US Election 2016

[kyle]

@monkey, What I said, was not meant to sound like they all are that way, I believe you a lot of them are good people, I think I've mentioned that in the past here, My point was they do let in known criminals like https://x.com/WallStreetApes/status/1851117454811877472

I think I've said enough in regards to the election. I simply do not have as much time as I'd like to devote to looking up more of the counterpoints. This thread though has moved me a bit. I more or less have decided to take some time to address my own heath, I've been getting a little too massive for my liking, I've started and stopped a lot of times, and stops were because of big events that took away my extra time, and habitats are hard as hell to break. But I guess according to sinewav if I fix this, my brain is still flawed and i'm just experiencing survivorship bias?

I'll still check in from time to time though

[sinewav]

... habitats are hard as hell to break. But I guess according to sinewav if I fix this, my brain is still flawed and i'm just experiencing survivorship bias?

Yes. When it comes to things like free will and willpower you can't put your finger on them anymore than you can explain why you have a favorite color. But you do have a favorite color and a sense of agency so you are compelled to make decisions. However, the root of that decision making is opaque and almost certainly deterministic.

Some people take credit for their successes and blame others for their failure. Some do the opposite. Probably even fewer take responsibility for both. I take responsibility for neither (all my success in life is simply luck). So when I wish you luck on achieving your health goals I really mean it more than anyone!

[Z-Man]

Right, moderator head off again, seems to no longer be required.

homicide rates IN Mexico specifically are two to three times higher than in the USA

If Mexico were as rich as the USA is and the USA were as poor as Mexico is (i.e. the wealth of these two countries were swapped), I bet that the homicide rates would, to a large degree, follow suit (swap).

Probably, yeah. Also, if you're going to base your racist immigration or travel policy on that factoid, look at where US citizens would no longer be able to go if the rest of the world were to apply the same standards. South America would be fine, but Europe, Australia, China and the northern half of Africa would be out. Russia and India would be fine. Canada borderline.

@monkey, What I said, was not meant to sound like they all are that way, I believe you a lot of them are good people, I think I've mentioned that in the past here, My point was they do let in known criminals like https://x.com/WallStreetApes/status/1851117454811877472

Is... that one of your trusted sources? Look, the post there reads as if there are a thousand convicted violent illegal immigrants in that jail. The actual number from the video? ZERO. That is right. They're suspects. And even discounting that, of the ICE hold prisoners, only a fraction are in there for suspicion of violent crimes, the post reads like it's all of them. I don't even have to point out it's FOX News obviously cherry-picking (It's ONE Jail, not even state-wide data). And yeah, of course, every single murder is a tragedy and should not be downplayed, I'm not attempting to do that.
In case you're wondering why you still feel like crime is on the rise, it's because you consume news like that. I'd try to stop.

... habitats are hard as hell to break. But I guess according to sinewav if I fix this, my brain is still flawed and i'm just experiencing survivorship bias?

Yes. When it comes to things like free will and willpower you can't put your finger on them anymore than you can explain why you have a favorite color. But you do have a favorite color and a sense of agency so you are compelled to make decisions. However, the root of that decision making is opaque and almost certainly deterministic.

With a bit of quantum randomness sprinkled in, yes, I agree there.
HOWEVER, our brain is still so vastly complex that it is impossible to predict. Stephen Hawking describes it such: Free Will is still a pretty darn good effective theory. (Not his exact words) Which means that for actually predicting human behavior, the assumption that there is something like Free Will somewhere inside the mushy bits we don't fully understand leads to overall good results. Our brains are constantly trying to improve themselves, to try and cope better with this world that evolution has left them completely unprepared for. Throughout our lives. Even on people with dementia, the brain rearranges itself so that the really important parts still can get handled. There is no telling how any given individual reacts to input. Some people react positively to encouragement. Some to competitive challenges. Some even to negging.

Right, all that: No, we don't have Free Will, but we better act like we do. It's a bit like money, or the economy. None if it should work, our money is literally just famous people with numbers printed on slips of paper, but it works because everyone pretends it is worth something.

Yeah, it can be hard to break old habits. That's why it is sometimes easier to just form new habits that then get to replace the old ones over time. If you're looking for exercise, I can recommend cycling or swimming. Both can be done at almost any fitness level. If you're looking to lose weight: the one thing where absence of Free Will is evident is this, if you have chocolate or chips or any other high caloric food in the house, you are going to eat it. Rather sooner than later. So the trick is simple: Don't buy the stuff in the first place! That's a way more economical way to spend your willpower, you only need that in the few minutes you are shopping and not the whole week. For me, that single change got rid of the ten pounds that had accumulated over the last years and were separating me from sort-of-ideal weight. (My Doctor claims that actually, for men my age, the upper range of the 'normal' BMI range is the healthiest place to be, and OF COURSE I believe that because it is convenient.)

[Monkey]

@monkey, What I said, was not meant to sound like they all are that way, I believe you a lot of them are good people, I think I've mentioned that in the past here, My point was they do let in known criminals like https://x.com/WallStreetApes/status/1851117454811877472

Is... that one of your trusted sources? Look, the post there reads as if there are a thousand convicted violent illegal immigrants in that jail. The actual number from the video? ZERO. That is right. They're suspects. And even discounting that, of the ICE hold prisoners, only a fraction are in there for suspicion of violent crimes, the post reads like it's all of them. I don't even have to point out it's FOX News obviously cherry-picking (It's ONE Jail, not even state-wide data). And yeah, of course, every single murder is a tragedy and should not be downplayed, I'm not attempting to do that.
In case you're wondering why you still feel like crime is on the rise, it's because you consume news like that. I'd try to stop.

@kyle
If pretty much all of the news you read comes from sources like X and FOX then of course you are going to have a very warped view of the World and the country in which you live. Also, I should mention that 12 million Native Americans were murdered, probably by your distant ancestors (please correct me if I'm wrong), making you effectively a descendant of both illegal immigrants and murderers/criminals. That is, unless you believe the old adage that if you kill one person you are a murderer but if you kill a million people you are a conqueror.

[kyle]

I don't consume Fox news, only linked to that because that is one of several cases, and could find it first. But I knew I should not have because it's on X an Fox you think it's got heavy Bias, but there are no pending community notes on that post, meaning none has even tried to challenge what they are saying. I do consume X, strategically, as I have to verify it via other ways as well, and a local CBS news, when I talk about crime rates I talk about the reports I see on my local news, but the data is hard to show, because it's not all in, we don't have this year which from my view the end of 2023 through this year has been a big upraise in crimes, I don't think I would have said that it was rising through 2022. But data is slow to get, so maybe in 2 years I can prove to you I was indeed right, all I can say is I trust my analysis of the real time information I am getting, rather than some cherry picked compiled data.

Also, I should mention that 12 million Native Americans were murdered, probably by your distant ancestors (please correct me if I'm wrong), making you effectively a descendant of both illegal immigrants and murderers/criminals. That is, unless you believe the old adage that if you kill one person you are a murderer but if you kill a million people you are a conqueror.

If you want to talk about murderers, lets talk about Biden, He pushed for sending funding to Ukraine to murder Russian solderers, and now he allowed Ukraine to send long range missiles the US built into Russia, His hands are literally dirty as a murderer. The Ukrane/Russian war has literally cost hundreds of thousands of lives, fed from my tax money, none of which I approve of, but somehow this is OK, for Ukrainians to take out Russians, and vise versa, but you want to stoop low enough to bring up a similar thing from many years ago trying to attack me for my ancestors?

Anyway You are wrong, my most direct descendants to me came to America well after the mass killings, but there probably is a chance some did, further out than I know of. To me this is just a ruthless argument, we all are likely descendants from some form of conquerors or murderer, if you go back far enough. I aim for the side of peace and not war, I aim on the side of allowing people in legally, that are good and vetted. When the border petrol is ordered to just let anyone in and turn no one away, that is setting you country up for potentially a big problem. As show by Elon from the border talking to the border petrol https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1707565081750290910 (well worth watching the full thing)

Yeah, it can be hard to break old habits. That's why it is sometimes easier to just form new habits that then get to replace the old ones over time. If you're looking for exercise, I can recommend cycling or swimming.

This is basically what I started to do for 3 to 4 days, slowly adding some exercise in form of stationary bike and crunches and push ups, I find that working abs, for some reason helps me not want to eat as much. Unfortunately I got diverted again after those 4 days, as I got a really bad cold, But I'm keeping track of what I'm doing to help keep it top of mind, so that once I'm over this cold I can get back going on it, I started the year or ended last year doing some of this stuff, but have stuff the beginning of the year derail me for over a month, that I ended up forgetting about it.

Also I've been successful at doing this before, but that was 15 years ago or so, when I had a much less busy lifestyle, I think It may have been when I was taking 1 college class a semester, S\o I know it's doable to create the new habitats, it's just making them work

[Lucifer]

If you want to talk about murderers, lets talk about Biden, He pushed for sending funding to Ukraine to murder Russian solderers

This is called self defense. Russian soldiers who are invading a sovereign nation aren't being murdered. They're being killed for invading a sovereign nation.

Get out of your media bubble, I know you're better than this.

[Z-Man]

I don't consume Fox news, only linked to that because that is one of several cases, and could find it first. But I knew I should not have because it's on X an Fox you think it's got heavy Bias, but there are no pending community notes on that post, meaning none has even tried to challenge what they are saying.

I literally showed you how the post on X is not even a remotely accurate representation of what the Video is saying. My beef isn't even with Fox News, because Fox News is gonna Fox News. It's with the X post. It fails at the most basic level, no bias needed. I challenged what they are saying right here. The fact that there are no community notes should prove to you one thing and one thing only:
On the whole, community notes don't work as well as you think they do.

One of the things about Absolutist Free Speech is that it is a license to everyone to try and bamboozle you. You can be for that, no problem, I see it can have advantages. But then you have to work on your bamboozling resistance.

[Z-Man]

To me this is just a ruthless argument, we all are likely descendants from some form of conquerors or murderer, if you go back far enough.

Not us! The Romans tried to conquer us once, but we sent them right back!
(Well, umm, sooo, the northern Germanic Tribes did. The people living where I live now were totally conquered, as evidenced by the fact that the name of the city literally derives from the Latin word for "Colony". And later, they considered themselves true heirs to the Roman Empire. And, well, later still...)

As show by Elon from the border talking to the border petrol https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1707565081750290910 (well worth watching the full thing)

(Deep nitpick: A quick google reveals the teardrop face tattoo has many meanings, not just murder. But yeah, most of them involve you having done a crime at some point.)
In case you don't trust Musk and a (maybe hand-picked) bunch of locals: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-68208637 Yep, numbers are up.

I do believe that every country has a right to control immigration. The decisions should be based on facts, however, not Racism. And refugees are refugees.

[sinewav]

I've argued with a lot of people on the Internet but I can honestly say this is the first such thread that feels more like family intervention with someone who doesn't know they have a drug problem.

[Monkey]

If you want to talk about murderers, lets talk about Biden, He pushed for sending funding to Ukraine to murder Russian solderers

This is called self defense. Russian soldiers who are invading a sovereign nation aren't being murdered. They're being killed for invading a sovereign nation.

Get out of your media bubble, I know you're better than this.

Totally correct.
kyle, Russia invaded the Ukraine. Are you really saying that no one should help the Ukraine to not be destroyed/taken over by Russia? If you saw someone across the street being attacked by someone bigger, would you help/intervene or just let them get pummelled?

[kyle]

I've argued with a lot of people on the Internet but I can honestly say this is the first such thread that feels more like family intervention with someone who doesn't know they have a drug problem.

I guess so, I wanted to be done with this thread, and see how it all plays out, but what Monkey said kind of triggered me and I don't usually get triggered. Just a reminder here, I an Not a hard core republican, I don't agree with everything they have done, They have banned a lot of things that they should not, I'm hoping with Musk's influence on Trump that some of the nonsense state level bans will go away.

kyle, Russia invaded the Ukraine. Are you really saying that no one should help the Ukraine to not be destroyed/taken over by Russia? If you saw someone across the street being attacked by someone bigger, would you help/intervene or just let them get pummelled?

It depends If i could help, I would help. The US doesn't have any extra money that they can really help with, Hopefully Doge Fixes the spending problems that the nation has.. Despite that there is a balance between helping, initially and then the countless lives that have gone on since initial land grab, they've basically stopped any changes in land and are just killing people at this point, I hate to say this from Russia's view, they are basically just protecting what they now have. I don't agree with them taking it in the first place, Ukraine tried to hold them off, but was unable to.

Yes to what Lucifer said, I agree, but Its still killing of lives, at some point someone needs to facilitate an actual conversation to end the pointless killings, rather than just bring in more deaths. Why under Obama and now Biden did Russia Grab land from Ukraine? Russia basically came, got what they wanted, and are now just defending what they want, so instead of negotiations, Biden authorizes attacks that very likely could will lead to WWIII, but I am very hopeful Trump will get in and actually form something that will stop the killings, and keep WWIII from happening.

I do believe that every country has a right to control immigration. The decisions should be based on facts, however, not Racism.

100% agree, Also that Fox news was not intended to be directed at what you had posted from that video, I felt it was mostly fair, Counts were more or less what I was going for, numbers don't matter that it was just 1 Jail, I did not really like they way the used percentage of jail with it either.


Anyway, like I had said before, I'm not planing on posting more on the election stuff. In 4 years hopefully it will prove out to you that I was right about Trump, If not I'll admit I was wrong.

[Word]

To me this is just a ruthless argument, we all are likely descendants from some form of conquerors or murderer, if you go back far enough.

Not us! The Romans tried to conquer us once, but we sent them right back!
(Well, umm, sooo, the northern Germanic Tribes did. The people living where I live now were totally conquered, as evidenced by the fact that the name of the city literally derives from the Latin word for "Colony". And later, they considered themselves true heirs to the Roman Empire. And, well, later still...)

Archaeology department here, 98% agreed, the conquered Cologne people did have their moments though, like when they declared themselves the Gallic Empire and killed the Roman emperor's son! At that time, something like this had been tried once before, by Didius Iulianus who bought/won the emperor title in an auction while being drunk. He declared a "Gallic Empire" and was killed after 66 days.

Also, for kyle, if this wasn't linked here before:

Elon Musk: The World's Smartest Idiot (Youtube)

[Monkey]

@Word
That's a good video, nice link, there is some important info in there.

what Monkey said kind of triggered me and I don't usually get triggered.

I wasn't trying to trigger you, I was trying to get you to see things from a different viewpoint. I don't think it worked though.

[sinewav]

The US doesn't have any extra money that they can really help with...

This is your bubble again. I remember trying to explain to you years ago that a country's debt isn't the same as personal debt. Background: I grew up in a conservative household where Rush Limbaugh played on the TV and radio daily. I remember as a kid utter panic about the trillion dollar national debt. When the debt hit 9 trillion you would have thought the country was collapsing. When it hit 14 trillion I thought it was surely the end for the global economy. And now its... 36 trillion? More than double than before? And nothing happened? Why?

Because money is fake. It's something humans literally made up. What really matters is value, something more abstract we collectively decide. The United States efforts to help Ukraine is an incredible value, not just for Ukraine but the whole world -- and it's worth every penny we spend. In fact, the US should have done a lot more! We could definitely budget it since the "money" (not actually money) we sent to Ukraine was a small fraction of the defense budget. Should the US spend more of its budget on its citizens? Absolutely! But it won't because the US right-wing only wants handouts for big business and they use the excuse "we're broke" to justify austerity -- yet income inequality keeps rising mysteriously...

Again you've shown a tenuous grasp of economics, but aside from that you've shown dubious morality too. Russia will absolutely not stop annexing Ukraine. They will continue their expansionist agenda for as long as possible because they only way for Russia to survive becoming a second Pakistan is for them to keep expanding both their borders and sphere of influence. And that's bad for everyone.

[Monkey]

money is fake. It's something humans literally made up. What really matters is value, something more abstract we collectively decide

My old metalwork teacher at school had a fantastic expression that he said to one of the spoilt kids, when the kid was saying that you couldn't get a decent music player for only twenty five pounds (sterling):
"You know the cost of everything but the value of nothing".

Russia will absolutely not stop annexing Ukraine. They will continue their expansionist agenda for as long as possible

This.

I am very hopeful Trump will get in and actually form something that will stop the killings, and keep WWIII from happening.

Such as? Maybe he could build a wall...