Helping Americans understand just how rich we are

@Robert Gentel,

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You don't ever notice that your obsessions and predictions aren't that connected to reality do you? Remember how you told us how the friends feature on able2know would make this all a popularity contest and clique and destroy debate? Debate continues with no real difference at all and you'll move on to new things to preach gloom and doom about.

only because we currently have enough people who either refuse to use such features, or use them part time only. My objections were right on the money, a2k has only been saved because of an unusually high percentage of people being here who are independent minded. It is a resource you would do well not to squander.

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What is an "unusually large amount" given a sample of people in terms of percentage? What is normal?

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@Robert Gentel,

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I also probably don't think that the emigration hurts their home countries as much as you do, they usually support their whole families back home and don't forget about them entirely.

In the Australian experience they bring their families with them, and when they get old they retire to their home country on an Australian pension. We take doctors, surgeons, bankers, business people, the rich, almost no middle class and only asylum seekers from the lower class. Very little money goes back home and when they return home, if they do, it is to retire and not work usually.

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Remittances (expats sending money home) are a huge part of the Mexican economy

It is a huge part of the Philippine economy too, and I am sure there are others. It is the least desirable way to add wealth to a nation. Spain collapsed economically because of its wealth not being based on local products when the wealth from the new world dried up. Sending money home makes it worse not better in the long run.

I think it is far better to say stay where you are we will bring the jobs to you.

As a somewhat contradictory footnote we recently had a clothing manufacturer bring their industry back to Oz because the lead times in China were way too long. Here with a modern technologically minded society it could change design and produce goods quick enough to take advantage of short notice changes in the market...eg an unannounced visit by a pop star resulting in a demand for printed t'shirts.

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@Robert Gentel,

I read these consecutively so I didnt notice this when I should have addressed it in my previous post.

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Remittances also foster, in the receiving countries, a further economic dependence on the global economy instead of building sustainable, local economies.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remittance

The last line seems to be what Ionus was concerned about, and it's certainly a valid point but it seems to me that it's still a net benefit to the developing nation.

I would be interested in knowing what you think are the specific net benefits. It seems to me money sent home is short term charity.

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@hawkeye10,

You have no idea how many people do or do not use the feature, but just make claims that they don't because your doomsday scenario didn't come true. Thing is, you predicted that they would use it to the detriment of debate, and now are revising it because your predictions didn't come true.

You are a false prophet of doom, you've predicted the deterioration of debate over and over and over but nothing ever happens.

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@Ionus,

Ionus wrote:

I would be interested in knowing what you think are the specific net benefits. It seems to me money sent home is short term charity.

Short term charity is better than nothing at all. A consistent theme in this thread is that people reject the concept of giving fish because teaching how to fish is better. While that is true giving fish is better than nothing at all.

Remittances are not a long-term solution for an economy but often they are addressing short term problems and while the development of the economy is underway people still need to eat fish. The remittances often bring people out of poverty, and while it might be better to take the jobs to them it is better for them to go to the jobs in the absence of that occurrence.

Teaching a man to fish is better than giving him a fish, but while you get around to teaching him give him a damn fish! Hunger is a short term problem too and can't always wait for long term ideals.

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@Robert Gentel,

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Short term charity is better than nothing at all.

When the wildebeast in Africa are too numerous, if we were to give them hay we would be prolonging the problem. They have reached a natural limit and are supposed to die off and come back from the tough survivors. Why is this not true for people ?

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@Ionus,

Ionus wrote:

When the wildebeast in Africa are too numerous, if we were to give them hay we would be prolonging the problem. They have reached a natural limit and are supposed to die off and come back from the tough survivors. Why is this not true for people ?

I think the notion that the world is overpopulated with people is completely ridiculous for one, but fundamentally this gets to those core values we were talking about in the other thread, "good" and "bad" are subjective values that we assign to things.

I have my reasons for defining death and suffering as "bad" and have explained them at length over on the moral compass thread.

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Robert, good for you on what you did the other day to help those in need. it was meant more as a rhetorical question to everyone. We tend to get on here and debate things like this for days on end, with no one doing anything to change what is being discussed.

I do things including donating money, donating time, donating physical items, and basing my votes for public offices on those that share my (and your) ideals. I like to think that is normal for Americans as individuals, even if our government is not as generous as it could be.

I don't have time right now to read up on it, but it appears there is an End Poverty 2015 Millenium Campaign that has as it's goals some of the issues you are addressing. Evidently, there were 189 world leaders that signed onto working towards ending poverty. Like I said, what has been done so far and where we are at the government level in achieving these things is not something I have time to research at the moment.

If interested, you can check here: http://endpoverty2015.org/goals

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@Robert Gentel,

Please . . . you read about rhetorical fallacies, and then demonstrate that you have completely failed to appropriately apply their definitions, either from a failure of comprehension, or from misinterpretation. My remarks do not constitute a naturalistic fallacy because i have not assigned a value to the circumstances i describe. I have not said that human selfishness is good or bad, nor have i stated that altruism and generosity are good--based on an appeal to a natural state, which is what would be required to establish your otherwise false claim of a naturalistic fallacy.

I used to think you had a handle on rhetoric and fallacies, but i haven't thought that for years now. My remarks were not based on an appeal to nature, nor was there any "moral" judgment of good or bad involved. My remarks were based on my historical reading, which suggests that there is a tendency to selfishness. In my remarks, i noted that it would be possible to achieve a program such as you envision (i stated that i think the American people are not ungenerous), and i also noted the fodder for demagoguery available to politicians who would oppose it. At no time did i describe any of it as good or bad.

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@Robert Gentel,

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I think the notion that the world is overpopulated with people is completely ridiculous for one

The whole world does not have to be overpopulated for there to be a benefit to a dying off. Wildebeast do not inhabit the entire world and they benefit from large herds shrinking, whilst smaller herds elsewhere live happily enough. Overpopulation is relative to a locale.

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@Ionus,

I tend towards Nietzsche and his Beyond Good and Evil premise.

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@dyslexia,

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I tend towards Nietzsche and his Beyond Good and Evil premise.

Whilst he makes some good points, he ignores collective wisdom earned the hard way, and just because it might have a false facade (Christianity) doesnt mean the structure is not solid.

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@Ionus,

right and your premise is solid as a rock.

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@dyslexia,

That rich.

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@dyslexia,

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right and your premise is solid as a rock.

Thank you.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

I used to think you had a handle on rhetoric and fallacies, but i haven't thought that for years now.

It comes as no surprise that you don't like having your fallacies identified and I suspect that pointing out your fallacies dramatically increases the likelihood that you will denounce one's ability to discern them in the first place.

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Helping Americans understand just how rich we are

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