Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Alternative Facts

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2017/01/31/catholic-priest-critics-of-donald-trump-should-kill-themselves-by-jumping-off-of-a-building/

to the other extreme

http://www.inews880.com/syn/107/176910/manitoba-ndp-boot-saran-from-caucus

The NDP caucus stands against all forms of sexual harassment.” 
 
--- but that should really be all harassment but that would eliminate vial politics... 


The world has gone nuts. We have two extremes here. Have you ever worked around *Arabs, Muslims, in a mixed sex environments? Their typical attitude toward women needs sensitivity training to bring there awareness up to acceptable standards. It is often not intentional, but difference in cultural standards, and a lack of cross cultural training.   

* I do not know what the political correct term is for people from the middle east with the "women are property to be controlled " attitude. This is living up to the feminist idea of men in general, that we are all a bunch of controlling assholes.

All people should be given sensitivity training at the school level to provide them with some understanding of what is acceptable  and what is not. We have such a diverse mix of cultures in Canada.

Anyone who does not live up to Canadian Standards should be sent for sensitivity training, but first Canadian Standards must be defined.

But that brings us to the next point. What do I care about someone who cannot separate real from fiction as taught to him as a child?  Also known as... belief in a supernatural being or religion. Such concepts are just concepts, and as such must be evaluated or the real-to-fiction spectrum. It is like the obese dietitian, the smoking doctor, the drinking sobriety promoter, the abusive sensitivity trainer.  

Monday, January 30, 2017

What do Canadians Really Want?

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-canada-mosque-shooting-idUSKBN15E04S?il=0

Trudeau needs a answer to the question, What do Canadians Really Want? but at the same time there is an extreme range of strong and irrational beliefs on both sides. Muslims want to believe in a imaginary being, and live in an imaginary world by a set a of rules from the bronze age. Others want to live by a different set of imaginary rules of their own making that dramatically make Muslims there enemy. Both are wrong, and that is ok, since the gods each follow is only in their cultural collective mental image. Both sides are delusional. And standing between the end are the majority who just do not much care, as long as it does not effect them much.

In the US nearly half of the voting citizens elected a man who stated he would ban Muslims. That could be used to imply the dislike of Muslims is substantial in the US. Canada is not as anti Muslim, and we have more of them. The extreme Muslim haters took steps themselves to eliminate a few and themselves. Both are delusional, but that is their problem.

The real question is what is the most rational philosophy, and life style? Well it should be free of delusion, that is recognize that in realty there is not now nor ever was a supernatural being nor occurrences.  Gods reside only in the mind of a believer as a delusion, or collective delusion. Our behavior should be rational, as far as that is possible... given the emotions and instincts cannot always be overridden by rational actions. Those who are unable to override the emotions sufficiently should be locked away where they cannot harm others. Given that overriding emotions and instincts is learned behavior, those skills should be taught in schools so that all have the opportunity to learn these skills without a supernatural component to good behavior.

Closes should be selected based on rational principles, protection from weather, and not aimed at enticing attention. We are live in a herd/predator environment, and that is the current reality. It should not be but is.

So what am I saying? Trudeau has no idea what we Canadians want, only what he thinks we want. If he was to put such a question on a plebiscite, it would split the country with feelings running high on both sides, and there may be, like the US, nearly half the population against the immigration policy. Multicultural is a divisive policy; splintering all sides. For those  of us who are atheist thinking, we see that it is the religions and behavior that splits the races. It is not genes very often, but learned behaviors that cause problems. This knowledge has lead to many failed attempts at producing a uniform culture.

This is likely not going to help the upcoming human battle over resources. Clean air with reasonable levels of carbon dioxide being the first big issue that all humanity is going to have to unite on, if we humans are going to survive. The second will be voluntary population control. Oh well, it is not my fight, I am retired, and have no decedents. Aka, have no dog in the race.

          

Sunday, January 29, 2017

religion and politics

Religion and politics are going to destroy the world. These two collective groups are belief based, not fact and logic based. They have caused an over-populated the world, and are refusing to acknowledge the problem, or even to consider the overpopulation in decisions. The world needs to go to a state of carbon dioxide concentration stability as a guideline.

Deduction of fossil fuels would help, but we need to reduce the production of carbon dioxide, which means the reduction of burning, of carbon dioxide production, and/or carbon sequestering, much of which can be done in the soil, plant matter, and animals. Humans have developed in a state of growth of the human population, and this must be replaced with a stable population. A one child policy may be the fair way to maintain the gene pool depth. Abortion should be allowed without question, birth control should be encouraged, and reality embraced.

Embracing reality will be the most difficult thing, for that means abandoning religion and learning many new science sort of things. That means change, and to what?

Change is a process which has bean studied. The first difficulty is to define what we want to change and into what. The Ideal future us must be defined so that we can figure out what much be changed, how and why each component must be changed, and what that is going to require. To that end, I have started to really consider what changes I wish to make to myself, even though I am on the downside of life sliding through retirement to the inevitable demise.      

Tuesday, January 24, 2017

Rate of Change

In calculus the rate of change is the derivative of the function, but in this case, the slope of the line at the current time is fast, high, and we are at the end of our experience. We have no indication that our life function continues past this point. All other similar functions just stop, or die to zero very quickly. In my lifetime I have seen technologies die off, be born and die in my working life. Fax, teletype. And the change, drafting by hand, computer, now standardized franchise designs, pick one of many past and customize. More problems, and mistakes. Oh well, I am retired now.

We humans may have exceeded our natural rate of change adaptability. Just as computers have exceeded our "need utility" and as a result, are not being replaced as fast, How much communications do we actually need? How much automation do we need? When computers are replacing minimum labor rate jobs, is there an economic benefit to society? There may be to companies, but to society? We humans have been society based, but now the electronics make human interaction unnecessary. What will that do to our society?

Self check out at the grocery store. I saw a lady? fill her purse with vitamins the other day, from her basket, in what I would guess is a camera dark area, with her back to the camera. How many time will she get away with it before some wises up? It is not safe to stick my oar in, so why would I? Security may be a growth industry, but unless a human is actually alertly watching in real time, what is the point of cameras? So who is the first to get laid off? The camera watchers or not get hired? Oh well.

So with a high rate of change in the employment, what career path should be considered? I have no idea. It is a question like what is the economy going to be like 10 years from now? Career choice is often that long term of planning.

There are those who say go with your heart, yet so many people do not have a strong desire for anything specific. I was gloated into becoming an engineer, but there was little for engineering employment for many of those years so I did various things, and some engineering. Oh well, I survived and I retired. looking back, I was poorly trained for some parts of engineering, and over trained for other parts. Miss match, mainly due to rapid change in the industry. I also noted another big change coming, economic decisions not sound engineering, where the lowest bidder was cutting below the code where he could find someone to take responsibility, and that make competition and code following difficult. Oh well, I retired.

It is this rate of change that will kill many industries, or at least some of the employees. As we get older, we need to be able to move up or upgrade our skill set entirely too fast. I figured it was we needed to spend 10% of our time learning new skill, but in some areas it must be higher, perhaps 20% or more.

I grew up learning to harness horses and work horses, and now what do we have? Some is cultural, granted I came from a backwards local community, and so much of what we have today is a result of cultural/societal characteristics. So what is the ideal society/culture, and where will that be at in the future? That may be a study of idealism of the future, but not the reality of what will be achieved due to retro people coming into power, alternative facts importing alternative reality governments. Men controlling women and abortion in an overpopulated world will just end in civil strife. People have had a taste of freedom, and Trump's proclamations cannot end well.

The British have over regulated themselves into a tight place, from which there may be no legal escape. Oh well.     






  

Friday, January 20, 2017

An important non-issue

http://canadianatheist.com/2017/01/20/demystifying-the-gallagher-index/

But all this does not examine the uniformity of the system, but of the results. There are some issues that are not mathematically resolvable.

1. The system must have a consistent numbers of eligible voters, more or less. This cannot occur if it is first divided by provinces and territories, and then rounded to the nearest or upper whole riding's.

2. Riding's have changing populations.

3. The turnout will not be consistent between riding's.

4. Some riding's will have no or disliked candidates, negative or strategic voting, as there are no obvious choices.

5. No system can correct for strong regional feeling for one party. This produces a strong voting preference, which can substantial effect the number of voters and proportional results. 

Conclusion: no system can produce equal number of representative percent and popular vote percentage. Equal potential representative is as close to fair as we can come.    

Friday, January 13, 2017

35 percent Trump

So Trump has suggested that unless someone produce a widget for a cost saving of more than 35 percent outside the US, it must be produced in the US for consumption in the US. Well for the next four years. So that will drive up the consumer cost by less than 35 percent. but it will be felt.

Trump is familiar with business among the rich, those that come to him. This is not the same as for the middle class, where cost is always an issue. Philosophy is fine until the costs are considered, then philosophy becomes a secondary consideration among the rational. Oh well, in the end we all just die anyway.  

So if you are a capitalist, and you have two choices, one plant in the US to serve 400 million people, or one plant in the world to serve 7,000 million, which are you going to choose and those other 400 million can have the product at 1.35 times the cost, which are you going to choose? The other choice is two plants, one to serve 70 and the other 4 hundred million, which are you going to choose? Well 350 billion have no money, so the US is 10% of the world market for some widgets, and 5% for other widgets. The US loses.

Now what about copyright and patent laws, existing agreements, and civil traditions? But this could be for eight or four years, or less. So what is the more economical to the business? 35% may be worth smuggling, at least by US citizens into the US. He will need a wall for sure, but it will have holes. At best it may be four years before it would be complete, and then what? Or will it just develop more holes? The US loses.

To China, in total trade, the US is 10%. So wtf. How upsetting will Trump be to the US? Packaged in Canada may be the common label for a few years. The US loses.

Friday, January 6, 2017

Unplanned Social Engineering

http://theseagypsyphilosopher.blogspot.ca/2017/01/social-engineering-for-fun-and-profit.html got me thinking about unplanned social engineering.

Nobody planned anything. It is all reactionary. Just like Politics. Just reactionary to the situation that develops.

Anything that is done perhaps has a few years at best before it is out of date and should be revised to correct for the unforeseen consequences. The unknown unknowns. There are some known unknowns, but it is the unknown unknowns that will kill us.

Consider the Canadian medical system. When it started, it was aimed at the high cost life saving processes, but since any medical is high cost for the poor, unemployed, working poor, that make up close to 50% of our population, most medical is covered. But not psychologist, and a bunch of other, as seen by the powerful, optional medical care professionals. The government missed a big chance there, the ability to reprogram the population just as they would like. Oh well. Everybody piled on, and no one is just allowed to die without heroic effort to save their lives; even when there is no realistic hope of life or them ever becoming a useful part of society again. This generates large costs and no benefit, other than turning dollars in the medical industry. Oh well, a fix will be required and nobody will like it. Bankrupt government will be the catalyst to that change.

Now our society is based on the most popular of competing technologies combined with ideologies. Some homes now are doing away with TV, others becoming minimalist, others home gardens, home preserving of vegetables, or living like the homesteaders. Back to the land movement is well and thriving, but not loudly as it once was. Radio and news papers have a difficult economic future, but oh well. TV as well, but it has a old population of addicts to die off first, or find new hobbies.

Now the US is about to embark on a re-establishing of home grow industry. Canada, Alberta mostly, is trying to reduce carbon emission from fossil fuel; and at the same time wrongly allow decrease carbon capture in the agriculture sector through carbon sequester depleting to make factory farms more economically productive and employ less people. All the while driving up the cost to the residents, which the government says is good for the economy. Forced spending of any cash reserves we may have. All this makes Alberta far less economically competitive for both industry and as a place to retire and live out the remainder of life.

The long term solution is education; or so we are told. Yet so many of us have spent so much time in getting more education, only to spend years oscillating between underemployment, unemployment, part time, and self employment where our highest technical level was occasionally required. Education is a sold commodity, and there may be no space, no need, no sale for the product. Nerds are not well suited for working construction, but with a excess of engineers, what are the choices. Oh well, that is all over now. You can go through a program and find that you are just not competitive because our ethics keep us above the building code, not a few percent below the code. Or short term designs that will get us beyond the warranted period. Oh well. Industries and professions change at tremendous speeds, and education is always behind the curve. Consider the speed that desktop computers came in to some industries, once they became economic and software was available, some at highway robbery prices, others at give-a-way prices. Oh well, it is all over now for me.

The real problem is over population, over supply of services, rather that an unsatisfied demand continual shortage of people and services. One can function long term, and the other has unemployment. Oh well. Which is easier to live with? If you are among the rich, say top 50%, over population is not a issue, but if you are in the bottom 50% competition will kill you. Of course, the political management is always in the top 50, likely mostly in the top 1% in Canada. Keep in mind, currently, the top 1% of income is just over $100,000/year family income. (2015 data).  So why are we letting the top 1% rule us?