Dumitru

I remember there used to be one, did it get dropped with the redesign? Thanks

It's about the development of consciousness and self-awareness. I'm still shocked to see these concepts presented so transparently in a Hollywood production. I haven't seen anything like it since the Matrix. Trailer (does NOT do the series justice) and a pretty good commentary on the series (spoilers of course):

Stef doesn't get what a game changer bitcoin is, unfortunately. I don't know how to "make that click" go off in his head.

Phew! Pretty close to reality though....

This seems rather huge, there doesn't seem to be much noise about it. I read it with some degree of disbelief, expecting it to be some kind of Onion hoax. For US based members, is it in effect yet? https://sheldon.liberty.me/obama-suspends-tv-coverage-of-middle-east/?utm_source=Liberty.me&utm_campaign=3597dacfa0-20160220_A_Richman_Obama_TV_Middle_East&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_ecad00b597-3597dacfa0-139753337 WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Departments of Justice and Homeland Security announced today that the government will forbid the television news media from covering the conflict in the Middle East because “displays of U.S. military operations there have the potential to radicalize Americans against the Obama administration’s foreign policy and provoke terrorism in the United States.” “In these dangerous times we can no longer stand by while graphic accounts of U.S. military action and the Islamic State’s growth inspire impressionable young people to commit violence in misguided acts vengeance,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch and Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a joint statement. “We have worked hard to shut off propaganda channels, such as websites and Twitter accounts, but we have concluded that this will never be enough to adequately address the problem. Frankly, the media’s very coverage of U.S. policy in Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere, despite good intentions, functions as a recruiting tool for the Islamic State and al-Qaeda. So after much consideration, we are taking this admittedly drastic step to safeguard the homeland.” Civil-liberties organizations immediately lodged a protest. “This outrageous action violates the First Amendment and America’s best traditions of freedom of speech and press,” stated an ad hoc coalition of groups assembled spontaneously in the wake of the government’s announcement. “If the government’s activities provoke terrorism, that is not the news media’s fault. Perhaps the government needs to reevaluate its policies. We are confident that the American people will not stand for this restriction on freedom and that the courts will vindicate our most cherished liberties.” Government sources, who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak on the matter, said the action was felt necessary because U.S. policy is known to “create terrorists.” According to one source, “Government studies and top military leaders have repeatedly acknowledged that America’s invasion and occupation of Iraq, bombing of multiple Muslim countries, and unconditional support for Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians have worked effectively to recruit men and women into the ranks of violent Islamic extremists. More than one top official has estimated that 10 terrorists are created for every one killed.” Another source said, “We are very concerned about self-radicalized terrorists, lone wolves who sit in their homes in the United States and communicate with no one while plotting violent acts inside the United States. Our FBI informants keep tabs on some of these people, but a few fall through the cracks. To the extent that television news coverage portrays U.S. policy in action, it can’t help but motivate violent resistance. We wish it were otherwise, but that’s just the way it is. We cannot ignore this undeniable fact.” A third source added, “It would be unreasonable to expect U.S. bombing of hospitals and wedding parties in Muslim countries, however well-intentioned, not to ‘radicalize’ some people against our policies. So the least we can do is to avoid inflaming home-grown terrorism. The president’s decision is aimed at that objective.” Out of concern for the people who would lose their jobs because of the president’s action, the State and Defense Departments said network correspondents would be given positions in a new Committee on Public Information. “These correspondents have faithfully kept the American people informed of how the government sees the conflict in the Middle East,” a source said. “With them now working formally for the American people, their coverage can be more finely tailored to the national interest, specifically, to the need to lessen the threat of home-grown terrorism.” The government’s action was applauded not only by conservative groups for its national-security value, but also by progressives, who are reluctant to criticize President Obama. The presidential candidates also reacted. “The Constitution is not a suicide pact,” Ted Cruz said on the campaign trail in South Carolina. “Desperate times call for desperate measures. But President Obama should have done this long ago. We cannot afford a commander-in-chief who leads from behind.” “President Obama would have never thought to do this if I had not raised the issue when I got into this race,” Donald Trump said. “No one was talking about homeland security and radical Islamic terrorism until I started talking about it. When I am president, we are going to win again, I can tell you that. I built a terrific company, so I know something about controlling news coverage. Obama is an amateur and a lame duck. And he’s weak. Look what he did. He had his attorney general and the homeland security secretary carry this out. As president, I’ll be strong. I wrote the bestselling The Art of the Deal, my second-favorite book after The Bible. I’ll just get the network chiefs on the phone and tell them what I want. That’s all I’ll have to do, believe me. We’re gonna start winning again.” Jeb Bush was critical, saying Trump was a whiner. When reminded that he was being asked about the Obama administration’s gagging of TV news, not Trump, Bush referred reporters to his mother. Barbara Bush said her son is a good son and best qualified to be president. Asked to comment, Dr. Ben Carson said that as a pediatric neurosurgeon he often had to make life-and-death decisions. He said something else, but it wasn’t audible to reporters standing close by. John Kasich also commented, but no on can remember what he said. Democratic presidential contender Hillary Clinton said she paved the way for this action when she was secretary of state. “Some people will say this is a violation of free speech. Others will say it is a violation of the free press. I say, at this point what difference does it make?” Her rival, Bernie Sanders, expressed misgivings, asking, “How does this address rampant economic inequality and corrupt campaign finance?” “Here’s the bottom line,” Sen. Marco Rubio said when asked about the administration’s action, “This notion that Barack Obama doesn’t know what he’s doing is just not true. He knows exactly what he’s doing.”

This movie made my brain hurt.

Re: navigating the Ontario Hell Insurance Plan: as far as I can tell he didn't even try, fortunately. Any chance you can get to a private clinic in the US for a diagnostic/second opinion? I wouldn't put it past the commie doctors to give you a diagnostic that kinda fits just to get you out of their hair.

I think the drug war is doing plenty on that front.

Yes, I mean the government(s). I've mulled this over a bit more, and I think I can boil it down to this: The hornets are coming because we (the west) kicked the hornet's nest. The immigrant crisis is a symptom, not the (main) problem, I think Stef should have focused on that.

Pretty good podcast, but a lot of accent on the less important aspect. Let's have a look at the 2 sides of the story: Europe is receiving all these immigrants, causing some expense and dilution of western culture. The immigrants are otoh trying to ecape from HELL. A hell created for the most part very recently, by the west. Mostly the US/UK, but still, the west. There's a picture around of drowned immigrant children washed up on shores in Lebanon. These people are taking enormous risks to get away. They're not just trying to go get a better job in Berlin, they're trying to escape from hell. How about a podcast to the people of the west, telling them to stop supporting the war on the Middle East, maybe that will stop the emigration, not to mention it might slow down on the growth of the state at home, or at least make it less lethal. The irony, as always, is that the worst perpetrators of the war on the ME have the least to deal with the immigration fallout. Somebody else pays.

Maybe laughter will be the trojan horse that will plant the seed of doubt into the minds of the people who are sort of unaware yet. The old man himself said the state isn't going to go out with a bang and wave of revolt, it's going to fade out with a roaring laughter during a late night comedy show, when people are going to wake up and realise the sheer stupidity of statism. Why not have it happen on his show? So yeah, I think an occasional dedicated comedy skit would be most excellent. PS, take this with a bucket of salt, but I think the greatest loss in the history of philosophy is the fact that there is no video to FDR584. I must've listened to it at least 50 times, and it still cracks me up

I'm wondering, does anybody know of any statistics on the amount of subsidies/tax breaks/incentives handed out to companies vs welfare/SS/etc handed out to working Joes in the US? Just a rough approximation, on a scale from 1:1000 to 1000:1. Thanks!

Yeah, Happy Birthday Mike, and listen, I've really enjoyed your recent contributions to the show, I hope the old man will give you the mike more often

Hey Mike, could you throw a btc adress out there for your b-day fund? just in case

Watched it today, I loved it, I was actually stunned to see this discussion about self knowledge brought to the big screen. Highly recommended.

For me the "connection" left me feeling manipulated and angry, so for now I've stopped attempting it anymore. There was also no follow-through after the admission of guilt.

Hi guys, I've listened to a podcast a while ago where Stef talked about the worship of gods, and whether that is because they are virtuous or because they have power. It's title is not exactly on this topic, or maybe this was the ever present tangent It's probably an early-ish one, below 1500 I'm guessing. Little help please? Thanks!

Booked the time off, will be there!

I used to love Tarantino movies, (pre-philosphy that is) and some parts of me still do. I went to see it even knowing what to expect content-wise, just to see what my own reaction to it would be. There were a lot of times while watching it that I felt someone was literally choking me. I think that's an improvement. Edit: I just realised I haven't answered the question posted, sorry. There's nothing moral about Schultz. No amount of respecting Beethoven and being polite can cover up the fact that the man murders people for a living.

I admit I don't remember the whole movie but what impressed me the most was that the main character had a serious lack of empathy and was a little bit self destructive, this was confirmed at the end. Good movie indeed though.

I'd like to address a couple of statements that were made and which are not quite in accordance with reality. Nobody can mine 1 bitcoin for the equivalent of 10 dollars' worth of electricity and some computer time. If it were possible, a bitcoin would not cost $1000 on the open market. It is a little difficult to do the math, but the cost to mine 1 bitcoin is somewhere closer to the market price of 1 btc. Intrinsic value is an oxymoron, at least as I understand the meaning of the words. Intrinsic is an objectively measurable property of an item like density, resistivity, molecular mass, mechanical strength and so on. This can be independently assessed to be identical throughout the world. Value is a subjective assessment of the item in question, and it would vary throughout the world according to supply and demand. As far I can tell, the concept of intrinsic value is a square circle. Perhaps people mean "commonly and readily agreed upon value" Alt-coins. The bitcoin protocol is open source, and I can create my own Dumitrucoins tomorrow, however those will be completely incompatible with bitcoin, of negligible market penetration, thus very limited use and sadly, limited value Dumitrucoins will also lack network effect, a major factor in the success of bitcoin. Bubbles: there have been bubbles, and there will be many more. I did notice that they have been getting orders of magnitude less intense between booms and busts. I believe this trend will continue, although there's no requirement for it to do so. Gold had and has its booms and busts too. Backing: Bitcoin does not need backing because it is desirable, thus valuable due to its own properties. Further, any entity which proposes a digital currency "backed" by anything introduces counterparty risk, meaning you have to trust said entity to make good on its promise to redeem its potatocoin into so many potatoes on demand. We know how well that turned out for gold, the holiest of metals. The following is an oversimplification, but it goes like this: Bitcoin requires trust only in the distributed miners' network to not inflate. However, all miners have a vested interest in making sure bitcoin is not inflated by other miners, thus they all remain vigilant of the actions of the other miners, and keep each other in check. I do believe bitcoin is a black swan event for Peter, and gold's golden days are behind it.

Excellent suggestion! I get the impression he's the type to call a spade a spade. I don't know far he's willing to take that, but he'd be great to have on the show for sure!

I've read up here and there, but what sparked this post was the announcement on bitcointalk.org that a new such city is in the works. I was trying to think logically about what the odds of its success were.

I've recently read up a bit about attempts to set up "free cities" in various places. The general idea goes something like this: a private entity goes to a state entity and asks them to grant it some land which is exempt of the laws and regulations of the fatherland, except of course for the basics like thou shalt not kill. The incentive for the state would be that in exchange for some unused land, there will develop a bustling, successful, entrepreneurial heaven that will provide employment, prestige, etc. Basically, the private entity wants to build an anarchic society on a piece of state land, in exchange for the promise that said state will promise to never plunder the newly built city in the future. And that's the rub. Why would any state willingly agree not to plunder its subject? Or by extension, why would the farmer just release one cow? So that said cow will lead a free and happy life outside the fence and give the remaining milk cows bad ideas? Aside from the obvious and not inconsiderable risk that the state might not keep its word, there's another question: most advances in freedom that we've ever had have come about from the bottom up, not from the top down. In other words, the church/state didn't stop burning witches at the stake because they saw the error of their ways, rather because the masses slowly began to develop some degree of empathy and it slowly began to dawn on them that such activities are highly immoral and repugnant. In short, the state ran out of people who were willing to round up, beat and tie up the witch, carry the wood and build the stake, light it and watch in cold blood as a poor woman is burned alive. Same goes for slavery I think. Free cities will not be set up as free cities from the get go. They will gradually come into existence as the state will slowly run out of people willing to threaten and attack peaceful people going about their business, under the pretext of enforcing regulations or collecting taxes, etc. That will take a few more generations, it will not happen everywhere at once or with the same speed. Are the people trying to set up free cities by begging the state deluding themselves?

Why is the word voluntary in the thead title in quotation marks?