http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20150417043945585

TLDR Russia is closing a lot of its for-profit schools. This is actually an admirable effort. These for-profit schools are exploitative and prey on people with poor judgment; they dont offer degrees that are worth anything and the training they provide is awful. The USA should follow suit. Near my college, there's an old Piggly Wiggly that's been converted into a University of Phoenix- every time I drive by, I feel compelled to shake my fist and yell "you aren't a college, you're a Piggly Wiggly!" We should close all of these schools like DeVry and University of Phoenix. They do nothing to help.

is this supposed to be funny?

This is so wrong on so many levels.

Quote

DEA agents in Colombia had lots of sexy orgies with prostitutes paid for by the cartels

yeah the DEA is a giant waste of taxpayer money. they're not only losing the war on drugs, they're actively aiding the cartels and punishing addicts, who should be treated like ill people instead of criminals. this entire system is fucked backwards.

rodney king is a hero because he's a martyr. what happened to him is in an ENTIRELY different ballpark from martin and brown.

superchillin

Now how much will this cost?

you can get all 3 DLC packages through the $25 season pass. not sure how much they cost individually

I'll still be here homojoe

http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/lincoln-hub/abraham-lincolns-duel.html

Abe Lincoln sword-fought a guy. And Lincoln was tall, so he had a huge advantage thanks to his reach.
In short: Abe Lincoln is the coolest President ever.

nah teddy motherfucking roosevelt takes the cake on that one no contest.

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 11:31:59 PM

Quote from: Arm The Mob on April 21, 2015, 11:20:21 PM

I'd like to remind you, though, that your life is meaningless with or without these social systems. When you die you're dead. When your friends die, they're dead too. The Earth itslef is going to die, someday. We, as a species, will die. And when that happens, all of our statues, books, films, buildings, everything will have been for nothing. Humn achievement is fleeting. Rather than trying to build monuments in sand, would you not rather try to live a dignified and personally satisfying life while you can?

i was wondering if you'd address this. im an existentialist. because we do not have any inherent purpose for living beyond survival and reproduction, we are free to carve our own meaning into the world. i choose to live for the pursuit of epicurean pleasure. someone like me could find great happiness in a free for all. in fact, i would ideally prefer it. but it cant last in anything except an isolated system. you have to know this. even members of the lesser animal kingdom form informal governments. it's the natural way. we'd have to achieve transhumanism in order to transcend our instincts.

Members of the animal kingdom also reproduce by rape and murder the offpsring of competitors. We, as humans, are lucky enough to be self-aware and conscious of our actions, as well as the effects of our actions on other, equally sentient humans. We are not the same as wolves, we are not the same as ducks, or sharks, or goats, or chimpanzees. Do some of the same rules apply? Yes. Because of the scarcity of resources, we will always compete for access to them. That said, I should hope we are aware enough to know not to use violence to reach those resources, and to shun and retaliate against those who do.

So I don't think humans need a violent hierarchy to survive like some animals do. We're past that point. We know better. We can and do cooperate on certain things because we know we should, not because we're beaten into it. I believe violence begets violence, and coercion begets coercion, so by institutionalizing coercion we are enabling it.

these ideals are admirable, but ultimately, not everyone sees things like this. most people dont understand these things. most people dont care. how do you propose that we beat these values into the greater bulk of humanity?

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 11:36:19 PM

Quote from: Assassin 11D7 on April 21, 2015, 11:30:32 PM

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 05:09:14 PM

Quote from: Assassin 11D7 on April 20, 2015, 05:17:49 PM

Quote from: Lemön | Queen of Anal on April 19, 2015, 05:18:52 PM

Quote from: Gama I The American Pleb on April 19, 2015, 04:55:50 PM

*Cringes*

Besides, God knows everything, we don't.

There wasn't anything cringey about it.

Besides, God isn't real, we are.

This might be shocking news to you, but humans have these things called opinions.

and, shockingly enough, opinions can be wrong.

the idea that people worship a levantine war god as the singular, all-powerful deity is laughable. its almost as funny as someone who still sacrifices goats to apollo.

Nice argument. You're wrong, I'm right, nanaabooboo

im coming at this from a historical perspective. yahweh was a minor god who stood as the canaanite answer to chemosh, a war god; yahweh was a legendary figure who led heavenly forces against the enemies of israel/canaan. eventually, he was seen as a deity. the yahwists worked for a long time to push him to the forefront of the canaanite religion, eventually pushing for a monotheistic tradition (much like the amarna revolution).

i dont think there is any logical reason to believe that yahweh, the god of christians, exists in the capacity that they believe he does. i dont believe he exists at all, but when you consider the history of yahwism, its pretty fucking obvious that the story has changed wildly over time. that isnt consistent with the popular rhetoric about "god."

I don't take it you have some sort of source or reference that I could look at to judge the accuracy of what you're saying? It's not really that easy to provide a counterargument when I lack the references you must have.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahweh
http://members.bib-arch.org/publication.asp?PubID=BSBA&Volume=27&Issue=3&ArticleID=1
http://www.theopedia.com/JEDP_theory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canaanite_religion

I'd like to remind you, though, that your life is meaningless with or without these social systems. When you die you're dead. When your friends die, they're dead too. The Earth itslef is going to die, someday. We, as a species, will die. And when that happens, all of our statues, books, films, buildings, everything will have been for nothing. Humn achievement is fleeting. Rather than trying to build monuments in sand, would you not rather try to live a dignified and personally satisfying life while you can?

i was wondering if you'd address this. im an existentialist. because we do not have any inherent purpose for living beyond survival and reproduction, we are free to carve our own meaning into the world. i choose to live for the pursuit of epicurean pleasure. someone like me could find great happiness in a free for all. in fact, i would ideally prefer it. but it cant last in anything except an isolated system. you have to know this. even members of the lesser animal kingdom form informal governments. it's the natural way. we'd have to achieve transhumanism in order to transcend our instincts.

You misunderstand me. I'm not advocating any commune. Collectivism is stupid. I'm advocating individual freedom. If you want to go start a hippie commune fine, as long as everyone involved is choosing to be involved I couldn't care less.
Now, as for the practicality of individual liberty?
I believe competition is the most efficient process for advancement and improvement. People are more creative and work harder when they're doing things they actually want to be doing. People will spend more and invest more when there is no mob with a flag taking a portion of their earnings every month. The state can provide no service that private entities cannot provide more efficiently and with more options.

Although I will admit I'm not as well-versed as I should be in the consequentialist arguments for liberty because I'm not a consequentialist. I approach it from a moral perspective.

that is just as impractical. a free-for-all cant exist. we will inevitably form social systems. ideally, yes, this works. in practice, it is quite literally impossible.

These are the very things that make anarchy ideal. If greed and violence are so prevalent, if humans are so inherently flawed, why the fuck are we giving them power and authority? We're enabling this violence and greed. I'm for the elimination of power.

because its better to put our welfare in the hands of a government. a free for all is the ultimate enabler of violence and greed on a very personal level. but again, it's quite literally impossible, so this is a moot point.

That paragraph was a fucking mess. I'll address it, but it's stupid.

Suffering is relative. I might say that I'm suffering because I've got a stomach ache, or because I'm being tied up and whipped every day in between being forced to till fields for no pay. You're right about that.

But the rest of it is incoherent bullshit. What the fuck do you mean we can only live through collective, unfeeling groups? What are you, Geth? No. Any society, group, collective, commune or whatever is made up of individuals. All individuals have their own minds, feelings, and perceptions. Everyone on this planet has conflicting goals, needs, and desires. You may share some. You may share most. But we all differ on some level, this is natural and inescapable. Competition is the name of the game, and pretending that we can all unite to do what's "best for all of us" is ridiculous, because there is no greater good, and there never will be.

i didnt say that we can only live through groups, i said that we live on through them. theres a difference. if we dont have souls, then there is no inherent purpose to our lives other than survival and reproduction. thats a terrible reality. fortunately, sentient beings have this lovely tendency to form social systems, and culture/art is born from that. culture and art are the lasting legacies of individuals, and they are born from the realities of the social systems in which these individuals live. without social systems, we lose these things.. at least in the form we know.

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 10:08:42 PM

Quote from: Ushan on April 21, 2015, 10:04:11 PM

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 09:51:27 PM

Quote from: Ushan on April 21, 2015, 09:48:54 PM

I'm honestly amazed that people thought it was good.

its decent on the first viewing. most people see it for what it is pretty quickly though

But it wasn't, though. Anyone with half a brain would notice early on that Erin's character is crap, considering how fucking long and often his internal monologues are.

id imagine most people dont actually care about the dialogue at all, and are really only caught up in "OMG WHATSGONNAHAPPENWITHDATITANS" until like 20 episodes in when it becomes clear that this is going nowhere fast. thats how it happened with me anyway

That's why you read the subtitles.

Unfortunately it didn't save me from it. A bunch of my friends were raving to me about it at the time and I figured I'd humour them

Never. Again.

well yeah, i did read the subtitles, but when you start watching a shounen, you kinda expect the main character to say a bunch of pointless stupid shit, which is exactly what happened, so i focused on other aspects of the show

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 09:49:49 PM

Quote from: Arm The Mob on April 21, 2015, 09:47:07 PM

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 09:39:40 PM

Quote from: Arm The Mob on April 21, 2015, 09:09:38 PM

Authoritarianism is relative. All coercion is abuse, whether you're using it to get public schools built or to silence dissidents. This notion that a state can be considered immoral once it crosses some arbitrary line is ridiculous. Are some states more inhumane than others? Absolutely. But the very existence of any state is based on the application (or threat thereof) of force by one group to control another. This is inherently immoral.

The United States government is no more legitimate than that of the former Confederacy, or Sweden, or the English Crown, or the Soviet Union, Franco's Spain, modern Spain, Nazi Germany, or modern Germany. All of these institutions rule by threat of force. There is no justification.

There is no such thing as a legitimate state, and there never can be. Can states be an evil means to a positive end? Most here think so, but I would argue that not only do the ends fail to justify the means, the means themselves are a part of the ends. The nation-state is definitely not the most moral structure of society, and it isn't even close to the most effective or efficient.

i would love to hear about your alternative.

I'm happy to share it.

You're free to make your own decisions and keep your own property, as am I, and everyone else. I don't pretend to have any right to tell you what to do with your life or property, neither do you pretend to have the right to tell me what to do, because we don't. I do not presume to know what's best for you, you do not presume to know what's best for me, because we don't. If you'd like something of mine, I may consider giving it to you for some kind of compensation, or for free if I feel like it, and vice versa. We can choose to work together on a project, or choose to never speak to one another, or be best friends, or casual acquaintances.

Sound alright to you?

sounds like a world we dont or ever will live in. its an ideal. ideals and reality dont mix.

Don't? Sadly this is true, we live in the world of the nation-state right now. In the future, though, there may be hope.

Ideal? Yes. But this "Hurr ideals aren't reality dudeharden up life is tough hur dee hurr durr" shit is retarded. Go be a ruthless dictator then if you think there is no place for morality in this world.

Don't pretend you don't have ideals yourself. You do.

idealism on this scale is impractical. you know this. you cant just magically make the world a peaceful commune. it will NEVER happen that way (unless transhumanism is humanity's savior). the very same problems that make peaceful anarchism impossible permeate government and ruin it. coercion may be morally wrong, but theoretically, the applied ethics defend the social contract; human greed and bloodlust are what exacerbate the inherent moral problems with government.

the reality is that we will suffer. day in and day out. that is the only true, applied reality of our existence. when we form communities and cultures, we form a new identity, a separate entity that cannot feel our individual pain. i think that makes it all worth it. we can only live on through the social systems that we erect. they arent perfect. they never will be. but thats ok. we can work to improve them. we WILL work to improve them.

Quote from: Azumarill on April 21, 2015, 09:39:40 PM

Quote from: Arm The Mob on April 21, 2015, 09:09:38 PM

Authoritarianism is relative. All coercion is abuse, whether you're using it to get public schools built or to silence dissidents. This notion that a state can be considered immoral once it crosses some arbitrary line is ridiculous. Are some states more inhumane than others? Absolutely. But the very existence of any state is based on the application (or threat thereof) of force by one group to control another. This is inherently immoral.

The United States government is no more legitimate than that of the former Confederacy, or Sweden, or the English Crown, or the Soviet Union, Franco's Spain, modern Spain, Nazi Germany, or modern Germany. All of these institutions rule by threat of force. There is no justification.

There is no such thing as a legitimate state, and there never can be. Can states be an evil means to a positive end? Most here think so, but I would argue that not only do the ends fail to justify the means, the means themselves are a part of the ends. The nation-state is definitely not the most moral structure of society, and it isn't even close to the most effective or efficient.

i would love to hear about your alternative.

I'm happy to share it.

You're free to make your own decisions and keep your own property, as am I, and everyone else. I don't pretend to have any right to tell you what to do with your life or property, neither do you pretend to have the right to tell me what to do, because we don't. I do not presume to know what's best for you, you do not presume to know what's best for me, because we don't. If you'd like something of mine, I may consider giving it to you for some kind of compensation, or for free if I feel like it, and vice versa. We can choose to work together on a project, or choose to never speak to one another, or be best friends, or casual acquaintances.

Sound alright to you?

sounds like a world we dont or ever will live in. its an ideal. ideals and reality dont mix.