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You're such a tease! 
Now is it bad enough that you let somebody else kick your butts without you trying to do it to each other? Now if we're all talking about the same man, and I think we are... it appears he's got a rather growing collection of our bikes.
modified 31-Aug-21 21:01pm.
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OriginalGriff wrote: Mind you, I could be wrong: I don't own an iAnything; any Nike or Adidas trainers; my clothes don't boldly advertise any company or sports team; or even boast an alligator on the pocket so by many peoples definition I automatically am...
If they want me to wear their logo, they better pay me, or at least give me the stuff for free.
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OriginalGriff wrote: But ... maybe I'm an optimist (ha!) but I don't think it matters. Throughout human history, we have had those who can think, can write, can create or do things; and those who manifestly cannot, despite an enormous amount of self belief.
The difference is that now not only can anybody shout at the world, but that everybody is almost forced to shout as loud as they can, even if the most original thought they can conceive is "I ate a sandwich"
Err...seems like that is implicitly suggesting that at some time 'before' only those that had something intelligent to contribute were the only ones that got to contribute.
Rather certain that was not the case.
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Been on the weed again? 
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Seeing that I'm online. My official answer to this question is... What is this weed stuff you speak of? 
Jeremy Falcon
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Oh yeah, feigning ignorance now eh? :P
You know full well this kind of random thought stems from the old wackky baccy.
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Or boredom. Which is what it was in my case. Still, I'm loving the replies. If I were to hear of this weed thing... I'd be sure to tell my pastor about it.
Who am I kidding, I live in California. We're about to be able to buy it at Walmart.
Jeremy Falcon
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Here's a poem that kinda addresses the feeling you are having. I wrote it as a quick response to another person who was really gloomy, and was kind of happy with how it turned out. Sorry it is so long for a posting here. (Couldn't find a 'pre' tag that blocked it w/o formatting.) If you can't tell after reading, I'm mostly with OriginalGriff on this.
The Genius of the Individual
You are steeped
in the miracle of life
that neither religion nor science explains
To war? To Love?
What boundaries are these?
For without war, does love hold its flavor?
And without love, would anything be worth fighting for?
For millennium these questions have rung
through the hallways of history
Tragedy, comedy, kindness, and pain
Etched on the souls of every living human
making every present moment
an exquisite balance of choices
Stupidity has no meaning if all are genius
and material possessions hold no meaning
if all are poor
Do you choose money?
Do you choose poverty?
and if so, why?
Some say we are doomed
and can only be destroyed
Yet they can't explain
that we've outlived the prophets of old
who claimed this very thing
This orb of earth continues spinning
and the birds, they still do sing.
Waiting for the choices
that we still will bring
Do we continue fighting?
Or do we dance and sing?
What happens when we put down our arms
and celebrate the miracle of our being?
Or is the celebration fighting,
loving,
killing,
friendship,
hatred,
kindness,
slaughter,
creation,
treachery
Expressions of our very being?
In the lover is the fighter
and in the fighter is peace defined
And in the genius, stupidity,
and in the ignorant, the sublime
No matter what is done
the miracle of existence surrounds everyone
The core of our being united
to the greatest philosophy ever told
Perhaps it's just choices
on the path as we grow old
Does the lover love?
and does the fighter fight?
What happens when we've learned
that fighting does not love make?
There is an inner portion to each of us
balancing this question for ourselves
As we continue going forward
making history
Learning
Loving
Being
David O'Neil
It Is The Absolute Verifiable Truth & Proven Fact
That Your Belly-Button Signature Ties
To Viviparous Mama.
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Great poem man. I epsecially liked this part...
Quote: In the lover is the fighter
and in the fighter is peace defined
And in the genius, stupidity,
and in the ignorant, the sublime
Mainly because it's true in more ways than one.
Jeremy Falcon
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Glad you liked it.
It Is The Absolute Verifiable Truth & Proven Fact
That Your Belly-Button Signature Ties
To Viviparous Mama.
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I think people have been saying this for thousands of years
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They've been saying I can has cheeseburgers for thousands of years? I kid. I kid. You're probably right.
Jeremy Falcon
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Every older generation in recorded History has had disparaging comments to make about the younger generation's morals, ethics, language skills etc. etc. ad nauseum. We're still here.
If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.
--Winston Churchill
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The reverse is also true.
As Mike + The Mechanics sang, "Every generation, blames the one before..."
Every generation of teenagers think they invented rebellion.
Cheers,
Mike Fidler
"I intend to live forever - so far, so good." Steven Wright
"I almost had a psychic girlfriend but she left me before we met." Also Steven Wright
"I'm addicted to placebos. I could quit, but it wouldn't matter." Steven Wright yet again.
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MikeTheFid wrote: Every generation of teenagers think they invented rebellion.
Jeremy Falcon
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I totally agree man. But I still think we can learn from people who have learned from life. I mean without studying history we're doomed to repeat the same mistakes. Learning from elders is along the same lines. Humanity will never properly evolve at any significant rate until we start seeing bigger and there's no way to really look forward without also looking backward.
Jeremy Falcon
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My personal view: unfortunately we live in a world of increasing materialism, where, ironically, materialism/technology is being raised to the level of a deity. It may not look like worship in the archaic sense, but it has many of the same outer manifestations - drugs (legal and not) instead of meditative contemplation, portable devices that remind us of our materialism instead of icons that remind us of our spirituality, and so forth. Granted, there are some exceptions where technology enhances the wonder of the world, the universe, of life itself, but those are exceptions for those who know how to use technology to seek experiences of wonder and amazement. The rest, well, is sensory pollution where each stimulus is forgotten 5 seconds later as you scroll to the next one. Move on now to the next reply. 
Marc
Latest Article - Create a Dockerized Python Fiddle Web App
Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny
Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
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"Sensory pollution" 
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You are exactly correct sir. We have new aged false Gods, but they're still false Gods. We just call them name brands now. I grew up in the bible belt, so I totally understand the spiritual side of things man. And you're right, this whole false notion of crap lacks spirit. It's empty and dry. Materialism makes people feel worse not better.
Jeremy Falcon
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It is a substitution of quantity for quality in our ways of communicating. Farcebook is just the most prominent effect of our new ability to communicate to anyone anywhere. It is a part of the societal acceleration beginning with the industrial revolution and moving to the information age and maybe to the automation age or something next. I look at some of the graphs of different social, technological or economic aspects of our growth that seem to be approaching an asymptote and wonder where it will all end up. Looking at 1917-2017 and trying to extrapolate to 2117 is a mind blower. In 100 years will FB have faded from popularity or morphed into the Borg mental collective? 
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MKJCP wrote: In 100 years will FB have faded from popularity or morphed into the Borg mental collective?
More likely Bing than Borg.. but hey, same result really (except it might not work on an iPad)! 
Now is it bad enough that you let somebody else kick your butts without you trying to do it to each other? Now if we're all talking about the same man, and I think we are... it appears he's got a rather growing collection of our bikes.
modified 31-Aug-21 21:01pm.
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Oh, they'll work out their differences. It'll be called the iFaceGoogleSoftBook and really will be in the cloud, as a giant server permanently in geosynchronous orbit. Maintained by AI robots, of course.
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Excellent points. I do know one of the key things that started with the more more more notion of quantity was actually in 1913, at least for the US. That's when fiat currency came to be again. The idea to just print money left and right to pay for all sorts of things (at the expense of our future). It was in the early 1920s that human population really started to take off, just seven years after. And I suppose it makes sense, if you don't have to work for all this new money you get bored. What do you do when bored... well hanky panky. The 60s probably didn't help with that either. Now we have a cheap dollar and we're looking at Mars to hold us.
All I know is if the growth rate won't stop 2117 will mean war unless we do expand to Mars as we fight for land again.
Jeremy Falcon
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A fiat currency is helpful when the supply of materials (e.g. gold) that back the currency are limited and the economy is trying to expand. The other option is to keep money tied to gold. In that case, prices must drop to reflect the increasing value of the currency in the face of demand for it. But prices are sticky on the downside so the tendency would for withdrawal from the market. So, I can see why it would be done. Of course, my amateur economics aren't all the story.
If we are ever going to get a bunch of people to Mars it will be expensive and we will need to print LOTS of money. 
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That's exactly what happened though and for those exact reasons. It was done for short term economic and political gains. It's a temporary fix with the trade off of creating long term problems. And here we are today 100 years later experiencing those problems. Every currency created in history, including the Greenback in the US, that went fiat has flopped. Humans haven't evolved yet enough to control exuberant growth without having a means to stop over inflation like a gold-backed currency does. The only reason the dollar held out this long is there are a bunch of world currencies tied to it.
Of course, precious metals limiting inflation is the past. That's never going to happen again. The future is crypto currencies. We're in a digital world now. Only problem is when the government gets their hands on it, they'll probably screw it up again and for the same reasons we did in 1913... no foresight and greed. Maybe there's a small chance they won't screw it up. Whatever the case, the future will be interesting.
Jeremy Falcon
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