One Who Walks Among the Dead

Yes. I do like the irony that we evolved because of climate change, and we die because of climate change - that we caused.

This mostly gets into the semantics of describing a complicated unconscious process that produces things that are so complicated that some of them became conscious.

But I would think we could look at the "how many animals do this, and does it benefit them" numbers and conclude "no".

... responding to natural urges or imperatives. Ergo, if art can be considered "natural" to some extent, then why are societies not natural? Is a termite mound unnatural? Is a beaver dam unnatural? Is a wasp's paper-mache hive unnatural? (Yes, because wasps are hellspawn, not animals)

... between an abstract painting from an AI driven bot, and an abstract painting from a person? Actually, that's complicated. But for these purposes, isn't the defining element "what's natural"? A machine is programmed by a person to emulate something. But a person making art is simply ...

It doesn't? Aren't human societies an extension of humanity? And if we assume that humanity is a collective expression of natural traits and conscious ideas, that means at least some of society is a natural expression of natural urges and unconscious biases.

In other words, what's the difference...

Similarly, nature doesn't do inbreeding, and actually has defenses against it, because historically that's how a species deletes itself from existence.

The point is that cannibalism is bad for two practical reasons: it can concentrate disease and even create novel problems unique to that act (prions), and also, the species is supposed to be PROLIFERATING, not literally killing itself.

Maybe that's why they're still primitive tribes deep in the rainforest. On account of the prions and the broken brains.

"a little sugar helps the medicine go down", or so to say

... socialism" makes more sense. Allow just enough shameless profit seeking to encourage risk taking and innovation, while greatly restraining HOW MUCH wealth and in what ways various interests are allowed to accumulate.

And even if you flip a switch and somehow convert a country of 6 timezones and 350 million people to communism: many of these materials COME FROM OTHER COUNTRIES. And I don't think they'll necessarily operate on a barter or hand-shake system.

I dunno. This is where "capitalism constrained by ...

Okay, I get all that ... so maybe the issue is imagination on my end ... because I struggle to understand how this works outside of a town of like 10,000 people.

For example: let's build a factory. Labor is free, okay. But uh ... materials are not. It definitely costs time and labor to move those.

Yes, exactly. I agree with that.

To me, it's a signifier that someone's understanding of psychology is about 20 years out of date.

Just say someone's stupid. You can have a high IQ, and be stupid. You can also have a low IQ, and be smart. Because the IQ think is mostly a measure of how good you are at following instructions.

That's a point regarding the workers, which I'm not sure would always or necessarily be the same people who funded and built the factory.

Because let's say 100 people want to work at a factory, but they gotta build it first. But these few people can't get enough money to build it. Now what?

George was just trying to get to work.

ICE pepper-sprayed him, dragged him from his car, locked him in a detention center, and placed him on suicide watch. He even missed his young daughter’s birthday in the process.

This man is a veteran and American citizen. Don't look away.

is it not weird that every day there’s a new video of anonymous masked men having the time of their lives beating/shooting/disappearing people and the dem response from the top down is “republicans want to double your health insurance premiums”

Oh I know it is because I just have to look towards Europe.

I've written papers about where socialized healthcare came from and why it was actually a good idea even by utilitarianism.

I'm just not sure how investment endeavors work without a little incentive.

It's not so much an argument as a sign of caution. How do you make something work in contrivance to a natural system? Humans descend from hierarchical animals, and to this day, our societies, from top to bottom, are still organized that way.

Sounds like a distinction without a difference, like how magma and lava are different things.

As long as it's consensual and brings you pleasure.

Sorry about that head injury, I guess.

How? When? Why would there be workers for a job that doesn't exist?

Now I'm thinking of how incredibly shitty most small, community funded church buildings are that I see around the Midwest.

Communism as I understand it is not exactly how natural, unconscious systems created through a billion years of trial and error organize themselves.

Look, I get that neurotypicals are stuck in binary thought (either / or) because you open your eyes and see two hands, and they're oppositional to each other.

However, in reality, the truth is basically a nested set of spheres, spectrums of spectrums.

That is: I am not "either / or".

I did, but I guess you lack inferential skills?

So who BUILDS the factories?

What does that have to do with you trying to box me in as a eugenist because you can't parse that someone can believe two seemingly contradictive things at the same time?

And this is starting to feel a bit troll-y now that i provided an answer you didn't like and you're just dodging around that for a different gotcha.

You'd have a really good point if I made those kinds of blanket assertions and wasn't capable of selecting different ideological tools for different problems.