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A fellow historian? There are so many similarities to the fall of the Roman Empire and the current views of the Democratic Party that are gaining traction, it's like nobody is paying attention. ....
What do you see, given the changes, as the most important parallels? Note some things are simply different. Today's fighting age male may operate (essentially) a mouse / joystick inside a Abrams tank; he may operate four Predator drones across the world from a base in Nevada. But he does not need thousands of hours of practice with spear and the sword. |
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.... You are wrong. There is a spacecraft planned, its what goes on top of the bfr " Super Heavy"... Called " Starship":  In this CGI picture the launch vehicle " Super Heavy" is returning back to earth while the spacecraft " Starship" goes to an earth orbit to refuel with a similar shaped (but fuel only) vessel; to then carry on with its mission carrying people and cargo. Here is the official site of their plans: https://www.spacex.com/marsAnd here are more details of the spacecraft: http://spaceflight101.com/spx/its-spaceship/Some quick back-of-the-envelope calculations tell me this will burn up on re entry 100% reliably. |
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....
I do believe democracy is the best system we can have currently. Democracy means power to the citizens.....
Not the best, but possibly the worst. Look at Noam Chomsky's discussions about how to manipulate pure democracies, so that the votes produce the "best decisions" as previously decided by the elite. As soon as manipulation works, and it does, then "democracy" does not mean "Power to the citizens." |
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Just happened to comment that there was no business model for small groups or colonies on Mars; that's unchanged and cannot change. Well, he wants the company doing the business of moving cargo and passengers to and from Mars. Perhaps .... Lot of hype, no business model for Mars. By the way, something that should be obvious but apparently is not. Going to Mars is eight months in a SPACECRAFT, and that's one way. Musk is not building spacecraft. He is building launch rockets... The spacecraft that could possibly do Mars is variants of the Constellation / Orion NASA project. |
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Lol! As liberal and biased as NPR is, at least they value facts. No matter how much the MSM attempts to spin the truth, the facts can't be hidden any longer. One of their own just outed their lies: https://www.npr.org/2018/11/27/670807343/fact-check-whats-happening-on-the-u-s-mexico-border7000 invaders at the Tijuana border. Thousands attempted to bumrush the border crossing in an attempt to "protest" the slow process of invading our country. ROFLMFAO! The double speak is palpable. 450 apprehended yesterday trying to cross the border, 25% are not from Mexico or Central America. |
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.... Oh you mean the heavy gold coins I always keep in my pocket? Here, take them and go, but let me know if anybody would accept them as payment. I painted them myself, don't they look absolutely authentic?  If they are not really gold then keep them. Maybe those guys will take them and you can get away. But you would have to stop praying to get away... How about this? Go ahead and give me your car keys, and those tickets to the Lakers game you had for tonight with your girlfriend. I'll keep her company so she doesn't miss the game. Just call us and we'll come and pick you up. Unless it is in the middle of the game or too late of course. And you might ought to give me those tickets for the Cancun trip also... How long will the prayer session continue, do you have any idea? Should I just mark down to pick you up in a week or two?  My car keys? Sure you can take them. Drive it at your own risk though, I nicked it during an NBA match from some basketball fan, he was busy watching the Lakers and didn't notice his pockets being picked. Let's say cops are currently hunting for a car with license plate "$P3NDU7U5". There is also a sticker on the rear window that says "Let's Colonize the Moon" Lakers tickets? Sorry I only buy NBA finals tickets  My girlfriend? You can take her even before taking my car keys, at least I would get to spend this weekend free from headaches. In fact, you can keep her, but I want my car keys back  Disclaimer: All statements I made are not true, I love my girlfriend. If she ever sees this post, it might be our last conversation together on BTC forum *** Lol okay I'm thru...just making the point that praying might not be the best solution method in all circumstances... |
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Well, you'd need the materials to build those cities with...
How about colonizing Antarctica? It'd be a whole lot easier than another planet, although it would still be very difficult.
You can get a lot of materials from the Venus itself. All you need to transport from the Earth it's the materials for the first sustainable factory. The rest will be sourced locally and transformed to whatever is needed. About Antarctica, what would be the point? Maybe just as an exercise to train for Mars or Venus colonization. Because the thing here is that we need to become a multi-planetary specie and remove the single point of failure that Earth is right now. Humans can vanish from Earth for a dozen reasons and if we don't have a sustainable colony on another planet, the specie will disappear. And I think we should work to not let that happen. Venus? no, you can't get materials. IIRC, the surface temperatures were around 900F, so no going down there. Some speculation exists about living in airborne vehicles, like Zeppelins or such, in the upper Venusian atmosphere. Antarctica would be useful to test self sufficient biospheres, which we have never achieved. Thus it's totally correct to say we DON'T KNOW HOW to build a colony off earth. |
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Now there is for many of society's needs a third option.
I agree. We had "all done by state" or "all done by private corp". Most systems going in between in a complicate equilibrium, always a bit shitty. Now we have the "all done by ourselves cause we can be our own government". I don't see downsides to this. I'm ultra left, I think it's the best possible thing. It's like communism, but actually working I am interested in the ways that crypto currency can change society and our lives. Not really sure about which ways will prove with time to be superior, but am certain big changes are coming. It's impossible for these not to have an impact on the traditional dichotomy of communism/capitalism and as you note, their interplay in any particular societal construct. |
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Around here there must have been ten thousand Bird electric scooters dropped all over, just grab one and go. That's capitalism at work, letting the users decide if and where they like it. You? You'd just tell them how to live. Here are your very words. (And in the name of Saving the Planet...)
Yeaaaah! We've replace addiction to petrol by addiction to Lithium! Horay \o/ But just think. You can still buy a Toyota Hybrid, and have BOTH Evils. |
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.... Oh you mean the heavy gold coins I always keep in my pocket? Here, take them and go, but let me know if anybody would accept them as payment. I painted them myself, don't they look absolutely authentic? If they are not really gold then keep them. Maybe those guys will take them and you can get away. But you would have to stop praying to get away... How about this? Go ahead and give me your car keys, and those tickets to the Lakers game you had for tonight with your girlfriend. I'll keep her company so she doesn't miss the game. Just call us and we'll come and pick you up. Unless it is in the middle of the game or too late of course. And you might ought to give me those tickets for the Cancun trip also... How long will the prayer session continue, do you have any idea? Should I just mark down to pick you up in a week or two? |
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....
Anyway space has multiple commercial benefits, and they have already done what nobody else did before: reuse stages, to lower launch costs. SpaceX can probably remain afloat while the master goal of going to Mars (and back) becomes reality, tho Elon Musk himself refuses to go, he sent his car for lulz...
Master goal? I don't care what Musk has as goals. Just happened to comment that there was no business model for small groups or colonies on Mars; that's unchanged and cannot change. Therefore, there will be no colonies on Mars. I could be wrong, just show the business model that would support the travel and colony costs for humans. But I don't see it for Mars. |
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.... Or we could pray I don't know if that is a good idea, but how about this. You pray, but just in case that does not work out well, give me that heavy bag of gold in your pocket? I'll run away really fast, and they won't catch me. I promise to give it back to you if you wind up alive. Let's meet in two hours at The Snake Charmer Inn. I'll have two pitchers of beer on the table. You don't mind if I spend just a little bit of the gold for the beer, do you? We can discuss the injustice of stereotyping then. Kind of looks like those guys are getting closer. Now just hand that bag of gold over. I'll take real good are of it. |
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The intention is what really counts, but banning may not be the best way to curtail the havoc that it poses. Since weapon have there own advantages in that it helps in defending one's self. It can't be totally ban, there should be a way around it.
I always thought that along with a weapon, one should have perhaps a thousand rounds of ammo for it. How about we compromise, and ban ammo beyond five hundred rounds per pistol or rifle? |
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Those "enterprising individuals" are now your government, but they answer to no one. Those fees collected via microtransactions are your taxes except they aren't doing this for free. They are going to charge as much as people are willing to pay in order to turn a profit. Your anarchocapitalist dreamworld is really just dictatorship by capital.
I have not envisioned a utopia. Just noted that various possibilities exist currently, which have not in the prior history of civilization. In the past, many such things were "done by government," paid for by taxes collected. Now everything is changed. In the past, this in part led to political theories such as communism and capitalism, and various gradations and nuances of them. Now there is for many of society's needs a third option. |
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Spendulus was saying that sometimes it is beneficial to have heuristics, especially during times of "fight-or-flight".
BADecker joked about it, which I think is hilarious XD
Ok, though I'm still not sure how having or not having heuristics is applied to what I said xD Don't worry about it, what you said was absolutely correct Well, I guess that works for me, lolz xD Put it this way. We could discuss the philosophical matter of improperly stereotyping. While running... |
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According to the plans published, there won't be any artificial gravity on BFR. I clearly remember Elon Musk saying the BFR will be constantly accelerating to maintain gravity until the middle where it turns around start constant deceleration intended to keep gravity as well. The 0G would only last while orbiting and when turning around in mid route to switch from acceleration into deceleration. I generally agree with most of the points, but I think small colonies are feasible, similar to the Antartica bases. If they build underground, the radiation and weather issues would probably be mitigated. I would guess if they happen to find some valuable mineral (ie. Gold) things would move on nicely (and the gold price would go down nicely as well...). gold? the cost to move a pound just to the moon is about 3x the price of gold, to get something on a return trip would be far, far higher. as for constant acceleration, that would require one of the several versions of ion propulsion, which would create a very, very slight gravity. not really noticeable. better to just consider as no gravity. bfr is a launch vehicle, not a spacecraft. it could launch anything.... i stand by my former comment... ....it will be the Moon, not Mars, that is first colonized. The Moon is lacking in some elements which makes it harder, but it has massive solar energy power source. The reason it will be the moon is quite simple. There is no viable business model for Mars; there is one for the Moon, and that would be 3 week vacations. |
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What were the reasons for the birth of the creation of this universe are still a mystery for the scientists as well as the so called firm believer of God .No one knows the exact planning of this creation .It is just the reasoned thinking we are calling ourselves athiests and thiests .The theory of nothingness is widely accepted by both the communities .It is just like that a seed came first or the tree because a tree is grown with the seed and the seed is grown from the fruit of the tree which came first is still not known and matter of the following which theory we like to follow.
Similar is the theory of athiests and thiests it is just a matter of the following which theory you like most.
I think it's important to understand that when a phenomena is looked at from the scientific viewpoint, the very LAST THING to attribute as causation is "the Work of God (you fill in your version)." In fact, it's more typical that if the causation is not understood or is unknown, that will be simply stated as such. It's only with the emergence of this method of thinking in the 17th century, that Europe pulled itself out of the medieval mindset and we started to progress in many ways. Further, note that often it's the mark of a lazy mind to flippantly attribute God as cause. |
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The article is a criticism of green capitalism which does indeed need to be criticized. Green capitalists think we can buy and sell our way out of this mess and for the reasons laid out in the article, they are wrong.
We not only need to shift to renewables but we HAVE to consume a lot less and theres just no way around that. It can't be shifting the money and consumption somewhere else, but we have to find ways to reduce the consumption.
For example, the green capitalist would say everyone should just trade their gas car for an electric car but I would say we should build livable communities where people can walk instead of needing to drive. The most environmentally friendly trip is the one that doesn't have to happen in the first place.
You are ignoring that while it's happening right in front of you. People are ordering far more things online and having them delivered, rather than "going shopping." My number of trips to places like Home Depot is way, way down compared to 5 years ago. As for walking instead of driving? Around here there must have been ten thousand Bird electric scooters dropped all over, just grab one and go. That's capitalism at work, letting the users decide if and where they like it. You? You'd just tell them how to live. Here are your very words. (And in the name of Saving the Planet...) we should build livable communities where people can walk instead of needing to drive. |
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I could give you many such examples. The question is really ridiculous isn't it?
You've made a gigantic leap there from "roads" to "healthcare" and then to "all".
The US healthcare system is a mess BECAUSE of the lock that insurance companies and big providers have on the government. That's a Kapitalist-Socialist system illustrative of the evil that socialistic policy engenders, not the evil of capitalism.
If you want to ignore the institutional changes made possible by crypto coins and micropayments, go ahead.
I'm not. I'm just finding funny how you point out the evil of socialism while capitalism leads to the same thing... Capitalism -> Capital gets rewarded -> Wealth gets concentrated at least temporary -> Individuals have the power to influence government and social rules -> your "Kapitalist-Socialist system" Socialism -> More power to government -> At a point some individuals get most of the power with having selfish interests -> your "Kapitalist-Socialist system" It's just that you put the blame on some kind of "socialism" while capitalism does the same thing just by another road. Saying private companies would do better is stupid because the end result is the same. It's not the same at all, but neither does this have anything to do with my comment about road funding and operation. "Some individuals get most of the power (blah blah blah)" yeah some people are more skilled and capable that others. Try to stick to the subject instead of meaningless generalities. Consider creating a village from scratch. Enterprising individuals go and build roads, and collect fees via crypto micropayments automatically. Never been possible before. Now it is. |
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