Bay 12 Games Forum

How can this even work, when thoughts/ideas must be unique to have an economical value?

I think your problem is right there. It should be incredibly obvious that ideas totally don't have to be unique to have economical value. That basically describes the entire history of human entertainment -- almost the entirety of everything in the field is derivative to more or less degrees, and in both entertainment and industry knockoff productions command a significant portion of the respective economies.

Even with unique ideas, it's rare any one individual can actually disseminate it to any substantive degree -- people spreading someone else's idea around in parallel is of incredibly significant value (this is basically what the entire multi-billion dollar advertisement industry is, ferex).

There's a lot more to thought economy than just the production of unique ideas, basically.

Realize it's rhetorical, but considering torture largely just doesn't freaking work and thoroughly fucks up the person doing it, to boot... no. Rules against shit like that exist for a reason, and nine times out of ten it's not because of a moral issue.

S'a pisspoor example for what you're trying to posit, helg, at least about it leading to further atrocities, since it's effectiveness that leads anyone with a brain to avoid torture, not (lack of) necessity. Torture is an extra gross ethical violation, though, since it's significantly unlikely to even accomplish what it's (ostensibly -- the general reality is that the folks doing it are just fucked in the head) attempting to do.

Big thing to remember about many atrocities is that they're considered excessive (and thus, an atrocity) because they're not freaking effective. They backfire, they cause greater resentment and retaliation than other methods, they salt the earth, they're just straight up uneconomical for the group doing it, the list just kinda' goes on. It's not lack of necessity prevent this shit, it's the lot of it being bad craft, either in the immediate or long run.

Hehe, ask the old ones, they know what's a huge time online.

"Come ye' children, settle down round ol' Frump and hear the tales of the great electroschlongs of yore..."

... or not. I like not.

Well, to me the fact that Vietnam spawned a strong anti-war movement while Iraq did not is a good example of the influence of the draft.

... are you sure that Iraq hasn't managed that, though? We've actually had some pretty bloody huge gatherings over the last decade or two, over here. Disturbingly little news on it when we've had stuff like half-million+ person protests (in one place, mind, nevermind other protests at the same time), but they've been there. The general sentiment has been trending pretty hard against it for a few years, now, too.

It'd be interesting to see how public opinion and such has actually moved, comparatively, actually. Cursory searching didn't really find anything easily digestible, but from what I (vaguely) remember there's not really been anything particularly unusual re: war weariness and whatnot for either conflict.

... I don't have a cell phone, either. When I say no camera, I mean no camera or camera equivalent. Entirely without. Could maybe bug neighbors or something, but that has non-zero odds of getting shot, so...

No, no, I still have a probably 10-20 lbs box of legos sitting around somewhere. Still in touch with the bricks. I just haven't bought any new ones in forever, 'cause that stuff rapidly started getting hella' expensive.

... yeah, I'm not sure what about that is supposed to be odd beyond the cosplay bit. That the critter in question is apparently good at it?

I haven't kept up with lego in a long time, though, so why is no batman worth note, anyway?