I did not know we were supposed to be fighting to the death about this hiking boot thing. I still use boots but I sort of imagine whatever little tourist thing Jesse is doing could be accomplished in running shoes.
The kayakers in my brother’s group were hauling their boats down a course scree slope to the put in on the upper Tuolumne when a rock slipped and brought down some others behind it. Would have been fine except a larger rock rolled onto one guy’s foot, cutting right through the upper of his (decidedly light weight) shoe and tearing his big toe clean off. SAR had to be summoned to extract him. The point is, Jesse will undoubtedly suffer the very same fate if he continues to listen to Katie. This is why we fight.
I think like a lot of things it's basically just preference. We've all got different bodies. I hated hiking boots as they always chafed my ankles but my husband loves his
I have done hundreds of miles in my Eco hiking sandals, including the Massif mountain range in France, along with the Pyrenees. Traditionally, the Camino was done barefoot by many as a penance. St. Jacques did it in sandals with a gourd for water.
I don’t like hiking in anything else because I get hot feet, unfortunately I’m stuck in boots during the winter. I’ve only lived in the UK and the PNW so I don’t have to worry about bugs or snakes anyways.
I have done a shameful amount of hiking in flip flops. I always get raised eyebrows from other hikers when I do but if the path gets really bad I just go barefoot.
I've done enough barefoot hiking to know that it's possible, but also that it involves moving very slowly, constantly staring at the ground, and frequently stubbing my toe or stepping on a rock or tree root right in the soft center of my foot where it really hurts..
I'll still walk around barefoot when I'm camping, or if I'm in a canoe or kayak and pulling up on shore or on an island, for example. But for actual hikes of any significant distance, most of the time going barefoot doesn't work well.
Hiking in sandals is fine (though not ideal for reasons I described in my other comment), especially on moderate terrain, as long as they have a heel strap.
But flip-flops are a pretty bad idea unless the ground is perfectly flat and smooth.
Hiking in sandals is fine if it's mostly flat terrain, especially when it's just a few miles, but with rough / steep terrain or long distances, eventually the straps cut into your feet.
Hiking trails tend to involve going up and down mountains, and sandals really aren't great for that..
Plus small pebbles and other debris frequently get under your feet, which gets really annoying to constantly be removing.
And while most of your foot statys cool in sandals, having the bottom of your sweaty feet pressed directly against rubber for extended periods isn't the most comfortable in my opinion..
I just can't imagine NOT wearing boots on my last hike. Infrequent but significant snow, scree, boulders, etc. If you don't have something with a significant shank you're toast. Training hikes, yeah get me my trail runners.
... But Jesse was probably just walking on a well groomed trail, right?
Lightweight boots are a totally respectable choice. Katie’s expert said something about adding 2-3lbs per step, which is wild. I compared the weight of my boots to some comparably priced running shoes, and the weight difference is 1lb per pair.
I posit that the 1/2lb per step will sound a lot lighter when you’re 8 miles from your vehicle with a rolled ankle.
Katie's mistake was repeatedly saying that people hike in "running shoes" and not "trail runners".
I suppose you could make a pedantic argument that trail runners are a type of running shoe, but they're very different, and not interchangeable for hiking (you could go road running in a trail runner, but it would be a bad idea to go hiking or trail running in a regular running shoe).
The biggest difference is that trail runners have a more aggressive and grippy sole, that provides traction in a variety of steep and rough terrain including loose soil / mud, rocks, etc.
And Katie is absolutely correct that most experienced hikers will recommend trail runners instead of hiking boots for most warm weather hiking, even for novice hikers, unless the individual has weak ankles or knows they are susceptible to easily rolling their ankles and needs the support.
Part of it is the weight as Katie says, but it's also about the flexibility and agility, plus they tend to be more breathable / well ventilated (especially if you get them WITHOUT Gore-tex, as you should), all of which makes them more comfortable and less tiring than boots.
I don’t see how the “it’s so expensive and inhumane to mass deport people” argument is sustainable at this point. I was saddened by the failure of the group of 8 compromise, marched against the Trump I policies & had high hopes for compromise under Biden.
At BEST, Biden’s approach to the border was negligent. It is just a fact that millions of people crossed the border with no defensible legal argument to remain long term and the Biden admin had no plan to ever revisit their status. Moreover, the feds and states spend billions supporting the new arrivals in unsustainable ways (hotels?!? Really?) in a way that fatally undermines the argument of immigration as an economic engine to voters.
Now we’ve lost two elections, one decisively, primarily on the issue of immigration. We let in millions of people with no oversight and it’s hard for me to complain when the majority says we have to send them back, even though it’s expensive.
I think Democrats have lost this issue for a generation and trotting out a bleeding heart fed ‘whistleblower’ or saying “no person is illegal” or whatever other Trump I playbook plan we have on the shelf isn’t going to work. The electorate wants to allocate money tax dollars to immigration enforcement, it’s going to harm our priorities, and we need to focus on how to convince the electorate that a sustainable immigration process is possible without these expensive & draconian measures. From 2020-2024 we failed at this.
I always default to this thought: If me, Jeriatric Jerry, nice old dude snuck across the border into Vietnam (or name your country) and set up a nice street-side booth selling hot dogs (just a nice helpful member of the community)--and the Vietnamese police found out I had no papers and wasn't there legally.... would I be surprised when they put me on a plane back home?
Nope. And I wouldn't complain. It would suck--for sure--but the police would be doing the Right Thing.
Most of these immigrants-here-illegally are nice people just trying to do the best for themselves--but if that was the standard then there'd be a whole bunch of things I could point to that *don't* make that a good standard beyond any one individual doing that.
The Biden's effectively open borders was a mistake, and this is what it looks like when you have to go clean up a mistake. Sorry... not sorry. We didn't ask for this situation, and I'm frankly pissed that we have to pay for the cleanup.
I think Katie doesn’t get crap from the cops for the same reason I don’t. We’re just non-threatening white ladies who don’t look like we can harm a fly as opposed to like apparently 6 foot five giant Jesse. I think the biggest threat that cops worry about me is that I’ll start crying. I won’t say that I haven’t.
When I was a child a cop helped me jump the fence and boosted me up to a window to break into my own house bc I was a latchkey kid and I was locked out of my house and I found him and asked him for help. I was about 13.
After the episode, I asked The Poet what her ratio of positive to negative experiences with law enforcement was. She rattled off a couple of examples where police officers were so nice to her, despite her and her friends breaking the law. She couldn't think of a negative experience. I can think of one or two positive experiences, but most of mine have been overwhelmingly negative (four specific cases come to mind), with a couple examples of active dishonesty and questionable legality. It was fascinating to hear Katie scoff at Jesse's willingness to believe that some people attracted to positions of authority do so out of dickishness. That doesn't mean they are all out there murdering unarmed Black people, but plenty of us have enough experience with unpleasant police to be mildly skeptical of their good intensions.
I've had bad interactions with the police. Too many really.
However, my older more temperate self has to admit I was being a total asshole in almost every case. And quite literally guilty of something in most of them. In fact, I'm somewhat surprised at the times I was treated quite civil and respectful by police DESPITE being a complete asshole and almost certainly guilty of something.
That doesn't excuse their behavior. It's certainly valid that police _should_ behave professionally regardless of who they're dealing with since they often interact with people being their worst selves. But context matters.
I'm also pretty sure my 1990's self would have insisted it was totally not my fault and entirely due to their fascist mumble mumble something fuck the police.
I don’t prostrate myself. I usually apologize and admit that they’re right. I did make a mistake and then I look kind of upset and usually they just fine with that. My feelings are sincere; usually if it’s like a speeding ticket or something, I’m just embarrassed by that.
My checkpoint was in the middle of nowhere when I was hunting down near the border, and I was the only one at the checkpoint. The border agent leaned out of his office, took one look at me in head-to-toe camouflage in a muddy Jeep, and just waved me through without even approaching me.
If economic migrants are such sympathetic figures once they arrive in the United States (and therefore should not be liable to deportation), then how is it just to deny similar uplift to all the denizens of poverty-racked countries? This is akin to sacralizing the moment of birth in abortion debate. All except pro-abortion fanatics would agree that, if it is morally wrong to kill a baby the moment after birth, it is probably wrong to do so the moment before birth. If that is the case, how can one argue that it is right to keep immigrants beyond our borders, unless they manage to illegally enter the country, at which time they should be not be liable to deportation, unless the commit some crime (which caveat is itself ambiguous, since it then invites debate about whether any given offense is serious enough to merit deportation, which is viewed as a tremendous harm). Is that not gaining immunity to punishment by committing the offense that that punishment is meant to deter?
There would be more honesty in this debate if people who express the aforementioned view (i.e. that otherwise law-abiding illegal immigrants should not be subject to deportation) would simply admit that they are in favor of open borders (much like the Koch brothers and the Wall Street Journal's editorial page). It is nonsensical to maintain that the millions of illegal immigrants who currently reside in the United States at worst inflict no harm on the country, or at best contribute positive good (because they supposedly do jobs that Americans refuse to, at least at the wages offered to illegal immigrants), without at the same time believing that millions more such illegal immigrants would similarly benefit (or, at the very least, not injure) American citizens. If that is the case, why should there be any enforcement of borders? Simply put, if our current illegal immigrants are a net positive, why should we not open the floodgates again, just like during the Biden administration?
I suspect that Katie and Jessie would argue that they favor greater border security without deportations, but once again, why should we sacralize a successful crime? If we owe it to those who illegally violate immigration laws not to deport them, why should we deny that gift to anyone who simply wishes to immigrate, but opts not to because it is illegal, that is to say, to those who do not actually break the law? Such a position is reminiscent of the stance that burglars should not be prosecuted for invading one's home unless they are caught in the act. One might object that burglary is an obviously harmful crime, whereas illegal immigration benefits the country, but that latter point is the very bone of contention. Proponents of deportation argue that illegal immigrants harm the country as a whole, whereas those who object to deportation believe that they contribute positively to it. Immunizing illegal immigrants (i.e. effectively granting them amnesty) is a strong incentive to immigrate illegally, which makes a mockery of immigration laws. Thus, enforcement of immigration laws requires a two-pronged approach: border security and deportations.
If you find the deportation of illegal immigrants to be objectionable, I ask that you either:
1) admit that you secretly want open borders, or if you reject such a characterization
2) specify the point at which illegal immigration would cease to be a boon to the country as a whole and start to be a burden, and then specify how you would see to it that immigration law be effectively enforced to ensure that that point never be reached.
Many easy responses to some of these facile points, in brief:
1. Why is it ok once they've entered the country -
That's an edge-case borderline strawman, the actual argument is that once someone's been living here for years and made a life here it's better to give a path to legal status. Deportation at *time of entry* is widely supported and does not appear to be the limit of what you're arguing for. Ditto for deportation of criminals. You're also calling economic migrants sympathetic figures which conveniently glosses over what you think should be done with them if they *are* sympathetic -- one can deport sympathetic figures or one can have different policies for border enforcement and "time-of-entry deportation" vs. deportation of those already in the country for years. I'd put it to you why deporting the head of a household who's committed no other crimes and lived and worked in the US for years isn't harmful to the societal fabric -- you are aware of statutes of limitations in criminal contexts -- why exactly wouldn't you want to see one in this context?
2. What is the proper number of economic migrants -
This is an instance of Sorites paradox or the "paradox of the heap": if a certain number of migrants is deemed beneficial, why not a larger or smaller number. That argument holds all the way down to arguing for zero immigrants at all, and to flip your framing back on you, if some immigrants are a net harm to society then why admit any ever? The resolution is that there must be a predictable level of enforcement over long periods of time such that an equilibrium rate of immigration and migrants is maintained: balancing pressures of border enforcement and external pressures to attempt immigrating to the US. If no predictable system exists or arbitrary enforcement changes occur, chaos ensues
3. Why should we "sacralize" a successful crime -
Yes this is a moral quandary in many contexts, one wouldn't permit a "successful" burglary. But there is broad recognition that criminal statues of limitations -- i.e. periods after which enforcement may cause more harm than good and pervert the justice ostensibly sought -- apply. If someone successfully illegally immigrated 13 years ago and since then built a life and family here and committed no other crimes, you must acknowledge there is a rational basis for adding effective enforcement limitations for cruelty prevention and strengthening the broader justice system. Even if it means this person is not deported!
These are good points, and I appreciate your thoughtful engagement with me on this vexing issue.
Your proposals are reasonable ones, but the devil is in the details (with which point I suspect you would agree), which to some extent render your own points facile in the same way that you fault mine for being.
If illegal immigration is to be treated as a crime subject to the statute of limitations, what should that figure be? Clearly that needs to be decided via legislation. Let's say Congress sets the period at five years. Does that strike you as reasonable? If so, what will happen when a married, law-abiding, productive member of society is deported after, say, four years and ten months? Would you view such a deportation as unjust, or is my example an unreasonable edge case? I fear that even a very short statute of limitations would not fundamentally alter the opinion expressed by Katie and Jesse, that it is wrong to deport anyone who has not committed an additional offense. As I speculated in an earlier post, even the prospect of deporting someone for committing a crime would prompt objections based on the type and circumstances of the crime, which would prompt even more edge-cases.
I suspect that your response might be along the lines of, "Let's have the individual cases be decided judicially with due regard for equity (in the British legal sense of the term) as they arise," and perhaps that is the best answer, but if deportation is permitted at all, there will always be some who argue that it is either always objectionable (if not down-right immoral), or objectionable in certain instances.
I hoped that I had conveyed a tremendous amount of sympathy for the plight of someone in such an edge case, but is such a figure more worthy of sympathy than a married, law-abiding, productive member of society who opted to remain in poverty abroad rather than illegally enter the United States? For every one person who illegally immigrates and makes a better life for himself here, there are many who wish to do the same, but are stymied either by respect for the law or cold calculation of the probability of success. I am sympathetic to all such people as well, but whatever the optimal amount of immigration may be (and I do not claim to know for sure, though I do object to the illegal variety), it is surely less than the number of people who wish to find a better life here.
I suppose the larger point is whether it is preferable that injustices fall upon individuals (such as the theoretical edge cases mooted above) or upon society as a whole (if one assumes that society is harmed by illegal immigration). A system organized to prevent the deportation of upright immigrants above all other considerations is one that simultaneously cannot help but encourage illegal immigration. A system designed to prevent and punish all illegal immigration is one that will produce stories that tug at the heart-strings.
> t is nonsensical to maintain that the millions of illegal immigrants who currently reside in the United States at worst inflict no harm on the country, or at best contribute positive good (because they supposedly do jobs that Americans refuse to, at least at the wages offered to illegal immigrants), without at the same time believing that millions more such illegal immigrants would similarly benefit (or, at the very least, not injure) American citizens.
It is nonsensical to maintain that the eight cups of water you drink per day are harmless or even beneficial, without at the same time believing that if you drank eighty gallons of water it would similarly benefit your health.
It’s also striking to see how the “taking our jobs” argument has persisted straight through this decade of full employment. It will never be possible to explain the lump of labor fallacy to some people.
* Supply and demand -> More laborers lowers wages. So, the effects on citizens can be harmful even if they can still get a job.
* Many opt into/out of the work force depending on the wage available (employment is just the fraction of people actively seeking a job who have a job). We have steadily slumped in labor participation since 2000 (from 67% to 61%).
But a better counterpoint is: Duh! Of course adding more low-wage laborers means worse conditions for all low-wage laborers. Just think for two seconds, please.
wages rose consistently throughout the supposed "invasion" years (and so did inflation, go figure). labor force participation also rose, so your two points are basically non-sequitors.
Your frustration with opposing viewpoints should not lead you down the path of ad hominem arguments. The "lump of labor fallacy" is easy to comprehend: in a dynamic economy jobs are not finite, and additional people (whether from natural increase in the population or immigration) do not simply consume a finite number of jobs, but also create demand for good and services, which demand fuels the creation of other jobs. This is hardly a recherche idea, and is certainly not beyond my ken.
The difficulty is that a facile embrace of that idea leads to the conclusion that I described earlier: if some immigration is good, then more immigration must always be better, and if such is the case, it is unreasonable to oppose any immigration. This is exactly the flawed view that you analogized with consumption of water.
The lump of labor fallacy is valid in the same way that the statement "water is good for you" is true, but not the whole truth. The lump of labor fallacy allows for the possibility that immigration is beneficial, but does not by itself disprove the possibility that immigration might be a net negative, nor does it make obvious what the ideal amount of immigration would be.
It is, in fact, the lump of labor fallacy that shows the weakness of the water analogy. Work is not finite, but the capacity of the human stomach very much is.
In the same way that one could easily fall into the trap of imagining that all immigration skeptics are flyover rubes mindlessly intoning "They're taking our jobs!" from mouths full of meth and void of teeth, one could caricature those who trot out the lump of labor fallacy in response to any criticism of immigration as effete members of the professional-managerial class who are confident that immigrants will always supply them with affordable nannies, cleaning ladies, and chic restaurants, but never compete with them for the same jobs (the jobs that AI may soon be coming for). If the former argue that immigration is always bad, the latter seem to imply that it is always good.
To return to my original point (which was never actually addressed) using your analogy, even if those who advocate drinking more water would avoid the reductio ad absurdum of concluding that more water must always be better, they rarely state how much is too much, thus creating the impression that more is always better.
Jesse and Katie agree that it is morally suspect to deport law-abiding illegal immigrants. This common view rests on two assumptions:
1) a moralistic argument that it is wrong to punish those who are simply trying to earn a living and find a better life for themselves and their families
2) an economic argument that immigration materially benefits not just the immigrants, but the United States as a whole
I doubt that many people (except perhaps effective altruists) would view the first point as dispositive by itself without the second point.
Clearly the economic impacts of immigration are complex and remain debated. What seems beyond dispute is that there are winners and losers, and those who reap the rewards seem to rarely compensate those who bear the burdens.
Full-throated advocates of open borders are not common (though vocal, e.g. Bryan Caplan), but the supporters of immigration who ostensibly eschew that goal rarely address the question of how much is too much, or even recognize the legitimacy of such a question, and thus they imply that more is always merrier.
I still maintain that if it is morally wrong to deport an illegal immigrant solely for having violated immigration law, it is wrong to deny entrance to the United States to anyone who wishes to immigrate (with provision to exclude criminals, etc., etc., obviously). Supporters of deportation and advocates of open borders are at least morally consistent. If the thought of expelling hard-working and law-abiding immigrants and thereby potentially breaking up families is a distasteful one (as it surely is), the image of the grinding poverty and violence that drives immigration from the Third World should be an equally compelling one. But why should we privilege the former over the latter, when the most meaningful difference is that the latter have violated American law? If ordo amoris causes us to favor those who are closer to us over those farther away (i.e. illegal immigrants, who have some established connection to this country, over those who wish to immigrate), then securing our borders is all the more imperative, since acknowledging a special status for already existing illegal immigrants serves an impetus for more.
It is not immigration per se that is good or bad, but the amount and type. I expect that Jesse would respond to the question "Is immigration good?" with the answer "It's complicated." Others would point out the lump of labor fallacy and retort, "Ackchtyually, it's not complicated."
> Your frustration with opposing viewpoints should not lead you down the path of ad hominem arguments.
I made no ad hominem arguments.
> Others would point out the lump of labor fallacy and retort, "Ackchtyually, it's not complicated."
You'll note that I didn't say that at all, which is why it's so important to you to to have written twelve aimless, rambling paragraphs as if I did. There are lots of reasons immigration can be good or bad or complicated. I am pointing out that if record immigration and record employment are coexisting, then taking-our-jobs is clearly not contributing on the "bad" side of the ledger.
"It will never be possible to explain the lump of labor fallacy to some people."
If by that comment you were not implying that I, like unnamed others, lack the cognitive ability to understand the lump of labor fallacy, then I have not idea what point you were making. In light of the fact that you really did not grapple meaningfully with any of my points, I would characterize your comment as an ad hominem argument in the absence of any real other.
What, exactly, do I not understand about the lump of labor fallacy? Are you claiming that the fallacy proves that immigration is always good? I already acknowledged that the fallacy shows that immigration is not always bad, but there is a wide gap between not always bad and always good. What, in your opinion, does the fallacy reveal about immigration?
You are making assumptions about my "ideology" and my level of commitment to it. I still regard that as an ad hominem argument.
Almost every woman in the southeast is wearing long dresses now, especially for maternal/pregnancy related things. That is just the current style down here.
While trying to open that Instagram link, this awesome clip is the first thing that came up for me - totally unrelated, yet absolutely on brand for BARPod:
I haven't finished this yet but two early laughs for me:
1) Palmer as NimbleRichMan claiming he told Trump to run in the previous election. Presumably this was around 2010/2011, before he'd made any money (and thus before he was anyone Trump would consider paying attention to!)
2) Jesse's gleeful cackle when he found out one of the regular misinformation writers wrote the incorrect Guardian article
For the record, I’ve been pointing out that Hitler was a vegetarian as a way to make fun of vegetarians, not as a way to say that bad people are capable of having good aspects about them.
As an avid hiker, I can confirm that hiking is the worst hobby. I spend a substantial amount of time on my hikes counting down the miles until I'm done (interspersed with taking pictures of mushrooms and creeks and other forest stuff), and then as soon as I'm home, I'm back on AllTrails planning my next hike like a sicko.
My hiking boots weigh the same as sneakers and are more comfortable than my other sneakers. I think maybe Katie is thinking of Vietnam era combat boots.
There was 100% a proper and correct way for The Daily Beast to report on the Palmer Lucky story that didn’t involve completely abandoning journalistic ethics. I’m certain some more digging (including working backwards from the information they already had) would have yielded an interesting piece about PACs, r/thedonald, and the billboard at the very least (which…I don’t get at all? Can someone explain why Hill’s head looks like that?).
But people like Ben Collins and Gideon Resnick didn’t and don’t give a shit about journalistic ethics. Ultimately, it’s just about the clicks and being on the right side of history for them. Every story they write is just another opportunity to signal to their friends and social media followers that they are the good guys and the people over there are the bad guys. Truth and knowledge don’t even rank in their reasons for being journalists.
For this one story, the consequence was a (very very rich) man’s reputation was tarnished. Some people may shrug their shoulders at that, and fair enough. But, over time, this approach to reporting leads to a breakdown of public trust in the media, as more and more people realize that journalists cannot even be trusted to uphold basic agreements or truths in their own work. I’m not trying to be hyperbolic here, but shit like this seriously contributes to institutional mistrust overall.
It just burns me that someone like Collins specifically has had so much success in an industry whose credibility he’s helped destroy.
“Lucky Palms” sounds like a nickname for a prolific masturbator. Katie asks Jesse what he was doing when he was 21 . . . I think we know. What did you think he was doing with all that leftover pizza grease?
If hiking 4+ miles, with rock scrambles, you need a thick sole hiking boot or you'll beat the crap out of you feet. It will take exactly one hike of this type in sneakers and you'll be purchasing hiking boots the next day. I'm on Jesse's side.
Finding one FBI employee does not an objective survey make. But then this show is entertainment not journalism -- and I mean that as a compliment.
Palmer Lucky didn't invent jack shit...he didn't contribute to VR technology...he contributed **HYPE** He's a good salesman and huckster, and he is smart and understands tech, but it was silicon valley hype not a legit engineer inventing something in a garage.
He was a DIY hobbyist who was great at self promotion in online communities.
His Occulus "prototypes" were just old cell phone screens and off-the-shelf code; he first made a name for himself in DIY community forums with several others making the same DIY headsets.
There's definitely some similarities to Elon, in that their success comes from hucksterism and hype.
His Kickstarter is what got him mainstream attention, and it was funded by DIY hobbyists (dorks) who also fueled the hype for Soylent, Tesla, NFTs, etc. From there, he did a great job not screwing up and getting investors, which led to his Facebook acquisition.
Palmer Lucky's payout wasn't insignificant, but he was mostly just a figurehead pitchman once he got institutional investment...he really was a kid DIY'ing with old cell phone screens that parlayed that into real wealth.
I know this seems like I am splitting hairs, but it's important to know what actually happened and not repeat the myth.
How are your NFTs doing these days dork? He didn't make anything new at all, he just used off the shelf components to diy something that was already in existence, Google Cardboard was the same thing...he's a hype man not an inventor or tech genius innovator
NFTs were extremely dumb and I thought that about them from the start.
There's a lot more to making a functioning product than just "screens". Getting a first prototype would already take heavy engineering chops (DIY, as you say). From there, there will be many new technical problems to solve in the process of streamlining the design and API, debugging things, and (a really important part) making the product cheaper.
I think maybe you could be right if you use a very narrow definition of "inventor". It certainly wasn't an "invention" on par with, say, the discovery of nuclear energy or penicillin. But invention can also be tinkering with existing tech, recombining multiple technologies in new ways, and then optimizing their performance. I would call whoever optimizes Porsche's combustion engine designs an inventor, even though they didn't invent the combustion engine. It also includes taking ownership of an idea and seeing it developed all the way to a fully-realized product that didn't exist before (that's the "invention").
"There's a lot more to making a functioning product than just "screens". Getting a ....streamlining the design and API, debugging things...making the product cheaper."
UNDERSTAND THIS: Palmer Lucky didn't do that!
Repeat: Palmer Lucky didn't contribute significantly to any technical aspect of VR.
Once he got funding he helped pick the people who did what you describe above, at most.
He could code well enough to get stuff he downloaded working...mainly back in the early days, he was online a lot, made helpful comments to noobs, and had the money and time to actually build the stuff he downloaded plans and codebase for that OTHERS MADE.
No shit Occulus took a lot of work, but Palmer Lucky didn't contribute significantly to the technical challenges.
I have absolutely zero patience for the "woe is me" routine from the (possible? probable?) FBI agent here. "Hey look, I hate this as much as the rest of you but I'm just doing my job" ok well then fuck you twice: first for doing it, second for being such a coward about it. This isn't the military; there's no reason that you have to keep being a FBI agent. And yes, I am saying that if you can leave your job without violating some other law you absolutely should if your job requires you to do things you think are bad. That's not a huge burden!
Look at it like this. Throughout almost all of human history, you straight up did not have a choice whether to do some job or another. Yeah, you always had a tiny number of people who were lucky enough to choose some business or another but for the vast majority of us the vast majority of the time, if the government said you were going to war, then it was either do what they say or you die, and maybe your family too. If you were born a peasant and didn't luck into something better somehow, that's how you died. That's not just ancient history, that's a lot of the world still today; if Putin's people come and tell you "you're fighting in Ukraine," then you're either fighting in Ukraine or going to a Russian prison. And now here we are, in the freest, most prosperous society you'll ever find, and you... just keep doing something you think is wrong?
You didn't become a FBI agent to round up people picking tomatoes, and you don't like that now you're no longer working on arresting child pornographers, terrorists, and gangsters? Ok, then you quit. That's the remedy here. Yes, it is scary to quit your job. Yes, it is inconvenient. It is also nearly the lowest cost anyone has ever had to pay for having principles that are more than just words. I see this as no different than people who couldn't bring themselves to speak out about woke nonsense when it was at its peak, except in that there were actual threats to people not just that they'd lose their jobs during that insanity but that they'd be unemployable afterwards. Does anyone think that's the case here? If a guy quits the FBI because he's no longer doing what he signed up to do, do you really think he can't get a job in a state police agency, at a prosecutor's office, as a defense investigator, etc.? People used to risk firing squads for choices like that; now, you risk temporary uncertainty about your career. Either do the job or don't; you don't get the moral points for doing it and being sad about it.
So any doctor that disagrees with euthanasia, abortion, or circumcision should quit being a doctor. Any teacher that doesn’t agree with standardized testing should quit. All lawyers should quit if they disagree with the law or are a public defender and have to defend a Klansman, murder, pedophile.
Or should they remain in their professions and do good? Do the best they can?
You clearly have strong feeling about this.. but your argument is 100% emotional and non persuasive.
A doctor can refuse to perform euthanasias, abortions, and circumcisions. A lawyer can refuse a client. And yes, if a teacher has a genuine moral problem with standardized testing, he should not be a teacher if being a teacher requires him to give standardized tests. That's a strange position, but if you genuinely hold it then yeah your morals should drive your actions. When you have the ability to live by your morals, you have the duty to live by your morals. Emotion does cause me to feel contempt in these cases rather than simply reach a conclusion, but the conclusion isn't driven by emotion. The logical form of the argument requires no emotion:
If A and B, then C. In this case, A is "it is bad to round up peaceful people and deport them." B is "I have the ability to not round up peaceful people and deport them without breaking the law." C is "I am behaving badly."
But also, we're having a discussion about morality; you can behave like a moral philosopher and take a dispassionate approach, but that's not how most people approach the subject. Violations of moral rules cause emotional responses, that's always been the case in proportion to the seriousness of the violation and the rule itself.
Think about it like this: we give heightened moral status to people who behaved according to their stated morals if behaving in that way entailed serious risks, and we do not find their stated morals themselves objectionable. This is the logic behind martyrdom in the Christian tradition: a person who refused to renounce his faith under threat of torture and death is accorded special status in relation to those who did not suffer the same threat or who acceded to the threat. This is also the logic behind timeless examples: a soldier who rushes towards an enemy position to save his fellow soldiers is more heroic than a soldier who does not take the same risk. The corollary to the rule "when the risk is high, living in accordance with your morals is rewarded" is "when the risk is low, failing to live in accordance with your morals is condemned." It's not hypocrisy exactly; to be a hypocrite is to pretend to have values you don't in fact have. It's simple cowardice. "I know this is wrong but I'm doing it anyway because I'm afraid." To return to your earlier example about lawyers: a person who finds it immoral to represent a Klansman should not be a public defender. He can still be a lawyer. He can open his own practice, and refuse whatever client he wants; he can work for a firm that he knows will not accept such a client; he can go do document review or work for a general counsel office in some other business. In all of human history, it has never been easier to live according to your morals. The ease of the action should inform our response when the action is not taken.
So we switched to you defining what is moral. Not everyone agrees on morality. And just because someone doesn’t agree with something doesn’t mean they should quit.
I was in the military and went to Iraq and Afghanistan.. did I agree with why we went there? No. Should I have gone AWOL then? Should I have deserted? I did treat the people of Iraq and Afghanistan with dignity and respect.
There are tons of laws I don’t agree with. Doesn’t mean I am going to break them.
He's not attempting to define morality? He's saying if a job violates your principles you should quit because it's never been easier to do so. And yes you might have deserted if you felt strongly enough, clearly you didn't, which is fine! People do things like this all the time.
And as you'll note from what I've already said, being in the military is different. You would be breaking the law if you went AWOL. As I already said, that's a different level of risk; furthermore, if you consider following the law to be moral, then following the law even when you disagree with it is living in accordance with your morals. I'm glad you did not violate your morals by mistreating the people of Iraq and Afghanistan, but that has nothing to do with anything we're talking about. In this case, we're talking about a person who could leave his job without violating the law but refuses to do so even though remaining in the job causes him to do things he thinks is wrong.
I'm defining what I believe is cowardly, which is an aspect of morality; as an extension of that, I am expressing contempt for those who behave in a cowardly manner. Yes, not everyone agrees. I certainly don't agree that there's anything immoral with standardized testing, but I already said that someone who thinks there is should not be giving standardized tests. I'm not interested in telling people what their morals should be in most cases; I am interested in this phenomenon where we see someone failing to live up to their own morals and then decline to point out that this is cowardice
He's been doing it for twenty years and is kind of invested in it. I understand, I still entertain the idea that the 2028 election won't result in a much worse version of "Stop the Steal" because I'm invested in being an American. Hardly seems likely though...
You're projecting your own judgement onto the speaker. You think this is a mortal sin. I'd wager he thinks it's an inefficient waste of time and resources (both human and monetary).
Why would someone blow away their whole career because they think they're being used inefficiently when all they have to do is wait it out a few years or less?
I absolutely live for the petty sibling-like bickering between K&J, it makes the show. Please don't ever change ❤
I did not know we were supposed to be fighting to the death about this hiking boot thing. I still use boots but I sort of imagine whatever little tourist thing Jesse is doing could be accomplished in running shoes.
The kayakers in my brother’s group were hauling their boats down a course scree slope to the put in on the upper Tuolumne when a rock slipped and brought down some others behind it. Would have been fine except a larger rock rolled onto one guy’s foot, cutting right through the upper of his (decidedly light weight) shoe and tearing his big toe clean off. SAR had to be summoned to extract him. The point is, Jesse will undoubtedly suffer the very same fate if he continues to listen to Katie. This is why we fight.
I think like a lot of things it's basically just preference. We've all got different bodies. I hated hiking boots as they always chafed my ankles but my husband loves his
I’m a big fan of hiking in sandals.
Marry me!
I have done hundreds of miles in my Eco hiking sandals, including the Massif mountain range in France, along with the Pyrenees. Traditionally, the Camino was done barefoot by many as a penance. St. Jacques did it in sandals with a gourd for water.
Never a rolled ankle, no blisters, no problems.
I don’t like hiking in anything else because I get hot feet, unfortunately I’m stuck in boots during the winter. I’ve only lived in the UK and the PNW so I don’t have to worry about bugs or snakes anyways.
I just hate wearing shoes. I would always be barefoot if I could.
I always hike in my teva hurticanes unless it’s muddy or freezing.
I have done a shameful amount of hiking in flip flops. I always get raised eyebrows from other hikers when I do but if the path gets really bad I just go barefoot.
I've done enough barefoot hiking to know that it's possible, but also that it involves moving very slowly, constantly staring at the ground, and frequently stubbing my toe or stepping on a rock or tree root right in the soft center of my foot where it really hurts..
I'll still walk around barefoot when I'm camping, or if I'm in a canoe or kayak and pulling up on shore or on an island, for example. But for actual hikes of any significant distance, most of the time going barefoot doesn't work well.
Hiking in sandals is fine (though not ideal for reasons I described in my other comment), especially on moderate terrain, as long as they have a heel strap.
But flip-flops are a pretty bad idea unless the ground is perfectly flat and smooth.
Hiking in sandals is fine if it's mostly flat terrain, especially when it's just a few miles, but with rough / steep terrain or long distances, eventually the straps cut into your feet.
Hiking trails tend to involve going up and down mountains, and sandals really aren't great for that..
Plus small pebbles and other debris frequently get under your feet, which gets really annoying to constantly be removing.
And while most of your foot statys cool in sandals, having the bottom of your sweaty feet pressed directly against rubber for extended periods isn't the most comfortable in my opinion..
I’m just mad that she made me defend Jesse.
It’s absolutely a horses for courses thing. All Katie’s observations mean is that people wear sneakers on hikes that middle aged lesbians frequent.
I just can't imagine NOT wearing boots on my last hike. Infrequent but significant snow, scree, boulders, etc. If you don't have something with a significant shank you're toast. Training hikes, yeah get me my trail runners.
... But Jesse was probably just walking on a well groomed trail, right?
Lightweight boots are a totally respectable choice. Katie’s expert said something about adding 2-3lbs per step, which is wild. I compared the weight of my boots to some comparably priced running shoes, and the weight difference is 1lb per pair.
I posit that the 1/2lb per step will sound a lot lighter when you’re 8 miles from your vehicle with a rolled ankle.
I stopped wearing boots on hikes , GTX running shoes , if I am somewhere deep bush , I am wearing snake boots
I do most of my hiking while I’m hunting, which is usually in cold weather and unpredictable/uneven terrain.
Sequoia National Park? A "little tourist thing"?
You're not from around here, are you?
I'm going to let this one go.
I'm here to argue on the internet and argue on the internet, and I'm all out of internet.
Come at me.
In that case, you're right. I'm not from California. I am from a state called Washington, which has real mountains.
The highest mountain in the Lower 48 is immediately adjacent to Sequoia National Park.
I can’t believe how polite this community is. I’m going to report you for causing “harm.”
Fuck you!
There we go.
Katie's mistake was repeatedly saying that people hike in "running shoes" and not "trail runners".
I suppose you could make a pedantic argument that trail runners are a type of running shoe, but they're very different, and not interchangeable for hiking (you could go road running in a trail runner, but it would be a bad idea to go hiking or trail running in a regular running shoe).
The biggest difference is that trail runners have a more aggressive and grippy sole, that provides traction in a variety of steep and rough terrain including loose soil / mud, rocks, etc.
And Katie is absolutely correct that most experienced hikers will recommend trail runners instead of hiking boots for most warm weather hiking, even for novice hikers, unless the individual has weak ankles or knows they are susceptible to easily rolling their ankles and needs the support.
Part of it is the weight as Katie says, but it's also about the flexibility and agility, plus they tend to be more breathable / well ventilated (especially if you get them WITHOUT Gore-tex, as you should), all of which makes them more comfortable and less tiring than boots.
I fast-forward through the vapid, petty bickering.
Crying and throwing up at your comment
I slow it down to 10% speed to savor it
Literal violence!
Can understand it not being everyone's cup of tea!
I am so indifferent to their footwear and yet so into this pointless feud.
My fav is when they try to get the other one to read something aloud.
Worst part of every episode, but it wouldn’t be the same without it.
I don’t see how the “it’s so expensive and inhumane to mass deport people” argument is sustainable at this point. I was saddened by the failure of the group of 8 compromise, marched against the Trump I policies & had high hopes for compromise under Biden.
At BEST, Biden’s approach to the border was negligent. It is just a fact that millions of people crossed the border with no defensible legal argument to remain long term and the Biden admin had no plan to ever revisit their status. Moreover, the feds and states spend billions supporting the new arrivals in unsustainable ways (hotels?!? Really?) in a way that fatally undermines the argument of immigration as an economic engine to voters.
Now we’ve lost two elections, one decisively, primarily on the issue of immigration. We let in millions of people with no oversight and it’s hard for me to complain when the majority says we have to send them back, even though it’s expensive.
I think Democrats have lost this issue for a generation and trotting out a bleeding heart fed ‘whistleblower’ or saying “no person is illegal” or whatever other Trump I playbook plan we have on the shelf isn’t going to work. The electorate wants to allocate money tax dollars to immigration enforcement, it’s going to harm our priorities, and we need to focus on how to convince the electorate that a sustainable immigration process is possible without these expensive & draconian measures. From 2020-2024 we failed at this.
I always default to this thought: If me, Jeriatric Jerry, nice old dude snuck across the border into Vietnam (or name your country) and set up a nice street-side booth selling hot dogs (just a nice helpful member of the community)--and the Vietnamese police found out I had no papers and wasn't there legally.... would I be surprised when they put me on a plane back home?
Nope. And I wouldn't complain. It would suck--for sure--but the police would be doing the Right Thing.
Most of these immigrants-here-illegally are nice people just trying to do the best for themselves--but if that was the standard then there'd be a whole bunch of things I could point to that *don't* make that a good standard beyond any one individual doing that.
The Biden's effectively open borders was a mistake, and this is what it looks like when you have to go clean up a mistake. Sorry... not sorry. We didn't ask for this situation, and I'm frankly pissed that we have to pay for the cleanup.
Of all the things we could spend money on, we are spending billions of dollars to deport roofers.
Relevant King of the Hill clip:
https://www.facebook.com/share/r/16mWiWDgh9/
I think Katie doesn’t get crap from the cops for the same reason I don’t. We’re just non-threatening white ladies who don’t look like we can harm a fly as opposed to like apparently 6 foot five giant Jesse. I think the biggest threat that cops worry about me is that I’ll start crying. I won’t say that I haven’t.
When I was a child a cop helped me jump the fence and boosted me up to a window to break into my own house bc I was a latchkey kid and I was locked out of my house and I found him and asked him for help. I was about 13.
Well, demographically speaking the police aren’t wrong to not worry about us.
After the episode, I asked The Poet what her ratio of positive to negative experiences with law enforcement was. She rattled off a couple of examples where police officers were so nice to her, despite her and her friends breaking the law. She couldn't think of a negative experience. I can think of one or two positive experiences, but most of mine have been overwhelmingly negative (four specific cases come to mind), with a couple examples of active dishonesty and questionable legality. It was fascinating to hear Katie scoff at Jesse's willingness to believe that some people attracted to positions of authority do so out of dickishness. That doesn't mean they are all out there murdering unarmed Black people, but plenty of us have enough experience with unpleasant police to be mildly skeptical of their good intensions.
I've had bad interactions with the police. Too many really.
However, my older more temperate self has to admit I was being a total asshole in almost every case. And quite literally guilty of something in most of them. In fact, I'm somewhat surprised at the times I was treated quite civil and respectful by police DESPITE being a complete asshole and almost certainly guilty of something.
That doesn't excuse their behavior. It's certainly valid that police _should_ behave professionally regardless of who they're dealing with since they often interact with people being their worst selves. But context matters.
I'm also pretty sure my 1990's self would have insisted it was totally not my fault and entirely due to their fascist mumble mumble something fuck the police.
When you get pulled over, just prostrate yourself and comply. "Yes, sir." "No, sir." No shitlib tone, no back-talk. Works every time.
I don’t prostrate myself. I usually apologize and admit that they’re right. I did make a mistake and then I look kind of upset and usually they just fine with that. My feelings are sincere; usually if it’s like a speeding ticket or something, I’m just embarrassed by that.
I’ve been racially profiled by border agents.
are u a non threatening white lady?
This is the internet. I could be a cat walking across a keyboard for all you know.
Omg! That is how I have always pictured you!
I have too!
They thought I was a white college kid just hopping the border for easy prescription drugs.
My checkpoint was in the middle of nowhere when I was hunting down near the border, and I was the only one at the checkpoint. The border agent leaned out of his office, took one look at me in head-to-toe camouflage in a muddy Jeep, and just waved me through without even approaching me.
They shook me down, dumped everything out of all my bags, confiscated anything they could come up with an excuse to confiscate.
To be fair, I was a white college student who was only in Mexico for easy prescription drugs and had a backpack full of them.
Yeah I think you got the mule treatment.
Let me make the case in support of deportation:
If economic migrants are such sympathetic figures once they arrive in the United States (and therefore should not be liable to deportation), then how is it just to deny similar uplift to all the denizens of poverty-racked countries? This is akin to sacralizing the moment of birth in abortion debate. All except pro-abortion fanatics would agree that, if it is morally wrong to kill a baby the moment after birth, it is probably wrong to do so the moment before birth. If that is the case, how can one argue that it is right to keep immigrants beyond our borders, unless they manage to illegally enter the country, at which time they should be not be liable to deportation, unless the commit some crime (which caveat is itself ambiguous, since it then invites debate about whether any given offense is serious enough to merit deportation, which is viewed as a tremendous harm). Is that not gaining immunity to punishment by committing the offense that that punishment is meant to deter?
There would be more honesty in this debate if people who express the aforementioned view (i.e. that otherwise law-abiding illegal immigrants should not be subject to deportation) would simply admit that they are in favor of open borders (much like the Koch brothers and the Wall Street Journal's editorial page). It is nonsensical to maintain that the millions of illegal immigrants who currently reside in the United States at worst inflict no harm on the country, or at best contribute positive good (because they supposedly do jobs that Americans refuse to, at least at the wages offered to illegal immigrants), without at the same time believing that millions more such illegal immigrants would similarly benefit (or, at the very least, not injure) American citizens. If that is the case, why should there be any enforcement of borders? Simply put, if our current illegal immigrants are a net positive, why should we not open the floodgates again, just like during the Biden administration?
I suspect that Katie and Jessie would argue that they favor greater border security without deportations, but once again, why should we sacralize a successful crime? If we owe it to those who illegally violate immigration laws not to deport them, why should we deny that gift to anyone who simply wishes to immigrate, but opts not to because it is illegal, that is to say, to those who do not actually break the law? Such a position is reminiscent of the stance that burglars should not be prosecuted for invading one's home unless they are caught in the act. One might object that burglary is an obviously harmful crime, whereas illegal immigration benefits the country, but that latter point is the very bone of contention. Proponents of deportation argue that illegal immigrants harm the country as a whole, whereas those who object to deportation believe that they contribute positively to it. Immunizing illegal immigrants (i.e. effectively granting them amnesty) is a strong incentive to immigrate illegally, which makes a mockery of immigration laws. Thus, enforcement of immigration laws requires a two-pronged approach: border security and deportations.
If you find the deportation of illegal immigrants to be objectionable, I ask that you either:
1) admit that you secretly want open borders, or if you reject such a characterization
2) specify the point at which illegal immigration would cease to be a boon to the country as a whole and start to be a burden, and then specify how you would see to it that immigration law be effectively enforced to ensure that that point never be reached.
Many easy responses to some of these facile points, in brief:
1. Why is it ok once they've entered the country -
That's an edge-case borderline strawman, the actual argument is that once someone's been living here for years and made a life here it's better to give a path to legal status. Deportation at *time of entry* is widely supported and does not appear to be the limit of what you're arguing for. Ditto for deportation of criminals. You're also calling economic migrants sympathetic figures which conveniently glosses over what you think should be done with them if they *are* sympathetic -- one can deport sympathetic figures or one can have different policies for border enforcement and "time-of-entry deportation" vs. deportation of those already in the country for years. I'd put it to you why deporting the head of a household who's committed no other crimes and lived and worked in the US for years isn't harmful to the societal fabric -- you are aware of statutes of limitations in criminal contexts -- why exactly wouldn't you want to see one in this context?
2. What is the proper number of economic migrants -
This is an instance of Sorites paradox or the "paradox of the heap": if a certain number of migrants is deemed beneficial, why not a larger or smaller number. That argument holds all the way down to arguing for zero immigrants at all, and to flip your framing back on you, if some immigrants are a net harm to society then why admit any ever? The resolution is that there must be a predictable level of enforcement over long periods of time such that an equilibrium rate of immigration and migrants is maintained: balancing pressures of border enforcement and external pressures to attempt immigrating to the US. If no predictable system exists or arbitrary enforcement changes occur, chaos ensues
3. Why should we "sacralize" a successful crime -
Yes this is a moral quandary in many contexts, one wouldn't permit a "successful" burglary. But there is broad recognition that criminal statues of limitations -- i.e. periods after which enforcement may cause more harm than good and pervert the justice ostensibly sought -- apply. If someone successfully illegally immigrated 13 years ago and since then built a life and family here and committed no other crimes, you must acknowledge there is a rational basis for adding effective enforcement limitations for cruelty prevention and strengthening the broader justice system. Even if it means this person is not deported!
These are good points, and I appreciate your thoughtful engagement with me on this vexing issue.
Your proposals are reasonable ones, but the devil is in the details (with which point I suspect you would agree), which to some extent render your own points facile in the same way that you fault mine for being.
If illegal immigration is to be treated as a crime subject to the statute of limitations, what should that figure be? Clearly that needs to be decided via legislation. Let's say Congress sets the period at five years. Does that strike you as reasonable? If so, what will happen when a married, law-abiding, productive member of society is deported after, say, four years and ten months? Would you view such a deportation as unjust, or is my example an unreasonable edge case? I fear that even a very short statute of limitations would not fundamentally alter the opinion expressed by Katie and Jesse, that it is wrong to deport anyone who has not committed an additional offense. As I speculated in an earlier post, even the prospect of deporting someone for committing a crime would prompt objections based on the type and circumstances of the crime, which would prompt even more edge-cases.
I suspect that your response might be along the lines of, "Let's have the individual cases be decided judicially with due regard for equity (in the British legal sense of the term) as they arise," and perhaps that is the best answer, but if deportation is permitted at all, there will always be some who argue that it is either always objectionable (if not down-right immoral), or objectionable in certain instances.
I hoped that I had conveyed a tremendous amount of sympathy for the plight of someone in such an edge case, but is such a figure more worthy of sympathy than a married, law-abiding, productive member of society who opted to remain in poverty abroad rather than illegally enter the United States? For every one person who illegally immigrates and makes a better life for himself here, there are many who wish to do the same, but are stymied either by respect for the law or cold calculation of the probability of success. I am sympathetic to all such people as well, but whatever the optimal amount of immigration may be (and I do not claim to know for sure, though I do object to the illegal variety), it is surely less than the number of people who wish to find a better life here.
I suppose the larger point is whether it is preferable that injustices fall upon individuals (such as the theoretical edge cases mooted above) or upon society as a whole (if one assumes that society is harmed by illegal immigration). A system organized to prevent the deportation of upright immigrants above all other considerations is one that simultaneously cannot help but encourage illegal immigration. A system designed to prevent and punish all illegal immigration is one that will produce stories that tug at the heart-strings.
> t is nonsensical to maintain that the millions of illegal immigrants who currently reside in the United States at worst inflict no harm on the country, or at best contribute positive good (because they supposedly do jobs that Americans refuse to, at least at the wages offered to illegal immigrants), without at the same time believing that millions more such illegal immigrants would similarly benefit (or, at the very least, not injure) American citizens.
It is nonsensical to maintain that the eight cups of water you drink per day are harmless or even beneficial, without at the same time believing that if you drank eighty gallons of water it would similarly benefit your health.
It’s also striking to see how the “taking our jobs” argument has persisted straight through this decade of full employment. It will never be possible to explain the lump of labor fallacy to some people.
Two counters to your point 2:
* Supply and demand -> More laborers lowers wages. So, the effects on citizens can be harmful even if they can still get a job.
* Many opt into/out of the work force depending on the wage available (employment is just the fraction of people actively seeking a job who have a job). We have steadily slumped in labor participation since 2000 (from 67% to 61%).
But a better counterpoint is: Duh! Of course adding more low-wage laborers means worse conditions for all low-wage laborers. Just think for two seconds, please.
wages rose consistently throughout the supposed "invasion" years (and so did inflation, go figure). labor force participation also rose, so your two points are basically non-sequitors.
But someone might object (indeed, has already objected) to these cogent points: "What about the lump of labor fallacy?!"
Your frustration with opposing viewpoints should not lead you down the path of ad hominem arguments. The "lump of labor fallacy" is easy to comprehend: in a dynamic economy jobs are not finite, and additional people (whether from natural increase in the population or immigration) do not simply consume a finite number of jobs, but also create demand for good and services, which demand fuels the creation of other jobs. This is hardly a recherche idea, and is certainly not beyond my ken.
The difficulty is that a facile embrace of that idea leads to the conclusion that I described earlier: if some immigration is good, then more immigration must always be better, and if such is the case, it is unreasonable to oppose any immigration. This is exactly the flawed view that you analogized with consumption of water.
The lump of labor fallacy is valid in the same way that the statement "water is good for you" is true, but not the whole truth. The lump of labor fallacy allows for the possibility that immigration is beneficial, but does not by itself disprove the possibility that immigration might be a net negative, nor does it make obvious what the ideal amount of immigration would be.
It is, in fact, the lump of labor fallacy that shows the weakness of the water analogy. Work is not finite, but the capacity of the human stomach very much is.
In the same way that one could easily fall into the trap of imagining that all immigration skeptics are flyover rubes mindlessly intoning "They're taking our jobs!" from mouths full of meth and void of teeth, one could caricature those who trot out the lump of labor fallacy in response to any criticism of immigration as effete members of the professional-managerial class who are confident that immigrants will always supply them with affordable nannies, cleaning ladies, and chic restaurants, but never compete with them for the same jobs (the jobs that AI may soon be coming for). If the former argue that immigration is always bad, the latter seem to imply that it is always good.
To return to my original point (which was never actually addressed) using your analogy, even if those who advocate drinking more water would avoid the reductio ad absurdum of concluding that more water must always be better, they rarely state how much is too much, thus creating the impression that more is always better.
Jesse and Katie agree that it is morally suspect to deport law-abiding illegal immigrants. This common view rests on two assumptions:
1) a moralistic argument that it is wrong to punish those who are simply trying to earn a living and find a better life for themselves and their families
2) an economic argument that immigration materially benefits not just the immigrants, but the United States as a whole
I doubt that many people (except perhaps effective altruists) would view the first point as dispositive by itself without the second point.
Clearly the economic impacts of immigration are complex and remain debated. What seems beyond dispute is that there are winners and losers, and those who reap the rewards seem to rarely compensate those who bear the burdens.
Full-throated advocates of open borders are not common (though vocal, e.g. Bryan Caplan), but the supporters of immigration who ostensibly eschew that goal rarely address the question of how much is too much, or even recognize the legitimacy of such a question, and thus they imply that more is always merrier.
I still maintain that if it is morally wrong to deport an illegal immigrant solely for having violated immigration law, it is wrong to deny entrance to the United States to anyone who wishes to immigrate (with provision to exclude criminals, etc., etc., obviously). Supporters of deportation and advocates of open borders are at least morally consistent. If the thought of expelling hard-working and law-abiding immigrants and thereby potentially breaking up families is a distasteful one (as it surely is), the image of the grinding poverty and violence that drives immigration from the Third World should be an equally compelling one. But why should we privilege the former over the latter, when the most meaningful difference is that the latter have violated American law? If ordo amoris causes us to favor those who are closer to us over those farther away (i.e. illegal immigrants, who have some established connection to this country, over those who wish to immigrate), then securing our borders is all the more imperative, since acknowledging a special status for already existing illegal immigrants serves an impetus for more.
It is not immigration per se that is good or bad, but the amount and type. I expect that Jesse would respond to the question "Is immigration good?" with the answer "It's complicated." Others would point out the lump of labor fallacy and retort, "Ackchtyually, it's not complicated."
> Your frustration with opposing viewpoints should not lead you down the path of ad hominem arguments.
I made no ad hominem arguments.
> Others would point out the lump of labor fallacy and retort, "Ackchtyually, it's not complicated."
You'll note that I didn't say that at all, which is why it's so important to you to to have written twelve aimless, rambling paragraphs as if I did. There are lots of reasons immigration can be good or bad or complicated. I am pointing out that if record immigration and record employment are coexisting, then taking-our-jobs is clearly not contributing on the "bad" side of the ledger.
"It will never be possible to explain the lump of labor fallacy to some people."
If by that comment you were not implying that I, like unnamed others, lack the cognitive ability to understand the lump of labor fallacy, then I have not idea what point you were making. In light of the fact that you really did not grapple meaningfully with any of my points, I would characterize your comment as an ad hominem argument in the absence of any real other.
I don’t think you aren’t smart enough to get it, I think you are ideologically committed to not getting it.
What, exactly, do I not understand about the lump of labor fallacy? Are you claiming that the fallacy proves that immigration is always good? I already acknowledged that the fallacy shows that immigration is not always bad, but there is a wide gap between not always bad and always good. What, in your opinion, does the fallacy reveal about immigration?
You are making assumptions about my "ideology" and my level of commitment to it. I still regard that as an ad hominem argument.
"they supposedly do jobs". Supposedly? The guy can't even concede this point.
Also fun fact, Palmer Luckey’s sister, Ginger is married to the normalest ex-congressman, Matt Gaetz
The fact that this didn't come up during the episode is why we need trace back
That IS a fun fact. Had a snoop on IG and she's a MAHA Mom-to-be
"Raising a generation that will never know synthetic Blue 1 — this baby’s blues come from the sea 💙🩵"
https://www.instagram.com/p/DLk6bl0yu2I/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
Of course she has all the long flowing dresses with a pregnancy picture because she’s such a mother Earth person
Yes! It's delightfully cliche.
Almost every woman in the southeast is wearing long dresses now, especially for maternal/pregnancy related things. That is just the current style down here.
But but but …. She’s so pretty! Why is she married to him?!? 😭
Unless he dies from measles or worse.
He just goes back to the sea. No harm, no foul?
While trying to open that Instagram link, this awesome clip is the first thing that came up for me - totally unrelated, yet absolutely on brand for BARPod:
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DLxwocivoPI/
oh man
I wonder how much she loves him going to underage prostitutes.
Wait. What!?
How was this not mentioned? This is an utter failure of journalism.
I haven't finished this yet but two early laughs for me:
1) Palmer as NimbleRichMan claiming he told Trump to run in the previous election. Presumably this was around 2010/2011, before he'd made any money (and thus before he was anyone Trump would consider paying attention to!)
2) Jesse's gleeful cackle when he found out one of the regular misinformation writers wrote the incorrect Guardian article
Number 2 was my favorite part of the entire episode. He was so giddy about it!
I would love for nothing - nothing - more in life than to be cyberbullied by Katie.
She’ll never love us.
For the record, I’ve been pointing out that Hitler was a vegetarian as a way to make fun of vegetarians, not as a way to say that bad people are capable of having good aspects about them.
Everyone hates vegetarians, we are the bisexuals of the bespoke restrictive diet community.
Nah. I could potentially be a vegetarian. Vegans, however… I’d have to get a whole new religion.
No no vegetarians are bi, vegans homosexual, pescatarians are queer.
They’re all just vegequeerians to me. 🤷♂️
When gummy bears offend your sensibilities, we’ve become too comfortable as a species.
Even when it'd been a year since I'd had any animal based foods at all I didn't call myself vegan.
Too much baggage.
100%
Make a call already! Do you eat and use animal products or not? FFS
As an avid hiker, I can confirm that hiking is the worst hobby. I spend a substantial amount of time on my hikes counting down the miles until I'm done (interspersed with taking pictures of mushrooms and creeks and other forest stuff), and then as soon as I'm home, I'm back on AllTrails planning my next hike like a sicko.
You sound like an ultra runner.
“Why did I do this to myself?”
“When can I do it again?”
Totally fucking agree. I hate hiking just to hike. Most of my hiking is incidental while engaging in other pursuits.
My hiking boots weigh the same as sneakers and are more comfortable than my other sneakers. I think maybe Katie is thinking of Vietnam era combat boots.
And generally modern hiking boots, unlike the old Tyrolean style all leather boots of old, do not require breaking in. They just need to fit properly.
There was 100% a proper and correct way for The Daily Beast to report on the Palmer Lucky story that didn’t involve completely abandoning journalistic ethics. I’m certain some more digging (including working backwards from the information they already had) would have yielded an interesting piece about PACs, r/thedonald, and the billboard at the very least (which…I don’t get at all? Can someone explain why Hill’s head looks like that?).
But people like Ben Collins and Gideon Resnick didn’t and don’t give a shit about journalistic ethics. Ultimately, it’s just about the clicks and being on the right side of history for them. Every story they write is just another opportunity to signal to their friends and social media followers that they are the good guys and the people over there are the bad guys. Truth and knowledge don’t even rank in their reasons for being journalists.
For this one story, the consequence was a (very very rich) man’s reputation was tarnished. Some people may shrug their shoulders at that, and fair enough. But, over time, this approach to reporting leads to a breakdown of public trust in the media, as more and more people realize that journalists cannot even be trusted to uphold basic agreements or truths in their own work. I’m not trying to be hyperbolic here, but shit like this seriously contributes to institutional mistrust overall.
It just burns me that someone like Collins specifically has had so much success in an industry whose credibility he’s helped destroy.
“Lucky Palms” sounds like a nickname for a prolific masturbator. Katie asks Jesse what he was doing when he was 21 . . . I think we know. What did you think he was doing with all that leftover pizza grease?
*Detective standing over a sticky puddle*
"Look at the load, Jefferson. Lucky Palms has struck again"
It was as my old stage name when I performed in Amsterdam
Why am I not surprised Ben Collins and his ilk look like an evil idiot once again.
Love the show.
If hiking 4+ miles, with rock scrambles, you need a thick sole hiking boot or you'll beat the crap out of you feet. It will take exactly one hike of this type in sneakers and you'll be purchasing hiking boots the next day. I'm on Jesse's side.
Finding one FBI employee does not an objective survey make. But then this show is entertainment not journalism -- and I mean that as a compliment.
Trail Runners are thick soled, lugged sneakers with rock plates. They're great for this.
Palmer Lucky didn't invent jack shit...he didn't contribute to VR technology...he contributed **HYPE** He's a good salesman and huckster, and he is smart and understands tech, but it was silicon valley hype not a legit engineer inventing something in a garage.
He was a DIY hobbyist who was great at self promotion in online communities.
His Occulus "prototypes" were just old cell phone screens and off-the-shelf code; he first made a name for himself in DIY community forums with several others making the same DIY headsets.
There's definitely some similarities to Elon, in that their success comes from hucksterism and hype.
His Kickstarter is what got him mainstream attention, and it was funded by DIY hobbyists (dorks) who also fueled the hype for Soylent, Tesla, NFTs, etc. From there, he did a great job not screwing up and getting investors, which led to his Facebook acquisition.
Palmer Lucky's payout wasn't insignificant, but he was mostly just a figurehead pitchman once he got institutional investment...he really was a kid DIY'ing with old cell phone screens that parlayed that into real wealth.
I know this seems like I am splitting hairs, but it's important to know what actually happened and not repeat the myth.
You're telling me he didn't hand-craft the screens pixel-by-pixel? For shame!
How are your NFTs doing these days dork? He didn't make anything new at all, he just used off the shelf components to diy something that was already in existence, Google Cardboard was the same thing...he's a hype man not an inventor or tech genius innovator
NFTs were extremely dumb and I thought that about them from the start.
There's a lot more to making a functioning product than just "screens". Getting a first prototype would already take heavy engineering chops (DIY, as you say). From there, there will be many new technical problems to solve in the process of streamlining the design and API, debugging things, and (a really important part) making the product cheaper.
I think maybe you could be right if you use a very narrow definition of "inventor". It certainly wasn't an "invention" on par with, say, the discovery of nuclear energy or penicillin. But invention can also be tinkering with existing tech, recombining multiple technologies in new ways, and then optimizing their performance. I would call whoever optimizes Porsche's combustion engine designs an inventor, even though they didn't invent the combustion engine. It also includes taking ownership of an idea and seeing it developed all the way to a fully-realized product that didn't exist before (that's the "invention").
"There's a lot more to making a functioning product than just "screens". Getting a ....streamlining the design and API, debugging things...making the product cheaper."
UNDERSTAND THIS: Palmer Lucky didn't do that!
Repeat: Palmer Lucky didn't contribute significantly to any technical aspect of VR.
Once he got funding he helped pick the people who did what you describe above, at most.
He could code well enough to get stuff he downloaded working...mainly back in the early days, he was online a lot, made helpful comments to noobs, and had the money and time to actually build the stuff he downloaded plans and codebase for that OTHERS MADE.
No shit Occulus took a lot of work, but Palmer Lucky didn't contribute significantly to the technical challenges.
I have absolutely zero patience for the "woe is me" routine from the (possible? probable?) FBI agent here. "Hey look, I hate this as much as the rest of you but I'm just doing my job" ok well then fuck you twice: first for doing it, second for being such a coward about it. This isn't the military; there's no reason that you have to keep being a FBI agent. And yes, I am saying that if you can leave your job without violating some other law you absolutely should if your job requires you to do things you think are bad. That's not a huge burden!
Look at it like this. Throughout almost all of human history, you straight up did not have a choice whether to do some job or another. Yeah, you always had a tiny number of people who were lucky enough to choose some business or another but for the vast majority of us the vast majority of the time, if the government said you were going to war, then it was either do what they say or you die, and maybe your family too. If you were born a peasant and didn't luck into something better somehow, that's how you died. That's not just ancient history, that's a lot of the world still today; if Putin's people come and tell you "you're fighting in Ukraine," then you're either fighting in Ukraine or going to a Russian prison. And now here we are, in the freest, most prosperous society you'll ever find, and you... just keep doing something you think is wrong?
You didn't become a FBI agent to round up people picking tomatoes, and you don't like that now you're no longer working on arresting child pornographers, terrorists, and gangsters? Ok, then you quit. That's the remedy here. Yes, it is scary to quit your job. Yes, it is inconvenient. It is also nearly the lowest cost anyone has ever had to pay for having principles that are more than just words. I see this as no different than people who couldn't bring themselves to speak out about woke nonsense when it was at its peak, except in that there were actual threats to people not just that they'd lose their jobs during that insanity but that they'd be unemployable afterwards. Does anyone think that's the case here? If a guy quits the FBI because he's no longer doing what he signed up to do, do you really think he can't get a job in a state police agency, at a prosecutor's office, as a defense investigator, etc.? People used to risk firing squads for choices like that; now, you risk temporary uncertainty about your career. Either do the job or don't; you don't get the moral points for doing it and being sad about it.
So any doctor that disagrees with euthanasia, abortion, or circumcision should quit being a doctor. Any teacher that doesn’t agree with standardized testing should quit. All lawyers should quit if they disagree with the law or are a public defender and have to defend a Klansman, murder, pedophile.
Or should they remain in their professions and do good? Do the best they can?
You clearly have strong feeling about this.. but your argument is 100% emotional and non persuasive.
> So any doctor that disagrees with euthanasia, abortion, or circumcision should quit being a doctor.
Uhhhh… yeah, I think if I was a pro-life doctor and they reassigned me to the abortion clinic I would probably quit.
A doctor can refuse to perform euthanasias, abortions, and circumcisions. A lawyer can refuse a client. And yes, if a teacher has a genuine moral problem with standardized testing, he should not be a teacher if being a teacher requires him to give standardized tests. That's a strange position, but if you genuinely hold it then yeah your morals should drive your actions. When you have the ability to live by your morals, you have the duty to live by your morals. Emotion does cause me to feel contempt in these cases rather than simply reach a conclusion, but the conclusion isn't driven by emotion. The logical form of the argument requires no emotion:
If A and B, then C. In this case, A is "it is bad to round up peaceful people and deport them." B is "I have the ability to not round up peaceful people and deport them without breaking the law." C is "I am behaving badly."
But also, we're having a discussion about morality; you can behave like a moral philosopher and take a dispassionate approach, but that's not how most people approach the subject. Violations of moral rules cause emotional responses, that's always been the case in proportion to the seriousness of the violation and the rule itself.
Think about it like this: we give heightened moral status to people who behaved according to their stated morals if behaving in that way entailed serious risks, and we do not find their stated morals themselves objectionable. This is the logic behind martyrdom in the Christian tradition: a person who refused to renounce his faith under threat of torture and death is accorded special status in relation to those who did not suffer the same threat or who acceded to the threat. This is also the logic behind timeless examples: a soldier who rushes towards an enemy position to save his fellow soldiers is more heroic than a soldier who does not take the same risk. The corollary to the rule "when the risk is high, living in accordance with your morals is rewarded" is "when the risk is low, failing to live in accordance with your morals is condemned." It's not hypocrisy exactly; to be a hypocrite is to pretend to have values you don't in fact have. It's simple cowardice. "I know this is wrong but I'm doing it anyway because I'm afraid." To return to your earlier example about lawyers: a person who finds it immoral to represent a Klansman should not be a public defender. He can still be a lawyer. He can open his own practice, and refuse whatever client he wants; he can work for a firm that he knows will not accept such a client; he can go do document review or work for a general counsel office in some other business. In all of human history, it has never been easier to live according to your morals. The ease of the action should inform our response when the action is not taken.
So we switched to you defining what is moral. Not everyone agrees on morality. And just because someone doesn’t agree with something doesn’t mean they should quit.
I was in the military and went to Iraq and Afghanistan.. did I agree with why we went there? No. Should I have gone AWOL then? Should I have deserted? I did treat the people of Iraq and Afghanistan with dignity and respect.
There are tons of laws I don’t agree with. Doesn’t mean I am going to break them.
He's not attempting to define morality? He's saying if a job violates your principles you should quit because it's never been easier to do so. And yes you might have deserted if you felt strongly enough, clearly you didn't, which is fine! People do things like this all the time.
And as you'll note from what I've already said, being in the military is different. You would be breaking the law if you went AWOL. As I already said, that's a different level of risk; furthermore, if you consider following the law to be moral, then following the law even when you disagree with it is living in accordance with your morals. I'm glad you did not violate your morals by mistreating the people of Iraq and Afghanistan, but that has nothing to do with anything we're talking about. In this case, we're talking about a person who could leave his job without violating the law but refuses to do so even though remaining in the job causes him to do things he thinks is wrong.
I'm defining what I believe is cowardly, which is an aspect of morality; as an extension of that, I am expressing contempt for those who behave in a cowardly manner. Yes, not everyone agrees. I certainly don't agree that there's anything immoral with standardized testing, but I already said that someone who thinks there is should not be giving standardized tests. I'm not interested in telling people what their morals should be in most cases; I am interested in this phenomenon where we see someone failing to live up to their own morals and then decline to point out that this is cowardice
He's been doing it for twenty years and is kind of invested in it. I understand, I still entertain the idea that the 2028 election won't result in a much worse version of "Stop the Steal" because I'm invested in being an American. Hardly seems likely though...
You're projecting your own judgement onto the speaker. You think this is a mortal sin. I'd wager he thinks it's an inefficient waste of time and resources (both human and monetary).
Why would someone blow away their whole career because they think they're being used inefficiently when all they have to do is wait it out a few years or less?