The pics thread

[CiG]

There are all sorts of things people want, and I agree that sufficient food, comfortable housing and competent healthcare would be constant requirements whichever type of society came into being. Where I take issue with capitalism is the idea that having more of everything - more food, bigger houses, faster cars, better entertainment, etc etc - actually improves people's lives, which is pretty easy to prove wrong seeing as extremely rich people tend not to be any happier than people who simply have enough to meet their needs.

My problem with you is, you think you have some right to tell people when they have enough.

 

[Internally Deformed]

My problem with you is, you think you have some right to tell people when they have enough.

That is actually 100% true, and it's my problem with most people that they don't see why that would be necessary in a world with limited resources. If you were on a dinghy in the middle of the ocean, and some fat fuck was scarfing up all the water and the remaining beef jerky, and not even enjoying himself in the process, you'd probably feel much the same way.

 

[CiG]

That is actually 100% true, and it's my problem with most people that they don't see why that would be necessary in a world with limited resources. If you were on a dinghy in the middle of the ocean, and some fat fuck was scarfing up all the water and the remaining beef jerky, and not even enjoying himself in the process, you'd probably feel much the same way.

Bullshit metaphor to bolster a bullshit position. There are entire industries dedicated to creating alternatives.

 

[Baroque]

Didn't he cut a significant amount of funding though?

It is certainly getting worse, but it was already bad under Bush. I do disagree with Obama's space policy but you have to acknowledge Bush's cuts as well.

Also we were spending more Per Day in Iraq than NASA's entire yearly budget.

Imagine what NASA could do if you gave them two, three days of Iraq war budget? A week? This is why I take issue with you commenting on the cost of a Mars rover. The fact they do this at all given the budget is astounding. It's 1/400th the cost of one year of the Iraq war for All of NASA. That include the Mars rover, maintaining the satellites and deep space network, several other upcoming missions I probably shouldn't even talk about yet. Maintaining all of the older missions. Scientists studying the data, engineers developing new tech etc... The Mars rover is a small fraction of a small fraction.

 

[Internally Deformed]

Bullshit metaphor to bolster a bullshit position. There are entire industries dedicated to creating alternatives.

If it's a bullshit analogy, I can only assume it's because you feel that the world's resources aren't limited.

As to alternative industries, I'd rather not risk the continuation of the human species on scientific solutions which may or may not even exist.

 

[CiG]

Fair enough. You still have to deal with the problem of freedom. How do you force people to consume less?

 

[Elric of Melniboné]

Is that you?

 

[CiG]

It's about a year old but yeah unfortunately.

 

[Internally Deformed]

Fair enough. You still have to deal with the problem of freedom. How do you force people to consume less?

There are all sorts of freedoms I like the sound of - freedom of expression, freedom of association, freedom of religion, freedom of persecution, etc - but freedom to indulge destructive vices ranks pretty low on my list. As to controlling people's consumption, I'd probably institute rationing.

 

[Elric of Melniboné]

It's about a year old but yeah unfortunately.

I see nothing unfortunate about that photo. It's awesome.

 

[CiG]

There are all sorts of freedoms I like the sound of - freedom of expression, freedom of association, freedom of religion, freedom of persecution, etc - but freedom to indulge destructive vices ranks pretty low on my list. As to controlling people's consumption, I'd probably institute rationing.

Well I'm glad you'll never be instituting anything in that case.

Pretty sure freedom of association guarantees your right to participate in a free market, so I'm not sure how your position makes sense. How can you support that freedom as you tell a baker he can only sell someone one loaf of bread rather than ten?

 

[Baroque]

For every $100 you spend on taxes, less than 50 Cents goes to you know, developing the future of human space exploration. Spare any change man?

 

[CiG]

Take it from welfare funds.

 

[Internally Deformed]

Well I'm glad you'll never be instituting anything in that case.

Pretty sure freedom of association guarantees your right to participate in a free market, so I'm not sure how your position makes sense. How can you support that freedom as you tell a baker he can only sell someone one loaf of bread rather than ten?

We'll probably end up with rationing in our lifetimes whether I want it or not, it will just end up being too late.

As to freedom of association including freedom to trade as much as you want, I can't be bothered up looking whether that's true, but if so it's retarded. What I mean is that people ought to be able to talk with whoever they want, not do whatever they want with them.

Edit: I did end up looking it up and I can't find anything about it including free trade, it's more to do with joining political groups, clubs, trade unions etc.

 

[CiG]

We'll probably end up with rationing in our lifetimes whether I want it or not, it will just end up being too late.

As to freedom of association including freedom to trade as much as you want, I can't be bothered up looking whether that's true, but if so it's retard. What I mean is that people ought to be able to talk with whoever they want, not do whatever they want with them.

Edit: I did end up looking it up and I can't find anything about it including free trade, it's more to do with joining political groups, clubs, trade unions etc.

This is pretty astonishing stuff...

Edit: I think I'm wrong about freedom of association.

 

[Internally Deformed]

For every $100 you spend on taxes, less than 50 Cents goes to you know, developing the future of human space exploration. Spare any change man?

It must be less than that, or we'd be spending $180 on the Iraq war for every $100 on taxes.

 

[Baroque]

Either way I doubt they'll invite me along, so they can pay for it their damn selves.

At leads with a publicly funded space program there's a chance some of the public or their genetics will be brought along, and it would likely be merit based rather than wealth based.

Also that's a damn selfish world view. "If I can't survive the apocalypse neither should the entire human race" really? Never mind that you share 99.9% of the genetic code of all of your brothers?

 

[Baroque]

It must be less than that, or we'd be spending $180 on the Iraq war for every $100 on taxes.

The Iraq war put us in massive debt.

 

[Dak]

Freedom of association should extend to market transactions. There are a lot of limits on the freedom of association in the world.

 

[Internally Deformed]

At leads with a publicly funded space program there's a chance some of the public or their genetics will be brought along, and it would likely be merit based rather than wealth based.

Also that's a damn selfish world view. "If I can't survive the apocalypse neither should the entire human race" really? Never mind that you share 99.9% of the genetic code of all of your brothers?

It isn't that I want the entire human race not to survive - the whole point is that in the scenario you're laying out, the overwhelming majority of the earth's population are going to be wiped out anyway. If that happens, preserving our genetic blueprint on another world won't make any of us feel any better about it. In fact, if we've all proven ourselves to be that self destructive, perhaps it's best we don't preserve it.