dsayers

Are you saying that what you're doing is taking a moral stance? You're talking about theft, which is immoral. You're saying you won't fund criminals, but keeping the money makes you a criminal. And since you're keeping the money, you're funding that criminal. Stand up, conceding... Do you really think all these re-packagings will fly amid people with moral clarity?

If you borrowed money stating you would repay it, to not repay it would not be civil disobedience. It wouldn't be civil because theft is the initiation of the use of force and it wouldn't be disobedience since the obligation you're shirking is one you imposed upon yourself.

Why is this? I've never understood tattoo regret.

Not long ago, my religious father surprised me by revealing that he also believes in things like hauntings, ghosts, and possessions. He actually uttered this sentence: "I've never much cared for Catholics since most of their stuff seems made up, but they sure do seem to be experts at unpossessing." Damn near bit my tongue off I had to hold onto it so hard. Anyways, I'm glad you found out about that girl before it got to the kids stage. And I wish to thank you on behalf of your unborn children for not subjecting them to such a mother.

Minarchism is one of the easiest ideas to debunk. Either the initiation of the use of force is immoral or it isn't. If it isn't, then there's no reason to reduce government at all. If it is, there's no reason to abide any government at all. He doesn't accept that the initiation of the use of force is immoral if he thinks that minarchy is a valid conclusion. If something has voluntary funding, it wouldn't be a government. Also, even if his ideal country was funded voluntarily, it's edicts would still not be voluntary. If your portrayal of his position is accurate, then for him to say "government should be funded by..." he's starting from the position that government is necessary, which is begging the question. For as long as this is true, he will not consider any methodology that leads to a conclusion where government is not necessary. You say he mentioned Spain. I'm not intimately familiar with that, but wasn't that an example of the aftermath of a government collapsing? When a church burns down, you cannot accurately describe the congregation as atheists. If statists are present where a government collapses, of course that "anarchy" will not last. This is precisely WHY it's important that we help others to see that the initiation of the use of force is immoral. When the US empire falls, I don't want my neighbors frantically trying to erect a new body to enslave me in its place.

Short version of my question: If I was running identical software on two computers whose only difference was that one had a video card rated at 60 TDP and the other one's was rated at 150 TDP, would the 150 TDP machine be running hotter because the video card was in fact stronger or would it run cooler because I'd be utilizing a lower percentage of its capabilities? Since TDP is not universally determined, I wanted to include that the cards in question were of the same line by the same manufacturer (though different generation). Long version: The last time I rebuilt my PC, I hand picked components that were relatively low power to achieve low heat, to make the use of quieter AIR cooling solutions more realistic. I was very pleased with the results, which included a power supply whose fan never needs to come on, thermistor controlled case fans that almost never need to come on, and a fanless, gaming class video card (Radeon HD 7750 by Sapphire, which had replaced me fanless Radeon HD 4670 by Sapphire). I've been considering upgrading the video card. My pursuit for fanless models has been a frustrating one despite nVidia's release of Maxwell architecture at the beginning of this year making it a more realistic option than ever. I have found a GTX750Ti by Palit. However, Palit doesn't sell to the US. Also, Amazon.co.uk says they cannot ship it to the US, even though they can ship the non-Ti version to the US despite it having identical shipping weight/dimensions!? I've been in contact with them to figure out which item was the erroneously classified one. When I revised my criteria from fanless to quiet, I was pointed in the direction of Asus's Strix series, which has a robust pipe/heatsink system AND fans that will only come on when necessary. I think I'm willing to give this a try and want to do what I can to make sure those fans are off as much as possible because what other PCers/gamers consider to be quiet is rather annoying to me. Case in point, my only continuous fan right now is on the processor, and it is a 600-700 RPM model. I can hear that it's on, but usually ambient drowns it out well enough. Anyways, within the Strix line, I'm currently eyeballing their GTX750Ti and the "newly" released GTX970. The 750Ti would be a significant step up for me as it is. The 970 is significantly stronger still. It has newer tech and would generally be better from a future-proofing standpoint (such as that is with PC components). What gives me pause (besides the price tags) is that their TDP ratings are substantially different. Namely 60W and 145W respectively. At first glance, I was ready to abandon the 970 for price and TDP alone. However, I got to thinking that because the 970 is significantly stronger, would this mean that what I use it for would make it cooler, leaving the fans off more often? If so, it might be worth the extra expense for the extra quiet. Or is it like comparing an 8 cylinder engine to a 4 cylinder in that it would consume more juice (produce more heat) in idle as a result of it being stronger? For what it's worth, I very rarely do video editing. Beyond that, the most intensive thing I use my PC for is playing Skyrim, which my current video card handles just fine on medium settings with numerous mods installed.

Mr. Cotton, I was rather pleased with this bit and feel you discarded it entirely. Was that deliberate? If so, was it because it was nonsense or because you cannot offset it?

HAHAHA! Sorry, that sucks. But I do so delight in hearing the religious malign others in ways that applies to themselves.

Mr. Cotton, without State interference of perverse incentives, those who didn't provide value to others would already suffer and in some cases die off. You didn't specify, but these work camps you describe don't sound voluntary. How do you justify those who set it up/run it owning themselves while the people in it do not?

By American retail shops, do you mean K-mart or Gucci? I ask to make the point that referring to shops by their country of origin is too vague to be able to answer your questions.

Stef has addressed this before and valid points have been made to the contrary before. I'd rather Stef was beholden to his listeners than advertisers.

...and the ire of everybody who learns of it and the efforts of anybody who knew the person you killed. You get a hoe and +$5 in the moment, but you lose your ability gather resources in the future, or have any peace of mind, or sleep. The more complex a life form, the more complex its desires, the more it benefits from the division of labor. Unless a being can defy ALL laws of physics merely by thinking it, they will require effort to achieve resources, and therefore benefit more from co-operation than from domination. If I befriend you, then we both can work together to satisfy our needs. You no longer have to do what I specialize in because I'm doing it already, so the overhead is already in place and vice versa. The definitions of most words you use were set before you ever existed. The only way you can communicate with somebody is if you do so in a manner in which they can receive. What did you mean when you tried to point out that agnositicm and atheism are not mutually exclusive? Anybody else I've ever talked to understood these terms to mean uncertainty and certainty respectively. What dysfunctional need would they have for them to assign those definitions en masse? People have suggested deities, therefore we have a use for words meaning belief in such a thing, acceptance of lack of such a thing, and unwillingness to consider such a thing. If not those words, then which? The fact that people will say "oh you mean 'atheist'?" is evidence enough that the use of labels is an inefficient method of communication. On a side note, I had made another post in this thread whose sentiment I am inclined to revisit, that hasn't gone live yet.

I don't think validity is analog. Anyways, I do not take your claim of curiosity at face value. Not only does your post history NOT demonstrate curiosity, it mostly demonstrates bias confirmation. If it is true that your purpose here is curiosity, then you should know that this is not at all how you come across.

I don't think so. If a person voluntarily submitted to the experiment, there would be no dilemma.

I never spoke of A self-applying label. The statement was that I refrain from self-applying labels. I won't call myself an atheism even though the conclusion it represents is one I've arrived at also. Labels cannot sum up who a person is and the label of atheist in particular is meaningless because it attempts to sum somebody up by one thing they accept doesn't exist. It would be like if there were a label of aSantaClausist. Useless. No, what happened was you made an objective claim that two ideas are not mutually exclusive when most of the world understands them as such. This statement rejects the correction and the opportunity to become a more effective communicator. :/

Precise language could've avoided this. This is the reason people use the phrase initiate the use of force. Behaviors can be violent, not individuals. I think you meant to ask if he thought it was morally acceptable to initiate the use of force against another person. The problem is that in order for this question to be meaningful, you need to first establish with the person that people own themselves. If he's a socialist as you say, chances are his conclusion regarding self-ownership is unprincipled and will be interpreted by him differently in different circumstances. By the way, have you watched Stef's Bomb in the Brain series?

Preparation is very important. However, I would caution against this particular approach. Saying a cabinet is off limits is inflicting a conclusion upon the child. This will not model egalitarian interaction, provide a nurturing environment, nor lead to win-win negotiation. The thing parents need to keep in mind is they literally create their children's entire world. If they did have such a cabinet, they could put a lock on it. Telling them it's off limits is saying that not having access to whatever is in the cabinet is more the child's responsibility than it is the parent's. The man who made this video made that same mistake. He's in control, not them. For him to blame them is not only a missed opportunity for him to gain self-knowledge and up his parenting skills, but it also traumatizes the child (however mildly) by inflicting a conclusion upon them that doesn't accurately describe the real world.

Why not? Most children are indoctrinated with it before they have the intellectual fortitude to resist. You can't turn on the television or watch most movies without it having been shoved down your throat. The beauty is, one doesn't have to partake of all Statist materials anyways. The moment you get to the part about the square triangle being valid, you can safely discard everything that is built upon it. Oh and with regards to our last exchange, you dodged the question. You were essentially claiming that people need to be violently subjugated to keep them sharp. It doesn't matter if you have a wife or not. If you did, you would not beat her just to keep her primed for potential mugger attacks. Since you wouldn't live your own value, you reveal your position yet again to be full of shit.

@Kevin: That's not my understanding of what those labels mean. This is one of the reasons I try to refrain from using or self-applying labels. At any rate, on the off chance that my grasp of those labels was faulty, I looked them up. According to dictionary.com (whatever that's worth), agnosticism denotes uncertainty and atheism denotes certainty. On a side note, while I discourage the use of labels in general, atheism and anarchism are among my pet peeves. Even dictionary.com say atheism is a disbelief in God. It's like saying a mathematician disbelieves in 2+2=5. It makes it seem as if theism is the origin and atheism is the variance. As if the onus is upon the "disbeliever" to prove an absence (logically impossible).

What does having a rational bone in their body mean if they're not willing to apply it? If a=b and b=c, then a=c... and hitting defenseless, dependent children who cannot escape is assault. The ability to process the first, innocuous rationale will have no bearing on encouraging a person to accept the latter when doing so would mean facing that everything they've ever known was based on a lie, the people they thought loved them and they could count on were sadistic, etc. It can be good to plant the seed, especially if they've never been exposed to the possibility before. The moment they demonstrate an irrational resistance, any attempt to proceed is for your benefit, not theirs. I would even argue that doing so is not even to your benefit because trying to topple a brick wall with your bare hands would be in defiance of empirical evidence that such an effort is futile.

This is why such labels aren't really of any use. The word means different things to different people. If you really want to be technical, people who scoff at libertarians are themselves libertarians as evidenced by their enjoyment of having agency over various aspects of their own lives.

What was it about? Was it about whether aggression is immoral or not? Was it about whether behaviors done in the name of government are aggressive or not? I can't picture a worthwhile debate where "governments will aggress against people" would contribute, let alone make their case for them. Also, government is a concept and not capable of behavior. PEOPLE can aggress against other people. This is why it's important to help others understand that the initiation of the use of force is immoral. It sounds as if your friend considers governments as necessary and unavoidable, so why would he waste any of his mental energy considering whether it's necessary or harmful? If this is true, then for you to debate with him is only going to strengthen this belief when he sets something up that you can't knock down. If you haven't already, please check out Stef's Bomb in the Brain series. You can't change people's minds until you understand WHY they think the way that they do.

Could you give an example then please? I don't know what you're talking about. You say compromise for mutual benefit but compromise is lose-lose while mutual benefit is win-win.

I have seven tattoos. The last six were acquired within a small time frame. This was some time ago. I don't think that I would present day get a tattoo. I don't regret the ones I have because it's just skin. I just wanted to point out that regardless of what that makes you think of a person and whether that interpretation is accurate or not, all you can know for sure is that you're judging one aspect of who somebody was at some point in the past. The thought processes I had back when I got them is not how I think today. It's not who I am today.

Are you aware that you've just contradicted yourself? Not only is private space travel a reality, but in the US, NASA actually plans on (if not already doing so) making use of private spacecraft since it's cheaper than continuing to developing their own. The reason for this is because the theft that allowed State space programs to begin were unsustainable. While not exactly a proof that visitors would be traders and not aggressive by default, it's a damn fine case for it. I'm not aware of this. Isn't this like saying that it's possible for a light switch to be both in the off and the middle (neither off nor on) position simultaneously? How does one simultaneously NOT believe in a deity and believe that they cannot know whether or not a deity exists?