iNow

No

No. I’m saying the mRNA vaccine is quite obviously better than any sheep dewormer promulgated by Fox News and which one buys at a feed store.

How long exactly is your chalk? Like sidewalk long, or just blackboard long? It’s super fun how you so nonchalantly and with such conviction lay the entirety of the blame and ownership of this problem solely down on to one side of a coin that itself actually has three. It’s easy to the point of being lazy and slothish to tear down existing barns. It is, however, much harder to build new barns from scratch and from the ground up. My question to you is, “What alternative do you have in mind?” You speak of rules needing shredding. Okay, great. I’ll supply both the power and the blades. But with what will you replace them? This is a genuinely interesting question. Sadly, my expectation of you, however, is for little more than another waste of bandwidth / waste of time post lacking in any meat, merit, or meaning. Truth be told, I would genuinely welcome you proving me wrong here. Go ahead, I dare ya… I’ll even say, please. Good for you. I’ve seen it, too. Please, however, try replying next time with something even within the vicinity of relevant… or at least within the same zip code or continent of relevant. It would be much appreciated.

Jesus, dude. “Interesting” is how female friends describe to each other blind dates of questionable character, attractiveness, and intelligence. Just take the damned vaccine. You’re basically drowning and refusing the life vest 17 people are throwing you bc once some uninformed uneducated crank somewhere in a place that doesn’t matter once said to you one time that “blue magnets can help you float in choppy waters during hurricanes”… so you keep brushing aside all those 17 people with life vests in search of this nonexistent and nonhelpful blue magnet. It’s like someone is asking you what 2 + 2 equals and the answer you keep giving over and over and over again is “banana, but only when it’s purple.” No, dipshit. 2 + 2 = 4.

I guess it sure is a good thing I never told you to shut up. Let’s add lying and problems with reading comprehension to the list of reasons your opinion lacks value. There’s literally no debate. It’s not effective, at least not in context of successfully slowing the spread of this pandemic and treating Covid.

Good for you. You’ve given me no reason to care.

You’re welcome. Now, shut up and go get vaccinated if you haven’t already. Golly. Now… Imagine just how profoundly worse it would be without them having been vaccinated. I’m all out of shits to give, buddy. You’re a moron if you think you’re on the right side of this one.

Of course, they can. The way it’s been framed, however, provides them with a quote unquote “legitimate out” not to have to. There is no constitutional challenge. It’s just private citizens exercising their legislatively guaranteed rights to sue “people.” Like I said. Clever. We need more on the right side of history willing to surrender their scruples to achieve wins within the rules of the game like this. It’s smart, even though I hate what it means.

Sorry..: WTF is the meaning of “infinitively pointless?” Feels a bit like word salad without any of the roughage or fiber.

The sad part is that all this idiocy around making it illegal for schools to ban masks, or ensuring guns can be carried into kindergartens, or that private citizens can legally sue anyone they personally decide are wearing Scarlett letters in abortion issues, or that voting shouldn’t happen on Sunday’s or be allowed via mail, or ad infinitum… all that stuff is PRECISELY what wins them the election. The problem isn’t the politician. While governors and their various henchmen obviously wield enormous power, the problem is not with them, per se. They are the symptom, not the cause. The problem is the widespread base of millions of otherwise decent neighbors demanding the pols all behave in one certain and very precise way or else be strung up and cast out. The problem is the elected “officials” are doing these things precisely bc that’s the most optimal and successful path towards maintaining power when the next election ultimately happens.

Because they’re fucking idiots who refuse to take the easiest most well evidenced and effective path toward bringing this pandemic to an end Here again, idiocy of this magnitude is no longer acceptable.

There’s always a way, but it requires power and control. Right now, those who know how to play the game and who wish to impose their preferences on women at all costs tend to have the power… in Texas and other states like mine, and also in the federal courts across the states and most importantly in the US Supreme Court (see also: Mitch McConnell blocking Merrick Garland, but allowing Amy Conen Barrett to be seated during election years). Hope that she has enough money or a kind friend with enough money to drive the 8-10 hours across Texas into a more liberal neighboring state (tho really the only state bordering Texas where this could possibly help is New Mexico… Oklahoma and Louisiana are really no better than Tejas in this regard) to have the procedure done there, then repeat the 8-10 drive back home and still hopefully have gainful employment / not have been fired for being gone 2 days. Here again, profound wealth inequality rears its ugly head. Yes, some can. No, most can’t.

That’s effing disgusting, and not even within the same galaxy of what I was thinking when the word “ramen” crossed my brain 😂

The clever bit here is that they’ve subtracted government officials from the process. They’ve basically opened up the system such that any private citizen can sue abortion providers and also anyone else deemed to be “assisting” in the process of abortion for money and damages. They’ve empowered citizens to rip the system apart from the inside and this allows judges to look aside and avoid ruling for/against since it doesn’t involve government entities. Like redrawing district lines and changing who can vote / how they can vote, these practices are effective. I disagree with them, but they know how to play the game. We need more people like this without scruples on the side of liberal policies. The right is racking up win after win after win despite being a minority.

I find that the type of person who actually reads studies doesn’t tend to be the same type of person avoiding vaccines or masks and rushing off to take hydroxychloroquine… erm… ivermectin or whatever other snake oil gets peddled next by extremists and fascists.

Phew. That was a super close call. Thx for the warning! 😂

Truths contained in their opposites.

But can it really even be called a birthday without ramen? Does nothing even matter anymore? The universe proves over and over again in unexpected ways that it’s under no obligation to make sense to our puny terrestrial human minds… and that ain’t nothin’. Something being hard to fathom doesn’t mean that something is untrue or in any way invalid.

That’s one reason, anyway. I do, however, like borrowing intelligence from other members here because it’s not quite so scarce or as hidden. Lobsters have always driven motorcycles, fast, free, clawed, but only on paved roads. See? I can do it, too! This is fun.

I will do no such thing. There is a correct answer here. It's the one I have shared (even if perhaps you've failed to adequately comprehend it). Let's assume this is true. I'm fairly comfortable accepting it's not, but let's assume for the sake of argument that you're 100% correct. The next question is obvious: Then where did that intelligence come from? It's turtles all the way down. You haven't answered the question. You've merely displaced it.

First, that's not what he stated. Second, even if it WAS, you really need to educate yourself on the basics here if you're going to use them to defend your stance. The factual untruths are with your words, not his. Summarized: Reflexes DO happen without the need for a functioning brain. The brain is not needed to create the action, no matter how forcefully or repeatedly you suggest otherwise.

Must you resort to arguing against strawmen? Zapatos obviously suggested nothing of the sort. It's a shame you feel the need to move the goalposts so completely in order to defend your stance.

I believe the crux of any disagreement we may have here resides in the fact that you're thinking of computers in the 1970s, and I'm saying we've come a very long way in the 50 years since then such that these simplistic assertions are no longer quite as valid as you propose. Rather like humans is the core of my counter-proposal. We're simply running similar programs on wet computers. In short, I am suggesting you're making a distinction without a difference. If a corporation can be human in our laws, then likely so too can AIs. There's precedent here. I refer you here to please go review the insular cortex, the anterior cingulate cortex, and the medial prefrontal cortex. You're welcome. How else would you describe the way action potentials are triggered across the nervous system only after sufficient build-up of potassium and sodium ions? Once enough of those elements have come together in the plasma membrane within the hillock, a threshold is crossed and the axon depolarizes. I readily acknowledge there are many crucial differences between our minds and digital computers, but the lack of bit flipping and registration of electrical signals is not IMO one of them. I suggested that we're just flipping sodium and potassium channels on a biological substrate. That has been very well understood and well evidenced for several decades now. Will you kindly please clarify which specific part of this you believe has "no evidence" and which is "just not true?" Of all the claims I made, this one is perhaps the best supported, yet this is the one you've chosen to cast aside with the brush of a hand as blanketly untrue, and that rather confuses me. I welcome clarification of your dismissal. Here I'm going to go so far as to say you're arguing against a strawman. I don't believe it's intentional, but I do believe your comments suggest a deep ignorance of the last several decades of research into neurobiology and function, or at the very least an overconfidence in your own seemingly limited understanding of this space. Here yet again, I must dismiss this as quite obviously untrue to the point of being a strawman... it doesn't even raise to status of hyperbole. It's just false. It's fine for you to hold this opinion, but I believe your opinion is not representative of reality on this particular point. Agreed. Thanks for the cordial exchange and intelligent discussion thus far. It's always appreciated. Let's also remind ourselves to be cognizant of the OPs intention for this thread and hopefully we don't hijack it with this interesting aside.

Maybe for you…

You can’t separate the two. You’re asking for an answer to a question within no basis in reality. The baby in a womb is too young for sense of self. They just “are.” They don’t even have object permanence until sometime during the first year after birth (it doesn’t exist if they can’t currently see it)