posted
Steel: >And besides, they're already manipulating the >tests; who's to say they won't manipulate the >tests for the watchdog group?
You misunderstand the nature of watchdog groups.
As Ben Franklin (I think) once said, "The price of Liberty is eternal vigilence." Watchdog groups are people who volunteer to do the watching. There is no test to join, except for said individuals actually caring enough to get off their butts and do something.
>And, harkening to an earlier post, > >>No professor I've ever heard of gives partial >>credit for a right answer that's not the one >>that's most right. So, too, in voting." > >Problem is: who's the professor? Who ultimately >decides right from wrong?
The professor and decision makers would be the economy, GDP, and other measures of national success. If you choose wisely, your economy does well. Then your nation, and its citizens, flourish. If you choose poorly, then it doesn't.
>A democracy is governed by numbers: by the >majority.
Actually, there are a lot of checks which have been put in place to prevent tyranny of the majority. See 'The Federalist Papers' for full details.
suntranafs: >George Orwell's book gave me nightmares. Almost >nothing gives me nightmares like that. I do not >think it was realistic.
"Orwell was an optimist." -- Kibo More details below...
>The media would still be there to express all >the views of the world.
You mean like CNN was there, "fairly" expressing the views of the world after 9/11? Showing old footage and making up headlines out of whole cloth to present the story you want is fair?
Go to your history books and do some research on "yellow journalism". The Pravda-style news situation isn't the only time when you get bad news.
>but let them just try to corrupt 2+2=4 without >getting caught.
The CNN thing I mentioned above is only the most obvious of a constant string of corrupting things like 2+2=4 that goes on all the time.
Try this experiment, please: watch any news channel, or read any newspaper or news magazine of your choice. Pick any current story or article, and then go do a personal investigation (NOT web or library research) to find out what really happened. Compare what you find with what the news reported. I can promise you that at least half the reported "facts" have been falsified.
If you don't have the rersources to do this yourself, get on google and look up what Thomas Jefferson found when he did what I've just suggested. Yes, *that* Thomas Jefferson. This isn't a new problem.
>Just what the government did that could possibly >affect the lives of its citizens would be in one >section, and extremely trivial ones in abother >section Steel replies: >3. An honest government-run governtment >reporting agency... a great idea, but impossible >to pull off.
Actually, here in the U.S., we've already got one. It's called 'The Federal Register'.
Ever heard of it? Don't worry, I hadn't either, until a few weeks ago. I still haven't succeeded in actually finding a copy. I'm beginning to suspect that when I do find it, it will be similiar to the line from 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy': "Oh, yes. It was 'on display' in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet, in a disused lavatory, with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."
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Long ago, it was noticed by netizens that if any discussion went on long enough, one side would eventually compare people and/or ideologies of the other side to those of Hitler.
For this reason, and because bandwidth is expensive, when Hitler is mentioned, the discussion is officially over, and all sides go home to lick their wounds.
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Interesting theory about Hitler , though possibly impractical. Siece wrote: ' "Orwell was an optimist." -- Kibo' Tell you what Siece, I'm willing to sell you the Brooklyn bridge for 50$... and in fact for only 10$ more, I'll throw in the whitehouse! Just give me your credit card # in your next post. I mean to don't mean to be unimaginative, here, but there's no way that guy could have read 1984 and understood its implications.
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suntranafs: >I mean to don't mean to be unimaginative, here, >but there's no way that guy could have read 1984 >and understood its implications.
He understood the implications all too well.
How much do you know about current politics, beyond what you see on TV? Do names like the Carlyle Group, the Council on Foreign Relations, or the Black Skulls ring any bells?
If you'd really like to know what Kibo though about the book, however, feel free to go over to usenet and ask him why he said that.
Apathy: >I love the Hitchhiker's Guide! Except for the >last book... it was kind of demented.
Which last book, Mostly Harmless, or Salmon of Doubt?
If the latter, you should know that that one wasn't supposed to be a Hitchhiker's novel. Before he died, Adams said it just wouldn't work like that, so he started to rewrite it as a Dirk Gently novel. After he died, some bad decisions were made, so the Hitchhiker's version (which Adams said sucked and couldn't be fixed) is the one that got published. Please don't consider it a part of the H2G2 universe.
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Actually, I thought it was the other way around; it started as a Dirk Gently book, most of the version in the Salmon of Doubt collection IS the Dirk Gently one, but he decided that a) he wanted to revisit the Hitchhiker universe because he'd finally repented of Mostly Harmless and b) the themes of the book (whatever those would have been) worked better as a Hitchhiker novel.
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Well, the key to making a commentator like Locke work is to have the "other" commentator engage the Locke figure.
If Rush Limbaugh, for example, began to engage a moderate editorialist, that is what it would take.
The problem with moderatism is that it doesn't grab anyone with emotion (at least to begin with).
I was about to write another five thousand words, but the bottom line, if you want to create a Locke, you probably need to create someone else who engages the Locke character.
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Ah, but that's simply not possibly an accurate statement. There's no way in heck you could have read this whole thread, and therefore how do you judge. The particular flaw in plemet's entire thread is that it has no point. It's simply a negative. A accusation that Abyss's question was a stupid one. And there are no stupid questions, only stupid answers. Personally, anyway, I think a book's analogy to the real world is far and away more valuable and interesting than the real world's analogy to a book. Give me a f***ing break.
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You posted in both "Our Locke" and "our Locke". What do you have against the ideas and concepts put forward here? Why are you desperately trying to sabotage the "Where is" threads?
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posted
and I am proven wrong by the extended patience of the mod.
Aside from the rules of the board that I carelessly ignored in my headlong rush to get into the nitty-gritty, is there someplace I can read over the general and specific rules? I noticed (logging on late - a product of my west coast locale and busy schedule) that some of the threads have been closed. Under what circumstances does this take place? Topic? Staleness? (date of last post), etc?
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Okay, I made my first post in this thread... "April 22, 2002 11:17 AM"
Since then I've made many posts, on this thread alone; to say nothing of my posts in other threads. Why, when I look at my post count in my profile, do I see "5 posts"??
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1. Introduced me to hatrack(and ornery), without it I never would have gotten involved. While some of the people may dislike me an not view this as a good thing, I, personally, at least in a manner of speaking, am proud to call a few of you my friends.
2. Introduced me to a wide new world of ideas, even though many of them have been my own. Truly, I am a worldy thinker and very interested in very wide affairs, and before this thread, I had thought quite a bit about governments, the foundation of governments, and the building of governments, but before this thread, even though I read Card's books, I'd hardly even considered a WORLD government. Now, not only have I thought about many of the many aspects of it, not only do I think it's a good idea, but I think it may very well be neccessary to the survival of the human race.... for more than one reason.
In conclusion, I'd say that this thread has postively influenced my life and furthered my personal quest for enlightinment. To all those who have brought this inteligent discussion together, Thank You.
quote: What I Was Saying Was That We Should All Be Our Own Leaders. That When We Obviously Are Upset With The Rulers We Should Work To Overthrow Them And Put In A System That We Like And Works. The True Leaders Only Show When The People Have Decided That The One They Have Is Wrong. Who Would Napolean Have Been If There Was Never A Revolution? We Must Get The Ball Rolling For The Good Leaders To Arise.
And we should all stop murder from ever happening, keep everyone from speeding, and remove all corrupt politicians from office. Sorry, but while that idea is good-hearted, it is a smite to optimistic.
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posted
Sorry, Abyss, I found myself running out of inteligent things to say... temporarily.
Ok, a couple of questions: For starters, does anybody but Siece disagree with me that this planet is quickly running out of resources and that Space exploration and colonization is necessary to the survival of(and for that matter, "moral, intelectual, spirtual, and economical" advancement of) the human race? Secondly, what would you all say if I said that a world government is crucial to large scale space colonization?
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posted
To the first one, yes, to the second one, no.
Should/must we explore/colonize space? Yes. If the human race is going to continue to grow at the rate it is growing, we will need more resources. Those resources can come from space.
Is a world government neccesary for space exploration? I doubt it. I feel that it could be accomplished through private enterprises. With the attitude government takes towards funding space exploration, it'll probably have to be private enterprises who colonize space.
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Sure, for rich people to visit the moon... 'Commercialized' space exploration? Basically thats random people -exploring- space. And we cant get out of the solar system... This is far away, and even the mere possibilty of it is in question. Unless we make another planter habitable, or find one we can get to, no 'commercialized' space exploration is going to happen. What exactly would they explore? Theres very little reason to go anywhere, and the few people that do go off into space cant really be considered commercial. Eccentric at best.
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Well, I guess we have our answer to that particular question.
"...Is a world government neccesary for space exploration? I doubt it. I feel that it could be accomplished through private enterprises. With the attitude government takes towards funding space exploration, it'll probably have to be private enterprises who colonize space. .."
I tend to agree with Apathy on this. I have a difficult time seeing government doing anything about the need to expand into space before our problems reach critical mass. Government has a tendency to grow complacent without stimulus. We see examples of this throughout history: in World War II, American government ignored the escalating fascism problem until it smacked them in the face. Or, more acurately, in Hawaii. Before September Eleventh, American Government ignored foreign terrorism, or at least did too little about it. The examples go on and on... the tendency of a democratic government is to turn its eyes inward, focus on useless internal, domestic issues, basically focusing on re-elections and little else; ignoring important issues outside of their immediate view.
The chance that the government will make a preemptive move into space is doubtful.
However, I do not see enterprise as the first movers into space, the first colonizers. Commodities in space, while abundant, are slow to ship. Getting the food from point A to point B takes a very long time: before the first shipment arrives back to Earth, the founders of Space Incorporated will be long dead. Not a feasible business.
But freedom... freedom can move at the speed of light.
I see the first colonizers as being the same as the colonizers of America... pilgrims. Seekers of religious freedom. Cults, perhaps, but religions nevertheless. I would imagine that they would be the first to leave the Earth... in search of freedom.
posted
I suppose that's a point, but I think it's a bit more complex than just "religous" freedom.
The points made so far about government and space exploration are all well and good, but all the references have been to current governments, most of which are old, dried up and corrupt. Revolutionary governments, on the other hand, have every capability of doing vastly new things quickly. If we had a new, improved, and powerful world government, especially one in which the exploration of space was recognized as a neccessity, I think that nearly any such goal could be achieved.
One of my questions asked whether a world government (as opposed to current governments) is a neccessary prerequisite to space explorization and colonization, and the main answer being given is..... yes? I mean you can't say ANY government based space travel is flat impossible, unless you're just a complete pessimist. Think of it, if we designed and built this world government, with the idea of space travel in mind, and things worked out at all ideally, unless everything went all to hell,(this could happen rather easily if we weren't careful) then we could definitely achieve a space program that would really go somewhere, literally.
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posted
Hmm. Very interesting. The problem is, when you say "Revolutionary governments, on the other hand, have every capability of doing vastly new things quickly," the image that comes to my mind when hearing "revolutionary government" is rioting Venezuelans. Revolutionary governments tend to have very, very little money. Now, if the World Govt. came about peacefully, it's not really revolutionary. If it came about as a result of a massive war, it is much more likely that it would be fast-paced enough to consider space travel a good idea.
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posted
C'mon Steel, you can have a revolution without a war. Still, ouch... you're right, ouch. Sort of. It would really take a hellofasomethin' to get all governments to unite under a world government, quickly , and thus have revolutionary momentum and innovation carry over.
Irregardless, though, It seems to me that once it got going, one unified government would be way more able to have an effective space program than all the two bit beuracracies that we've got now.
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posted
All very good points, but... Where are they all gonna go to? I think the first most likely place to be colonized is the moon. All you have to deal with there is lack of air and temp changes.. Looking at other planets in our system, its just not reasonable. The environment is far too unstable currently to support any significanly sized population. Mainly because its not economically feasible. We dont have the money/resources/equipment to colonize a planet around here. And I doubt we will have them any time soon.
As for going outside our solar system, as of right now this is a bit ridiculous. im not sure how many lightyears the nearest star is away, but think about it... How many people do you need to successfully colonize? How much food will those people be needing, and how much food will their offspring be needing, etc... Probably have to bring along a big garden and a herd of cows.. Its a very very long trip. Centuries at least. And then when they get there, it turns out to be a system with nothing habitable anyway.
I do agree that some relgious group will eventually start this up. It will have to be a very rich one.
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posted
What about Mars? For colonzation, I mean. As far as I know, the moon is basically just a chunk of rock.
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posted
What is Justice? We must begin with what Justice is not. Justice is not repaying one's debts because repayment is not always beneficial and therefore unjust. Justice is not many things, but for the sake of being succinct, let us not go into detail. To illustrate the nature of Justice-in-man, an analogy to a state is helpful. The state is known as Plato's Ideal State. The Ideal State is composed of two main classes. The one class, the craftsmen, lives private lives and may accumulate wealth. An important feature of the class is that you may only have one job (function) in life, and it is determined by the state according to what is best suited for you. The second class is made up of two "sub-classes", the Guardians and the auxiliaries. A Guardian is, in effect, a ruler. They are trained from childhood to be wise, brave, and disciplined. It is only in this way that they can be effective rulers. A ruler must selflessly make decisions in accordance to what is good for the community; therefore, they must live lives without owning property or knowing wealth. It is also in this way, that the pros and cons of every class cancel each other out. On the one hand, the Guardians have power and knowledge, on the other; the craftsmen have wealth and success. As for the auxiliaries, theirs is much the life of a Guardian in that they may not live private lives or own property. The auxiliaries serve as soldiers for the state. Both Guardians and auxiliaries are chosen as children by their intellect and bravery. You may ask how this state illustrates Justice-in-man. The Ideal State functions only when all three classes are in perfect harmony. This means that the Guardians must be in control of both the craftsmen and the auxiliaries, though the auxiliaries often step in on behalf of the Guardians. In man, there are three main things that function together, reason, emotion, and desire. Reason must always control both emotion and desire. It is only in the way that he may come to have a “well-ordered soul” and, therefore, be just. Justice is had, only when a man has a well-ordered mind.
posted
An interesting parallel can be drawn between the philosopher Plato and the philosopher Karl Marx. Both of them had intiguing ideas concerning the functioning methods of society. Both put forward new theories as to the functions of a perfect, or ideal, society.
Neither societies work in their practical application. Marxism failed. Those who attempted to implement his ideas quickly fell into decadence. Plato's Ideal State failed. When Plato tested his concepts for an Ideal State, it could not function. Why? Because the State is not a machine devised for human ease. It is not a system which can be vastly improved upon within the span of a few years, a few decades. It is an organism. A natural evolutionary facet of the human race. If it is to be improved upon, if the structure of society is to be changed, then it must be cultivated over a period of centuries, millenia. If it is not cultivated in this way, society will react to invading concepts and ways of life in the same way that an organism fights off a virus.
If societal change is to be attempted, it will not be done by a sweeping revolution. It must be done in slow, painstaking steps, or the revolutionary ideas will be purged and the old ways of life will return in a worse manner than before, as an organism funstions after a life-threatening illness.
Justice? How does one find justice in order-of-the-mind? Justice is not, has never been, an internal affair of a man. I am not just if I am orderly. I am just if I do not act out against those around me. Respect. It is not the order of the mind that brings justice, it is the order of one's actions. A homicidal man may have a meticulously ordered brain, and yet be still a homicidal, i.e, unjust, man. Conversely, a man may be the most just and considerate man in his actions and be of the most disorderly mind. The key difference is the actions of the man, not his thinking processes.
Justice cannot be defined by one's actions because justice is a Form and actions are mere images (apples to oranges). Also, a homicidal man cannot have a well-ordered mind for in commiting murder, he has let his passion over-through his reason and, therefore, is no longer of an ordered-mind. Similarily, the man of an unordered-mind cannot be just for he acts on his whims and impulses. One may argue that a man with an impulse towards what is just is in essence a just man, but this cannot be, for impulses will never be reliable or sure enough to accurately reflect true Justice.
posted
See the little "pen and paper" icon on top of your post? That's "Edit", and it means you don't have to bother with the little asterisks. Glad to be of service.
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posted
How can justice be measured? When observing a man, how does one declare "He is just!" or "He is unjust!" ? We cannot measure a man's justice based on the order of his mind, for we cannot weigh the order of the man's mind. We can only weigh the justice of his actions. If an unorderly man acts justly, who are we to denounce his just actions? If a well ordered man commits murder, must we then exalt him in his justice?
If there were a device by which the order of a man's mind could be measured, then the order of his mind may then be used to determine his justice. But while no such device exists, his justice must be weighed by his actions.
Consider re-reading the post. A murderous man cannot possibly be well-ordered; therefore, he is unjust. Similarily, an unordered-man cannot possibly commit a just act for an act of justice is only born of a just man.
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