Brexit, for once some facts.
- Thread starter flecc
- Start date
I've always fancied getting my DNA tested, but worry that I will cease to own myself in a few years, after Apple buy patents to some of my genes and demand a licensing fee for the continued use of... what was in the T & C's?
It'll burn all the way through, out the other side and back, over and over again until the earth collapses like swiss cheese in a hot oven, the sight of which will be a nice diversion for otherwise miserable Amazon warehouse slaves on the moon.
Not to mention equity released for the next generation to spend on hydrofoil surfboards. But they'd lose Tory voters - on the other hand, if voting Tory is genetic, the resulting spending boost to the economy, might make things look rosy enough to get the beneficiaries of wills to keep them in power. It's a tough gamble for any Conservative government.
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The government has been laying out its future plans for the environment, electric cars, electricity generation, home heating by heat pumps and a myriad of other details, all entailing immense future costs for all of us and a virtually certain loss of personal wealth and living standards in consequence.
In this post I'm questioning the wisdom of any of this, on the basis of the past record of any of us always failing to predict what is needed or wanted in the future of our modern world.
I'll start at some 260 years ago when from the middle to the end of the eighteenth century vast sums and effort were expended in building a canal network, confident that they would serve our economy for hundreds of years. But as the last of those canals was being completed in the 1830s, the first public railway was built, with the rapid expansion of rail then making that immensely expensive 4000 mile canal network virtually redundant.
Of course the investors were certain that with rail they had hit the jackpot, so in a hugely expensive 40 year railway building spree the country was largely covered by rail with even some villages served by a station. Yet by the end of the 19th century just 63 years after the first railway opened, almost all the new rail companies had failed because the public only wanted rail for very limited purposes like some commuting. As those rail companies tumbled into bankruptcy at the turn of the century the public showed what they really wanted, their own private locomotive on the road, with steering so they quickly could go where they wanted to go and not to where the rail company decided. And the same happened with most of the freight. So the entire history of our rail was a 40 year boom, followed by 120 years of struggling to keep the railways alive and find more use for them.
But the planners and future predictors still hadn't learnt as they showed after WW2, when they decide to solve the family housing problem with tower blocks, certain they'd be very popular with their modernity and fantastic views. Indeed as people moved in it looked promising initially, but that honeymoon soon ended as all the problems showed up, with the result that most of those 1950 blocks have been long since demolished.
People wanted low rise housing of course and one might think the planners couldn't get that wrong, but oh boy, did they just in the 1960s and 1970s. The terraced housing estate I live on, built from the 1960s into the '70s is a perfect example. Since people clearly wanted and were buying cars, the planners assuming everyone would want a garage built rows of them adjacent to the terraced housing blocks. But people are too lazy to garage their cars a short walk away, prefering street parking as close as possible to their front door, so the garages were demoted to sheds to hold bikes, lawnmower, surplus furniture etc., the garages often slowly falling into disrepair with broken doors, leaking and collapsing roofs etc. All over Britain one can see housing estates blighted by this ever worsening decay and the criminal activities these decaying areas attract. With hindsight what the public had really wanted wasn't garages but rows of parallel parking bays close to their front doors, plus nearby small lockups for bikes, gardening stuff etc.
And that wasn't the only mistake made with these estates. With many like mine the planners decided against row of houses by the side of roads and instead scattered the the terraced blocks around with landscaping and trees and long paths to access the housing from the road, certain we'd like it. Yes it looks very nice, but ever since they've been a nightmare to service. Removal men struggle with furniture along long paths, then met with flights of outside steps up to each block often on hillsides. Likewise delivery men, postal workers and couriers and worst of all refuse collection and recycling entailing long trips to and from house and truck, all hopelessly inefficient and expensive. Elderly people have far longer to walk to buses and these estate layouts are too often a nightmare for the disabled, being especially difficult for wheelchairs and mobility vehicles.
There are numerous examples of how wrong all our predictions always are. For those of you old enough, remember Raymond Baxter and Tomorrows World on BBC TV? And how wrong all those predictions were. We were told for example that our fridges would keep an eye on the the contents and automatically re-order ingredients as things got low. Never happened of course, since so much of what has actually happened wasn't realised. Instead much of the population don't cook, they watch cooking as entertainment on TV. When they want to eat they order what they want ready to eat from a delivery service. Or they microwave something from out of the freezer. We were told that by year 2000 we'd be flying to the office in our own private air transport, when instead the office has come to us via laptops, smartphones and home working from anywhere in the country or even the world.
We suffered the same with the post war predictions that the USSR was the big enemy. Trillions were spent on armaments by both sides, money that could have immeasurably improved the lives of everyone, while the predictors were proved wrong by the fact that the USSR no longer even exists, having lasted only a very few years. Yet far from learning, the planners and predictors are at it again, this time saying China is our new big enemy that we need to arm against.
Wrong, more wrong and even more wrong is what all predictions always are, so we really must stop making them, especially when it's our governments making them and spending trillions in the process, wrecking our futures.
The future is the present for the future's people and it is their right to decide upon it, not ours to expensively mess up out of ignorance yet again.
.
In this post I'm questioning the wisdom of any of this, on the basis of the past record of any of us always failing to predict what is needed or wanted in the future of our modern world.
I'll start at some 260 years ago when from the middle to the end of the eighteenth century vast sums and effort were expended in building a canal network, confident that they would serve our economy for hundreds of years. But as the last of those canals was being completed in the 1830s, the first public railway was built, with the rapid expansion of rail then making that immensely expensive 4000 mile canal network virtually redundant.
Of course the investors were certain that with rail they had hit the jackpot, so in a hugely expensive 40 year railway building spree the country was largely covered by rail with even some villages served by a station. Yet by the end of the 19th century just 63 years after the first railway opened, almost all the new rail companies had failed because the public only wanted rail for very limited purposes like some commuting. As those rail companies tumbled into bankruptcy at the turn of the century the public showed what they really wanted, their own private locomotive on the road, with steering so they quickly could go where they wanted to go and not to where the rail company decided. And the same happened with most of the freight. So the entire history of our rail was a 40 year boom, followed by 120 years of struggling to keep the railways alive and find more use for them.
But the planners and future predictors still hadn't learnt as they showed after WW2, when they decide to solve the family housing problem with tower blocks, certain they'd be very popular with their modernity and fantastic views. Indeed as people moved in it looked promising initially, but that honeymoon soon ended as all the problems showed up, with the result that most of those 1950 blocks have been long since demolished.
People wanted low rise housing of course and one might think the planners couldn't get that wrong, but oh boy, did they just in the 1960s and 1970s. The terraced housing estate I live on, built from the 1960s into the '70s is a perfect example. Since people clearly wanted and were buying cars, the planners assuming everyone would want a garage built rows of them adjacent to the terraced housing blocks. But people are too lazy to garage their cars a short walk away, prefering street parking as close as possible to their front door, so the garages were demoted to sheds to hold bikes, lawnmower, surplus furniture etc., the garages often slowly falling into disrepair with broken doors, leaking and collapsing roofs etc. All over Britain one can see housing estates blighted by this ever worsening decay and the criminal activities these decaying areas attract. With hindsight what the public had really wanted wasn't garages but rows of parallel parking bays close to their front doors, plus nearby small lockups for bikes, gardening stuff etc.
And that wasn't the only mistake made with these estates. With many like mine the planners decided against row of houses by the side of roads and instead scattered the the terraced blocks around with landscaping and trees and long paths to access the housing from the road, certain we'd like it. Yes it looks very nice, but ever since they've been a nightmare to service. Removal men struggle with furniture along long paths, then met with flights of outside steps up to each block often on hillsides. Likewise delivery men, postal workers and couriers and worst of all refuse collection and recycling entailing long trips to and from house and truck, all hopelessly inefficient and expensive. Elderly people have far longer to walk to buses and these estate layouts are too often a nightmare for the disabled, being especially difficult for wheelchairs and mobility vehicles.
There are numerous examples of how wrong all our predictions always are. For those of you old enough, remember Raymond Baxter and Tomorrows World on BBC TV? And how wrong all those predictions were. We were told for example that our fridges would keep an eye on the the contents and automatically re-order ingredients as things got low. Never happened of course, since so much of what has actually happened wasn't realised. Instead much of the population don't cook, they watch cooking as entertainment on TV. When they want to eat they order what they want ready to eat from a delivery service. Or they microwave something from out of the freezer. We were told that by year 2000 we'd be flying to the office in our own private air transport, when instead the office has come to us via laptops, smartphones and home working from anywhere in the country or even the world.
We suffered the same with the post war predictions that the USSR was the big enemy. Trillions were spent on armaments by both sides, money that could have immeasurably improved the lives of everyone, while the predictors were proved wrong by the fact that the USSR no longer even exists, having lasted only a very few years. Yet far from learning, the planners and predictors are at it again, this time saying China is our new big enemy that we need to arm against.
Wrong, more wrong and even more wrong is what all predictions always are, so we really must stop making them, especially when it's our governments making them and spending trillions in the process, wrecking our futures.
The future is the present for the future's people and it is their right to decide upon it, not ours to expensively mess up out of ignorance yet again.
.
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They'll be kept in zoos, like some other endangered species, dissected to see why they survived. It will be worth the entrance fee
They'll be forced to mate continuously too, to improve the young stock, which is well worth looking forward to IMHO.
Isn't their PR exercise, I mean plan, largely privately funded? Which means it depends on consumer demand, which means it will fail along with all the other PR exercises from other countries, I mean plans, and humanity will die.
How do you persuade people, make them feel they positively want to do what is needed, avoid pre-assigning blame. I suggest this isn't a textbook example of achieving his claimed aims:
Mr Javid told a Downing Street news conference: "If not enough people get their booster jabs, if not enough of those people that were eligible for the original offer... if they don't come forward, if people don't wear masks when they really should in a really crowded place with lots of people that they don't normally hang out with, if they're not washing their hands and stuff, it's going to hit us all.
And the "and stuff" is more what you'd expect of a vox pop than a statement by a minister of the crown. Well, maybe not these days...
Mr Javid told a Downing Street news conference: "If not enough people get their booster jabs, if not enough of those people that were eligible for the original offer... if they don't come forward, if people don't wear masks when they really should in a really crowded place with lots of people that they don't normally hang out with, if they're not washing their hands and stuff, it's going to hit us all.
And the "and stuff" is more what you'd expect of a vox pop than a statement by a minister of the crown. Well, maybe not these days...
While they are still bothering with coffins, we're still doing just fine. Wonder if they have ordered plenty of compostable shrouds?
This snippet sums up a lot:
Sajid Javid has urged the public to wear face masks in enclosed spaces to combat spiking Covid cases – just as he was challenged about whether Tory MPs are leading by example by avoiding coverings in the “packed” parliament.
In his first ever Downing Street press conference, the health secretary repeated his warning that infections could reach 100,000 a day as the country enters a challenging winter period.
He stressed that, aside from vaccinations, people can take other – now voluntary – measures such as meeting outdoors where possible, ensuring good ventilation, wearing masks in crowded spaces and taking lateral flow tests.
Sajid Javid Tells Public To Wear Face Masks – Despite Tory MPs Doing Otherwise
Images of packed benches in the Commons appear to contradict government messaging.
Just two years ago he was coming up with things such as this:
First, we will be smart and responsible in the way we invest for the long-term.
We can do this by taking advantage of incredibly low interest rates…
…and borrowing-to-build, not borrowing-to-waste like the Labour years.
I hope Mentholyptus stops my coffin
Except for one thing... The only value in this world is making those new things. There is no value in keeping the money. There is no inherited debt.
There might be, if your children don't own all of their genes; born part Bosch owned and therefore in debt to Bosch... living in a Bosch house mortgaged to Bosch Bank, riding a Bosch bike to work for Bosch... Or maybe they don't get to the birth stage at all, because routine DNA testing at the Bosch hospital detects patented Shimano genes...
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Data Grab Bill is Government revenge on NHS patients
Health data has become one of the most valued prizes of the surveillance economy, but they aren’t being used to “save lives”.
www.openrightsgroup.org
It sometimes comes across as a bit shrill, but interesting reading:
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Electric Motors Versus Internal Combustion Engines
Next time you stand for 90 seconds filling your petrol tank, you might think of the enormity of what is happening, in energy terms. Chemical energy is entering your tank at a rate of typically 17 mill
Interesting and probably somewhat pessimistic view of our current and future energy requirements. Either way it's not going to be plain sailing in our move to carbon free... Article doesn't mention the hole in tax revenue changing to ecars will provide..???
The author.
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