pugbutter

If you see this, please send it to your leaders as soon as possible.

So, you're going to ignore all the mathemathical, scientific, and political rebuttals to your previous claims?

@catchamber

When you selectively ignore parts of my post at a time, so you can present your perfect little argument in sterile laboratory conditions unaffected by real-world dilemmas and obstacles?

You fucking bet.

If you see this, please send it to your leaders as soon as possible.

I laughed because it's fucking funny, kiddo. From your words themselves right down to the very format of your posts, I gave you a chance to present yourself, but it's clear at this point that you don't plan on considering the full context of a situation before you attempt to confront it. Instead you'll dissect everything into individual sentences, and then attack them individually, pretending all the while that your opponents are the ones who are leaving out details and neglecting to think from various angles. All this time you've basically created strawmen through omission, and with your latest post it's evident this isn't an anomaly; it's a pattern. This is your staple method of, uh, "arguing," so anything else I write about this will evaporate before it reaches your ears, just like the five posts which came before.

You use the word "concede" to insinuate not only that you're right, but that you were right all along, and I was just too daft to realize it. (noun: To acknowledge, often reluctantly, as being true, just, or proper; admit.) And if your definition of "winning" debates is being so deliberately dense that your opponents refuse to debate further on the principle that you're a vampire sucking away at their finite time on this earth, then yeah, good job, you've won. If "winning" means having the last word, regardless of whether you've said anything of significance or merit in the meantime, then congratulations. Anyway, I wonder how long the others in this thread will last too—that is if they haven't left already. It's hard to tell sometimes whether silence on the internet means "concession," or that a longer and more convoluted post is being written in retort.

Ciao, baby. Let me know when the world realizes how brilliant you are and I'll be the first in line to stroke your fur and purr into your ear about how incredible you are. Until then, please post your governors' responses when you mail this thread to them. I think we all want to see what they think of your profundities.

Men vs. Women Race to 1000

871

The 'Explain The Appeal Of......' Thread

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And you're choosing to ignore the geopolitical, sociological, and economic implications...why? Do you choose to be deluded, or are you just failing to wrap your head around it?

Let's pretend for the sake of argument that solar paneling is a feasible way of fueling an entire country right now. All 54 billion square feet that we'd need to fuel the USA if it happened tomorrow. Let's pretend it will never be cloudy and that we'd get as much sunlight in the winter months as we do in the summer.

Are you choosing deliberately to forget that lobbyists and think-tanks in the pockets of the coal and oil industries are still going to try to impede your progress every step of the way? Are you choosing to forget that a single panel costs $250 right now, and that millions of them will cost several billions of dollars? (Because you cannot appeal to the common good when you want thousands of workers setting these things up; they have families to feed just like most other taxpayers. They're not going to do it for free, no matter how charismatic a speech you think you can give.) Are you forgetting that if the government doesn't subsidize those building costs, it's coming out of the taxpayers, some of whom will object to the project? Are you forgetting that in addition to the cost of setting up the solar panels, you'll also need to build the lines which transport this electricity country-wide (because more than likely they'd have to be built in a flat, sunny area like the southwest)? And what about the non-contiguous states? Will Alaska and Hawaii see their taxes go up to subsidize solar panels which they won't even benefit from, since the electricity won't be able to travel across the Pacific ocean, and since Canada will probably give us shit for building these lines through their territories? Or is Alaska not going to receive this new electricity? Is that fair to them? Furthermore, if, for whatever reason (like, I don't know, the aforementioned clouds), there's less electricity than the country needs, how do you plan on enforcing a nationwide rationing plan so that critical infrastructure has its needs met before the general public do? Will there be priority lists of who deserves electricity more during times of scarcity? Will this be challenged as an assault upon people's civil rights, and as a staunch class divide and offensive inequality in a supposedly free nation?

The degree of tunnel-vision with which you're approaching this discussion is ludicrous.

If you see this, please send it to your leaders as soon as possible.

And 46% isn't enough to be a sustainable energy source for such enormous countries. Even when it reaches 99% (in how many years, again?), do you not understand the gargantuan scale of such a problem as replacing oil and coal altogether with sustainable energy infrastructure?

So my analogy stands. Sorry to pop your bubble on that one.

You're having trouble seeing the forest because there's too many damn trees in your way, darling. I remind you of what you said in your OP:

For all to have energy, we must diversify capture, transfer, and storage. We must stop subsidizing inefficient methods, given we have cost effective and safer ones. For instance, algae fuels can replace corn biofuels and fossil fuels.

@catchamber

You think sustainable energy is a life-saving, problem solving solution to the world's energy and pollution crises. Not at 46% efficiency it isn't. Not by waiting three more decades for that efficiency to crawl its way up to a practical level, either.

Too idealistic and fantastical. Not enough realism. (But then, what did I expect from someone who thinks people disagreeing with him is "insulting"? A rich imagination is a spice of life, I suppose.)

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Photovoltaic efficiency is constantly increasing

@catchamber

If I go from spending my whole waking day sitting sedentary at my computer jerking off on RoleplayerGuild, to spending 99.9% of my day on the Guild and the other .1% lifting a ten-pound dumbbell for a minute and a half, I've "improved" my physical fitness. That doesn't mean I've improved enough (quantitatively), or that I'm improving quickly enough to see practical results.

Men vs. Women Race to 1000

820

If you see this, please send it to your leaders as soon as possible.

@Arawak Absolutely. I could have gone on about why mass-scale renewable energy development won't happen until it's too late, but I only wanted to bring up the points that were semi-relevant to my argument at this time; where the struggle for solar power and the struggle for taking back our prisons are parallel to each other, in the form of sabotage at the hands of private interests.

Never mind the fact that the Democrats will oppose anything the Republicans try to do just to be petty and vindictive. Never mind the fact that some people sincerely believe global warming and the dangers of pollution are myths. Never mind that even if we took all personal vehicles off the roads and powered all personal homes with renewable energy, that's still a drop in the ocean compared to the enormous environmental strains of our industrial infrastructure (shipping and transportation, manufacturing, etc.). It goes on and on.

If you see this, please send it to your leaders as soon as possible.

Also, the new law allows prisoners with marijuana related sentences to appeal for shorter sentences.

@catchamber

And their appeals will be denied, but they'll have fooled you into thinking the system is fair and balanced for the prisoners now. Bravo.

California legalized the recreational use and sale of marijuana.

@catchamber

Are you aware that one of the largest warning signs of being on the autism spectrum is taking everything literally, and being unable to detect sarcasm, hyperbole, or subtext?

Yes, California legalized weed. So did two or three other states. That doesn't change the fact that there's enormous resistance against legalizing it country-wide, because doing so would inhibit the private prison complex, among others. Weed is also only hard drug among dozens.

Tangentially related, your "ingenious" ideas about solar paneling will face exactly the same stonewalling from the oil and gas industries. What benefits the entire country does not benefit the very small number of people who are pocketing huge amounts of money from these scams, and they're the ones with lobbying power in the lawmaking process, not you. Probably the greatest irony in this genius thread is that our senators' ability to be bought is the reason this shit happens in the first place; yet you want us to send your thread to our senators and governors thinking they'll listen! They wouldn't even if your ideas were feasible. (And they're not feasible anyway.)