[TML] A Plague of Spacemen

[Jerry W Barrington]

On 10/14/07 3:45 PM, Stuart Frew wrote:

> Of course a good step would be for the first world to remove their internal
> agricultural subsidies so the third worlds primary production could competite
> on the world market(free market my arse)
> 
> I don;t know if its still the way but both the EU and USA use to spend much
> more on agricultural subsidies, making artificially cheap food stuffs or
> paying farmers not to grow food to prevent gults, than on humanitarian aid.

True, and don't expect subsidies to go away any time soon.  The reality is,
any country feeding it's people mostly with imports is setting themselves up
for trouble.  The thing most Americans my age remember about Ethiopia is the
famines in the 70's.  So, assume we did away with subsidies and let the
market supply us from Africa...  What happens when they get hit by another
major drought?  You think they'll keep up the exports, or keep what food
they make for themselves?  Sure, America could get through it, if the
drought is just 1 fairly small region.  But it would definitely drive prices
up, which would kill political careers.  And guess who runs the subsidies?
That's right: politicians.

Besides, the subsidies actually keep the price of food *higher* than free
market would.  The main American subsidy is to *not* grow crops.  Those
would compete with the crops that already are growing and drive prices down,
bankrupting *all* the farmers.  Plus we pay the taxes that pay the subsidy.



On 10/14/07 3:45 PM, Mikko Parviainen wrote:

> Though politics has its effects: Finland is now on the verge of losing
> all sugar production, as the EU (== mostly bigger countries than us)
> is trying to lessen the over-production, which seems to mean cutting
> all Finnish sugar production.
> 
> Of course, if you consider the EU as one entity, it wouldn't be that
> bad. I don't.

In the long run, it will basically be "The United States of Europe".  Many
Europeans today resist that movement, but as they die off and are replaced
by the younger generations, eventually they'll get over it.  Overall it will
be a good thing for Europe, as they will be able to more effectively compete
in the larger world.



On 10/17/07 12:02 PM, Stuart Frew wrote:

> Maturity in this discussion has generally meant tech level.
> 
> I think classifying cultures as "child like" just because their tech level
> is lower than ours is a tad patronizing.

Labeling it "patronizing" doesn't address it's truth...

Just as you wouldn't (I hope!) let a child just pick up a gun off the table
and play around with it, you don't want to give the members of a culture
technology that they don't know the implications of.  Say you give them
autodocs, 1 per 100 people (assuming appropriate power supply, yada yada).
Pretty soon you'll have a population explosion.  Look at the difference in
birth rate in 1st world vs. 3rd world countries.  Even between the better
off and the worst parts of USA.  It's not just availability and use of birth
control.  Lower tech requires higher birth rate to offset expected
mortality.  Curing the mortality doesn't change the mindset of the people in
just a few years.  All kinds of technologies have similar interaction that
are dealt with at the normal pace of technological change.  If suddenly
introduced as fast as the natives can learn the tech, it will cause all
kinds of havoc.

> True it will not always work, but most of the time it will or close enough.
> Not being able to achieve perfection is not a good reason to give up.

I've met parents who (quite literally) think that having produced a baby
makes them far more expert at the subsequent raising than anybody who
hasn't.  My own sister as an example.  And yet, based on there performance
down the years, it doesn't appear that their "controlling" the process has
*any* notable effect.  The majority of people turn out reasonably well
adjusted *no matter what* their parents do.  I don't think that implies that
the parents are "doing a good job", just that the parents are only one
aspect of a complex issue of the child reaching adulthood.