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georgioz


				

				

				
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joined 2022 September 05 07:15:35 UTC
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User ID: 493

georgioz


				
				
				

				
0 followers   follows 0 users   joined 2022 September 05 07:15:35 UTC

					

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User ID: 493

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Yes, the OP mentioned the fact that even if we take the EA utilitarianism into account it is hard to calculate utility lost by killing untold number of moths and larvae compared to inconvenience of not crushing them when walking around the tiny apartment. Another interesting thing that jumped at me was that the EA poster decided that next time she has to kill the insect ASAP, informed by emotional response of seeing moths dying slowly. To me it is interesting to compare with how EA is so obsessed by saving future unborn people. I am very glad that this got posted, unlike your accusatory oneliner.

Maybe you are not aware of it but many countries - including USA since 2013 - declared obesity itself as a disease. The decision makers in American Medical Association openly admit, that they completely abandoned long-standing criteria for diseases such as disease having some symptoms as opposed to being symptom by itself. Imagine for instance declaring malnutrition itself as a disease, it makes no sense. Malnutrition can be simple lack of food and thus not caused by anything special, or it can be a symptom of some other metabolic or psychological disease. The same with obesity, we can create a "cure" that will work 100% of the time, just admit people into anti-obesity camp where they will have their food intake as well as exercise managed. As the saying goes, there were no obese victims in Gulags or other prison camps, the "cure" is easy.

Instead what AMA did was stick with "utilitarian" definition of a disease in order to "destigmatize" the condition as the word "disease" suggests, that people may not have a control over it such as with some pathogens. Additionally if we allow this definition we can now direct the whole infrastructure used to treat diseases into this new problem. I guess this it the precursor of the new trend such as when CDC declared racism as a public health threat, who knows maybe in the future racism will become an official disease that will treated institutionally or by some brain surgery or pills.

I think a lot of that can be viewed through immense impact that boomer generation had on culture. Sixties and seventies when boomers were young adults, it was all about celebrating teenage revolt, and drugs, rock n' roll and all that. Eighties and nineties when boomers were at their prime, it was all about making money, and celebrating being fit and healthy and being full of vigor, and above all else being sexy - it was time of masculine men shagging fit women like in Baywatch. Aughts and tens is when boomers are becoming old and it is time of moralization and experiencing their failing bodies and being aware of their mortality - so suddenly grey is gorgeous and of course sex is suddenly all about power relation of men over young women of young healthy women over old desiccated boomer hags; which means that healthy sexuality has to be suddenly forbidden.

It is all display of cultural power of objectively the most powerful and narcissistic generation of the last century imposing their self-centered worldview on broader culture.

Gaza is already cut off even from neighboring Egypt. So what Israel should have done is basically no change - meaning that they should continue providing water, electricity and support the Gaza in the same way as in the past. Basically pretend that nothing changed, correct?

For many generations the natives of the Belgian Congo, for example, endured the most unspeakable atrocities at the hands of the Belgians, at the hands of Europe.

Those "many generations" were around two - between 1865 and 1908 when Congo was run as personal domain by king Leopold II with all the horrible atrocities, probably one of the worst if not the worst in whole colonial Africa. The whole situation ashamed Belgians and after they annexed the country from the king the invested heavily into Congo making it one of the most developed countries in Africa be it infrastructure and industrialization, literacy or population health and growth.

Just curious, what response do you think would go against what Hamas wanted Israel to do?

Of course I do understand that what follows is a lot more complicated, but I think that in general medicine should always be driven by primum non nocere - first do no harm principle and I would be much more strict in enforcing this. So for instance transhumanist things like most forms of esthetic medicine such as breast implants, trans surgeries, contraception pills, sterilizations, euthanasia, abortion and other similar or procedures or drugs would be considered outside of core publicly funded medicine. It could still be provided but under different scope let's say akin to getting tattoo or going to nail saloon and thus it should be automatically clear to the customer that the primary goal is unrelated to certain standard of this no-harm principle and that he or she should accept the risks as well as costs associated with it.

As for the part where people do not follow the medical plan or even actively sabotage it, which then requires even more resources from the system, I think having a system of deductibles like let's say in Singapore can partially resolve the problem. So the principle is that state pays for your medical bills because it is a prosocial thing to do in order to have healthy population but only up to the point. A level up from that is to involve immediate family so for instance part of the costs will be coming from their savings so that the immediate family (children, spouse, parents) has incentive to pressure that person to do something about themselves or they will be at least partially held accountable.

As far as I understand the $200 trillion is the difference between liabilities and tax income if taken from the perspective of government's infinite horizon intertemporal budget constraint. It takes into account the net present value of such liability and the number is 200 trillion. I actually like this calculation even for home budget as you can put on the same playing field different type of spending. Imagine that you want to compare value of drinking a $3 coffee every day compared to let's say once in a lifetime expenditure you are about to undertake such as let's say some medical procedure or even a voucher entitling you to one free coffee for the rest of your life, which for that $3 coffee is around $20,000 net present value with around 5% interest rate. You can use this method to discover ponzi schemes if somebody tries to do magic with cash flow - as the US government wants to do.

Similarly here, the solution can only be to increase taxes to increase income to finance those liabilities, or decrease payouts which means reneging on those liabilities or some combination of thereof. Also you are correct that Social Security is a transfer from young to the old but with implicit assumption that the young will receive similar from young if they themselves are old. Except there is a huge risk that by the time it should happen the boomer or even Gen X generation will be long dead and the Millenials and Zoomers will end up with no place to sit in this metaphorical musical chairs game.