Next, anyone with half a brain would also know in advance that nothing in the real world would be accomplished by such a thread, given that world leaders probably aren't reading this forum in search of our advice. — Foghorn

Sir: (I'm presuming) You do not understand the function of threads such as the "Israel killing Civilians in Gaza and the West Bank". "Philosophical discussion is the nominal function; the real function is quite different. The Philosophy Forum, and especially its non-participant readers, is composed of many thousands of testosterone-fueled right wing / left wing cisgendered males who, for lack of this noble outlet, would pour into the streets. Arson, rape, and bloody murder would ensue. There are also low-T old gay codgers like me who no longer riot, rape, and pillage but are perfectly capable of mixing a decent molotov cocktail (vodka or gin, as preferred) for the front line men. This is not to mention all of the politically correct, gender-fluid, non-binary thems, thoses, and its who are perpetually pissed off with nature who will throw their delicate carcasses against the hard bronzed statues of the patriarchy.

Without The Philosophy Forum, and publications like the NYT, NPR, PBS, et al to contain this bubbling cauldron of controversy, bloodbaths would be a daily event. That might be a good thing were there adequate ideological oversight and guidance by the Central Committee, but alas there is not.

NPR does do that a lot. So does the New York Times and some other publications. Too often the background reporting consists of interviews with advocacy groups--people with a major stake in depicting this, that, or another problem as a terrible tragedy. I understand how that works. Unfortunately, the advocate's views may be heavily slanted without being factually wrong. So, there is a large crowd of people who want to come into the US camped on our border. That is true enough. Cue the crying child, the distressed mother. I'm sure they are not happy. The NPR or NYT news stories do not mention that we are not obligated to let all (or any) of them into the country, and we didn't ask them to make a long trip north through Mexico for nothing,

Yes, it's sad that people drown in the Mediterranean trying to get to Europe. Yes, it is sad that they paid to get smuggled into southern Italy in a leaky boat. Yes, it is sad that they traveled a long way to get to Europe only to end up getting fished out of the sea and taken back to Libya--if they were lucky. But fleeing every bad place for the promised land won't be the solution. Can't be the solution.

But all one gets in these stories is the same weepy narrative.

global warming, nuclear war, drug resistant super infections, ecological collapse, overpopulation, solar flares, asteroid impacts, AI overlords... — Benj96

All that and more!

There are solutions to our problems at hand, but we ourselves--our inability to plan and act together for the long-run (a century ahead, at least)--doesn't have a solution.

Take drug-resistant infections--a topic that hasn't received as much doom-scrolling attention as it deserves. When penicillin and the other new antibiotics entered productions, alert researchers were aware of the problem of resistance. Billions of us used antibiotics like aspirin, taking them for sore throats for which they were not needed, or for viral infections for which they were generally irrelevant.

In 2021 doctors in the US still receive demands from patients for antibiotics that aren't going to help their ailments. In less regulated markets antibiotics are over-the-counter. Even where care was taken, in the treatment of gonorrhea for example, penicillin gradually lost its effectiveness. Other antibiotics were substituted. There are now multi-drug resistant strains of Neisseria gonorrhoeae, a tough well-traveled hard-working organism. On the other hand, Treponema pallidum, which causes syphilis (a more dangerous infection than gonorrhea, is still very susceptible to ordinary penicillin after 75 years of use.

Drug companies do not find antibiotics as profitable area for research as drugs for chronic diseases. Get an infection, take a pill for 2 weeks, and that sale is over. Get depressed and then hooked on antidepressants and you have a customer for decades. Or high blood pressure, high cholesterol, over-eating, arthritis, and so forth. Very real problems that deserve good treatment and will result in sales for years on end.

As a consequence of decisions at Bayer, Pfizer, Johnson and Johnson, GSK, et al, there are no new antibiotics in the research and production pipeline. That's entirely owing to short-sightedness. If the drug companies don't want to do it, then the government must.

Unfortunately, there is no drug for short-sightedness.

Your existence on TPF is probably doomed.

Good luck with that, BC. That will be hard even here. — ssu

Yes, indeed. @Hanover's definition applies to governmental behavior. I'd add application to employer behavior. The balance between the prerogatives of government and employers vs. personal freedom is a point on the scales that will be hard to agree upon, even among people who are philosophically similar. I want more personal freedom, of course, but I desire more limitation of the predations of private agents than @NOS4A2 would accept. Limiting the power of employers requires cooperation from government. Workers can form powerful labor unions, but labor unions can be frustrated by law--as they have been by both federal and state law. So... whose fleece is going to get shaved?

"Favoring or enforcing strict obedience to authority, especially that of the government, at the expense of personal freedom." — Hanover

Governments are often enough the purveyors of authoritarian enforcement, but I would include employers as a category. The workplace is where most people have to negotiate authority and the power to compel compliance. Employers can't jail employees but they have the very great leverage of wage withdrawal--firing. Depending on one's circumstance, the rate of unemployment, the condition of the economy, and so on losing a job can range from inconvenient to catastrophic.



I am arguing to include employers as agents who can and do enforce strict obedience to their authority. In a different thread I'd argue that workers need more power to resist employers.

I voted yes, but the entire government apparatus, corporate establishment, and social patterns is by no means uniformly authoritarian. Further, it is not a straight-forward authoritarianism of the sort that Franco or Pinochet, Hitler, Tojo, Stalin, Mussolini, et al exhibited. The people who attempted to disrupt Congress and state legislatures strike me as authoritarians, even if their affect was more anarchistic. Police are generally authoritarian in the US, more so in some states than others; more so in some cities than others. Business management is often authoritarian. Twisted social service agencies can be authoritarian too.

Example: I once attended a training on a therapeutic technique that was to be used in the agency. We were told at the beginning that we were expected to accept the technique as presented without question or doubt. I became persona non gratis by announcing that I was not inclined to believe things just because somebody told me to. Oops. Bad move. Nearly got fired for saying that. It wasn't the technique per se that I refused to swallow--it was the requirement to "accept it or else".

Authoritarianism has more than one definition. Like fascism or anarchism, socialism or democracy, there needs to be an agreed definition. For me, authoritarianism is characterized by punitive responses to resistance or disagreement; willingness to employ violence (under some circumstances); rigidity; non-negotiable policies; unwillingness to be questioned publicly; indifference to harm caused by authoritarian actions.

And yet those systems created something that would have been labeled very intelligent if we had created it. — Foghorn

That's the miracle in it! Following the Big Bang, the particles formed into atoms and molecules, made stars that later on exploded, creating still more and heavier elements in a cloud of dust that congealed into this celestial ball, billions of years after which we came along. I don't know why or how the universe pulled off the trick of turning mud into vigorous single-celled life, or single celled life into primates with a penchant for proclaiming their preeminence, but it did.

We are not under-rating the universe if we say it isn't intelligent. The universe is sublime [inspiring awe because of beauty, grandeur, and transcendent immensity]. The universe encompasses everything, from the farthest flung galaxy right down to our posts on The Philosophy Forum.

It doesn't require our assistance.

wouldn't we have to presume that we who judge levels of intelligence are more intelligent than the reality which created "our" intelligence? — Foghorn

The natural systems that brought about our reality were not, in my opinion, intelligent. Inordinately complex, absolutely. We rate our intelligence as great--which it is in our system of rating intelligence. We don't have any third-party observers to offer comparative ratings, so we may be quite mistaken.

The evolutionary proof of fitness is long term survival and as exemplars of intelligence, we do not have a long record. We have made advances but these were separated by long plateaus. The Stone Age lasted a long time. So did our life as hunter-gatherers--200,000 years, to pick a round number. Settled urban life is very recent (10-12,000 years ago) and the harvest of technology is still coming in.

There are serious flaws in our intelligence. For one big thing, We are not at all skilled at long-term thinking, planning, and management. By "long-term" I mean 100 years out. We are having great difficulty planning for carbon reduction (and a worse climate crisis) at midcentury, only 29 years away. Planning, and managing practice, for 69 years out (2100) is pretty feeble. Thinking, planning, and managing for the 22nd century is hard to even imagine.

In a worst case scenario, the climate crisis of our own making may be the end of our intelligence. I hope not, but success can not be a foregone conclusion.

In reality there is much less intelligence than one would hope for.

Which way is better? — Wheatley

We have to learn it ourselves -- whether somebody teaches us or whether we use trial and error. The thing is, whatever we learn, we have to fold it into our repertoire by processing the information. It can't just be "poured in". If it could, then languages, math, or milking a cow could be known by anyone with no effort.

A teacher presents information; maybe makes it interesting; maybe threatens a pop quiz on the next chapter tomorrow. But you have to read it and incorporate it into your structure of knowledge. Trial and error works too, at least for many procedures (if we survive our errors). The results of our T & E efforts also have to be integrated into what we already know how to do.

suppose you’re right. In many ways I think this is why the escapism of media and literature plays such a large part in our lives. Distraction from the disenfranchising aspects of every day social life and lack of true freedom. If anything the human mind and imagination is the most free thing we’ve got - there is little restriction in the non physical/ hypothetical. — Benj96

Your are right on target. There is this very extensive discourse aimed at convincing us that we are free. We are free, for example, to buy whatever we like and can pay for: See Amazon.con . We can freely move--pull up stakes in Maine and try Arizona. There are all sorts of things we can do without much restriction which creates the impression of great freedom, while at the same time foreclosing options that might yield greater long-run freedom.

While we are pretty much free to quit any job we dislike, we are definitely not free to organize our fellow workers for better working terms and a greater share of the profits they produce. The law is stacked against workers organizing, as is the combined weight of Capital. At various times, political deviance has been severely repressed. Even the expression of political deviance had been sanctioned at times. Deviant sexual behavior is much less policed now, but that is a recent development. Well, one can multiply the many examples of ways in which we are explicitly or implicitly not free.

Helping the implicit and explicit restrictions on freedom, there is the escapist literature you named, everything from Downton Abbey to The Simpsons--two of my favorites. One thinks of the Superman comics of one's youth -- a powerful person capable of slicing through all limitations. Some prefer Jane Austin; others prefer hard core porn, but we all want to escape.

It's a conundrum: being sort of free and sort of enslaved at the same time. I'm on the side of those who want to cut through the confusion to reveal what is arbitrary restriction of freedom (repression of workers' organizing, workers' exploitation) and what is natural restriction (individual limitations, social necessities like working to produce food, clothing, shelter, and escapist literature). I'm on the side of those who want to reduce arbitrary restrictions on freedom for workers who are 95%+ of the world's population.

I think of ethics as more secular and morals more religious. I can ethically have consensual sex with another man where I may not be able to do so morally (it's a sin). Times change: A good many sexual morals have been adapted to secular practice and ethics in the last century.

Society in many ways is not the fosterer of individual freedom but rather convention (agreement), law, order, policy and regulation and ultimately control of a population.
Many of these things are of course beneficial to the vast majority - such as law and order and the general peace and security that comes with that. — Benj96

Has the individual ever been free? We've been living in ever-growing communities for the last 12,000 years, but even as hunter-gatherers individuals were not "free". Social animals like us can't be entirely free and independent agents. We are obligated by our various needs to maintain tight social relationships.

Obligated social beings as we are, we still have drives which conflicts with society. We have all sorts of needs and (especially) desires which may not be satisfied, sufficiently or at all. That is the bind we are all in, and always have been in.

There are various ways one can find relief. One can rise in society and gain more executive agency. People with more power and money have more options. One can also find social roles which involve less conventional social engagement. Loners, mavericks, and rebels specialize in social opposition. This route involves significant material sacrifices, usually, but can bring the reward of individual executive agency and interesting options,

One can also adapt to society, which is what most people do. Well-adjusted people fit society and society fits them. They may be better or worse off than others, but they are reasonably content, reasonably successful, reasonably happy. This is the lot of most people in the world.

The defining characteristic of capitalism is the contract made between a private citizen who owns a place of production with another private citizen to exchange labour for a wage. — Judaka

Less than a contractual relationship [and many workers do not have 'contracts' per se] the defining characteristic of capitalism is the accumulation of profit at the expense of the workers who produce all wealth in the first place.

Capitalist ethics? Bah! Humbug!

That interpersonal relationships within capitalist workplaces can be pleasant doesn't change the nature of exploitation of the workers by the company owners. Many capitalists are also "honest" people who behave "ethically" all the while exploiting for the purpose of getting richer.

That was a very nice sentence to read.

the theory rests on the observation that from the torrent of information processed by the brain, only a meagre trickle makes it through to consciousness; and crucially that includes information about the processing itself.

For which we can be exceedingly grateful. Imagine being aware of everything the CNS was doing. You'd have no time to look at porn! Or consider the 'enteric nervous system' the CNS sub-system that runs the digestive tract. Would you really want to be cognizant of the flow of data from your bowels? Mercifully, the enteric nervous system operates without regularly updating the conscious , or even the unconscious mind, of what it is doing down there. When it does send a news flash to the conscious brain, it's almost always bad news, like your bowels are about to explode; get ready.

I don't get this impression we have of lizard brains being primitive. We are the lizards that survived the extinction level event 65 million years ago. — TheMadFool

The survivors of the Yucatan Impact are birds, not humans, We descend from mammals that lived at the same time as the dinosaurs and survived the catastrophe.

We do have a "reptile brain", so called because it is similar to the brain of reptiles. It's the cerebellum and brain stem. It's a vital control center of physical functions like breathing. It is in control of our innate and automatic self-preserving behavior patterns, which ensure our survival and that of our species.

You might like to know that your inner ear structures are an adaptation of the back part of the fish jaw that shrank in size and somehow (don't ask me) was used to fashion your inner ear as we developed into a different group within the larger phylum of vertebrates--chordata (animals with backbones). Chordata is divided into five common classes: fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals and birds. To read more about this (and related matters) see YOUR INNER FISH by Neil Shubin. Fun read, I thought.

"Wisdom" and "wise" may be the sort of word that seems to be meaningful but is very difficult to qualify or quantify, and is, in general, non-inferential. Expertise, knowledge, and experience are much more measurable. Wisdom not so much.

Learning from one's mistakes, knowing one's limitations, understanding motivation, knowing what one doesn't know (and having an inkling as to what one won't know in the future), wide-ranging "common sense" all takes time to accumulate, and some people accumulate it a lot faster than others. As a consequence, there are "wise" 35 year olds and 70 year old idiots.

Wisdom is a word I almost never use. It's just too vague, subjective.

Hmmm, haven't looked at a National Geographic in decades. No. The idea that poor people can be happy comes from experience -- my own experience and observation, and others' observations. I am distinguishing "poor" from "immiserate"--lacking food, shelter, water, etc. The immiserate are not happy.

I personally do not know anyone who believes that. Everyone I know is either rich, striving to get rich, or bemoaning not being rich. — baker

You need to get a new circle of friends, associates, acquaintances--maybe new relatives.

"Rich" and "poor" are relative terms, of course, but I understand what you mean by "rich". I don't think it is an exclusively American phenomena, but Americans may be more deluded than some others that they CAN get rich by hard work. 'They' are not grouped together in the '1%' for nothing. The decidedly rich are a very small group--less than 1% of the population.

Ross Perot would call it a giant sucking sound... — James Riley

Goodness gracious! Almost 30 years since Ross got his charts out and cited that 'giant sucking sound' from 'South of the Border, Down Mexico Way'. About which he was at least partly correct: There are so many giant sucking sounds, one can be forgiven for not naming all of them.

There are substantial overhead costs to delivering welfare benefits, just as there are substantial overhead costs in delivering health care, paid for by private insurers. How much is spent to relieve poverty per se is a bit difficult to prize out of budgets. Should the cost of Medicaid be folded into the cost of single payer health care or the cost of UBI?

In 2010 Minnesota spent $20,000 per person in poverty. Nationally, however, the amount spent was just $11,000. Similarly in 2018, Minnesota spent $30,000 per person in poverty. Nationally, the average was just $17,000. — American Experiment

Minnesota is between Massachusetts and Rhode Island in spending--we are #5. Fine by me; my source for these statistics (American Experiment) lamented that so much was being spent [WASTED!]. Then there is the issue of state funds, federal funds, and NGO programs. Determining amounts spent for what becomes complicated quickly.

I see how it looked like an afterthought. Gay liberation, as it manifested itself in 1969 and into the next decade, was a big deal to me. It is not now, because the times have changed and I've changed, old age and all.

Technology was not an issue in gay liberation but the means to organize, using digital connectivity, didn't come into wide practical use until the late 1990s.

Technology trumps gay rights? — RogueAI

What do you mean by the question? No, I don't think technology trumps gay rights.

Happiness comes from personal qualities and how you think. — Tom Storm

I could not agree more.

I don't think there is a conspiracy either way here. — Tom Storm

I don't think it's a conspiracy either. It's just business as usual.

bad news and tales of disaster and woe provide the strongest interest, bringing in the highest potential revenue — Tom Storm

Aka, "If it bleeds it leads." Totally agree. We enjoy watching disasters that don't have anything to do with us.

Instead they'll simply look for distractions and buy shit to cheer themselves up. — Tom Storm

Just so you know, my comments were following on @CountVictorClimacusIII's comments, above.

It takes too much effort to blow up the local factory or store — CountVictorClimacusIII

We wouldn't want to give too much away but actually, blowing things up doesn't take all that much effort. (that was a joke)

hopelessness and despair — CountVictorClimacusIII

The corporo-technik elite is more likely to lull you with hope and happy talk rather than despair. Hopelessness and despair are not useful corporate values. People without hope and who are deep in despair are unlikely to either produce or consume at the desired Level. If they are hopeless and despairing enough, they might blow up the factory, office, or the store--and then where would we be?

controlled and manipulated by a technocratic / corporate elite through the media — CountVictorClimacusIII

You can rest assured that the technocratic / corporate elite is, or would like to control and manipulate the masses for purposes of enhancing their return on investment. Their efforts include the media, but a lot of their effort takes place in the workplace and marketplace. It may be pervasive, but it's not all that difficult to evade. You can tune out, for instance, and turn off. You can pursue ends that are quite different than those which the techno-corp elite pursues. Sure, there are some costs [you won't be invited to the annual elite Christmas Party, for instance] but you will be free of a lot of their corrosive influence.

For what it's worth, according to the web, more than 60% of high school graduates go on to college. That surprises me. — T Clark

It should surprise you. In 2019 29% of students aged 25 to 29 completed a BA degree. [nces.ed.gov]

The percentage of the population 25 years and older holding at least a bachelor's degree has increased by about five percentage points across the 15 years. In 2005-2009, 27.5% of this group had a bachelor's degree. That increased to 29.3% in 2010-2014. And in 2015-2019, the percentage reached 32.1%. [Census Bureau]

The college drop out rate is fairly high because a) college is more difficult than high school; b) college expenses may be unexpectedly high (living expenses, books, fees, tuition, etc.); c) success in college requires more motivation than success in high school; d) students fail and/or drop out sometimes because they do not know how to self-manage in college.

Many students are not well advised to attend college. They are not well prepared and they are not very interested. There are other manual/technical kinds of work that pay well that may be far more suitable (not talking unskilled or semi-skilled labor).

If college were free, and people didn't have high expectations for employment afterwords, then millions would benefit from higher education. Their cultural sophistication would get a boost, if nothing else. They would be able to appreciate finer grades of porn, for instance.

Well, Aliens, apparently — CountVictorClimacusIII

Or it could be evil spirits. Don't count them out.

I often wonder if we are in the decline phase. — CountVictorClimacusIII

Well, we could be -- depending on how you define "our culture" or "my culture".

I'd say that the average person who completes high school this year is in general less well educated in general than someone who graduated 50 or 60 years ago. The function of high school for the hoi polloi has changed, as has the nature of labor (to some extent). This has resulted in a cultural decline among the majority of the population who are younger (under 55 or 60, say). For a minority of high school graduates, the function of high school is college prep, and for this minority of students who go on to professional work, the culture of education, and their lives later on is excellent.

Those who like classical music are alive at a time of abundant high quality live and recorded performances. This area of culture is better off now (IMHO) than at any time in the last 100 years. Bookstore (local or Amazon/Barnes & Noble, etc.) now have more high quality science fiction than ever before. They also have a lot more schlock. I find too many interesting historical and sociological studies to read should I live another 25 years (I'm 75 now). The INTERNET makes a huge amount of interesting and at least very good quality material available that would once have been very inconvenient to access. That's a cultural improvement.

Do popular music consumers think the culture is getting better or worse? (I don't know -- I'm too old to judge; there are current bands that I like the sound of, but most not so much.). I don't think fast food is improving; good Chinese restaurants are getting harder to find in the midwest, alas. Are sports teams improving or deteriorating? Don't know.

We have a very good technical culture. Smartphones are remarkable pieces of tech. On the other hand, a lot of stuff one buys at big box stores (Walmart, Target, Cosco, Amazon, et al) is quite often cheap plastic junk. That part of the culture is in the dustbin. I can buy excellent shoes (costs an arm and a leg) or I can buy cheaper tolerable shoes which won't last as long, won't be as comfortable, and so on. But... I don't have to go barefoot in the snow.

So, it all depends.

I think all of these other things being equal, money brings more friends, sex, relationships, and achievement - presumably helping to explain the rise in happiness as one's income rises up until 75k. — Down The Rabbit Hole

You are, actually, probably right. On the face of it, money likely does make people happier. Even a $1,000 emergency fund gives people more security than no emergency fund at all (and many Americans have zero funds to take care of emergencies). $2,000; 3,000; 5,000... the more one has on hand, the more secure one is. Let's say, up to one's annual take-home pay. [Many people would have great difficulty saving a year's take-home pay, even over 10 years time.]

Money on hand gives some security, and security gives one more options (up to a point). One can afford to entertain good prospects for friendship and sex, for instance. Having enough money (enough -- not a lot) enables one to avoid continuous cash-short crises, and be more relaxed. Etc.

Beyond having enough money to operate a secure but frugal lifestyle (up to $75,0000 what do you think the mechanism is of money's contribution to one's number of friends, happiness, frequency of satisfying orgasms, happiness, et al?

The theory that money makes people happier has to account for the happiness of people who have not a pot to piss in. How do the poor manage to be happy--enough poor people are happy enough to make the question worth asking.

And what happens after $75,000? Does too much wealth begin to sour? I ask because I've never come close to $75,000, so I know not what it would do for me.

Does more money bring more friends, sex, more stable relationships? It may, but the people I know who have lots of friends, sex, and good relationships are on the low end of the economic distribution. Good looks, health, a strong sex drive, and a pleasant personality help more than money.

If one has great wealth, not just "some wealth", one can arrange to have people surround one with what looks like friendship, sex appeal, and good relationships. In that sense, money can get one those things. But none of this is "the real thing". One's 'friends' and 'bed mates' are playing a role. I've heard that some rich people are actually nice folk who other people like for who they are. That's the rumor, anyway.

The thing with money is that "enough money to meet one's real needs" is as good as a lot of money beyond what one can spend easily.

I’m still looking at how I wish my career and mid life to go. I definitely don’t think pursuing money is a good path. — Benj96

I agree: pursuing money as an end is not good. Thrift is very helpful, as is limiting one's material aspirations (even if it's a necessity). Thrift and low-overhead make it easier to pursue your own agenda.

If you don't mind me asking, what are your career and life plans? What do you want your life to be like in 20 years--assuming the world doesn't go to hell in a big way?

I find this puzzling. Personally I don’t believe happiness is anything more than a transitory emotion. — Benj96

What emotion isn't transitory? One thing: people who are happy don't spend a lot of time discussing it. They get on with their lives. And getting on with one's life probably helps keep one happy.

I'm happy right now so I don't want to discuss this any more.

from reading Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Sartre and exploring ideas from Camus, then relating these to the current cultural climate in the West, I'd like to stir discussion on whether you think we are in decline, or in despair as modern individuals living in our times? — CountVictorClimacusIII

Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Sartre, and Camus didn't invent despair or anxiety. History has had many episodes where people felt like a Christian Scientist with severe appendicitis. [That's a joke; it means suddenly discovering that one's beliefs are decidedly not up to the demands of the moment.)

Society is always in decline, always being renewed. Culture rises and falls like waves on the shore. The details depend on who is pontificating at the moment. There IS real decline and renewal, but it isn't society wide, generally. Not unless events shred the very fabric of society -- such as what happened to the society of dinosaurs when the big rock hit the Yucatan 65 million years ago. Even the plague didn't wreck societies, even when 35% of the population died.

How's the cultural climate? You can't tell in the middle of it.

The data shows that happiness increases with income up until about $75,000.

There would be no need to try and obtain more, but there is no point in giving up the non-material things that could influence happiness, such as friends, sex, love, and achievements. — Down The Rabbit Hole

According to Statista, "In April 2021, the average hourly earnings of all employees in the United States was at 11.31 U.S. dollars." If one figures 2100 hours worked per year, the average income is then $23,800. (Obviously, there are many low wage workers, far fewer high wage workers). No doubt, the $23,800 a year worker would feel rich suddenly bringing home $75,000. For that matter, the $50k or $60k worker would also be happy to have another $15,000 to $25,000 a year.

Is it as hard for the average person to have friends, sex, love, and achievement as $50,000 extra? Achievement seems like it might be the most difficult commodity to obtain. It seems like the opportunities to freely achieve are fairly restricted.

It's late in life for me, and I find I have, or have had, most of what I ever wanted. Some of it is gone, owing to normal processes of aging, death, disease, and so on.

There are two things I wish I had when I was 18--roughly--that I have now. One is peace of mind. I'm pretty contented. It would have been good to be so calm and collected when I was at the beginning of college, instead of bouncing off the walls.

The second thing I wish I had had when I was 18 was the technology I use now -- computer, tablet, internet. These three things (and the companies that back them up, like Barnes & Noble or Amazon) would have made study so much more effective.

Yes, it would have been nice if gay liberation had arrived in the outback where I lived in 1964. All that erotic energy wasted under the cold wet blanket of condemnation and guilt.

Loads of money? Nope. I never had a lot, but I always had enough money. So far, anyway. All that one needs is a little more than one needs--a margin.

I doubt Biden will run for a second term--just based on age.

There is more than the presidential vote at stake, and the Republicans have done a much better job at the state level of getting and keeping control of enough seats in legislatures to control redistricting, which is crucial to either party's long term strategy.

I agree; for the most part, presidential candidates--and other office seekers in some states--win or lose with slim margins. We have not had a major landslide election for president since Reagan in 1984 (525 Electoral votes to Walter Mondale's 13); Before that, Nixon's 520 Electoral votes to George McGovern's 17) and then Roosevelt's 523 Electoral votes to Alf Landon's 8 in 1936.

The Republicans and Democrats exchange control back and forth, and yet the Republic stands. Both parties have strong allegiance to our economic system. Both parties pursue similar policies in many areas. There are, of course, significant differences between the hard right of the Republican and hard left of the Democrat parties. The hard right Republicans, for instance, have strongly resisted New Deal programs like Social Security, Unemployment Compensation, Medicare, Medicaid, and single payer insurance. They haven't scuttled SS, UC, Medicare or Medicaid, but they have tried; and single payer insurance remains unachievable.

The hard right and hard left constitute a cohesive ideological POV, but they do not control very many seats in Congress.

You know how sometimes you look at someone and you just know they are super smart. — TiredThinker

Happens to me every morning when I look in the mirror.