Quote from: Spike;318673Ah... but it is ALWAYS easier to simply paint people you disagree with as 'confused' or 'fucked up' than to actually rebut anything they say.  That's why its so popular.

Also: Ignore any replies from Jeff, he is a moron

I should listen to the Pika's advice more often....


- Ed

Quote from: Koltar;318687I should listen to the Pika's advice more often....


- Ed

Only as long as it keeps your fellow Klingon cosplayers from robbing convenience stores with bat'leths.

Quote from: jeff37923;318696Only as long as it keeps your fellow Klingon cosplayers from robbing convenience stores with bat'leths.

That person is a criminal NOT a "cosplayer".

I am NOT a "cosplayer" either. the groups I work with normally benefit a charity.

You've crossed the line into Nox territory with that last post.


- Ed C.

You do realize you've started to sign your posts twice, right?

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;318490That cocksmock is still around? He's one of the poster-child Bitter Non-Gamers, he's been whinging and shaking his fist in futile nerdfury for half a decade at least. I wouldn't pay attention to anything he says.

I think his stated reason for leaving here was we were all too mean to him.

Quote from: Koltar;318766I am NOT a "cosplayer" either.

- Ed C.

From your own signature...

Klingon Votes on November 4th: http://s3.silent-tower.org/TheKlingonVotes/index.html

Do you deny that this is you dressed up as a Klingon depicted in that link?

Quote from: wikipedia entry on cosplayCosplay (コスプレ, kosupure?), short for "costume roleplay",[1] is a type of performance art whose participants outfit themselves, with often-elaborate costumes and accessories, as a specific character or idea.

You dressing up as a Klingon, acting the role of Koltar/Quoltar/whatever sure fits the definition of cosplay. Regardless of whether or not you like the word cosplay, you are exhibiting the behavior.

Quote from: jeff37923;318672Not really. All you have to do is read his book on political activism entitled Take Back Your Government to see that he was pretty conservative with a dash of libertarianism. Not hard to say what his political leanings are when he tells you in a book.

Heinlein wrote that book in the mid-40s, decades before his death.  Over the course of the rest of his life, his political ideas went on evolving, shifting back and forth around the political "spectrum", and no doubt affected by not only changing times but also by events in his personal life (not least of which was the brain-fever).

I generally like Heinlein, but he's far too complex to tack into a single political "side", and anything he says about politics can only be taken at what he was thinking at a given moment.

RPGpundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;318793Heinlein wrote that book in the mid-40s, decades before his death.  Over the course of the rest of his life, his political ideas went on evolving, shifting back and forth around the political "spectrum", and no doubt affected by not only changing times but also by events in his personal life (not least of which was the brain-fever).

I generally like Heinlein, but he's far too complex to tack into a single political "side", and anything he says about politics can only be taken at what he was thinking at a given moment.

RPGpundit

You have a point, but if his political ideology changed in a radical fashion from that written down then you'd think that those who knew and worked with him like Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven would have mentioned something in the interim.

Quote from: One Horse Town;318769I think his stated reason for leaving here was we were all too mean to him.

But we're mean to everyone! It's not like we were picking on him. That would be political.

Quote from: jibbajibba;318483Intertesting position (I say interesting i mean ... um the same as everyone else says ) but not necessarily true. There is a school of thought that says overpopulation is a myth and if you take sub-sarharan africa say ... Sudan the average population density is 14/km (the 194th highest in the world compared to say Indai with 344/km (the 29th highest). The real problem in Sub-sarharan Africa is the people that live on the boarders of arid areas are politically unable to migrate so the land gets increasingly poor. In Sudan in particular the political oppression of Darfur and the cycle of civil war it leads to doesn't help any.
In fact The densest mainland African state is Rwanda and prior to the genocide in '94 it had a realatively high standard of living. Overall thepopulation density of Africa as a whole is only about 17/km (1/2 the global average) .

Sorry if this sounds a bit preachy but I get unnecessarily narked when people trot out the same old Africa is in the shitter becuase "its population density is too high and women have 8 kids each". Now if only they had replicators...
.

You're using the numbers, but the numbers often lie in situations such as these. You're right about the use of land, except that the very dry numbers ignore cultural, social, and political issues-effectively putting the cart before the horse. Rwanda had a decent standard of living by Africian standards before the killings, but for various political, social, and cultural reasons a significant portion of the population felt that said standard of living was insufficent. And felt strongly enough that the killing started.

Just as sufficent First world citizens feel that their standard of living is barely sufficent, and needs upgradeing, no matter what the cost to the Third World.

In the realm of realpolitik, preception is the reality.

The reality of American grain-fed beef means massive amounts of food  production is expended in a pointless closed loop. But frankly, I'm certainly not interested in changing my eating habits. Nor are most Americans.

One of the prime directives of political science: self interest is the dominant motivation of every culture, and any political sitation that is not based on that concept is doomed to failure.

So: the fact is, Earth cannot support six billion people at First World standards of living. We know people are not going to change, so the fact is that barring the magic replicator technology, a good percentage of the world will live their lives in squalor. And I suspect that much like modern medicine, just the development of great technology in the First World will generally not translate into aid for the Third World.

World-wide, more tonnage of weapons are shipped into the failing parts of the world than food.

Quote from: RPGPundit;318638Heinlein was kind of a mental case; its very hard to say what his real political leanings were.

RPGPundit

Very true.

His opinions on the military are likewise all over the field, from arch convservative to really out there.