Self entitled monsters+what really happened at UC Davis

[Ducky]

You mean to tell me that a group of people seated peacefully on the ground presents some sort of extremely difficult situation that police are ill-equipped to handle? Right… because non use of force by the protesters warrants use of force by the police, because according to you, this was some complex, incredibly difficult situation that had no clear endgame. Gotcha, seated citizens > years of police training on crowd control.

Civil disobedience is very difficult to approach. We are not a police state and police are people also. Yes, they are breaking the law. Beating them and hauling them off is very questionable morally. Just think about the cops in this situation, you have a bunch of kids sitting around… you want to clear them out, do you just shoot them? Beat them? Why don’t we just execute them? In the previous thread, as well as this one, I think my posts point towards me not supporting the Occupy movement - which I don’t. I don’t think sitting around in drum circles accomplishes much.

That being said, I still have a hard time saying it’s acceptable to just pepper spray the protesters. In this case, they were just sitting around. Yes, they were breaking the law, and yes, they were not following orders. Still, what is the proper escalation of force when these guys aren’t showing force and just sitting around? The riots in Oakland, you had people doing crazy shit, actually rioting. Here, you have a group of kids sitting around chanting. If what the police did was so right, then the college wouldn’t have apologized the way they did.

It’s black and white as far as what actions to take, but the difficult and complex situation is a moral one.

[pedoviejo]

This thread is informative, its smart, I like reading it even though I don’t have much to say but there is this one minor detail I can’t quite get over: why is there one guy with that terrorist dude as his avatar?

Nigga, what are you talking about. The “dude” isn’t a terrorist, just because some politician said so doesn’t make it so.

Speaking of which, im watching this super propaganda bullshit shit from Univision. Now they are attacking the moronic immigrant community and molding them to do what they want.

So you agree that the bail out is BAD, you just don’t think it’s a redistribution of wealth from the middle class to wall street but because of greed? The tax payer money doesn’t just go from the government to Wall street because of some ghost. It’s government giving away your parents’ hard earned money to other people that ‘need’ it.

It’s called socialising the loss, the same way we socialise poor destitute bums on the street with welfare. For some reason, it okay when you give tax payer money to a jobless person but when it’s a group of rich people that went broke you aren’t okay with the idea anymore? Be consistent.

And I don’t see why you think I suscribe to reagonomics or that other trickle down stuff. I don’t, I just think that taxing the rich and corporations will ultimately not work because they are more powerful than the rest of us and they are smart enough to pretty much option select against anything. We have to rethink and reengineer the civilisation we know of and I’m sure we won’t start to do that until the US is a completely trashed 3rd world nation where I can trade bread on the street for sex. That shit’s going to be so free.

I agree, but its not government who is taking your money. Its these corporation that are taking your money. government are the corporations.

As with anything in regards to America, we won’t do shit into its to late. We’ll just take it.

The real issue with letting the “people” have a direct say (instead of representatives), is that the common person doesn’t have enough information. Just look at this thread, there are people talking about economics and the economy, but there is MAYBE a couple of people who have any idea of what is going on. Before you can really understand the economy and how we got here, you need to understand the basics of economics.

So please guys, go study the math, learn the assumptions, educate yourself before you continue talking. Don’t take other people’s words for granted. It is not something that you’re going to be able to learn in a night from a couple of essays.

you should tell that shit to our politicians.

Bam,

Me 1, America 0

[LoyalSol]

The problem is that the peoples’ representatives don’t know shit either. If they did, the country wouldn’t be in this mess. I honestly don’t see the difference between a well-intentioned if under-informed citizen and some Senator that doesn’t have any fucking clue what the real world is.

I think they know shit, but they are too busy playing their own games to care.

[Tekno_Virus]

Solar is a pile of crap right now and isn’t going to be better anytime soon. Even if we had a viable solar option it would take 5 years to actually make enough of them to be even able to handle 10% of the US energy consumption. Wind power doesn’t produce on the scale we need. Inherently those energy sources are weaker than chemical and nuclear energies just by nature. Solar is limited by how fast light can fall on the earth and wind is a finicky power source. You can’t run a country off of it with our current level of understanding. Anyone who says it close to being ready is not living in reality.

Now let’s look at the flip side. We haven’t built a new oil refinery in forever, we aren’t exploring for new oil, we continue to import oil from volatile regions of the world, we keep implementing more and more taxes for energy use, we keep tearing down hydro electric, we keep shutting now nuclear power plants, and overall we keep doing dumb things.

The whole world knows we are running out of cheap oil (notice I didn’t say running out of oil). Yet the US is the only country trying to commit energy suicide.

I used to do work for renewable energy (mostly wind, not a lot of solar) and it seemed to me that a lot of it out there didn’t seem…confidence inspiring. If I was an investor, whether private or from the government, I would definitely do a study whether those things are economically (yes, if it can make money) and environmentally viable, sustainable. Honestly, if I were to guess, probably not by a long margin.

It’s true that I haven’t seen a chemical plant/refinery project in the US, but there are definitely big stuff overseas. There are only big projects out there anymore. Oh and we’re not running out of cheap oil as I see it. There is A LOT of cheap oil in Saudi Arabia. There is a lot out there in politically unstable countries like Venezuela and OPEC. I would definitely say things aren’t the same anymore but in the way that the game is changing and people out there are playing differently. Now, I don’t know if that’s enough to start doom saying. Companies are getting tired of getting screwed over. I think Shell got screwed over one too many times (in politcally unstable regions). Oil companies are stepping away from OPEC and such, and investing more into OECD countries.

Players out there are constantly exploring. Brazil has a lot of stuff offshore and whatever else, lots of projects coming from them. South America usually has heavy oils. Cheap stuff in Saudi as usual. Chevron’s doing stuff in U.S. Gulf of Mexico, offshore West Africa and the waters off western Australia. Exxon’s doing stuff in the US, shale oil apparently, ordering a lot of equipment for that (and whatever purpose). I could type more, but that’s enough.

[Tekno_Virus]

There are a lot of infrastructural problems here. It’s going to take a long time and a lot of hard work to get going. Anyone who thinks there is a silver bullet is mistaken. These politicians with their slogans are not convincing. One thing I’d like to point out is the US is losing its technical competency. Education here sucks. I have gone through it myself and have tutored HS algebra for a little bit. I also have been on the other side of the pond. Don’t tell me it doesn’t suck, education here just suck. Sometimes people get offended and start talking about nationality and stuff, it’s not. Someone out there is taking to school and you’re not doing anything about it.

[Legendary_Hoamaru]

Since the discussion is turning towards energy, I’ve always wondered how viable ideas such as using a mass amount of exercise bikes or other human electricity generating devices would be for generating energy. I know it would probably be solar levels of wackness in regards to our energy usage but I’ve always been curious.

[Tekno_Virus]

Since the discussion is turning towards energy, I’ve always wondered how viable ideas such as using a mass amount of exercise bikes or other human electricity generating devices would be for generating energy. I know it would probably be solar levels of wackness in regards to our energy usage but I’ve always been curious.

Just read your electric bill then go to 24 Hour Fitness/Bally’s/LA Fitness and go look in the cardio section, there should be an option where it shows the amount of W the fat girl is putting out.

[FOBio]

If this were actually feasible, the nation as whole would be a lot healthier.

[No_Cigar]

There are a lot of infrastructural problems here. It’s going to take a long time and a lot of hard work to get going. Anyone who thinks there is a silver bullet is mistaken. These politicians with their slogans are not convincing. One thing I’d like to point out is the US is losing its technical competency. Education here sucks. I have gone through it myself and have tutored HS algebra for a little bit. I also have been on the other side of the pond. Don’t tell me it doesn’t suck, education here just suck. Sometimes people get offended and start talking about nationality and stuff, it’s not. Someone out there is taking to school and you’re not doing anything about it.

In regards to this post and your previous one I wanted to say that we’re just going to keep harming our planet because the biggest incentive for our government is how much money they can make from it. That’s the reality of it.

What I say is fuck cost efficiency. Do you realize how stupid it is to be constrained by money, which doesn’t even exist in the first place? Not only that but look how much money we can put into other bullshit, but we can’t even get our government to back useful projects that will be mutually beneficial to everyone in the long run. The amount of money we spend on our defense industry every year, the $700 billion TARP bailout along with all of the other money from the bailouts, and who do those benefit? Well they benefit the heads of those banks and companies who received millions of dollars in bonuses at the end of the same year that they crashed their own companies a hell of a lot more than it benefited you and me.

The system is going to hurt us all in the long run (more than it already does).

And as far education goes, you have to look at the broader spectrum of the environment of the students. I came from a hard part of town. My high school’s drop out rate and rate of teen pregnancy were crazy high. I was conditioned not to actively participate in my classes because it wasn’t “cool”. It’s foolish I know. There’s teachers who have to go purchase school supplies using their own money out of pocket, on their meager salaries.

What I’m trying to say is that you can’t just blame the students. You have to blame the environment, which is often harmful and self-perpetuating in it’s negativity. Not only that but many educators will agree that the educational system itself is antiquated. It is not as stimulating as it could be. The idea of standardized tests and wrote and memorization without stimulating actual critical or divergent thinking.

If you want to watch a thought provoking presentation on education check this vid out:

[media=youtube]zDZFcDGpL4U[/media]

[dodgers2213]

energy? I always refer to this lecture. A little long, but its very good

[media=youtube]ZjiilzE24eA[/media]

Nuclear energy is the most expensive form of conventional energy. If it was economically viable, it wouldn’t need government subsidies

[Tekno_Virus]

snip

I guess my knowledge is still limited but there is a lot of work that can be done to make operations/manufacturing sustainable. At the very least, it’s not static it’s evolving. I know it’s not a perfect world but at least it’s something and people’s attitude seem to be changing for the better. I know it may not be such a lofty saying to say “Gotta make that money” or even to say “money” because at the end of the day, it’s gotta work on a technical basis as well as on an economical one however I do not believe that making more money means more pollution. At the end of the day, people just gotta be smart about it. Producing energy will always produce some kind of waste, that’s just physics, but we should be smart enough/have technology to manage and minimize that waste product. Just the other day I was impressed that you could reduce SOx and NOx emissions by having certain burners designed that the flames join upon themselves at an angle and there was also this other design where the flame actually spirals upwards with a surrounding cylindrical one. The point I’m trying to make is that, ok maybe we can’t solve everything/make everyone happy in one day, but I’d like to believe is that if people really put their brains together then yes tomorrow we can make a step and another step the day after.

And yes, I do agree, money is definitely not managed well in this country. For example, putting ethanol in gasoline. Everyone loses on that one. Government wastes money (it takes more energy to create a lesser amount of energy), it drives up the cost of food so we lose, and it doesn’t really work as well in your car and we lose again. Another case is government investing in Solyndra. Just reading about the design makes me realize that this wouldn’t work, and it didn’t. The government lost a lot money having invested in that technology. The point I’m trying to convey is that whoever’s running this show isn’t/aren’t making the right decision and isn’t/aren’t directing the available funds to the right places and probably their way of operations isn’t probably the smoothest.

Concerning education,
I know we may disagree but honestly there’s gotta be change on all levels. Now I’m not trying to make this into a nationality/cultural versus thread. I’m not. I’m trying to say, we need to be more competitive.

If I’m a student, I want to school feeling like I’m getting smarter and feel like I’m doing something. When I was abroad, I experienced such thing but I’m trying to not bring it up because no place is an utopia but what I’m trying to show is that this sort of thing is definitely possible, very possible. High school textbooks are so worthless. When I tutored algebra, I always used my university’s algebra textbook. I don’t need pretty picture on glossy paper with sensational writing. How about focusing more on problems that actually make sense. Everyone knows high school is a lot of waste of time, not completely but a lot of it is. I could go on, but however you see it, or even if our perspectives are different, but things gotta change. It’s going to take work, it’s going to take some thinking, and if we ever do something about it, probably a lot people will get pissed. Oh and no silver bullets/overnight solutions.

On the student side, why is “nerdy” why is it “dude man that’s lame” to be smart? Why is it looked down to be hard working? I think that’s enough typing for now. I saw that video a while back.

[Ducky]

So they tried to shut down ports today, the OWS movement… a move I didn’t really agree with.

Back to proper use of force, I found an article in the NYTimes that is pretty relevant:

Opinion | Have American Police Become Militarized?

Basically I have strong feelings about the militarization of police forces - they shouldn’t be serving that type of function. It’s heading down the direction of possible police states. I understand they need proper training and all, but the police is not there to treat the general population as an enemy and they definitely should not be utilizing military tactics and arming themselves as such.

[LoyalSol]

Since the discussion is turning towards energy, I’ve always wondered how viable ideas such as using a mass amount of exercise bikes or other human electricity generating devices would be for generating energy. I know it would probably be solar levels of wackness in regards to our energy usage but I’ve always been curious.

You can always calculate an ideal equivalence by figuring out the energy taken given off. This gives you an upper bound on what you could realistically expect.

So assuming 100% of the energy is retained (a more realistic assumption is more like 10-20%) the calories you are shown n the bike are kilocalories or 1000 calories. 1000 cals = 4182 Joules

Heat of Combustion of Gas is 47.30 Megajoules per kilogram. Density of Gas is about 0.7 g/mL

So working it all out every cal you burn is the equivalence of 0.126 mL of gas or 3 one hundred thousandth of a gallon of gas. The average person burns what? 360 calories when they work out on a bike?

[No_Cigar]

hey LoyalSol what do you think about this?

???

[media=youtube]YU47blakiiI[/media]

Combustion from salt water using radio waves. I wonder if this can be applied as an energy source and how efficient it would be? Your thoughts?

[Tekno_Virus]

???

Combustion from salt water using radio waves. I wonder if this can be applied as an energy source and how efficient it would be? Your thoughts?

Concerning the cancer thing, a similar technology was developed years ago. Forgot if it was a proton beam (I’m not alluding to IM) but basically the wave has low energy as it travels through healthy tissue then as it reaches cancerous tissue the energy level is high thereby killing the cancerous tissue.

[Rhio2k]

So they tried to shut down ports today, the OWS movement… a move I didn’t really agree with.

This is the second time they tried to it impossible for regular working class people to work. Next thing you know, this movement and their shenanigans will be used as an excuse to put us under martial law or maybe just remove our right to organize, kinda like Operation Fast Track was an attempt to manufacture an excuse to fuck over gun owners. When the administration likes something that is questionable, look at the big picture: how can they use this to their advantage over the public? That’s certainly what they’re thinking every step of the way. “How can we use this?” This is the world we live in now.

[obscura]

Anyone else notice everyone who uses the term “Self-Entitled” is an uninformed idiot?

[VI_The_Sixth]

I love how people oversimplify the problems of a generation to suit their own political views. Hindsight is 20/20.

Not to mention the fact that even the founding fathers were something called…Human.

Nice job missing my point entirely.

Exactly, the founding fathers were human and humans are never perfect. So obviously, there is no reason to look at EVERY single issue and agree with what the founding fathers might have thought about it. That was what I was trying to get at and it flew right over your head.

[LoyalSol]

Nice job missing my point entirely.

Exactly, the founding fathers were human and humans are never perfect. So obviously, there is no reason to look at EVERY single issue and agree with what the founding fathers might have thought about it. That was what I was trying to get at and it flew right over your head.

Sure we won’t agree with everything they did, but they did get several things right and quoting their failures doesn’t make everything they did worthless.

I see these kinds of arguments all the time.

Person A: I believe we had a great economic policy under JFK and we should go back to the policy we had in the 1960s"
Person B: “WE HAD CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUES!!! I DON’T WANT TO GO BACK TO THAT!“
Person A:”…”

That was the style of your point which is faulty logic.

[Ducky]

This is the second time they tried to it impossible for regular working class people to work. Next thing you know, this movement and their shenanigans will be used as an excuse to put us under martial law or maybe just remove our right to organize, kinda like Operation Fast Track was an attempt to manufacture an excuse to fuck over gun owners. When the administration likes something that is questionable, look at the big picture: how can they use this to their advantage over the public? That’s certainly what they’re thinking every step of the way. “How can we use this?” This is the world we live in now.

The movement seems to be losing a lot of steam now. It’s funny how the unions at the ports came out and told the media that they don’t want OWS getting involved in their shit.