OT: Jibjab, Politics, the Big Bang and more!

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
I wasn't aware that the proper way to judge whether something was good was to ignore every single instance where that thing fails.

I'm the one ignoring every instance where it fails? You seem to be doing that yourself. Every person who leaves the country to seek treatment represents a failure of the health care system. Yet you'd ignore this when claiming your system is better.

I won't deny that some people do this. I will still ask to see that the number of people who do this is statistically significant.

That depends on how you define statistically significant. After all, people who are rich is a small slice of the population already, and smaller still is the population of rich people who are sufficiently sick to do this. They also don't exactly fill out a form indicating they're doing it.

But so what really? When it comes down to it you pay less than if you weren't paying for everyone else's problems, and all of society benefits as a whole.

Err....if I wasn't paying for everyone else's problems, I'd pay less for healthcare. Far less for healthcare. Like, say, zilch. Because I'm not sick. I get to keep my money. Funny how that works. And I see no evidence to suggest that society benefits as a whole: These people are not contagious, and what they have isn't going to affect me, or anyone else. I fully support the idea that a publicly-funded program against infectious diseases is a good one. I don't believe that publicly-funded healthcare in general is, as there are an awful lot of really frivolous treatments that get funded at your expense.

Yes, because people don't bother to work hard when that means that they will make more money.

They wouldn't have to try as hard. After all, they don't have to worry about saving money for if they get sick. They can just be totally useless slackers and expect somebody else to pay for them. I'm not saying everyone does this, but it's obvious that the people who end up becoming sick as a result, and couldn't have afforded to pay, are.

I suppose that you also support the privatization of police forces, since only people that require them should have to pay for them.

Not at all: The police arguably provide a public service that is beneficial to all. Everyone benefits from them, mostly, unless you happen to be a criminal. I say "arguably", because many times, it's not really clear that they're actually providing this effectively, as they're overburdened with meaningless, frivolous things. However, the theory remains sound, even if present implementation is lacking in many areas. This doesn't mean I don't think people shouldn't take care of themselves, though. We have the second amendment for a reason, insofar as certain politicians keep trying to hamstring it, something which is apparently sadly lacking in Canada and leaves you at the mercy of killers, rapists, robbers, and other hoodlums.

Yep. The standard "people who fail are always lazy" fallacy of false causes.

Oh, not at all. I don't believe people who fail are always lazy. Everyone has their own cause for failure, which can be summarized as consisting of some combination of apathy, incompetence, stupidity, and laziness. If you bothered to apply yourself and didn't just give up and whine when the going got though, you would succeed, or die trying. Either way, you have dealt with your personal problems personally, the way it should be.

[ July 28, 2004, 18:23: Message edited by: Norfleet ]

[Arryn]

Norfy, I'm surprised you haven't made the Darwinian argument against the social safety net of universal healthcare: the weak, the lazy, and the inept die off, preferably before they breed, and the gene pool gets cleansed. Or were you working up to this?

[Skolem]

Originally posted by Arryn:
[qb] just look at bin laden . but the muslim faith is in general more tolerant bin laden is only a sect which isn't even tolerated by the muslim leaders while the catholic church seems to me much more fanatic and they tolerate , even support extreme and almost violent catholic sects .Can you name an "extreme" Catholic sect that exists *today*? (And cite examples of what makes them "extreme" and "almost violent".)

I can G.W. B. and his follower!!!!!!!!!

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Skolem:
I can G.W. B. and his follower!!!!!!!!!

Wrong. Bush isn't Catholic, though he is pretty extreme.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Norfleet:
I'm the one ignoring every instance where it fails? You seem to be doing that yourself. Every person who leaves the country to seek treatment represents a failure of the health care system. Yet you'd ignore this when claiming your system is better.

No, I'm not ignoring it. The aggregate health statistics of the population show that in general people are healthier in Canada. Nobody here has been able to show that these statistics are significantly altered by those wealthy people that might go to the U.S. for treatment.
There is no need to ignore large segments of the population to arrive at this. You, on the other hand, would like to simply ignore the part of your population that can't afford health care. That's called biased sampling, and you can be used to get such useless results as showing that there are no people living below the poverty line by refusing to count people that live below the poverty line.

That depends on how you define statistically significant.

Statistically significant means that the number of such cases is large enough that it has a noticeable effect on the health of the general population.

I don't believe that publicly-funded healthcare in general is, as there are an awful lot of really frivolous treatments that get funded at your expense.

Why don't you name some frivolous treatments then.

Not at all: The police arguably provide a public service that is beneficial to all. Everyone benefits from them, mostly, unless you happen to be a criminal.

And everyone benefits from a healthy population. A population with healthier people is a population that can be more productive.

We have the second amendment for a reason, insofar as certain politicians keep trying to hamstring it, something which is apparently sadly lacking in Canada and leaves you at the mercy of killers, rapists, robbers, and other hoodlums.

Oh good grief. Keep on spreading that FUD Norfleet. I know that you are incredibly paranoid, but the violent crime rate is lower in Canada than the U.S.

Oh, not at all. I don't believe people who fail are always lazy. Everyone has their own cause for failure, which can be summarized as consisting of some combination of apathy, incompetence, stupidity, and laziness.

You might want to avoid contradicting yourself when you write something.

[ July 28, 2004, 19:33: Message edited by: Graeme Dice ]

[Stormbinder]

Wow. You are gone for less than a day, and there are 3 new full pages of flames on several none-related topics. Ok, here we go...

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
And you're a moron with all the logical skills of a rather stupid rock. An argument made without supporting evidence is one that can be ignored, as it contains no useful information.

LOL. Well said. It looks like I need to reclarify my collection of rocks into 2 new categories of smart and stupid. Sounds like facinating project. Do you think you can give me a hand with it Graeme?

[ July 28, 2004, 19:56: Message edited by: Stormbinder ]

[Stormbinder]

Originally posted by Norfleet:

quote:

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Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
I suppose that next you'll tell me that Zaire has a great health care system since the richest people there can afford to go to the U.S. for their treatment.

That assertion makes no sense, because obviously, Zaire does not have a great health care system if people there are leaving the country to seek their health care. Nobody goes *TO* Zaire to get treatment.

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You have missed the Graeme's point completely. He was saying that any healthcare system that gives most benefit only to the rich people is not a good one. The question what exactly they need to do to rip these benefits is irrelivent for the topic of this discussion.