[sailorman]

 
Quote:

I know this thread has contained pretty much every topic and argument you can think of, but I'm pretty sure politics is one topic we should take somewhere else to avoid this thread's inevitable doom being sooner than necessary. And I do find it kind of an entertaining thread, so I'd miss it

I don't consider economic and politics to be the same thing, but I get you.  I'm done with it.  A few years in the real world will prove to be much more educational than posts from me.

 

[sailorman]

Quote:

Clearly you're missing out on a few points. First, the collegeboard creates the test so it's essentially an aptitude test. They try to trick you throughout the entire test. That's why psychologists make it. It's not purely an aptitude test because you can prepare from it. Second, it also costs money to apply to college. Moreover, colleges look at your grades. They keep in mind that some people are better test takers or they had the money for classes. Again though, without capitalism there would not be as great an incentive to make the SATs. Quite honestly, you don't even need classes for the SATs. I got a 2100 on my first go without any classes. It was a practice test of course, but I'll take the real one when I get older. Realistically, the SAT doesn't hold as much weight as it once did. It's just something that may confirm that you are intelligent if you have good grades, or that you might not be a good test taker, etc. Look at companies like Sennheiser and Grado. Do you think they make money? If they didn't, they wouldn't be open.

Of course they make money. Unlike Monster, they make money by creating a good product, not by exploiting dumb teenagers into buying overpriced junk on the word of some athlete.  BTW, Sennheiser is a German company. There's a totally different ethic among German corporations that is decidedly not lasseiz faire.  Grado is not a big, multi-national corporation either.  Both of them pride themselves on being audio companies, not marketing machines.  Neither would ever put out an overpriced piece of junk like Beats and resort to fooling naive teenagers into buying them.

 

[Swoosh]

Quote:

In each of those cases, except perhaps the glofish, none of it would have been possible without the kind of research that nobody wanted to do because they didn't see any ultimate application.  The NIH is responsible for virtually every cancer breakthrough and virtually ALL research in cancer.  GSHU received the patent for the use of vericillin A, but I'll guarantee you that they didn't invent it.  Patents for the use of a product is entirely different than patents for the product itself.  I can guarantee you that in almost every case you quoted, the research done by the company was based on government funded or government conducted research.
 
In the case of GM food, capitalism has caused huge displacement of entire regions of the world.  A major reason for illegal immigration from Mexico is the devastation of the domestic corn market caused by Monsanto dumping GM corn, under the aegis of NAFTA, on the Mexican market.  Thousands of Indians have starved and committed suicide when Coca Cola monopolized their water supplies and turned their farms into deserts.   And, I won't even get into the environmental devastation wreaked across every corner of the earth by the uber-capitalist oil companies.

I would gladly do research and I'm a high school kid. I'm this close to applying to one of Johnson & Johnson's research lab to be a volunteer. I'm qualified, so please don't doubt me on that. Also, if a kid like me would do it, why wouldn't a professional scientist. I would do it out of a love for science. There is only one moment where you know something of value that nobody else does. As for the GSHU, you can't invent something that exists in poisonous mushrooms from southwest china. You can extract it though. Capitalism makes the entire system possible. As for the government funding it or not, I'm not sure on that one, but I might take the time to look into it.
 
Don't know if you're a liberal or conservative or whatnot, but both parties are receiving money through lobbying. This adds to the problem. The government should be independent of business. I want to open a company (I actually want to double major), but to me it's not about just money. I want to make other things possible with that money.

 

[DigitalFreak]

General thoughts concerning whats been discussed this last page or so:
 
Let's not be gullible, yes capitalism has created some good things for society but we're all kidding ourselves if any of us think for a second the mega corps original intention was to be a benefactor for society in general. When big business does anything it's with the intent of making money and it goes no further then that. In the above post someone quoted an example using golden rice and how it benefited society with more nutritious food. I'm glad there's a company out there doing that but you honestly think that more nutritious rice will make it to the plates of the people who need it the absolute most which is the poor starving masses of the third world? No it won't make it to the plates of the starving poor it'll make it to the plates of the developed world citizen who is well off enough to pay the extra premium for this new rice which is more nutritious. Someone else posted about pharmaceutical companies and what they've done in respect to research on cancer treatment. Yes pharmaceutical companies have done a lot in cancer research but they've done it only in the quest of profit not to help the poor sick patient. Not to needle anyone whose American but I think the average American is only to painfully aware what would happen if they went into a hospital needing treatment for cancer and you didn't have medical insurance. Even if you eventually did get treatment in the hospital you'd be leaving that hospital in debt for a good portion of your life and then the problem of getting further treatment requiring prescription drugs would arise. Try going do any of these so called well meaning pharmaceutical companies and telling them you needed a certain pill to survive but didn't have any money to pay for it. I doubt they would give you the time of day. Your medical problems in their opinion isn't their concern their concern is getting the drugs out to people who can pay.
 
Yes there's nothing wrong with getting a product out on the shelves and expecting that it makes money and insuring your company is profitable. There's everything wrong though when the focus is put solely on making money and a person is left to suffer or be taken advantage of or in the worst case scenario even die. Look whats been happening the last few years and how jobs have become more and more scarce. Fifty years ago there were tons of jobs available for people who wanted to work but nowadays those jobs have been eliminated and sent overseas to the third world where people work for slave wages in unhealthy and dangerous work environment all for the sake of some western industrialist's love of money. If anyone thinks the people working in those 3rd world countries for rich and powerful western companies are getting ahead I suggest they do some research. If anything those workers have a short life span and never come out ahead in life. The really sad part about it is the people in those situations many of them are not only stuck but the future generations are also stuck due to intentional outside interference from large rich companies which the last thing they would ever want is a country with fair labor laws forcing them to pay more money and not get their products manufactured for a few measley dollars. The third world is as poor as it is for a reason and with out current technological capabilities there shouldn't be a third world. A few pages back someone posted about the book Brave New World I suggest if anyone is curious they read the book it's quite a good read and makes you stop and think about certain subjects in a new perspective. If you're really curious try also watching the old silent black and white Metropolis movie it really makes you stop and think.
 
Just my two cents.

 

[Swoosh]

Quote:

General thoughts concerning whats been discussed this last page or so:
 
Let's not be gullible, yes capitalism has created some good things for society but we're all kidding ourselves if any of us think for a second the mega corps original intention was to be a benefactor for society in general. When big business does anything it's with the intent of making money and it goes no further then that. In the above post someone quoted an example using golden rice and how it benefited society with more nutritious food. I'm glad there's a company out there doing that but you honestly think that more nutritious rice will make it to the plates of the people who need it the absolute most which is the poor starving masses of the third world? No it won't make it to the plates of the starving poor it'll make it to the plates of the developed world citizen who is well off enough to pay the extra premium for this new rice which is more nutritious. Someone else posted about pharmaceutical companies and what they've done in respect to research on cancer treatment. Yes pharmaceutical companies have done a lot in cancer research but they've done it only in the quest of profit not to help the poor sick patient. Not to needle anyone whose American but I think the average American is only to painfully aware what would happen if they went into a hospital needing treatment for cancer and you didn't have medical insurance. Even if you eventually did get treatment in the hospital you'd be leaving that hospital in debt for a good portion of your life and then the problem of getting further treatment requiring prescription drugs would arise. Try going do any of these so called well meaning pharmaceutical companies and telling them you needed a certain pill to survive but didn't have any money to pay for it. I doubt they would give you the time of day. Your medical problems in their opinion isn't their concern their concern is getting the drugs out to people who can pay.
 
Yes there's nothing wrong with getting a product out on the shelves and expecting that it makes money and insuring your company is profitable. There's everything wrong though when the focus is put solely on making money and a person is left to suffer or be taken advantage of or in the worst case scenario even die. Look whats been happening the last few years and how jobs have become more and more scarce. Fifty years ago there were tons of jobs available for people who wanted to work but nowadays those jobs have been eliminated and sent overseas to the third world where people work for slave wages in unhealthy and dangerous work environment all for the sake of some western industrialist's love of money. If anyone thinks the people working in those 3rd world countries for rich and powerful western companies are getting ahead I suggest they do some research. If anything those workers have a short life span and never come out ahead in life. The really sad part about it is the people in those situations many of them are not only stuck but the future generations are also stuck due to intentional outside interference from large rich companies which the last thing they would ever want is a country with fair labor laws forcing them to pay more money and not get their products manufactured for a few measley dollars. The third world is as poor as it is for a reason and with out current technological capabilities there shouldn't be a third world. A few pages back someone posted about the book Brave New World I suggest if anyone is curious they read the book it's quite a good read and makes you stop and think about certain subjects in a new perspective. If you're really curious try also watching the old silent black and white Metropolis movie it really makes you stop and think.
 
Just my two cents.

Good points. As for your comment on golden rice, it won't feed more people but fewer people will be malnourished. Realistically, we can't sustain 7billion people. The best way I guess would be to create high yielding mono-cultures but that uses all the nutrients.  I liked what you wrong though. There are clearly flaws with capitalism, but good things have come out of it as well.

 

[sailorman]

What's happening here is that Swoosh is pointing to a warm kitchen table, with well cooked food and extolling the virtues of fire as the element from which all goodness springs.
 
OTOH, I'm pointing to the burned down forests and homes, warning him that we need to have plenty of fire extinguishers and fire roads and we can't trust fire to be left to its own devices.
 
DigitalFreak is right. Capitalism does nothing good except as an accidental byproduct of creating a profit. They do evil exactly to the extent that they can get away with it and it's profitable. If capitalists could put their money under their pillows and get a return without doing anything at all, that's precisely what they would do.  In the U.S., the laws are such that if a corporation even attempts to do something good and it affects shareholder value, they can be sued.  If they do not do something bad in order to increase shareholder value, that something had better be illegal, or they can be sued.
 
Again, I have nothing against capitalism, just like I have nothing against fire.  I don't hate Monster for preying on dumb naive kids any more than I hate the lion that preys upon the cute little gazelle.  I hate the laws that almost demand it. Laws that deregulate capitalism are like laws that prohibit fire extinguishers.  They don't exist in most other countries, like Germany and, AFAIK, the rest of Europe.

 

[Swoosh]

Quote:

What's happening here is that Swoosh is pointing to a warm kitchen table, with well cooked food and extolling the virtues of fire as the element from which all goodness springs.
 
OTOH, I'm pointing to the burned down forests and homes, warning him that we need to have plenty of fire extinguishers and fire roads and we can't trust fire to be left to its own devices.
 
DigitalFreak is right. Capitalism does nothing good except as an accidental byproduct of creating a profit. They do evil exactly to the extent that they can get away with it and it's profitable. If capitalists could put their money under their pillows and get a return without doing anything at all, that's precisely what they would do.  In the U.S., the laws are such that if a corporation even attempts to do something good and it affects shareholder value, they can be sued.  If they do not do something bad in order to increase shareholder value, that something had better be illegal, or they can be sued.
 
Again, I have nothing against capitalism, just like I have nothing against fire.  I don't hate Monster for preying on dumb naive kids any more than I hate the lion that preys upon the cute little gazelle.  I hate the laws that almost demand it. Laws that deregulate capitalism are like laws that prohibit fire extinguishers.  They don't exist in most other countries, like Germany and, AFAIK, the rest of Europe.

I've admitted that there are cons to capitalism as well. It's like that for a lot of things. A car for instance is a commodity, but it doesn't exactly help the environment. The system is too deeply rooted for change.

 

[NoKTurNal]

Quote:

This happens to me all the time (I go to UH where on average I will see around 30-40 pairs of beats on campus a day, so a lot of Beats support) 
I must admit... I used to be one of those people who thought beats were the be all end all :O :O But when you think about it someone mentioned that the 4 main headphones are Beats, Sony, Bose, and Skull candy and this is true, not a lot of places (in Hawaii at least) allow you to hear the headphones so the only ones you hear are these 4 brands and I must say that Beats beat all of them (when I say Sony I mean the super cheap Sony IEMs like the 5-20 dollar range) and since they
are featured at the Apple store people can actually try them unlike most other headphones sold around here.
 
Background: I used to own Skull candy (Skullcrushers) and thought they were awesome (This was from stepping up from the 4 dollar jelly earphones.) Reason I got em was cause they sounded way better than my super cheap POS "IEM" Then 2 months later they break (plastic snapped and one of the cans stopped working) 
Back to 4 dollar IEM and faith in headphones crushed Then I hear the Bose and I think they're AWESOME!! But alas... no money Then later I hear Beats and I am in LOVEE I go to the Apple store sometimes just to listen to em on my iPod :xSaving money to buy some Beats but they're just too dang expensive.
 
Epiphany: I go to Japan and what happens? They have WALLS of headphones out of package ready to be plugged into your iPod to test out. So where do I go? Straight for the Beats! Then the Bose, Then for the heck of it I heard of sennheiser so I try out the 558s...THESE KILL THE BEATS! I can imagine the price tag is probably in the 600 dollar range... Then I see it's only around $150~ 
Anyway I tried out a bunch of other headphones from Sennheiser, AT, Shure and I realize that 300-400 dollar Beats are just a waste of money. I still think they're okay, but as time went on I don't care for bass heavy music anymore so Beats are just okay... But the performance is nowhere near 300 dollars worth.
 
I realize that the whole reason that they are so popular is cause they are one of the few headphones that I could actually try in Hawaii and because of that my reference point was some 10 dollar Sony IEM or the 4 dollar jellies, and compared to those the Beats KILL them.
 
currently own ATH XS5 which I actually got for $40 in Japan due to my lack of funding, otherwise would have gotten the 558 (sidenote Getting Shure 940's soon ) Even though I still think, for my music, these crush any skull candies and can compete with beats for 1/7 the price I understand why people like Beats so much. They can actually test them and hear how much better they are than super cheap bad IEMs.TL;DR: I used to love beats cause they were the only thing I heard other than my cheap 4 dollar IEM. Went to Japan heard some 558's saw price tag realized beats are a waste of money. People mainly like Beats it seem cause they have no idea what good headphones sound like/cost and Beats are their only reference point to what decent headphones sound like.

Oh my god, another Hawaii local. I am not alone
 
 

 

[Parall3l]

This thread has been derailed so much we should just start posting stuff about ponies...

 

[sailorman]

 
Quote:

Good points. As for your comment on golden rice, it won't feed more people but fewer people will be malnourished. Realistically, we can't sustain 7billion people. The best way I guess would be to create high yielding mono-cultures but that uses all the nutrients.  I liked what you wrong though. There are clearly flaws with capitalism, but good things have come out of it as well.

Please guess again. Monoculture is exactly what we don't want and has been responsible for much famine in the past. Monoculture introduces all sorts of hazards into the equation, including famine, soil exhaustion, insect extinction, disease and the centralization of food supplies.   It is Monsanto's dream to monopolize the world's food supply via genetically modified crops that can only be obtained through Monsanto.  Already, they have contributed to a huge decline in the genetic diversity of certain food crops. As pests and pathogens evolve, those crops become vulnerable and we run the risk of food shortages.  Recently, a similar problem has plagued bananas.  Lack of genetic diversity has devastated banana crops in large regions of the world.  Multiply that by all the different food crops and you can see the ramifications of monoculture.

 

[sailorman]

 
Quote:

I've admitted that there are cons to capitalism as well. It's like that for a lot of things. A car for instance is a commodity, but it doesn't exactly help the environment. The system is too deeply rooted for change.

No one is advocating a massive change.  Let's start with ending this idea that deregulation is the answer to every economic problem.  That's simply arguing that the problem with fires can be solved if we only get rid of all the fire extinguishers.
 
About your monoculture remark.  I think we can feed 7 billion people.  Consider how many millions of acres of farmland, in this country alone, has been lost to development.  How many millions of those acres are standing vacant right now?  We need to staunch the loss of farmland and reclaim some of it that we have lost in the last 30 years.  Start with massive housing developments that are standing virtually empty.  Tear down the houses. That would also help stabilize home prices.  More farms, less subdivisions.

 

[Swoosh]

Quote:

 
Please guess again. Monoculture is exactly what we don't want and has been responsible for much famine in the past. Monoculture introduces all sorts of hazards into the equation, including famine, soil exhaustion, insect extinction, disease and the centralization of food supplies.   It is Monsanto's dream to monopolize the world's food supply via genetically modified crops that can only be obtained through Monsanto.  Already, they have contributed to a huge decline in the genetic diversity of certain food crops. As pests and pathogens evolve, those crops become vulnerable and we run the risk of food shortages.  Recently, a similar problem has plagued bananas.  Lack of genetic diversity has devastated banana crops in large regions of the world.  Multiply that by all the different food crops and you can see the ramifications of monoculture.

 
http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/sparing-or-sharing-protecting-wild-species-may-require-growing-more-food-on-less-land/
 
I still think we can't sustain 7billion people. There are more factors than just the presence of the land.
 

 

[NoKTurNal]

Quote:

 
http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/sparing-or-sharing-protecting-wild-species-may-require-growing-more-food-on-less-land/
 
I still think we can't sustain 7billion people. There are more factors than just the presence of the land.
 

False, the world currently makes enough food to sustain EVERYONE
However distributing those food is the problem
Prices are the main reason why people are dying cause of starvation
 
http://sabhlokcity.com/2011/03/the-world-will-produce-enough-food-for-9-billion-people/
 
http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/world%20hunger%20facts%202002.htm
 
http://www.womenaid.org/press/info/food/food4.html
 
http://rehydrate.org/facts/hunger.htm

 

[Swoosh]

Quote:

False, the world currently makes enough food to sustain EVERYONE
However distributing those food is the problem
Prices are the main reason why people are dying cause of starvation
 
http://sabhlokcity.com/2011/03/the-world-will-produce-enough-food-for-9-billion-people/
 
http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/world%20hunger%20facts%202002.htm
 
http://www.womenaid.org/press/info/food/food4.html
 
http://rehydrate.org/facts/hunger.htm

 
We have enough food, so? That makes no difference if we're not feeding everyone. You might have money, but if it sits under your mattress until you die, it's wasted.

 

[NoKTurNal]

Quote:

 
We have enough food, so? That makes no difference if we're not feeding everyone. You might have money, but if it sits under your mattress until you die, it's wasted.

 
Well then, you can blame politics and greed for that
 
 
Why don't you help us out by protesting?
But then again most people don't even care or are too lazy