Ha, I hear you.

Funny.

That is appreciated, Monte, and has a lot to do with why you are held in such affection by so many here. But it comes at a cost. Leadership entails recognizing that cost and making a deliberate decision as to whether it is worth paying.

The easiest thing is to duck the decision, and let nature and assholery deteriorate quality to its base entropic level, as both you and Jez seem wont to do. Wonder how Dru et.al. feel about that approach?

Forum a better place now than it was 2 years ago, in your estimation?

O.O you changed your pic

I suspect few of us here drink a thimble of fluid on a weekly basis.

A more effective way to end human annoyances, I have not encountered.

Hi Monte- the purpose for revisiting this forum and checking on you (and your writings) is that I quite like a woman who seems to be INFJ (she's a speech therapist). Well, you commented one time (in an archive search) that your wife is INFJ and that the compatibility is good.
Anyway, please don't go to the trouble of replying- I'm really only passing through. But I think you bring a lot of good to the forum and enlighten so many of us. In turn, I hope you benefit from articulating your thoughts on various matters- I find such actions quite liberating.
Best wishes,
Karl.

nyahaha you know, I like that song!

A very gripping comment in the first impressions thread. I love the new avatar.

People aren't being raised to high standards lately. Holding them up to them doesn't seem to work well these days. It might be more practical to try to make relationships work and fix problems yourself, because societal pressure no longer makes people stay together and work at it, automatically.

I don't think the government can really be trusted to fix things. We don't elect the right people into government - or perhaps... the right people don't want to be in government.

I sometimes think that you would need conscientious businessmen to create a second government to compete with this one

Not sure. I think some members finally succeeded in silencing the opposition, but without theists to beat up on they might get bored and leave.

The R & M subforum has also been a lot less busy. Coincidence?

that's just my Ne/Ti speaking. If I see something that is easily falsifiable, I feel like I must point it out. Sometimes, I can clearly articulate what the heck I'm talking about, but if my Ni takes over... forget it. I just ramble.

Very insightful.

Apparently even Bill Gates has jumped on to the efficient nuclear reactors wagon. They say 5 billion years worth of energy if we get them to work right - in a sense that is bringing in something from outside the system to make it feasible again. Improved manufacturing techniques potentially do something similar.

If those advantages don't come through in time, then there will indeed be a crash and restart as a new generation works to create some kind of stable system from the ashes of the old... and there would be much suffering for many, as others take advantage to strengthen themselves.

I'm kinda hopeful that it will work out. On the minus side, I don't like the direction of social evolution and revitalizing the current system means that those problems wouldn't get fixed and would continue down their current direction.

Its actually interesting to see just how many separate things are going wrong and feeding into each other. At its core though I think the main issue is that we make changes to systems we don't understand, without clear intent on what real improvements we are trying to make or what measures we will use to validate our choices, and what we will do to undo things if we realize we made a mistake.

... or basically we aren't even trying to be intelligent, on a social / government level... Although there's the chance that it will still work out. If cheap energy or cheaper manufacturing methods come through for example, they could revitalize the economy enough to overcome the weaknesses in our other systems.

(We're basically like a guy living on too much credit and using more credit while hoping for that big break that will fix everything )

The form of our debt based economy and government also has a tendency of covering up current day problems and pushing them into the future to be dealt with by future generations, while we get the impression that we must not be doing that badly since things are still working...

I think its multiple factors... the strong like to be seen supporting the weak and mistreated. Some ideas had time to gain acceptance. Technology changed some of the underlying needs for some systems. etc.

Once things started changing, people started questioning more of the way things were - except that understanding what makes morality moral - the fact that the traditions and systems societies developed are what gave them an edge, and that you didn't end up successful by magic ... and what the actual importance of individual traditions or ideas in the overall system is... can be non-obvious. Especially to simple people who are just trying to rationalize some excuse for acting on their feelings.

Unfortunately, its not always obvious to the spoiled rich kid having fun, that he doesn't really deserve to be rich and that if he doesn't carry on the habits that made his parents rich and improve on them, that he might not stay rich for very much longer.

Thanks!