Random Thought of the Day

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August 12th, 2013 at 10:58:16 PM permalink
rxwine
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 188
Posts: 18633
Quote: Nareed
August 12th 2013. If you went back in time to the 1960s and told a gathering of techies that the big advance in 2013 was "remote computing and storage from centralized locations to users distributed all over the world," they'd justifiably wonder whether there's been any progress in the intervening half century.

:P


And they'd be surprised we aren't all in flying cars by now.
You believe in an invisible god, and dismiss people who say they are trans? Really?
August 13th, 2013 at 6:45:14 AM permalink
Nareed
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 346
Posts: 12545
Quote: rxwine
And they'd be surprised we aren't all in flying cars by now.


Not if there has been no progress in the intervening half century.
Donald Trump is a one-term LOSER
August 14th, 2013 at 1:24:43 PM permalink
rxwine
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 188
Posts: 18633
Quote: Nareed
Not if there has been no progress in the intervening half century.


"Flying car" was an Arthur C. Clark prediction from 1970/s.
You believe in an invisible god, and dismiss people who say they are trans? Really?
August 14th, 2013 at 5:23:46 PM permalink
Nareed
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 346
Posts: 12545
Quote: rxwine
"Flying car" was an Arthur C. Clark prediction from 1970/s.


I read "Profiles of the Future." Offhand I can't recall whether that's true or not.

However, the great man erred when it came to mobile phones. All the more ironic since he made his name in technology when he imagined the comsat. He goes into great detail about why more than a few thousand phones per big city would be a physical impossibility. Although he also comes close to a cellular network kind of idea, but dismisses it as impractical.

Anyway, the flying car has been predicted ever since, oh, there were practical airplanes. So say since the 1910s onward, if not earlier.
Donald Trump is a one-term LOSER
August 14th, 2013 at 9:21:59 PM permalink
Pacomartin
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 1068
Posts: 12569
Renderings have certainly gotten better in six decades.

August 14th, 2013 at 9:58:05 PM permalink
rxwine
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 188
Posts: 18633
Now that I think about it, I remember hoping that we really were reverse engineering an alien "flying saucer" at a secret government installation and that one day they would reveal the technology.

Oh well.
You believe in an invisible god, and dismiss people who say they are trans? Really?
August 14th, 2013 at 10:46:38 PM permalink
Fleastiff
Member since: Oct 27, 2012
Threads: 62
Posts: 7831
Feynman said the only Anti Gravity Device he knew of was a chair.
August 14th, 2013 at 11:33:47 PM permalink
rxwine
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 188
Posts: 18633
Hah, especially the easy chair.

The discussion that started on a AP "working both sides" on the other board reminds me of something too..

Reputation

Mobsters value it, because you can't count on anything else.
The most powerful dictators can only have it as long as they're in power, and not a moment longer.
If you're rich you can only rent it, but never own it.
You can build it up for years and destroy it in a second.
It's is one of the few things you leave behind when you're dead.

You can't buy it, but you can still have it even if you've lost everything else.
You believe in an invisible god, and dismiss people who say they are trans? Really?
August 15th, 2013 at 7:02:21 AM permalink
Nareed
Member since: Oct 24, 2012
Threads: 346
Posts: 12545
August 15th 2013. You can't choke off the supply of anything for which there is a demand for just by passing a law. A demand for labor has driven immigration, despite making it hard or impossible to immigrate legally to a country. The demand for drugs drives the drug trade, despite making all drugs ilegal (except alcohol and nicotine). The supply keeps coming, only ilegally, at a higher price, and acompanied with the criminal elements necessary to make it work (ie drug smugglers, human traffickers, associated gangs, etc) and highly negative consequences (overcrowded prisons, underground economies, etc). Further restrictions won't help the situation.
Donald Trump is a one-term LOSER
August 15th, 2013 at 9:05:27 AM permalink
Fleastiff
Member since: Oct 27, 2012
Threads: 62
Posts: 7831
Sin taxes funded most state expenditures despite rampant smuggling.

Tobacco, whiskey, playing cards, teas ... easy to smuggle, not likely to be stamped out by taxation.

The Boston Tea Party kept a major smuggler from being ruined when his 12 cent Dutch tea (smuggled) had to compete with lawfully imported British tea at 2 cents.

The point was that there were no social welfare programs or armies of state employees or anything that a State really had to spend its money on. A very sporadic and leaky taxation system based on Sin was just fine to finance what little had to be financed.

So the "demand" is really the fault of the state.

Fifty hours of labor was all it needed to bring in a year's crop of corn. Leisure pursuits were just fine. No one needed an industrious population. No one needed an efficient tax collector.
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