"Most of us have the distinct pleasure of going throughout our lives bereft of the physical presence of those who rule over us. Were we peasants instead of spreadsheet jockeys, warehouse workers, and baristas, we would toil in our fields in the shadow of some overbearing castle from which the lord or his steward would ride down on his thunderous charger demanding our fealty and our tithes."
This is gutturally revolting to me. The insinuation here is that the average person is a passenger in their own lives, without free will.
You don't come out of the womb and someone puts a stamp on your head saying "Barista! Paperboy! Grocery bagger!"
Barring considerable physical/mental disabilities, or personal choices like deciding to have kid(s) that you're financially responsible for at a young age with no money, I'd make the argument that most people can become millionaires.
I find this as a reaction to the quoted passage (not to some hypothetical other passage, perhaps) so confusing that I can't wrap my head around it without categorizing it as the result of misreading. "Gutturally revolting"? But your objections hardly seem related to the text at all. To something you feel was suggested (a couple steps removed, and not necessarily) by it, or some expansion of it you're making, maybe, but to that text? I'm at a loss.
> I'd make the argument that most people can become millionaires.
Make the argument then. How do “most” people become millionaires if that requires owning businesses or getting high up in a company? Who works for them if the majority of people are at the top?
There are many more ways of making money, and the economy is not zero sum. And of course just because most could do it doesn't mean most will. Most of us can workout 3 times a week, that doesn't mean most of us do.
It’s not a zero sum game but I think maybe we’re using the term millionaires differently.
When I, and most people I presume, use millionaires in casual conversation the reference is to being wealthier than most of society. It’s not usually meant as precisely having at least a million dollars since inflation has made that not a lot of money already since the colloquial use of the term millionaires first came about.
If you mean literally having a million dollars than we can probably just wait 50 years and even the destitute will be able to scrounge around for that much change.
Probably much sooner than 50 years, but yeah. If you mean filthy rich I think that takes a combination of work skill and luck that's hard for most people to achieve.
That being said, you don't need to be filthy rich to live a good life. There's the perspective that it's all mindset of course, but barring that you don't need to be filthy rich to go see F1 races for example. I've been to some when I was nearly broke. Obviously no Grand Prix grandstands but it's still achievable for the average person.
I think a good deal of US adults will become nominal millionaires in their lives. The trick is to marry someone, own a house together, and contribute to 401ks.
It's a lower bar by the day. I expect by the time I'm, perhaps, retiring (which isn't even that far off), "millionaire" won't be enough qualification to tell if someone's comfortable in retirement, or mightily struggling. Especially if we just mean a net-worth millionaire.
I agree. The sudden influence of the separatist movement does match what that book (Foundations of Geopolitics) says: "Russia should use its special services within the borders of the United States and Canada to fuel instability and separatism" (quote from Wikipedia). I don't want to be a conspiracy nut, but I have to wonder how many separatist and protest movements are unknowingly getting external support to produce geopolitical disorder.
> I don't want to be a conspiracy nut, but I have to wonder how many separatist and protest movements are unknowingly getting external support to produce geopolitical disorder.
I'm Latin-American, so this doesn't sound at all nutty to me. The USA has long been doing this: from successful attempts promoting separatism in Panama and Texas, to failed attempt in Sonora and Baja California (officially a private citizen acting in his own accord, but conveniently enjoying the complacency of the US Government). It's one of the strategies big powers use, and there's more examples of this in Europe, Asia, and the rest of the world.
I think it's worth considering that perhaps this isn't Russian-fueled separatism, but American-fueled. The would gain a lot USA from an independent Alberta. It'd go the way of Texas— independent for about a year and then incorporated into the United States. Moreover, Alberta statehood would create a geographical rift in Canada that would place immense pressure on British Columbia to go independent or join the United States too.
It would also make the future annexation of the Northwest Territories and the Yukon much more likely, which would not only give the USA better access to the North-West Passage [1] and a wealth of resources, but it would connect Alaska to the rest of the continental USA.
> have to wonder how many separatist and protest movements are unknowingly getting external support to produce geopolitical disorder.
Many movements "wittingly" receive external support. From wikipedia[0]:
> In 2022, a report by the Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI) identified Qatar as the most significant foreign donor to American universities. The research revealed that from 2001 to 2021, US higher education institutions received US$13 billion in funding from foreign sources, with Qatar contributing donations totaling $4.7 billion to universities in the United States.
In addition to investing in US Universities, Qatar is also host to the the Hamas political apparatus, which operates out of Doha.
Foreign propagandists don't exclusively target right wing radical movements, they are very happy to exploit leftists as well!
Agree on the Donor Advised Fund (I use Fidelity). If you have highly-appreciated stock, you definitely should look into a DAF. Another benefit is that it is extremely easy to donate to a charity; click and submit and you don't have to worry about paperwork and putting each donation down on your taxes.
Important: If you've received a text from a wrong number, this article describes exactly the Pig Butchering scam that you're being set up for. Have you received a random text like "Shall we grab a coffee soon?", "How have you been lately?", or "Let's go to the new restaurant." You'll find that an attractive, professional woman texted you by mistake, but she thinks you're a friendly person and wants to keep talking. After a few weeks, she'll tell you about all the money she made through investments and offer to help you invest. As you put in more and more money, you'll see huge returns on the (fake) website. When you eventually try to withdraw your fortune, there will be a small fee, followed by a tax payment, followed by more fees. Worst case, you end up like the banker in the article, frantically trying to borrow $18 million so you can recover the mythical $47 million.
This is an extremely common scam; the group https://reddit.com/r/scams is very interesting, with many stories of this scam and others. Key takeaways: it's easier to get scammed than you'd think. Never spend money to withdraw money. Don't respond to wrong-number texts. Anyone who wants cryptocurrency (or gift cards) is scamming you.
A similar paradox applies to interpersonal relationships: in many cases, if you try to reduce someone's workload, they will take on more tasks and end up where they started. E.g. Wife: "I'm too busy; you need to do more". Husband: cleans more. Wife: takes on the PTA fundraising auction. "I'm too busy; you need to do more."
Midazolam/Versed sedation seems pretty close to a p-zombie. You can have someone who seems completely awake, walking around and interacting normally, but if you ask them later they were completely unconscious from their own perspective. So self-reported consciousness isn't always accurate. And it also seems that consciousness is very closely tied to memory.
(I'm not arguing a particular position, but trying to figure out what to make of this. Also, this is based on what I've read, not personal experience.)
> You can have someone who seems completely awake, walking around and interacting normally, but if you ask them later they were completely unconscious from their own perspective
Were they unconscious, or are they now unable to remember what they did? I.e. amnesiac.
If you ask a deceased person about their life, you will find that they also will offer no evidence of a previous conscious experience. Life, apparently, resembles unconsciousness.
Thanks for the research. I did similar (but less extensive) calculations a few years ago and came to the same conclusion that ESR probably got negligible money from VA Linux. Also, having your net worth drop from $36 million to ~0 can kind of mess someone up.
ESR's (slightly smug) post "Surprised by Wealth" at the time when he had $36 million on paper makes very interesting reading now: https://news.slashdot.org/story/99/12/10/0821224/esr-writes-...
He implied that he was going to cash out in 6 months when his lockout expired, but that apparently didn't happen. Ironically, he said that he had much more faith in VA Linux than the U.S. economy over that 6 months. Also ironic in light of Loadsharers is his statement "Anyone who bugs me for a handout, no matter how noble the cause and how much I agree with it, will go on my permanent shit list."
No. New HIV diagnoses in the US are 67% male-to-male sexual contact, 22% heterosexual contact, and 7% injection drug use. (BTW, I have no agenda here except accurate statistics.)
What I find interesting is that this seems to be an obscure philosophical thought experiment, but it's actually highly political and turns up all the time on, say, Twitter. Specifically, how do you compare "factual knowledge" and "lived experience", and which is more important, and who is the "expert" on things.
To make this concrete, consider expertise on England. Suppose Prof. Smith has never been to England, but has studied it in detail for decades. And suppose Mr. Chav has grown up in England, but is uneducated and isn't even sure who is the Prime Minister. Who is "allowed" to talk about England? Smith, who knows all the facts, or Chav who lives there and knows what it's like? Can Smith tell Chav that he's wrong about England, or does Chav's lived experience matter? (I'm using England as a less controversial example, but this usually happens in discussions of race or gender.)
I think what you're suggesting here might be both more and less complicated than you're making it, owing precisely to the presumption of the "identity" of the thing called "England" (very similar to race and gender of course).
As a black person, I just find that there's probably something along the lines of the philopsohical idea of "things are what they do," which also means occasionally getting comfy with contradictions and paradoxes.
E.g. concretely, I can (well, must, really) accept the idea of "blackness" being a very flimsy concept from a scientific view but a very strong one from a social/political one.
> And suppose Mr. Chav has grown up in England, but is uneducated and isn't even sure who is the Prime Minister.
Easy: The head of lettuce.
More seriously, this stuff comes up with historical events, which is only to be expected given that the human mind is a tale-spinner of ill repute that has a habit of creating and re-creating stories and convincing itself that this new version was the way it really happened. Records might be incomplete, or even wrong, but they don't flip things around quite as avidly as the human mind. Of course, I don't know how much known facts about cognitive science are allowed to inform philosophy...
I had no problem getting my colonoscopy without drugs, and I recommend considering this route. It's very cool to see what's going on—how often do you get to see your appendix? Discomfort was minimal; I get more pain from my abdominal workout at the gym. (Although I suspect my doctor was unusually good.) For the most part, it was kind of like watching a procedure on TV, with occasional reminders that I was the subject: "You're watching in Cramp-O-Vision!" It was nice to have zero recovery time and drive home.
