it doesn't mean I can't put on a "mask" and pretend to be someone I'm not. My real me will be invisible, and my fake me will be as visible as I desire. Kinda like spider man — Wheatley

The trouble with using masks too often is that one can get confused about who one really is. That kind of invisibility isn't a good thing.

I deeply resent not being included in the spam that everybody else is getting. I want my share!

Right. I agree; for most people it isn't going to be a problem.

those masks only help the infected not to infect the uninfected, but they really do next to nothing to prevent catching the virus — Mayor of Simpleton

Wait a minute: How can one of the flimsy paper face masks help prevent spreading contagion from the infected to the uninfected, but not the reverse?

My impression is that the typical paper mask is not terribly effective in protecting people and patients from each other. What the masks can stop is droplets of bodily fluid large enough to be snagged by the product; it won't stop very fine droplets or aerosolized sprays of fluid.

One thing the masks do is discourage people from touching some parts of their face, like their mouth and nose, with fingers which can collect bacteria or contaminants from environmental surfaces. Frequent hand washing also reduces transmission from the hand to mucus membrane (nose, mouth, eye...).

Highly effective masks cost waaaay too much money to hand out for free to all and sum. If you are really worried, you can shell out some money and get an effective one, and wear it all the time you are out in public.

People find things like masks reassuring or comforting, which might make them worthwhile for peace of mind (even if not really effective).

Shouldn't that be 10-20,000 deaths per million, (i.e. 1-2%)? — Punshhh

Sorry about that. The most familiar stat form is deaths per 100,000, live births per 100,000, etc.

Let's hope that the mortality rate is less than 1 or 2 percent. But it seems pretty likely there will be a pandemic--given that cases are popping up hither, thither, and yon. There will be 1,000 to 2,000 deaths per million cases--not one of the world-class devastations like the 1918 influenza pandemic, WWI, WWII, the Black Plague, small pox, and so on. The usual death rate from influenza is pretty low -- less than 1/2 of 1% per 100,000.

You have nailed the economic problem; Production and trade will suffer -- which is understandable. IF you thought that 1% or 2% of the attendees at a big sporting event were going to be shot, you wouldn't attend that event. This is a new disease, so people are double-plus nervous about it. Most people will be inconvenienced at most, if they get sick. Younger, stronger, healthier people won't die very often, or maybe even get very sick. Us old folks should be sure our wills are in final form. I haven't written one yet, so I guess I had better get cracking.

We'll just have to wait and see.

As far as the stock market goes, the ups and downs of speculation are kind of hocus pocus anyway; investors are regularly reported to be spooked or goosed by one thing or another. Like, "the markets are down owing to investor jitters over a report about the Vatican's rodent infestation" or some damn thing. I generally discount that stuff; it sounds too much like fortune telling.

My argument, BC...is NOT with work. It is with "having to EARN a living." — Frank Apisa

I'm glad to hear you are still playing golf at 83, and at 83 you deserve a perk or two, so keep on swinging the club and chasing the ball, even if on a cart. I don't play golf because I'm way too blind. The ball disappears as soon as it is struck.

But on to the point here...

I didn't understand what your objection was. I thought you were objecting to work. OK, then, you object to having to EARN a living.

Why do you object to the expectation that people ought to earn your living?

We waive the necessity of earning for those who can not do so; the very disabled, for instance, and the aged--people as aged as you and me. We give a living to those who can not earn it (which is meet, right, and salutary).

But as Masefield's poem says, and most economists too, livings do not grow on trees free for the taking. The resources of the earth--plant, animal, and mineral--do not give up their uses without a major effort. A lot of labor goes into making a copper pipe, from mining the ore to buying the pipe at Home Depot. One can have lettuce from one's own garden, but it won't plant itself, pick itself, wash itself off, and cover itself with dressing. Somebody has to labor to have fresh salad.

due to fear — Mayor of Simpleton

I've had really bad colds that pushed my tolerance of being sick to the limit; constant coughing, sinus infection, sore throat, sneezing, malaise, etc. Yeah, I wouldn't go somewhere where I thought I would catch one of those really bad versions. Call it fear, call it prudence.

Where do these new diseases come from?

It appears that a lot of the new viral infections that have cropped up in the last 30 or 40 years come from bats. Why bats? For various reasons, bats have very tolerant immune systems: they can harbor all sorts of viruses without getting sick, and without destroying the viruses. So when people come in contact with bat feces, bat urine, or bat blood (whatever), or trade in wild animals that have come into contact with bats, they are likely to become sick with something humans have not previously encountered. That's the story for ebola, for example. The covid-19 virus could have bat origins too -- don't know, just speculating.

Some of our worst diseases circulate in other animals and ourselves. The influenza virus regularly circulates through birds and swine (sequentially) and in the process is shaped into a more or less dangerous virus that emerges in Asia and then spreads around the world to humans. SARS, MERS, and other respiratory infections behave similarly with different animals involved. Bird flu, which didn't make a lot of people sick, had a 60% mortality rate among birds. It also was cooked up in Asia.

Why Asia? Asian farming practices have swine and fowl mixing in the same barn yards, same water holes, and same barns. There's lots of opportunity for disease to breed among the various birds and hogs. American and European meat and egg production farms keep fowl and swine isolated from much contact with people and certainly with each other. Hogs and fowl never lay eyes on each other.

American farms used to look a lot more like Asian farms, but because American farms were far more dispersed, there was less chance of transmission from one batch of farm animals to another. Still, American farmers have disease problems which have to be monitored carefully.

Should we be worried, or should we just wait until a vaccination is developed so that we can irradicate it through a vaccination programme?
Or is this the beginning of a deadly pandemic? — Punshhh

Don't panic yet. There will be plenty of time for hysteria once people start dropping like flies, which hasn't happened so far.

Respiratory infections (almost always caused by one virus or another) are very difficult to control because they are so readily contagious. Alls it takes is one strategic uncovered sneeze on the bus, and presto, maybe 20 people are exposed before they can flee at the next stop. Or less dramatically, just breathing the same air for a while -- like on a plane, a bus, a small office, etc.

The mortality rate (= you're dead) for this virus is not astoundingly high -- maybe 1% or 2%, maybe a bit higher. That's not insignificant because it can mean hundreds of death per 100,000 cases. The mortality rate for the 1918 influenza epidemic was 20%; many millions of people died during that epidemic lasting around a year. Ebola and Marburg viruses, and some of the other newly emerged infections, have mortality rates over 50%. Untreated rabies has a 100% mortality rate.

So, while a pandemic of Covid-19 would not be a picnic, it wouldn't be the end of life as we know it, either. Of course, this virus has been active only since December -- far short of enough time for us to have any understanding of how it will behave in the future. The worst - case scenario would be that no effective vaccine is developed (which is unlikely) or that it will not have seasonality and be active throughout the year.

Most people are not going to be very sick at all. Older people (like... 60 and up) and people with weak immune systems of any age are likely to be the most common fatalities.

The dark side of all this is that no nation, however developed, is going to be ready for a bad epidemic. It's just not possible. For instance, if New York City had 30,000 serious covid-19 cases, it would not have enough hospital beds to handle a contagious infection. New York would have to do what China did -- put the sick people together in huge wards (not in hospital buildings) to provide care while not exposing every other sick person in the hospital to something which might well finish them off. The staff would have to dress for bio-hazard protection, which in itself makes work more difficult (like you get hot).

If there are many cases in a city, people will do well to self-quarantine--something more palatable to civil libertarians than forced quarantines. If you feel sick, go home and stay there. If you are very very sick, they can come get you in an ambulance. If you are not very very sick, try to cope on your own. If you are not sick and don't have to mix in public, then don't. Stay home. Fuck work. Capitalists will have to adjust to people not being able to maintain production.

This approach will work over the relative short run. People can't self-quarantine for weeks or months -- they'd starve, eventually. Might as well go out for groceries and take your chances.

Our technology has provided billions upon billions of willing, very productive mechanical slaves to do the work that needs doing... — Frank Apisa

From The Everlasting Mercy by John Masefield 1911

***
To get the whole world out of bed
And washed, and dressed, and warmed, and fed,
To work, and back to bed again,
Believe me, Saul, costs worlds of pain.
***

The lines are from a very long poem. It would have been a lot of work for me to write it. I came across the quote on the flyleaf for WORLDS OF PAIN, LIFE IN THE WORKING CLASS FAMILY by Lillian Rubin, a classic in its field published in 1976.

The headlong drive for endless production that must go on, no matter what, is wrecking our world. I quite agree that we not only could, we SHOULD be producing less -- less oil (much, much less), far, far fewer cars, plastic disposables, huge houses for 2 or 3 people, fewer highways, fewer huge office buildings, and so on.

But if we did what we should be doing (reducing greenhouse gas emissions) more labor will be required, not less. For instance, far fewer cars and far less gasoline means people will have to spend more of their own energy to get around short distances. Rather than driving a mile to the grocery store for a small bag of groceries, they will have to hoof it or bike it, thus using more time and more of their personal supply of calories.

Rather than driving 10 miles to work, parking in a huge lot or ramp, they might have to walk 4 blocks to catch a bus, then maybe another 3 or 4 blocks from the bus to their job. There are people who view such prospects with horror.

Capitalism is predicated upon exploitation of other people's labor for profit. More jobs for everyone means more profit producing jobs, more profit, and more disequilibrium in distribution of resources. If capitalism were abolished in a revolution (which I heartily hope for) then labor could be for human need and not for profit. But there would still need to be a lot of ordinary human labor to feed everyone, keep everybody warm, housed, clothed, bathed, and adequately amused and mentally stimulated.

And if you think male psychology is the same as female psychology, I can not help you. — Nobeernolife

Did I suggest that I thought male and female psychologies were the same? Don't think so. No, I don't think men and women have the same psychological makeup. -- both as a result of social shaping and inherent sex-linked differences.

There is of course overlap. I don't think there is much difference in learning, for example. Males and females both learn content from instruction and experience, whether that's the rules of grammar, the multiplication tables, the rules of the road, and so on. Motivation, emotion, group dynamics, and so on do vary by sex.

But men are not from Mars and women are not from Venus, by which I mean they aren't THAT different.

Aggression is an innate part of the young males of our species, of course. Ever read Lord of the Flies? — Nobeernolife

I do read fiction, (being a one-time English major) but I haven't found it necessary to read fiction to discover that aggression is more likely in young men than in old men or women. And not all young men are testosterone time bombs, either.

People become aggressive usually as a response to social conditions. One finds reasonable aspirations blocked arbitrarily; one has suffered public humiliation; one is insecure in one's person and feels threatened; one is slightly deranged by being too hungry, angry, lonely, tired, slightly depressed, and so forth.

At various times, anyone may be celibate, and even involuntarily celibate. I've been celibate for the last 10 years, because at the age of 63 and the loss of my life partner, I decided I'd rather not begin another life-relationship. I'm pretty happy living alone -- now, at my age, 73. 30 years ago, even 20 years ago, celibacy was out of the question. I was up for as much sex as I could get. The sex drive gradually cools off, which is a great mercy in many ways.

What makes celibacy a bad thing is not having a choice in the matter -- in the manner of prison inmates. If one is at large and finding that one can't find a partner for so much as a fast fuck, then one should probably undertake a major audit of one's methods, motivations, style, and... mental health in general.

My impression is that heterosexuals can usually find sex if they want to -- just like gays can, Get too fussy, too resentful, too hung up, and so on -- then the market dries up.

I understand where a heterosexual orientation leads to the kind of considerations you are raising here. For men and women, sex and then marriage, or marriage and then sex, is a costly deal. Supporting a spouse and children is a long-term expensive proposition. Most of us are the beneficiaries of those sorts of long term outlays. Good parents generate as much wealth as they can to give their children a fair chance at having a decent life. The poor, of course, have less cash. But they can still do a good job of raising their children. $ doesn't work as a measure of good parenting, though $ is correlated with certain desirable outcomes.

My experience has been entirely in the gay male community where sex is still pretty much free, with very few if any entailments. Well, an occasional dinner as a seduction strategy, maybe a round or two of drinks, maybe living near by the place of assignation--all low cost gambits. But, you know, if you go to a public park and have sex, or pick up someone at a bar or with Grindr, or however, you have the sex and then part company. (Sometimes one hits it off with a trick and the two might end up living together--maybe for a long time.). This approach works for many (not all) gay men. (There's nothing preventing a return engagement with x, y, or z if they so wish.)

Male/male sex does not lead to pregnancy, of course, so sex can be casual and free. (This leaves aside questions of communicable diseases like HIV, gonorrhea, syphilis, herpes, HPV, parasites, and other fine products of the bacterial/viral world.). Fucking once or twice and then getting HIV early in the game is going to seem like a very bad deal, no matter how one slices it. That has happened to people. Gonorrhea isn't the readily treatable infection it was 40 years ago. Syphilis remains as susceptible to penicillin as it ever was, but if neglected is still a quite serious infection. Herpetic infections can be really unpleasant, as can HPV infections. HPV strain #16 and #18 are associated with cancer.

If one smoked, drank, had lots of sex, engaged in vigorous activities like running or long-distance biking, ate too well, was too lazy to get one's derrière off the couch, or any number of lifestyle choices, one can expect to have some negative consequences sooner or later. Millions are walking wounded because they partook of life's risky pleasures. Most would probably do it all over again if they had the choice.

Heterosexuals hoped that the sexual revolution would open the way to more satisfactory sex lives for both men and women. It didn't, in a number of ways, because women still have more to lose from casual sex than men do.

I haven't the vaguest notion of what ails you, but for comparison: When I miss several doses of my antidepressant, I experience a feeling of pressure in my head, the sound of water sloshing around (in my skull, not in my ears), and in general feel ill. When I try to describe this to my doctor I can tell it's not registering as a sensible [something that can be sensed] description. He can't feel my pain, let alone my vague feeling of pressure or water sloshing around.

The walking wounded are of course better off than those in hospital, but at least those in hospital seem to have something that can be treated. Or maybe not.

I have no suggestions either, which is unusual for me. You are probably in some nether region of psychiatry where undiagnosable vague symptoms are the rule, and nobody ever gets much satisfaction from seeing a doctor.

Ah ha: Here's a suggestion -- I knew one would pop up. Have you been examined by a neurologist? -- just to make sure that nothing is amiss neurologically. Neurologists deal with more concrete matters than psychiatrists, it seems like.

Question: is there any time, place, or activity that seems to exaggerate or relieve these symptoms?

The statistic is pure invention for rhetorical purposes.

@IvoryBlackBishop: "Sexual ethics"

Is nothing safe from ethicists?

waltz to the grave hand-in-hand — god must be atheist

Lovely. I like that.

As of right now, I would honestly prefer playing a video game than trying to 'pick up' a woman at a strip club. — IvoryBlackBishop

One would hope that there are more choices than a strip club or a video game.

I'm 73. I enjoyed both a promiscuous gay sex life for 20 years and a settled gay relationship for 30 years. Both were satisfactory, but in different, and non-interchangeable ways. The pleasure of the hunt, the delight in anonymous sex (anonymous, but not meaningless, not exploitative; call it collaborative), the pleasure in home life with Bob, the mutuality of the close relationship -- it was all good.

Pairing up early in one's life, not having the experience of sharing in a variety of sexual styles, preferences, wishes, wants, etc., seems like an impoverished life.

What doesn't work well is freely having sex with different partners while trying to have a stable, one-on-one relationship. Some people can manage open and settled relationships (they have to be ambidextrous multitaskers) but 94.3% of the population can not manage it. It just doesn't end well, usually.

Bernie — Xtrix

Biden — Xtrix

The problem with both Bernie and Biden is that they are too old. I'm in my 70s; Bernie is 78. He will be 79 before he takes office. Perhaps his health is very robust and he will live to be 100, mentally sharp all the way. Perhaps he will collapse under the strain of what is an extremely demanding job. I like Sanders, I like what he proposes. But he is still too old.

Biden is just a little younger, not enough to make a difference. He is also too old.

Pete, on the other hand, is short on governmental service, and perhaps short on 'gravitas'. I'm glad a young gay guy is running for president, more power to him, but... kind of young and inexperienced.

In the 'good old days' candidates were not put through the kind of demolition derby the Democrats are running. The 'pros' decided who was going to run on the basis of various political factors. The smoke filled back room had a decided downside, but it wasn't all down.

Just because somebody thinks they could run the country is no reason for the party to let them run. Donald Trump is the prime example of what happens when that route is tried.

Who really thinks that a "democratic socialist" can command enough votes? I'm a socialist, but most people are not, and I just don't see a DSA candidate winning.

I have nothing against cat pictures. My preference is for dog pictures. Wasting time is, indeed, a natural human behavior; I have nothing against that either. I have nothing against "private property" as long as we mean "personal property" -- a home, a car, clothing, books, china, etc. Capitalism is about "capital property -- factories, newspapers, rental properties, land rents, railroads--all that stuff from which capital (wealth) is accumulated. That's the source of hard core exploitation (today: in the past other systems carried out exploitation).

One can object to "consumerism" and that becomes a problem for people when it gets out of hand and no longer serves the interests of the person doing the consuming. Buying stuff that doesn't make one particularly happy on credit (with high interest rates) is consumerism against the consumer. Getting people to buy stuff that doesn't and can't make their life better is just exploitation.

True enough: We can use media for our own purposes, but we do well to remember that the owners of media also have purposes, and quite often our welfare isn't one of them.

it "sells" and appeals to emotions over logic — IvoryBlackBishop

Of course. Logic is a fine facility for some kinds of problems, but entirely unsuited for cultural appreciation and participation. The opposite is true as well -- sometimes we really have to try very hard to screen out emotional response.

I just want to emphasize that capitalism exploits everyone in every available venue--work, family life, entertainment, leisure, etc. As Marx said, "Under capitalism, everything is reduced to the cash connection."

Capitalism didn't invent exploitation -- that's been around for millennia. What capitalism does is intensify exploitation and make it ubiquitous--and more efficient.

"People" don't like talking about how capitalism degrades life. They would rather talk about sexism, racism, homophobia, xenophobia, blah blah blah, rather than talking about the herd of elephants in the room. Back in the day when there were 3 networks and nothing else, people spent a lot of time criticizing television. most people didn't realize that the IMPORTANT parts of television programming were the commercials; the programs were just bait.

The relationship of users to media is basically the same. The POINT of Facebook, Google, Yahoo, et al is to put advertising in front of eyeballs; that's how they make money. I use Google Search all the time and value it highly -- but search is the bait. Sharing pictures of your cat with the world is the bait for Facebook. At least with pornography, the product and the bait are one and the same thing.

Our use of the internet (what we look at, when, for how long, whether we click or not, all that stuff) is the product that is sold to advertisers. Everything we do socially and economically that can be tracked and valued is tracked and valued. That's why your cell phone keeps track of where you are at every moment of the day (assuming you have not disabled location functions): Where you go and when is very useful information to companies that want to sell you stuff. Of course it's also useful for governments which might have an unsavory interest in what you do with your time--when, where, and with whom.

I'm just having a bit of fun at his expense. — Frank Apisa

They also served who were the butt of somebody else's amusement. Carry on.

For me, "atheism" privately means "rejecting the presentation of the God-concept that I grew up with". It isn't that I believe that god(s) can not exist or do not exist or that they may exist but I don't believe it. It is rather that I reject a particular kind of judgmental, picayune meddling deity. I have room to believe in a more distant deity who may be loving, may be all knowing and all that, but who does not intervene on a regular basis. For conventional Christians that is, of course, a heresy. It amounts to rejecting God altogether, from their perspective.

This observation might not be worth much, but "atheist" appeared in print far more often in the early 1800s than more recently. That from Google Ngram, which charts word-in-print frequency over time, usually not further back than 1800. "The term atheism was derived from the French athéisme, and appears in English about 1587. An earlier work, from about 1534, used the term atheonism. Related words emerged later: deist in 1621, theist in 1662, deism in 1675, and theism in 1678. At that time "deist" and "deism" already carried their modern meaning."

Words like "atheist" are usually brought into English by a word-coining author. The 16th - 17th centuries were an active period of word coinage.

by buying the video game, I am indirectly supporting a media establishment that obviously objectifies women in some way to garner a profit. — darthbarracuda

By participating in the capitalist economy, you--we--are supporting an establishment that ruthlessly objectifies and exploits men, women, children, animals--the very earth itself. Media is but a part od the grand scheme.

Sex sells, and humans enhance their market value by whatever tricks in the book are available to them. Back in the day before proper trousers became common, men wore leggings that did not join at the waist. The genitals were not covered, so other arrangements were made. One of the other arrangements was the 'cod piece' -- initially a mere piece of cloth which was developed into a showy cup that made it appear the man had a huge and erect penis. Sexual advertisement and objectification in action--by men.

Women--and men--both engage in sexual advertisement as a form of self-advancement self-enhancement. Given instances might not be quite as obvious as the cod piece or the artfully bared breast. And why would we NOT engage in self-enhancing, self-advancing deployment of clothing or tattoos or bared skin?

BTW, I got a little rush seeing some old names on the first page of the posts, then I noticed that the thread was 3 years old. How time flies!

IvoryBlackBishop, I think Judaka pretty much nailed it. Conformity and non-conformity can both be either principled or unprincipled. Then too, deviation is probably a necessary step on the way to good individuation. Mass-conformity (the cheering crowds at a Nazi rally in Nuremberg for instance, or Trump's fan-base) are a major downside of conformity.

This is a good topic, imho.

"Lag time" between the recognition that resource depletion or population growth might be a problem, and then deployment of effective solutions is our #1 problem. We know CO2 is a extremely serious problem, but changing the energy production system, transportation system, and other systems that produce CO2 is extraordinarily inconvenient to everyone concerned, and it isn't happening, even as the CO2 levels continue to rise.

Contending for the #1 problem title is the tendency of selfish interest to continue being selfish, whatever the future consequences. So it is that oil companies continue to expand infrastructure, auto production rises, highways continue to be built (as opposed to mass transit systems), and so on and so forth.

BTW, I liked the video. Thanks.

Happiness is an emotional state--not just simply that, but that among other things. Can you choose emotions like love, rage, fear, etc? Here you are, sitting in your comfy chair on a bright, sunny California day. You feel 'ok'. Nothing much is bothering you. Can you, at that moment, decide to feel rage, like throwing a switch? No.

Our emotions don't just pop up, like mushrooms. Circumstances, events, various factors bring them about. If you went to the grocery store and, while there, @unenlightened's mad axewoman entered the Safeway and started whacking people (before she was shot by the security guard), you might very well feel a great deal of fear--assuming you weren't one off the victims, put permanently beyond feeling anything.

Concersely, if, while standing in the checkout line at the mad axewoman-free grocery store, you struck up a fascinating conversation with a really interesting person (not the mad axewoman), and the conversation continued for an hour or so outside the store, you would probably feel contented, happy, or pleased--any number of positive emotions.

There are many things you can choose to do (quit a horrible job, end a horrible relationship, do vigorous exercise, practice the piano, make a chocolate cake...) and some of these acts might contribute to feelings of happiness, at least for a while.

Re-engineering different thoughts and feelings might be a losing proposition. I'm not sure how successful we can be at that game. My guess is that people who are happy are lucky in their arrangement of thoughts, beliefs, habits, and practices, and are blessed with a tendency to feel 'happy'.

Happy when the mad axeman asks you to bare your neck? — unenlightened

Since when does the mad axeman ask first?

Thanks for your passionate post.

What I fear is that, even with the will to save ourselves and the ecology on which we depend, we may be unable to do so. We are too dependent on petroleum and its various chemical derivatives. There is no viable alternative waiting in the wings.

What about wind and solar? Nuclear generation? All good - BUT these sources of power do not deliver the chemical feedstock which coal and petroleum supply. Gasoline is a terrifically convenient, portable source of energy. Its replacement is not just around the corner.

We could, theoretically, abruptly abandon petroleum, the auto, the airplane, coal generated electricity, large-scale mechanized agriculture, consumer-driven industry, and so on, but slamming down the brakes would be to commission megadeath (resulting from the massively discombobulated economy). Massive death may occur anyway, but from omission (doing nothing).

in other words, we are totally screwed--not this week, not next year, but in a matter of decades.

why is it that they don't impose the same exacting standards for their leaders (presidents, senators, governors, etc)? — TheMadFool

One reason is that "leadership" is sort of ineffable. Can you describe for us what traits and features the perfect (or even half-ways tolerable) leader would have? What kind of leader(s) do you want?

I'm not sure to what extent "leaders" are born and to what extent they are made. Then there are their followers. Followers have something to do with the behavior of leaders. So do "stakeholders". Every corporation and rich SOB that makes a big donation to a political campaign has a hook in the elected official. Hitler was financed; he didn't just run things based on his innate charm.

My guess is that certain inborn traits, coupled with playground experiences, life in families, classroom experiences, class-linked experiences, and so on go into making leaders. Then too, different circumstances require different kinds of leaders. A country thrust into a war (like, by being invaded) needs one type of leader; a country suffering from severe economic depression needs another kind of leader, perhaps.

I wish we knew how to get the kinds of leader we need.

No, schools are places to keep children occupied so their parents can work, if any learning takes place it's a bonus, and the subjects are those thought most appropriate to a colonial ideal which are sorely in need of updating, not anything to do with importance, otherwise they would be computing, economics, household maintenance, and organisational skills at the very least. — Isaac

There is, sad to say, a lot of truth in your statement. Schools have been described as management of the masses, regulation of the labor pool, keeping youth off the streets where they might interfere with the gears of capitalism, etc. Two caveats:

a) the children of the elite receive excellent educations, as do some others who will fill positions serving the interests of the elite
b) "school" is less important now than it was in the past (this itself is a dated observation) because 24/7 mass media now shapes people into the kinds of consumers that are needed.

FWIW, I never meant this to be an argument about the merits of small government, just about what exactly people mean by that, as illustrated by the argument over UBI I related earlier. — Pfhorrest

"Small government" is code for those who wish to endow government with no capacity to interfere with their particular set of interests. So, those who resent programs of environmental regulation (which definitely interferes with some profit making enterprises), small government has no mandate to regulate use of water, land, and air. For those who resent programs of social benefit (everything from Social Security to Head Start programs, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare, etc.) they would like to see a government too small to be able to raise sufficient revenue to carry out these programs. (In fact, Social Security was resented and suits were launched against it -- as well as against Medicare, Medicaid, etc.)

"Small Government" is usually not called for in the face of military procurement (which benefits corporations in the businesses of supplying military equipment); it usually isn't called for by farmers receiving substantial subsidies.

"That which governs best governs least" sounds attractive, but I think most people usually want government available enough, and powerful enough, to assist them effectively. The population of people who want government to help them includes both billionaires and those who are abjectly poor.

why is damage to the body or satiation accompanied by a qualitative feeling rather than simply being perception — Enrique

It seems obvious enough: We experience sensations with emotions (and 'qualitative' assessment) because our brains have evolved to do precisely that.

The many physical sensations we can experience (pleasure, cold, heat, pain, pressure, hunger, tickling, satiation, etc.) are interpreted in the light of meanings which are assigned. Various perceptions will be interpreted with more or less emotion and qualitative evaluation, depending on the meaning that can be assigned to a perception. A sense of alarm might be registered as you watch the tally on your groceries greatly exceed what you expected. The sensations of desired sexual contact are likely to be received positively. The usually unpleasant sensations associated with a dental drill may be welcome, in the light o the severe toothache which brought you to the dentist.

Fortunately, we do not experience everything with rich emotional or qualitative interpretation. A large share of our perceptions are received quite mechanically. A great deal of perception is utilitarian,. the numbers on gauges in a factory or lab are likely to be perceived in a utilitarian fashion, without feeling.

Presumably some animals with very simple brains do perceive in a very functional S/R manner. A simple worm, for instance, doesn't have enough neurons to do more than a simple SR. I'm not sure what insect brains are like; does a grasshopper feel anything? Could be, don't know. But once we get into larger more complex brains, perceptions become more complex 

What the Trump, Putin, Xi, et al administrations show is that a rather large pile of crap is compatible with the best of all possible worlds formula. What we have here is the most improvable of worlds.

But I am just saying that not everyone who likes living is the village idiot. — simeonz

Of course; I agree. Actually, I rather enjoy living; I don't agree with Schopenhauer1's consistently (and long-time) downbeat view. I used to feel pretty crappy about life-as-we-know-it, and as far as I can tell, life is at least as crappy as it was 20 years ago. But I feel better about life. Why? Don't know, really. I just started feeling better, one year, and it has continued on for the last 7.

But still, even though

In every so many ways, the world is an unsatisfactory place.
Happiness is probably not in the cards.
Nobody asked to be here, but here we are--for a while.
The cosmos doesn't care. — Bitter Crank

I am presently happy. That may change at any time -- bad things can happen that spoil the pleasant garden party.

barring cliched suicide responses — schopenhauer1

Shirley there must be fresh and novel methods!

you do care — simeonz

Who is it that is repeating these lies and slanders about me?

Well, sure, I care--a little bit, anyway; medication helps. But the cosmos definitely doesn't give a rat's ass that I care. The reason is that the cosmos can't care. The spheres are all silent. They spin. End of their story.

if things are that bad, why not just check out. — simeonz

Damned if I know. But I wasn't proposing suicide, anyway. I was merely suggesting one way that one can avoid making the situation worse.

My personal view: Only the most insensitive, unimaginative dolt would think this is a wonderful world after a careful perusal of life as we know it. Not just for us, but for everything else. But there is a time to rip off scabs and a time to refrain from ripping off the scabs on our wounds. Schop seems to be a serial scab ripper, if he even leaves his wounds alone long enough for a scab to form.

You're here; we're here. Get used to it. Really, because...

In every so many ways, the world is an unsatisfactory place.
Happiness is probably not in the cards.
Nobody asked to be here, but here we are--for a while.
The cosmos doesn't care.

One can flail away at the unfairness of life's ingravescent inimicalities, but they are not going to go away. So Schop, find a place that is not too awful and endure the bad situation. It will all be over before you know it.

why have resilience and endurance? — simeonz

Because it doesn't make a bad situation worse by figuratively ramming one's head into a virtual brick wall.

Just wondering what this drama is all about. — Frank Apisa

It's not a very good drama. Boooooring,

In order for you to assert that "'this' is the best of all possible worlds" you presumably have knowledge about the rest of all possible worlds. How many possible worlds do you know of?

Is art a mirror for reality, or a hammer with which to change it? Bertolt Brecht asked.