/townhall/ - Townhall

There's always a breaking point.  But it's a nice idea.

>>3546
Probably not.

>>3555
>That might as well be unconditional love.
True, perhaps.

>find someone they're more compatible with
That does sound nice.

>>3556
Hmm...can you love someone by not supporting their goals because their goals are self-destructive?  Probably.  It's a bit paternal, like a mother keeping a baby from going off a ledge.  Harder when you don't have that level of control.

>>3558
I see.

>>3596
Maybe it's possible to separate unconditional love and unconditional affection.
Post too long. Click here to view the full text.

>>3902
You could have at least said strasserism instead which was a strand of nazism that was at the least intended to be closer to socialism due to the complete lack of socialism in nazism. Strasserism is still bad though and still should be condemned. Socialism however in my opinion is fine outside of more authoritarian and oppression versions of state socialism and other questionable manifestations of it some of which are also questionable if they're socialism at all.

At any rate to answer OP's question no especially since fascism would still exist anyway as would ultranationalism of a similar nature to nazism.

>>3904
Don't forget lack of government as stateless socialism is a thing.

>>3912
Idk I think there are enough bad manifestations of more authoritarian versions of state socialism to make the choice interesting without bringing something into it that isn't socialism save for arguably strasserism.

>>3917
It really doesn't as there are already fairly well established definitions of socialism. Taking hitler's idea of socialism as socialism especially if you take it as the ONLY form of socialism as he advocates is like saying the political right is actually the political left. It's just pointless and counterproductive.

I wouldn't, but only because pure Capitalism would be just as deadly as pure Socialism and pure Communism.

A mixed system is the way to go. Some Socialist policies are good. Some things are better off in the hands of Capitalism.

If you could get me a button to erase all forms of Communism however, I would press it thrice for good measure.

>>3923
Yea, I'm of this opinion as well. You want to find a system that has the productivity of capitalism with the resource allocation of socialism. Such a system is likely impossible, but some kind of compromise that has a bit of both. The extreme of either is mass famine and poverty, either because there was no incentive for anyone to be productive (socialism problem) or because 3 people control everything and don't feel like sharing (oligarchy, aka the only logical endpoint to free-market capitalism). We want a system where people are working and putting in real effort, but not one where working 60 hour weeks isn't enough for basic necessities (looking at you, California)

>>3943
I just want to avoid insulting or offending any autistic people or normal people close to autistic people.

>>3943
Alternatively thinking people...
Malleoconscious individuals
Strong minded folks.

>>3945
Let's get back on topic.

If a symptom of autism is not understanding subtle and non-verbal cues, and a growing percentage of child audiences have autism, is it possible that cartoons have or will become gradually less subtle? Will more cartoons have to start spelling out a cartoon character's intentions more directly so the audience will understand?

>>3910
Well, I guess, as a prosocial pony, I try to minimize unpopular opinions.  I read a book where the authors said specialists in the field agreed on a connection between IQ and productivity, but I gather the book solidly failed peer review, and I have no research of my own, so I defer to the mainstream view of no association between IQ and much else in life, except perhaps whether a person gets the privilege of being able to pay dues to Mensa.

>>3915
It's true that not every position requires a high IQ.  For some positions, a person with IQ=130 might not be any faster than a person with IQ=85.  But other positions really do require a high level of intelligence.  If high-IQ individuals cost many times a low-IQ individual, then the right solution for a research-and-engineering-and-manufacturing organization will probably be a mix of people.  But if you eliminate ALL the high-IQ individuals, you can't really replace them even with 10,000 low-IQ individuals.

>Given that, I'm willing to place my money on the 10,000 people just trying things repeatedly until something works.
Not all tasks are parallelizable like that.  You might have hundreds of subsystems that need to function together.  And if you look at all the major advances in physics, none have been from people with below-average intelligence.

>>3918
> I try to minimize unpopular opinions.
You should instead try to minimize false beliefs, and only let evidence of truth be the deciding factor of what to believe.

>I defer to the mainstream view of no association between IQ and much else in life
That's not the mainstream view.  Hardly anyone with an IQ < 85 even graduates from college.

>>3919
I seek some social connection and I know about being agreeable.  If the mainstream sociologists have published their view on intelligence, and it's understandable, I may read it.  I assume those who work for NASA need college degrees, yes.

>>3813
>So I'm not sure what that situation has to do with what we are discussing.
I thought you said you followed the logic, in >>2866.

Maybe you can elaborate on why you think a call to investigate Jussie Smollett who is proper, but Trump's called to investigate Biden was improper.  What is the important difference?

>>3816
I'm not aware of any call to further investigate Jussie Smollett. I was under the impression that it was an open and shut case. He created a hoax and was almost immediately found out.

As for Trump investigating Biden, I think the issue here is that Trump did not go through the proper channels and organizations to investigate it. Instead he tried to pressure another nation into giving him information he could use against a political opponent.

An interesting update:
https://reason.com/2019/10/24/is-william-taylor-the-john-dean-of-ukrainegate/

After a report sent about this thread, it's been locked, and we're currently reviewing the report and thread contents!

This thread has not been found to meet the site standards for /Townhall/, and has subsequently been locked. Thank you all for your cooperation!

>>3420
>This place doesn't have an explicit political focus.
It's got a serious topic focus, though
I guess if you mean more scientific or philosophic topics, sure. But, that's more or less in the same boat for me.
I was wanting something less serious.

>>3423
We can't really force OP names, I think. There are some users on ponyville that are anonymous all the time.

I think you're right that it will create some discontent when users are banned for what is percieved as invalid reasons, but my hope is that people would channel that discontent by creating better threads and participating in the threads with the best frameworks.

if I'm right, I think this should lead to a system by which the quality of thread moderation systems is improved through an iterative approach.

But it could also suck major dick.

>>3418
I can agree this can be a problem. And often times one mod would not see a post as a problem, then another would come and claim it was once the thread had derailed.

I think the problem with this plan is that the modstaff is relatively small, made up of volunteers with their own lives outside of moderating, and their own biases. I'm not sure this system is going to help the problem they think it will.

Most public organisations and government organisations have, or should have an acquisition process. If you have a conflict of interest you shouldn't be part of that acquisition process. You could nominate your business, on the premise of being cheap sure. But that shouldn't garuntee your success. You can't scratch your own back using someone else's hand.

Private enterprises are allowed to do what they wish. They are not using other people's money. You can subsidise one of your private ventures with the other if you really want.

>>3786
Assuming that they are private ventures and you are the full owner. If it were an LLC or a publicly traded company then the laws are different.

Very very few companies have an ownership structure that would allow that degree of autonomy from an owner, including companies that only have one top executive who is the founder.

>>3787
Realistically yes. private companies typically have an acquisition process because it's a good idea anyway. They do not however have fiduciary duty to anyone.

Race is very much tied to culture, as certain cultures are more common or even exclusive to some races. But we should not use someone's race to guess their culture because it's possible to be any race and almost any culture.

That said, I DO believe there are certain experiences and are universal to people of certain races. But that's not really a "culture", as it were.

>>3654
Most of what Americans think of a "Chinese" food has a similar origin. What we think of as "Chinese" food is NOT what people in China eat. But that's pretty common. Pizza, as we know it, was invented in America. What Italian people call "Pizza" is very different from what we order from Dominoes.

Race is a folk taxonomy of people that sees people existing in discrete groups when otherwise humanity exist as what zoologists and ecologist call a "kline", that is alleles in the genepool tend to be spread out like a cloud, concentrated in one area of the geography spreading outwards and growing thinner to the point that discerning a discrete border is basically impossible.

So yes, race is pretty intrinsic to culture because it's up to culture to determine what arbitrary heritable characteristics you have are essential to determining your race, and distinguish them from the heritable characteristics they deem to be unessential in determining their own taxonomy of race caregories.

Should they be seperate? I mean, it might certainly allow some people a whole lot more personal freedom if cultural background was conceived as a wholly separate categorical scheme ... but that would most likely lead to subcultures that could still only be understood as intrinsically linked to those same race categories. Like, okay, "nerd" is no longer associated as a subcultural category closely associated with being white or asian, but now you have these distinct subgroups of that subgroup distinguished by race, i.e. "black nerds". I think, by their very nature, any social categorical schema generates a culture around the people placed in that category, especially if that category is based on something highly and constantly visible, which is biologically inherited and thus tends to occur in more concentrated in some locations than in others.

perhaps it would just be better to implement an educational curriculum that emphasizes critical thinking skills, with a big emphasis on the idea that the organizational schema you generate as you grow up from partly from experience and that you learn from cultural osmosis,  and which you use to make sense of and organize reality on a daily basis, is going to be perpetually tentative and need of revision when, inevitably, you run into real world exceptions to how you thought the world was organized, i.e. like when you run into that black nerd

>>3691
>Bernie's heart attack makes me wonder if he's physically fit to take the office, in my personal opinion.
Did you watch the debate?  It cleared up that question for me.  Bernie gave a vigorous performance.  I'm more worried about Biden.  He seems a little bit senile.

>>3691
>the last thing we need in the office is another old white guy.
Why do you think his race is relevant?  I think we should judge presidential candidates by the content of their character and other relevant job qualifications, not by the color of their skin.

>>3691
>But I feel like the US, especially the older voting demographics, isn't ready for a gay president.
I disagree.  Of the people who would refuse to vote for a gay man, I think few would vote for any other Democrat either.

>>3722
>Did you watch the debate?

I did. But one good performance doesn't mean Bernie is fit for the stresses of being the president for 4 years.

I don't think Biden is senile. I think he just has a tendency to ramble on.

>Why do you think his race is relevant?

Because race and racism, and reactions to said has been a polarizing issue connected with the current president. I want the next president to have pretty much the opposite opinions and stances to those issues that Trump does. And I feel like a person of color, who has real-world experience with racism and the divisive issues would be a better fit in these polarized times.

>Of the people who would refuse to vote for a gay man, I think few would vote for any other Democrat either.

That's a good point. But are you familiar with the Bradley effect?

>>3722
Vigorous preformances doesn't exactly mean you're healthy. It just means you have conviction for what you believe.
I don't know how bad his heart attack was, though.

>>3710
I've had fleeting thoughts that the people who did not want me to kill myself were being selfish. They did not know my pain, of what I had to do and deal with every day to continue living. That if they truly cared, they wouldn't try to stop me from ending that pain and suffering in what I thought was the only way I could ever escape it. But that was just my perspective as the person who wanted to commit suicide, and it was skewed by my emotions at the time. If you asked someone else, who's on the other side of seeing someone they cared about not wanting to live anymore, they would tell you the opposite. I think this song illustrate the dichotomy well.

>>3711
I fucking hate that song. Not because it's bad, but because my husband showed that to me and I spent months being terrified that he was going to try and kill himself. But yes, it's tells it quite well... I think this song shows another side too.

Eh but, what you were saying:

>If you asked someone else, who's on the other side of seeing someone they cared about not wanting to live anymore,

I don't know if it would be the opposite, exactly, so much as that they see a way that you could be, were you free of that pain. And maybe sometimes have no way to get you to that freedom, and that in it's own way can hurt very badly too. It's all very painful.

Yes. Easily. One child being beaten, abused, and tortured is a ridiculously low cost to pay for utopia. Think about how many abused children a large city naturally produces based on the natural harshness of reality, how many people suffer from sickness and homelessness or dead end jobs or gang violence or drug abuse... Trade the suffering of hundreds for the suffering of one? Easy. Why is this kid's suffering worse than the suffering of those who would suffer were he/she not?

Naturally i'd be curious to see what the details of the circumstances of this system are. If somehow getting the poor kid an epidural or otherwise mitigating his/her suffering while still maintaining the circumstances for utopia, of course it should be done.

If seeing something happen vs. not seeing something happen is someone's threshold for making decisions like that, i have no respect for that person. That's a weak, cowardly, ignorant, immoral perspective to have.

I need more information.

Does what is done to the child actually cause the peace and utopia? Like through some sort of supernatural or magical means? Or is it just a tradition that is kept with no real effect? Does the child need to be constantly abused, or can he be shown kindness in between? How is the child chosen?  

I get that it is a metaphor. That for developed nations to function, especially in capitalism there must be an exploited underclass. But you are asking me to take the story literally, so I need more information.

It would be good to seek an alternative, but realistically would I leave utopia over this?  I don't think so, no.  All societies have been built on some amount of suffering, and none of those have been utopias.  That we've managed to advance society to a utopian level while also reducing suffering to just a single person is rather a magnificent feat.  Ideally, moving forward, even that person could be saved, and I'd stick to it in hopes that I can see that happen.

>>3551
Don’t be deceived when they tell you things are better now. Even if there’s no poverty to be seen because the poverty’s been hidden. Even if you ever got more wages and could afford to buy more of these new and useless goods which industries foist on you and even if it seems to you that you never had so much, that is only the slogan of those who still have much more than you. Don’t be taken in when they paternally pat you on the shoulder and say that there’s no inequality worth speaking of and no more reason to fight because if you believe them they will be completely in charge in their marble homes and granite banks from which they rob the people of the world under the pretence of bringing them culture. Watch out, for as soon as it pleases them they’ll send you out to protect their gold in wars whose weapons, rapidly developed by servile scientists, will become more and more deadly until they can with a flick of the finger tear a million of you to pieces

>>3551
There's some interesting parallels to modern social media. Rebellion for rebellion sake and defining oneself through other people.

>>3442
This is really a nuclear level take, lol.

>>3440
>any social hierarchy will be the right social hierarchy for its proper subjects
What do you mean by "proper subjects"?  Depending on what you mean, I'd say that your statement is either true by definition (in which case some social hierarchies don't have any 'proper subjects'), or else obviously false.

>>3515
I'm going for more, true by definition.  Wherever and whenever you have authorities and subjects, and these authorities support hierarchies that put some above others, in terms of a range of social measures -- wealth, freedom, power, whatever.  If you are to be generally respectful -- and I gather that's what makes people happy or at least the least unhappy -- you must see these systems of enforcement and rank as moral systems applied to proper subjects, at least mostly.