No. Seriously. NASA just unveiled an inflatable space station. Cost effective.
A little too much emphasis on cost effectiveness? Or a future of giant islands if plastic, like we have in the oceans, at Lagrange points all over the solar system? The kind of distopia Philip K Dick only dreamed of.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Wednesday, January 9, 2013
NRA Please.
Would someone please start discussing gun control rationally? Why do all the spokes people look like televangelists and sound like crazy uneducated hicks?
Try this: People keep up Japan as a nation of no guns and no gun violence. Why has no one pointed out that they have one of the highest suicide rates in the world? Suicides need to be removed from discussions of gun death statistics, guns go away, for example in Australia, but suicides haven't changed, so including suicides in gun death statistics causes inaccuracies in thought. Good rhetoric, distorted facts. As Martin Bashir and Reverend Al Sharpton are fond of quoting: "You're allowed to have your own opinions but not your own facts."
Similarly, saying gun deaths and injuries due to accidents need to be removed from the numbers discussion. You have a table saw in your house, you're more likely to be cut off your own fingers than if you don't. So of course accidents happen with people who own guns than with people who don't.
Gun control will not stop criminals who bought guns illegally from getting guns. It will drive up the costs. It will open a new black market, like drugs, like alcohol, and the likely hood of guns used in violent confrontations over guns will increase but it won't stop violence.
And who cares how much ammunition you can buy? So the Aurora shooter bought 6000 rounds of ammunition over the Internet? Did he shoot 6000 rounds? If we're going by possibilities, the labs he had access to before dropping out of school could have been used to produce mustard gas any number of other chemical weapons. What would the death toll have been then? Just while we're pointing out things that didn't happen but could have done?
So...we need better spokesmen. We need better arguments over rational statistics. We need a realistic view of the world and its changing structure. I don't remember any school shootings when I was in school. So perhaps we should also look at the rise in school shootings for an explanation. Guns have always been available. It's the violence that's changed.
Why?
Until we answer that, the rest is silly posturing over sadness and guilt. Social media outrage in a world brought into focus through the same constant socializing and anonymity that degrades the empathy and reason of any mob.
Try this: People keep up Japan as a nation of no guns and no gun violence. Why has no one pointed out that they have one of the highest suicide rates in the world? Suicides need to be removed from discussions of gun death statistics, guns go away, for example in Australia, but suicides haven't changed, so including suicides in gun death statistics causes inaccuracies in thought. Good rhetoric, distorted facts. As Martin Bashir and Reverend Al Sharpton are fond of quoting: "You're allowed to have your own opinions but not your own facts."
Similarly, saying gun deaths and injuries due to accidents need to be removed from the numbers discussion. You have a table saw in your house, you're more likely to be cut off your own fingers than if you don't. So of course accidents happen with people who own guns than with people who don't.
Gun control will not stop criminals who bought guns illegally from getting guns. It will drive up the costs. It will open a new black market, like drugs, like alcohol, and the likely hood of guns used in violent confrontations over guns will increase but it won't stop violence.
And who cares how much ammunition you can buy? So the Aurora shooter bought 6000 rounds of ammunition over the Internet? Did he shoot 6000 rounds? If we're going by possibilities, the labs he had access to before dropping out of school could have been used to produce mustard gas any number of other chemical weapons. What would the death toll have been then? Just while we're pointing out things that didn't happen but could have done?
So...we need better spokesmen. We need better arguments over rational statistics. We need a realistic view of the world and its changing structure. I don't remember any school shootings when I was in school. So perhaps we should also look at the rise in school shootings for an explanation. Guns have always been available. It's the violence that's changed.
Why?
Until we answer that, the rest is silly posturing over sadness and guilt. Social media outrage in a world brought into focus through the same constant socializing and anonymity that degrades the empathy and reason of any mob.
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