hippies in the USA.
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| If you gave a starving African family a hen |
I'd have one less hen. (I got As in math)
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| , it is Illogical to expect them to feed it and thereby get a stable source of food for the next ten years |
I don't think anyone could make a stable food source for ten years out of one hen. If you can, then you might be able to solve world hunger!
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| (evil maniac laugh). |
Are all denmarkers like you?
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| Seriously though, the immediate need for food will far outweigh the africans logical mind |
logical? If they were logical they'd refrain from sex, impregnating their respective wives, and trying to birth children in a famine.
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| From this picture we must accept that people cant be expected to choose what is best for themselves --> they need experts to choose for them! |
uh no. you cannot conclude from one rare instance that ALL men are incapable of choosing what's best for themselves. nice try you almost-sly socialist.
A properly informed conscience is quite capable of choosing the good.
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| One gives the politicians more power |
that NEVER ends well.. escpecially in a system like yours where good is wholly subjective.
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| The second solution (and my favourite) is a system where there are no politicians as such. Law suggestions can be made by anyone. |
Anarchy has been tried and found wanting.
I am an expert in all things. Now.. see how 'expert' can be problematic?
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| - Ignorant People 55% |
Do experts get to declare who is ignorant?
If so I declare everyone except me to be ignorant. May I become denmarks sole benevolent dictator?Hey, Gonzo! Looks like you haven't lost your touch since you've been gone.. 
LukeakaDanish, I'm confused. (That's not easy to do, so consider yourself, um... talented? ) 
You titled the thread:
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The rotting flesh that is our political system |
You state that you live in Denmark. I know absolutely squat about how politics work in Denmark, (or if Denmark is actually part of the "western world" ) but you seem to be a self-proclaimed expert on how they work in the "western world". (Well, not really an expert, more like someone who is 13 attempting to write like someone much older, more informed and wiser)
Here's just a few things that stick out...
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| Nowadays physical survival is guaranteed (if you don't blah blah blah) |
That's a pretty broad statement with holes as big as my ex.
Does it apply to Denmark or the Western World?
You keep saying
experts
experts
experts
experts
The experts are right!
What experts? Teachers? Is THAT what this whole thread is based on? A teacher's point of view? :yikes:
And how do YOU know we'll all be out of energy by 2030? Because the "teachers" said so?
Who are these "experts" you're talking about? (Methinks it's the lieberals that keep losing ground because of their flawed political processes 
)
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From this picture we must accept that people cant be expected to choose what is best for themselves --> they need experts to choose for them! |
Why must we accept that? Because the "experts" say that's what will happen?
And what does a starving family in Africa have to do with the students and teachers rights to vote?
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Everybody can vote however it must be made so that the voting power is shared as such: Experts 45% - Ignorant People 55%. Thereby everybody have to agree to outpower the experts.
|
HuH?
Ok, I can't take this any more... I just want to ask you one question about how things work here in America...
When was the last time an American in America DIED from of starvation becasue of not having food available from either the American Government or other Americans?
It's been DECADES. You know why? Because we cloned that ****ing chicken. THAT's the difference between first and third world countries...
(I don't believe I just wasted 15 minutes in this thread... 
) | gonzo wrote: |
| LukeakaDanish wrote: | | I am of the personal opinion that the. |
phew! And I was worried you were using someone else's opinion.
|
Hey, just making sure no-one takes any offence from what i write...that usually works for me...
I am probably what you would concider a socialist but our government isnt, for your information...so denmark isnt equal to socialism
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| Quote: | | was founded around 1850 |
oh...are you sure |
Yea...certainly our "groundlaw" which gives the people basic democratic rights was signed on the 5th of July, 1849.
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And the average income tax as a percentage is what?
|
You know thats insignificant, seen as the people essentially decide what tax to pay themselves...but in denmark its around 50% for your information.
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| Quote: | | person and feel in control of his own destiny |
feeling like god is fun
|
Hell yeah...
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| Quote: | | could almost only be achieved |
almost? |
As in other systems which could solve the problem may exist, but to my knowledge democracy did the job.
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| Quote: | | (almost) everyone is represented equally. |
that doesn't sound very fair or very equal... unless everyone else is equally mistreated? |
Im not saying its fair, but only males above 30 who owned their own land could vote in 1849, and even nowadays 10 yearolds cant vote...Thats the way it is mate.
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| Quote: | | Nowadays physical survival is guaranteed if you dont have a fatal accident / illness or force your own death by the means of alcohol / drugs etc.. |
So pretty much the way its always been? Don't die and you'll stay alive. Wooo you demnarkens are crafty. |
No, it hasn't always been guaranteed! 300 years ago if you had no money you had no food and no place to live. And that has never been too good for survival...
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| Quote: | | Economical survival isnt guaranteed |
that's no fun. I want money for doing nothing. |
What im attempting to refer to here is basically, the government wont neccesarily help your business survive, and if you run up massive debts, life isnt going to be easy.
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| Quote: | | however society supposedly has enough capacity to help anyone in economical need. |
great. I need money. But I really don't want to have to bother working. Can denmark help me live a care free life? |
Surely there is no need to explain social security.
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| Quote: | | The freedom proposed |
What? Freedom is now only a proposal? And here I've been tricked into thinking it was an inalienable right. shucks. |
Yes, the freedom that the people where given was indeed only a proposal, and the declaration of independence may say something else, but true freedom is unlikely ever to be achieved.
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| Quote: | | We now have all the control over our destiny that anyone from 1850 could ever have dreamt about |
yeah, you've mentioned that but never bothered to explain it. Is it a secret? |
Its called proving a point.
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| Quote: | | Also our society is no longer in the need of more freedom |
So you're happy with opression? gotcha. |
Notice how it said "our society" not "I'm". That means society doesnt fight for improved freedom anymore. You dont hear George Bush winning an election by saying "If you vote for me, no-one will ever be forced to follow the rules anymore".
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| Quote: | | but instead craves insignificant choices |
I guess when you can't get what you want you have to settle. |
Rather pointless comment unless (as im guessing) your trying to comment everything i said.
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Is it not odd that we hang on to the system when its purpose has been served? |
It's not fair to the system if you abandon it. |
I feel so sorry for the dictatorship system in Iraq.
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| Quote: | | Politicians have always been afraid of changes. |
only to their salary |
True. But seen as President is a rather well payed job, they are afraid of loosing it by making big political changes, which they arent 100% sure the people will like.
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only to their salary |
what happened to that equality thing? |
Eh...read and all will be revealed...
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| Quote: | | Imagine a highschool where every single students vote has the same significance as the head masters. |
oh, anarchy! |
My image is working! Your understanding something! YAY!
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| Quote: | | Sure 99% of the people in the school are happy (the students!) but it isnt helping the population! |
getting what you want isn't always what's best for you. Its good that even you socialists realize this. |
I am pretty sure that is a communist message, not a capitalist one. But at least your still understanding my image. So im happy.
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| Quote: | | Of course the teachers and headmasters votes need to be the majority |
The easy way to effect this: only they get to vote. |
Yes. certainly. I could have written a 100kb post if i had to explain everything in extreme detail though.
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| Quote: | | none of the students will learn anything and therefore have a promising future. |
cool, denmark rewards ignorance? Can the USA ship you all our liberalists and fans of socialism? |
Sorry, that was very bad grammar. 
I know you've noticed im not English.
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| Quote: | | Dont you want lower taxes? |
YES! duh |
The only other person ive ever seen answering a rethoric question is Homer Simpson.
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| Quote: | | The experts may say that we need to invest Billions extra in helping the poorest |
It doesn't help them to give them money. |
Nope.
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| Quote: | | or crime will become a plague in 20 years time. |
that sounds like extortion. where are your facts? |
I thought people on this forum where intelligent enough to realize when they're being presented with actual facts but merely things which popped into my head and which are close to facts. Here is the place i believe i got the original fact from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/if/3489040.stm
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The experts may also say that we need to invest Billions extra in preventing ..global warming |
global warming is a silly myth invented by hippies in the USA. |
Once again a couple of sources which proves my point to anyone who isnt incredibly ignorant (in my oppinion).
http://www.worldviewofglobalwarming.org/pages/actions.html
http://www.worldviewofglobalwarming.org/pages/glaciers.html
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| Quote: | | If you gave a starving African family a hen |
I'd have one less hen. (I got As in math) |
Congratulation!
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| Quote: | | , it is Illogical to expect them to feed it and thereby get a stable source of food for the next ten years |
I don't think anyone could make a stable food source for ten years out of one hen. If you can, then you might be able to solve world hunger! |
Look, i dont know how long a friggn hen lives, but i know, and so do you, that logically the african familly are better of feeding the hen and eating the eggs (and then having a chance of survival), than eating the eggs and dying of hunger.
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| Quote: | | (evil maniac laugh). |
Are all denmarkers like you? |
Ehm...(evil maniac laugh)...No...I wouldnt say so.
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Seriously though, the immediate need for food will far outweigh the africans logical mind |
ogical? If they were logical they'd refrain from sex, impregnating their respective wives, and trying to birth children in a famine |
I agree. But thats just an other case where imediate need for something outweighs the concious mind. They need workers so they have children and are faced with the consequences. To bad.
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| Quote: | | From this picture we must accept that people cant be expected to choose what is best for themselves --> they need experts to choose for them! |
uh no. you cannot conclude from one rare instance that ALL men are incapable of choosing what's best for themselves. nice try you almost-sly socialist. A properly informed conscience is quite capable of choosing the good. |
Ok. My eloquence fails me again. I appologize HOWEVER: notice how it didnt say "people never choose the right thing". The meaning of "cant be expected to" is meant to "unless offered undoubtable evidence otherwise then they probably wont"
Just because your Intelligent and properly informed (appart from the global warming thing) doesnt mean everyone is. I have used quite some time to prove this in my first post, and unless you intend to show me the opposite, then we must accept this as at least a "hlaf" truth.
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| Quote: | | One gives the politicians more power |
that NEVER ends well.. escpecially in a system like yours where good is wholly subjective. |
True.
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| Quote: | | The second solution (and my favourite) is a system where there are no politicians as such. Law suggestions can be made by anyone. |
Anarchy has been tried and found wanting. |
If you actually read my entire post propperly you would find that in no way am I suggesting we get rid of the government and let everyone do what they want. So...not anarchy.
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| I am an expert in all things. Now.. see how 'expert' can be problematic? |
Yes. I know its very problematic. Read on in the thread, and you will discover how I and Texas Al have had a conversation about this.
but...please realize your not an expert in everything...You dont have university degree in everything!
| Quote: |
| Quote: | | - Ignorant People 55% |
Do experts get to declare who is ignorant?
If so I declare everyone except me to be ignorant. May I become denmarks sole benevolent dictator? |
VERY bad wording by me. This was an ugly generalisation. I (attempt to) take my words back and replace them with: "Uneducated People"
Ok...that seams to be all of your quotes. Hope you thoroughly enjoyed annoying me
By the way...i dont take ANY offence whatsoever in being called a socialist
Please continue not to criticize my spelling and grammar.
Luke
Your post was on the edge of being a flame in my oppinion
Whereas gonzo was intelligent or humoristic most of the time you fail to impress me with your insults.
If you are going to hurl personal insults at me for expressing my oppinion, I will discard your questions as insignificant.
Sorry
Luke | LukeakaDanish wrote: |
Your post was on the edge of being a flame in my oppinion
Whereas gonzo was intelligent or humoristic most of the time you fail to impress me with your insults.
If you are going to hurl personal insults at me for expressing my oppinion, I will discard your questions as insignificant.
Sorry
Luke |
Don't be sorry, I had already discarded your entire thread as insignificant. 
| S3nd K3ys wrote: |
| And how do YOU know we'll all be out of energy by 2030? Because the "teachers" said so? |
Guess his experts tend to think things different than the 'experts' at shell which have estimated that with the current amount of conventional resources to last till at least 2080 and by then due to progress made there will be alternate sources of energy to use, so no needs to worry 
.
Do we need to invest in this though? Seeing as to how we live in a capitalistic dominated world the answer is simple. No. Although it affects all of us the major energy companies like shell will do their best to be the first to come with alternate energy resources which can replace the conventional energy resources.
It doesn't truly end up having much to do with politics, although politicians like to get involved a lot with things like those whilst according to the words of dutch shell employees those politicians know jack shit about what we're doing, they can only manage to translate it into their own personal language which even less people understand.
Investing in the poor to prevent crime? I don't know, but as long as we live in a society in which we currently live you can pump as much money as you want in the poor but the crime rate won't change. Why? Since poor or rich is relative, currently in the western world we have no poor people, we just have people which have an income below average. The nice thing with averages though is that it is built up by 2 sides, the people above and the people below. So unless everyone would make the same form of income there would always remain a 'poor' side.
They aint poor though, they are just whining babies which should start working for their money, get an education, built up your own life. If they want to see poor they should go on a holiday to central africa, that would define the standards of poor in our western world.
Power to the politicians? I would say no, the politicians have to get a sense of the real world first since that is something which they currently lack. More power to the people? Hell no... God, I could already imagine the average day moron to start running the country, now let's have a look at what we would have:
No taxes!
Free education!
Free healthcare!
Higher wages!
Free insurances!
...
O ******, several morons just made everything free, nice. Looks like half of the country which basically gets their entire income out of taxes will now end up with... shit.
Instead things should remain as they were, you know why it has been like this since beginning of the 19th century? Since it worked in some way. Although you will never agree on every thing, it has created a reasonably stable society in which we live today. If it wouldn't have worked we might have looked like africa does now and they might be sending hens to us to laugh at us for being idiots for not being able to live of that for 10 years.
It should remain as it is, no massive changes, just slight adjustments to be made where deemed necesarry, that's it.On a further not, DX, If something like wealth redistribution WERE to happen here, you can bet your ass that me and millions like me that are CURRENTLY hard-working Americans, will STOP working and live off the rich. What would you possibly have to gain by working hard and trying to make something of yourself when it will be given to some low-life scum that refuses to work and lives off YOUR money?
Seriously.
| S3nd K3ys wrote: |
On a further not, DX, If something like wealth redistribution WERE to happen here, you can bet your *** that me and millions like me that are CURRENTLY hard-working Americans, will STOP working and live off the rich. What would you possibly have to gain by working hard and trying to make something of yourself when it will be given to some low-life scum that refuses to work and lives off YOUR money?
Seriously. |
That's exactly the reason why wealth distribution will not work in real life, it's nice as an utopia, but mankind just isn't made to support eachother and give in an equal share to let things running.
That along with other things which aren't in human nature are exactly the reason why communism doesn't work out, no matter how perfect the system is on paper.DX-Blog: Fair comments. reply below:
S3nd K3ys: Now that you've stopped flaming, and decided to take the thread | S3nd K3ys wrote: |
| Seriously |
, how about NOT presenting your personal oppinion as fact, and at least attempting to understand (no not "agree with" or even "like" but "understand") other peoples oppinion.
Energy situation: Ok...fair enough, lets forget about when the energy runs out...although shell's oppinionis likely to be rather biased, I will concede that 2020 probably is way of the target.
Nonetheless, the burning of fosile fuels results in global warming (if you, as S3nd K3ys, dont believe in global warming, then this is wasted on you i guess), which, if we continue at our current rate (we wont, it'll increase), will have a very serious effect on millions if not billions of lives around the globe. (if you want a source, i will find one but for now...i wont bother) Im not an incredibly humanitarian person. Sure, I give the odd bit here and there and occasionally feel lucky i was born in the rich part of the world, but usually it stays at that. But killing hundreds of millions of people? Maybe thats a bit too evil for me...
Think Shell will come up with some clean, ingenious, powersource way before it gets that bad? A while ago wavepower was concidered the future. Potentially there is loads (power 20% in all states with coastlines type-of-thing) of energy in this. It is, however, not an economical goldmine like Coal and Oil and Gas is. Therefore whoever was researching it at the time (some major commercial outfit) stopped the research in order not to lose customers for their less enviromentally sound projects.
(again, no quote, unless requested)
| Quote: |
| politicians know jack shit |
Couldnt agree more...politicians can however rely on their experts and without fully understanding something give money to it because their experts say it might "save the globe" or whatever.
To a certain degree money does change crime. Its not so much how well of the poor are, but more how well of they are compared to the rich. If we can keep a decent balance, then everything should stay "friendly" 
.
Yea...they should probably stop whining, but unfortunately neither me nor you can make them.
I totally agree on your "who to give the power" section, however, in my oppinion, education shouldnt just be free, you should be payed for it! The reason being that if you get an education you are likely to be able to help your society more than if you drop out of school and live of benefits.
Good conclusion. Its a very fair viewpoint which you represent, and it might just work, but seen as my entire first post argues against it, you probably know im not entirely satisfied... This may sound insane but in a real communistic society like what USSR used to be, you go to jail for not bothering with work. Just as you go to jail for not paying your taxes in Capitalism.
im not a communist, but am instrigued by some parts of the "ideal"
As for shell coming up with a clean powersource, they will. Shell currently has "cells" which can let a house run on water, the only problem they currently have is size. In order to gather enough cells for a house they need the size of a house worth of cells. But it definately won't take 80 years for them to reduce this size. So well yeh, energy coming from hydrogen will definately be a way of the future.
Besides that atom fusion is still being experimented with, once that can be controlled we will have an infinitive amount of energy for our usage. So energy won't be that much of a problem.
Global warming does exist indeed, but the question is though, is it caused by us? Scientists have found that before every ice age there has been a time of global warming, one thing is for certain we didn't cause it in those times and I doubt dinosaurs have been burning up foscile fuels .
Although we are certain that our energy usage does increase it, we cannot prove whether we can stop it or not by changing energy resources.
Balancing out rich and poor a bit better will not work either, money is not what makes you rich and that's the problem. It's the way you use it and you can definately see that rich people tend to use it differently than poor people. Even if a poor guy wins the jackpot and make 20 million at once they can manage to get themselves broke within 5 years, that happens in real life as well. In order to get to the riches you have to do more than just get money, you have to learn on how to use it wisely, how to maintain your balance of income and outgoings.
It is like 'fixing' africa on long terms, you don't help them with sending food, you must teach them how to fix their own.
Real communistic societies don't exist, yes you get sent to jail if you don't work in societies which call them communistic, but they also have a leader or a group of leaders with an absolute power. Kinda defines the ideal of everyone being equal in the system. Let's not start speaking about the differences of lifestyle between the leading parties and the civillians. | LukeakaDanish wrote: |
DX-Blog: Fair comments. reply below:
S3nd K3ys: Now that you've stopped flaming, and decided to take the thread | S3nd K3ys wrote: | | Seriously |
, how about NOT presenting your personal oppinion as fact, and at least attempting to understand (no not "agree with" or even "like" but "understand") other peoples oppinion.
|
Sorry if I misled you, I'm not taking the thread seriously. I'm taking the comments on wealth redistribution seriously.
| Quote: |
Nonetheless, the burning of fosile fuels results in global warming (if you, as S3nd K3ys, dont believe in global warming, then this is wasted on you i guess) |
I believe in global warming. It's been happening for millions of years. Same with global cooling. (Ice ages and all that) It goes in cycles. Just like the strong hurricane seasons, (which was falsly blamed on global warming).
I don't doubt that fossel fuel has a small part in it. But there's more at work here than us humans ruining the world with our fossil fuels. Did you know that the hottest day EVER recorded in Washington DC happened about 100 years ago? I guess DC got a jump on the whole global warming thingy, didn't they?
Also: You could take the entire 5+ billion people on the Earth, stick them ALL in the state of Texas, and your body to square foot ratio would be less than that in the city of New York or even the most populated cities in Asia.
Lastly, (not on subject, but I just wanted to throw it out there since this topic is headed all over the map...) did you know that 99% of all different species of life that ever existed on this Earth are now extinct???
:edit:
DX beat me to the punch. We seem to agree on much, but I can see a real debate sparking soon on illegal immigration. Global warming: The gradual global warming (the a natural thing) doesnt happen anything like as quickly as what we are experiencing now.
Hydrogen Cells: I thought these where genious until i found out that you dont actually get any "free" energy from the cells. You can merely plug them into your juice and they work like a very big battery. Very useful for making cars run more efficiently and other stuff, but not something which will save the world...
This thread is headed all over so lets leave it...
The hydrogen cells shell is working on are totally free, or well yeh, no fossil fuels required. They get their starting energy, which is only a small amount from solar energy. So you'll always have energy available, the only resource you'll need is water, from what there is enough.
| LukeakaDanish wrote: |
Global warming: The gradual global warming (the a natural thing) doesnt happen anything like as quickly as what we are experiencing now.
|
What, exactally, are you basing this ASSUMPTION on?? Were they recording this stuff millions of years ago and nobody told me? | S3nd K3ys wrote: |
| LukeakaDanish wrote: | Global warming: The gradual global warming (the a natural thing) doesnt happen anything like as quickly as what we are experiencing now.
|
What, exactally, are you basing this ASSUMPTION on?? Were they recording this stuff millions of years ago and nobody told me? |
Some scientists even believe that it has happened within a hundred years and have made an estimate of a new ice age coming somewhere around 2050. So well yeh, we'll see what comes first, an ice age or fossil fuels running out .
But well yeh, it are all just assumptions ofcourse, no-one can tell the exact date of when things like that will happen.H2O cells: Ok...i may be wrong...If this is the case DX-Blog, then our problems are solved
S3nd K3ys: Im not a genious, and i dont konw everything. I suspect they were'nt recording it no . Lets start some "Energy Talk" thread for this...the title seams rather inapropriate...
Luke | DX-Blog wrote: |
| The hydrogen cells shell is working on are totally free, or well yeh, no fossil fuels required. They get their starting energy, which is only a small amount from solar energy. So you'll always have energy available, the only resource you'll need is water, from what there is enough. |
Absolutely incorrect. Hydrogen cells get *all* their energy from some other source. Hydrogen cells are an energy storage medium, not an energy source. Furthermore, those things are hideously expensive to make, and their manufacture and transport use even more energy.
Our fuel problems are absolutely not solved, and it's not an easy problem. But we need to get busy solving it and fast, because the governments (whether run by experts or by spoiled rich-brat draft-dodging illiterate idiots from Texas) are not going to do it for us.
On the bright side, after civilization collapses, those of us who know how to actually do stuff with our hands will get to experiment with better forms of government because we'll be the only ones not living in caves. Still, I like our civilization mostly the way it is and would rather it not collapse. So right now, scientific questions are more important to me than politics.Thankyou so much Texas Al for saying that. No more "keep the shares high" shell propaganda in this thread hopefully 
Let the gaia teory take care of everyone who doesnt respect nature, and doesnt know how to fend for themselves...
| George Dubya Bush wrote: |
"Because the—all which is on the table begins to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculate, for example, is on the table; whether or not benefits rise based upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that, those different cost drivers, affecting those—changing those with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised more likely to be—or closer delivered to what has been promised. Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled. Look, there's a series of things that cause the—like, for example, benefits are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate—the benefits will rise based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases. There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the promised benefits grow, if those—if that growth is affected, it will help on the red."—Explaining his plan to save Social Security, Tampa, Fla., Feb. 4, 2005
|
Does he even know what the subject is?
| LukeakaDanish wrote: |
Thankyou so much Texas Al for saying that. No more "keep the shares high" shell propaganda in this thread hopefully
Let the gaia teory take care of everyone who doesnt respect nature, and doesnt know how to fend for themselves...
|
Don't get too excited. I think the gaia theory is superstitious nonsense. And in that sense, yeah, I guess I am in favor of it taking care of people who don't respect nature. I support alternative energy and self-reliance for practical reasons, not for moral reasons.
And I am an unashamed supporter of free market capitalism, history's most successful mechanism for stimulating technological, scientific, and social progress. I don't own any Shell stocks, so I don't directly care about what their price is.
But I do know that if/when the global depression comes along it will mean hard, back-breaking work, violence, and hunger for everyone, including us decadent Western computer geeks. So I'm doing what I can to prevent it, or at least soften the landing.
| Quote: |
Does he even know what the subject is?
|
Probably not, but it doesn't matter. He has to stick it to those terrorist-loving welfare-squandering tree-hugging leftists. Can't let them have the last word.
