Is it bad to be rich?

[Stargazer]

22 hours ago, Calm said:

I would rather see taking the risk of lowering profits by making useful and popular products cheaper so those with lower incomes could afford them as well or would not have to struggle to buy them or by raising the wages of those who make the lowest pay rate in the company.

 But I also think there is a major problem with monopolies and wish we had stronger, enforced laws at this point.

Here we are in country where the poorest can afford to own automobiles, personal computers, smart phones, and all sorts of interesting products. Those with lower incomes can afford them very easily, because mass production makes that possible. And it isn't just our country. 

I heard a lecture once given by a man who was traveling the Kenyan bush about ten years ago in a malfunctioning vehicle, and was wondering what would happen when the vehicle conked out entirely, a good 50 miles from anything. Suddenly up ahead he spotted a Masai warrior in full regalia standing just ahead in their characteristic resting post (one one foot with the other resting on the knee), right next to the track their vehicle was laboring along. He appeared to be focused on something in his hand. As they got nearer, it became obvious what the man was doing. He was texting on his mobile phone! The lecturer then looked at his own phone and found that he had a full four bars of connectivity. Tens of miles away from anywhere, in the middle of the African bush.

All of this comes about because in an effort to make loads of money, technology companies are falling all over themselves trying to produce and sell products that the poorest can afford. And in so doing, they are dragging everyone into the 21st century.

Monopolies aren't so bad, as long as they are not propped up in their monopolies by the government, and as long as they compete fairly in the market. Those monopolies that scourge the public with inflated prices, in a free market, will find competitors springing up in order to cut into their profits by offering better prices, products, and services.

[Stargazer]

23 hours ago, The Nehor said:

If we didn’t have billionaires there would never be any space flight!

Fact Check: Dubious

That's not a fact check, that's an opinion.

I will simply point to the Apollo program. President Kennedy's goal fulfilled in 1969, and what did they do? They ended the moon program and never ever went back. We should have had a colony on the moon thirty years ago, but the government just whiffed it. And that IS a fact.

23 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Who needs fairness and equality? GIVE ME RAMPANT CONSUMERISM OR GIVE ME DEATH!

Indeed. And it is this rampant consumerism that makes it possible for us to have these lovely discussions on the internet. 

[Stargazer]

23 hours ago, carbon dioxide said:

Man is not traveling to Mars in any big numbers and who would really want to live on that rock anyways.  Even Death Valley would be more tolerable than living on Mars.  At least in death valley, you can go outside and take a breath of fresh air.  Elon perhaps thinks the movie Total Recall is an actual idea that might work.  No it will not.

All that is true, but if you think that there aren't adventurous souls who will try it, I think you're wrong.

NASA has a space probe mission planned for launch in 2022, which will investigate the asteroid Psyche. That asteroid is believed to be pretty much pure iron and nickel, with a few other things. If it's mass of 22,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg turns out to have the composition expected, the asteroid would be a huge source of iron. Currently, we mine and produce about 2,280,000,000,000 kg each year here on earth. If we were able to fully exploit Psyche for its mineral contents, at today's rate of production it would take us 9,780,701 years to use it up. We could entirely give up mining of iron ore on the earth. Think there might be someone willing to invest the effort and money to start making use of it? I can see that it might not be economically viable to do this for delivery to earth, but it would make building structures in the asteroid belt much easier than if we had to drag earth-originated iron and steel to the asteroid belt.

And if we are able to exploit Psyche, which is actually rather difficult to get to, we would definitely be able to exploit closer worlds, such as the moon. About 12% of the lunar surface soil consists of metallic and cationic iron, for example, and processing it to usable iron would be relatively easy, especially with the abundant solar power available on the moon. 

These are very blue sky ideas. I'd guess the Millennium will get here, though, before we're able to do any of this. Oh, well. It doesn't hurt to try.

[mbh26]

On 12/22/2021 at 2:19 PM, Fether said:

I saw this topic brought up on another thread, felt it would be a good topic on its own.

The typical premise is “No one needs a billion dollars, so why not donate it?”

I am under the impression that that is a fairly short sighted view. Should a billionaire give away their $1,000,000,000? Or would it be better to continue to grow their wealth and consistently donate 5% of their wealth every year for the rest of their life and then pass that wealth to their family and have them continue to donate that 5% every year?

I’m not a Billionaire, but I intended on amassing some amount of wealth in my life and I have an idea of how money is used, stored, and spent. From what I have gathered, Billionaires don’t have rooms full of gold and cash Scrooge McDuck style. Rather, the vast majority of it is invested in their own businesses, other businesses and other entities. That money is then used to grow other industries that provide jobs for others. People with insane wealth are also incentivized to donate to charity for tax write off purposes. I would imagine a single year of a billionaire’s donations would exceed that of anyone normal person’s life time donations.

Additional questions I would ask:

- How much money is too much money?

- Should rich people just give all their money away? Is that the best thing to do?

- Is this a problem about maximizing the good someone can do? Or is it about there being some moral limit on how much someone should have? Or perhaps is it just jealousy?

Most of us will never be obscenely wealthy, so why does the question concern us? 

How is it my place to tell another man what the Christian thing to do with his earnings would be?  Isn't the gospel about having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and about what choices we make as individuals rather than what choices someone else makes?  I can guarantee you that if you were to round up the 1%, execute them, and redistribute the wealth, society and our individual economic situations would not be much better than it is now and certainly not for very long.  If anything it would get worse fairly quickly, as it has in every society that has chosen such a path.  So while I view taking an individual's free agency as wrong because it's Satanic, it's also wrong because it doesn't work not for the individual nor for society and nor will it work for the kingdom of Heaven.  

There's a myth out there that only the most cut throat people that become successful businessmen.  And yet I would argue that generosity can help build a business by creating good will in a community.  If I take a patient to the cleaners upselling them on their glasses with things they don't need what's the chance the patient is coming back to my office next year?   

It's the same argument apostates continue to make against the brethren.  Sadly I admit I fell into this trap before I once again found my faith and recognized it as another one of Satan's lies.   Should the church give away all of its money?  How much money is too much money for the church to have?  Are the brethren Christian on Sunday but hard nosed, perhaps even cut throat businessmen other days of the week?  I now know that answer is an emphatic No.  The brethren are among the most Christlike people this world has to offer and they're a lot wealthier than most of us. 

And while I love Mother Teresa and admire where her heart was, I'd say Thomas Edison did far more good for this world than Mother Teresa.   And I don't remember Mother Teresa spending a lot of time complaining about what Thomas Edison had that she did not.  Nor do I remember her passing judgment on people who had more than her.  She was too busy giving her all and IMO coming very close to individual perfection.  

 

Edited December 25, 2021 by mbh26

[Calm]

49 minutes ago, Stargazer said:

Here we are in country where the poorest can afford to own automobiles, personal computers, smart phones, and all sorts of interesting products. Those with lower incomes can afford them very easily, because mass production makes that possible. And it isn't just our country. 

A lot of these billionaires have businesses worldwide. When I am talking about those who have the lowest income in their employee, I mean global.

[Stargazer]

22 hours ago, carbon dioxide said:

Star Trek is science fiction and nobody has the finances to support these adventures.  Unless we can find propulsion systems that can make space ships travel near the speed of light or above, we are not ever going to colonize the stars.  The distances are too great even for any space ship traveling a million miles per hour. 

Certainly colonizing the stars is a non-starter. Unless and until a working star drive is invented. 

Above light-speed is technically impossible. But things like "warp drive" may be possible. And while the term "science-fiction" is sometimes used to dismiss seemingly outlandish ideas, I would like to remind you about what happened on 20 July 1969. That was an absolutely impossible dream at one time, but Neil Armstrong never let it discourage him. Last year I stood next to a monument on the Isle of Wight that commemorates Marconi's first public transmission of radio waves on 27 July 1896. And now, 125 years later, I will post this message and it will travel at near-lightspeed through cables and radio channels, thousands of miles in an instant, to be stored on a server located somewhere in the world, for you to read at your leisure. And the message itself will consist entirely of patterns of charge stored on a spinning magnetic disk, or perhaps a block of silicon dioxide. 

Don't scoff at what could be -- you have no idea what the future may hold.

You might find this video of interest:

 

[Stargazer]

22 hours ago, The Nehor said:

What resources? With current tech even towing a platinum asteroid to earth would cost more than exploiting ‘busted’ mines on earth to harvest similar amounts. The real advantage of space economically is zero-g manufacturing which has a number of advantages but only when manufacturing very specialized equipment.

Colonization would mean terraforming or developing specialized and very dependent environments. The former would probably take centuries at least and the latter is more a vanity project than a practical method of expansion. As to going to the stars we don’t have any way to get there or even a workable theory on how to get there. There are plausible stardrive theories but they all rely on things we aren’t sure exist and even if they do work require such prodigious amounts of power that short of finding a way to create, store, and control antimatter there is no way to utilize them.

If history has taught us anything then a new space race with China would be the way to get government funding into space travel. Then we make one big achievement (landing on  moon equivalent) and lose all the rest of the achievements (first satellite, first man in space) and declare victory. USA! USA!

The Space Race did have positive effects and a lot of neat stuff came out of it from what we developed for it but pretending the profit motive is going to run the next space race requires us to find something we need out there that is cost-effective to harvest and ship home. We haven’t found it yet. China’s program is focusing on space-based solar power devices and is worrying because they could easily militarize space. The threat is military and not economic.

Always with the negative waves...

 

[mgy401]

23 hours ago, The Nehor said:

3. Unless you are not a single parent in which case you are royally screwed.

You know, this brings to mind an interesting point.  Single parenthood is the result either of unchastity, or of at least one parent abandoning one’s covenants to the other parent.  It’s common to speak of our financial obligations to our broader, would-be “celestial community”; but that discussion really can’t be had in the absence of a similar discussion about our behavioral obligations to that community.

Obviously, one wouldn’t conclude from this that the poor deserve to be poor and should therefore be ignored or ostracized or left to suffer needlessly.   But if we claim to want to become a Zion people, then we need to acknowledge that in a free society poverty is as much the result of bad choices as bad luck.  The price of Zion isn’t just financial, and the social contract only finalizes when everyone has proven willing to pay their fair share.  We should be preaching chastity and commitment and child-rearing and hard work and honesty and self-sufficiency and duty at least as zealously as we’re preaching economic redistributionism.  If we aren’t, then we aren’t really spiritual Zionists; we’re merely secular socialists.  (Which term I don’t intend as a pejorative; I just mean that whatever is being advocated, it’s not really Zion.)

It might also be worth noting that when the scriptures were written (including right up to the 1840s), “poverty” generally meant that one was without reliably warm/dry shelter, didn’t know where next week’s food would come from, and was consistently a couple solid meals away from death.  Given the social programs available in most Westernized countries (even the US) today, that sort of grinding poverty just doesn’t exist anymore except among a couple of especially helpless populations such as the mentally ill, or children.

That doesn’t mean we don’t try to help those less fortunate than ourselves—helping folks feels good, it makes others feel good, it increases the amount of brotherhood and love in society generally and prepares us for the kind of existence God lives.  But I don’t think the scriptural passages on helping the poor mean that I’m putting my immortal soul in jeopardy if I use $20K of my surplus to buy a boat rather than to pay the Harvard tuition for some PhD student who’s defaulting on his child support to three different women while writing his dissertation about the influence of ancient Egyptian calligraphy on the evolution of ballroom dance during the high middle ages.

Edited December 25, 2021 by mgy401

[Stargazer]

45 minutes ago, Calm said:

A lot of these billionaires have businesses worldwide. When I am talking about those who have the lowest income in their employee, I mean global.

I know what you're trying to say, but what we consider extreme poverty wages in some parts of the world may actually be perfectly adequate living wages in those parts of the world. For example, the 2017 average living wage worker in India in 2017 earned 10,300 Indian Rupees per month, or $137.30 US Dollars. You would be homeless and starve on that wage in the US. But they are not in the US. They are in India. And the only reason they might have a job paying that wage from, say, an Indian company that produces a product that is imported to the US, is because they are being paid that "low" wage -- making it affordable for the US importer to buy that product. They are employed because their wage cost is lower than a US worker's, or, in other words, they out-compete US workers in these cases. Their living wage is possible because some US company takes advantage of the lesser labor costs. 

I'm not saying there aren't corrupt companies taking serious advantage of workers. Just that we cannot always judge using our own experience, because circumstance may be entirely different from what we expect.

 

[The Nehor]

2 hours ago, Stargazer said:

That's not a fact check, that's an opinion.

I will simply point to the Apollo program. President Kennedy's goal fulfilled in 1969, and what did they do? They ended the moon program and never ever went back. We should have had a colony on the moon thirty years ago, but the government just whiffed it. And that IS a fact.

Indeed. And it is this rampant consumerism that makes it possible for us to have these lovely discussions on the internet. 

What would be the point of a moon colony? We couldn’t find enough to do to keep an orbital space station manned with a lot of people and there is less to do on the moon and it is more expensive to get there and back.

Is it though? Is it only consumerism driving communication?

[The Nehor]

31 minutes ago, mgy401 said:

You know, this brings to mind an interesting point.  Single parenthood is the result either of unchastity, or of at least one parent abandoning one’s covenants to the other parent.  It’s common to speak of our financial obligations to our broader, would-be “celestial community”; but that discussion really can’t be had in the absence of a similar discussion about our behavioral obligations to that community.

Obviously, one wouldn’t conclude from this that the poor deserve to be poor and should therefore be ignored or ostracized or left to suffer needlessly.   But if we claim to want to become a Zion people, then we need to acknowledge that in a free society poverty is as much the result of bad choices as bad luck.  The price of Zion isn’t just financial, and the social contract only finalizes when everyone has proven willing to pay their fair share.  We should be preaching chastity and commitment and child-rearing and hard work and honesty and self-sufficiency and duty at least as zealously as we’re preaching economic redistributionism.  If we aren’t, then we aren’t really spiritual Zionists; we’re merely secular socialists.  (Which term I don’t intend as a pejorative; I just mean that whatever is being advocated, it’s not really Zion.)

It might also be worth noting that when the scriptures were written (including right up to the 1840s), “poverty” generally meant that one was without reliably warm/dry shelter, didn’t know where next week’s food would come from, and was consistently a couple solid meals away from death.  Given the social programs available in most Westernized countries (even the US) today, that sort of grinding poverty just doesn’t exist anymore except among a couple of especially helpless populations such as the mentally ill, or children.

That doesn’t mean we don’t try to help those less fortunate than ourselves—helping folks feels good, it makes others feel good, it increases the amount of brotherhood and love in society generally and prepares us for the kind of existence God lives.  But I don’t think the scriptural passages on helping the poor mean that I’m putting my immortal soul in jeopardy if I use $20K of my surplus to buy a boat rather than to pay the Harvard tuition for some PhD student who’s defaulting on his child support to three different women while writing his dissertation about the influence of ancient Egyptian calligraphy on the evolution of ballroom dance during the high middle ages.

So grinding poverty doesn’t exist because the homeless can usually find something to eat?

We are usually preaching those Zion principles. Many of the people trapped in poverty weren’t around to hear it.

What if the history of ballroom dancing unlocks some key secrets of the Universe? Don’t write it off so lightly.

[mgy401]

38 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

[1]So grinding poverty doesn’t exist because the homeless can usually find something to eat?

[2]We are usually preaching those Zion principles. Many of the people trapped in poverty weren’t around to hear it.

[3]What if the history of ballroom dancing unlocks some key secrets of the Universe? Don’t write it off so lightly.

1.  No.  It’s simply that private-sector efforts to help the latter-day homeless are usually duplicative of extant government programs that most able-minded homeless *could*, but for whatever reason don’t, (fully) utilize.  Local conditions and resources will naturally vary; but you’re (generally) not going to make much more progress merely by throwing more money at the problem.  The “low-hanging fruit”, as it were, has largely been picked.  The main avenues left to us are institutionalization of the mentally ill and widespread removal of children of less-functional parents; and the primary barriers to those avenues are cultural/social, not financial.

2.  Hmm.  The ones I worked with were aware that the principles existed; they just didn’t see the need to embrace one or more those principles in their everyday conduct.

3.  I suppose your comment was a bit tongue-in-cheek, but just for argument’s sake:  I thought becoming like God was what unlocks all the key secrets of the universe?   And I thought our theological commission was to care for the needy, not to pony up to the intelligentsia so that they can build us an academic Tower of Babel that they suppose will give us a secular route to get to Heaven.

When we talk about the theological need for redistribution—is it because we’re seeing needs, and it seems the wealthy are the only ones with the means to fill those needs, so we regretfully ask them to give more?  Or do we start by looking at the wealthy, seethe with envy and rage at their enjoyment of a lifestyle we could never hope to match, and then excitedly come up with causes and excuses to deprive them of their wealth in eager anticipation of the ego rush that comes with cutting our enemies down to size?

Edited December 26, 2021 by mgy401

[The Nehor]

4 minutes ago, mgy401 said:

1.  No.  It’s simply that private-sector efforts to help the latter-day homeless are usually duplicative of extant government programs that most able-minded homeless *could*, but for whatever reason don’t, (fully) utilize.  Local conditions and resources will naturally vary; but you’re (generally) not going to make much more progress merely by throwing more money at the problem.  The “low-hanging fruit”, as it were, has largely been picked.  The main avenues left to us are institutionalization of the mentally ill and widespread removal of children of less-functional parents; and the primary barriers to those avenues are cultural/social, not financial.

2.  Hmm.  The ones I worked with were aware that the principles existed; they just didn’t see the need to embrace one or more those principles in their everyday conduct.

3.  I thought becoming like God was what unlocks all the key secrets of the universe?
 

And I thought our theological commission was to care for the needy, not to pony up to the intelligentsia so that they can build us an academic Tower of Babel that they suppose will give us a secular route to get to Heaven.  When we talk about the theological need for redistribution—is it because we’re seeing needs, and it seems the wealthy are the only ones with the means to fill those needs, so we regretfully ask them to give more?  Or do we start by looking at the wealthy, seethe with envy and rage at their enjoyment of a lifestyle we could never hope to match, and then eagerly come up with causes and excuses to deprive them of their wealth and enjoy the ego rush that comes with cutting people down to size?

1. It is often much more complicated than that the programs are available but they choose not to use them.

2. Hearing about abstinence in a sex ed class probably doesn’t count.

3. Yet God can dance………….

The primary reason I want to see the wealth gap closed is that it is going to explode and cause horrible things to happen. I am less concerned about whether we fix it by systematic change in how wealth is transferred or because envious people break into mansions and steal their stuff. I prefer the former.

As to the deep envy and ego rush of cutting them down to size….

“But it must needs be done in mine own way; and behold this is the way that I, the Lord, have decreed to provide for my saints, that the poor shall be exalted, in that the rich are made low.”

….it LOOKS LIKE IT GOES ALL THE WAY TO THE TOP!!!!!

[Stargazer]

59 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

What would be the point of a moon colony? We couldn’t find enough to do to keep an orbital space station manned with a lot of people and there is less to do on the moon and it is more expensive to get there and back.

Is it though? Is it only consumerism driving communication?

Negative waves again.

The Russian government sold Alaska to the United States because they thought it was worthless. Newspapers of the time scoffed and called the place Seward's Icebox, after the US Secretary of State who negotiated the purchase.  For 7.2 million 1867 dollars. In modern terms, the cost was equivalent to $133 million in 2020 dollars or $0.37 per acre. Chickenfeed. Even in current dollars it was incredibly cheap. And what did we find? Gold. Oil. The Czar was extremely shortsighted.

Here's a good reason to colonize the moon:

And let's put a video on it:

 

[The Nehor]

29 minutes ago, Stargazer said:

Negative waves again.

The Russian government sold Alaska to the United States because they thought it was worthless. Newspapers of the time scoffed and called the place Seward's Icebox, after the US Secretary of State who negotiated the purchase.  For 7.2 million 1867 dollars. In modern terms, the cost was equivalent to $133 million in 2020 dollars or $0.37 per acre. Chickenfeed. Even in current dollars it was incredibly cheap. And what did we find? Gold. Oil. The Czar was extremely shortsighted.

Here's a good reason to colonize the moon:

And let's put a video on it:

 

Still cheaper on Earth.

All the moon mining plans are also based off of relatively scanty data on what is on the moon. He3 is often cited but it is a limited resource at best. With the earth elements you have to somehow make it viable to mine whatever we find if we find enough of it in a very hazardous environment and having to rely on a lot of automated equipment. The biggest problem is figuring out how to get it back to Earth in a way that the trip doesn’t cost several times over what the stuff is worth.

Some suggest using it as a jumping off point and using the water on Mars to fuel rockets. This is possible but we would need to confirm there is enough water and then it could be used as a refueling depot. I think a better method of getting fuel into space would be a space elevator attached to something. Possibly an anchored bernal. That way you could move the fuel straight from Earth. Of course then you need the material science that can build something strong enough to anchor something like that.

[Stargazer]

11 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Still cheaper on Earth.

All the moon mining plans are also based off of relatively scanty data on what is on the moon. He3 is often cited but it is a limited resource at best. With the earth elements you have to somehow make it viable to mine whatever we find if we find enough of it in a very hazardous environment and having to rely on a lot of automated equipment. The biggest problem is figuring out how to get it back to Earth in a way that the trip doesn’t cost several times over what the stuff is worth.

Some suggest using it as a jumping off point and using the water on Mars to fuel rockets. This is possible but we would need to confirm there is enough water and then it could be used as a refueling depot. I think a better method of getting fuel into space would be a space elevator attached to something. Possibly an anchored bernal. That way you could move the fuel straight from Earth. Of course then you need the material science that can build something strong enough to anchor something like that.

Negative waves again. "It can't be done. There's nothing there worth getting. And even if there is, we can't bring it back. Why bother?" 

Plenty of people much smarter than you and me think otherwise. I tend to trust that others with greater vision may very well bring about what so many think is impossible.

Just to address one of your claims, which is the biggest problem is figuring out how to get it back to Earth cheaply enough to make it worthwhile. With no atmosphere, abundant and virtually free solar power, an electromagnetic mass driver becomes eminently practical and very cost effective.

 

[The Nehor]

2 hours ago, Stargazer said:

Negative waves again. "It can't be done. There's nothing there worth getting. And even if there is, we can't bring it back. Why bother?" 

Plenty of people much smarter than you and me think otherwise. I tend to trust that others with greater vision may very well bring about what so many think is impossible.

Just to address one of your claims, which is the biggest problem is figuring out how to get it back to Earth cheaply enough to make it worthwhile. With no atmosphere, abundant and virtually free solar power, an electromagnetic mass driver becomes eminently practical and very cost effective.

 

I am aware of the possible uses of mass drivers and it is clever. The usual target for the payload though is one of the Lagrange points and not sending it back to Earth so you still need to get it down and still expensive.

I am not arguing it is impossible. It is very possible. We can do a lot of things. I am arguing it is unlikely to be economically viable if profit is the motive. Mining the moon is not beyond humanity’s capabilities. There are some engineering problems but they Making money doing it is not as easy or likely. We are not sure what quantity of resources there is on the moon (our earlier trips were not prospecting expeditions) so there may not be enough of value to bother with. Even if there are valuable resources there it is unlikely it will be cheaper to harvest them there as compared to getting them on Earth.

If we find resources in quantities that are viable and if we can get a space elevator anchored to something at a Lagrange point and use a rail gun to shoot resources it might be worth it primarily to take advantage of the zero-g environment to take care of specialized manufacturing enhanced by zero-g environment. Even then unless you are using what you build in space you have to get it back down to Earth.

Vision is wonderful but it isn’t going to magic profit out of nothing. Well, I guess you could get profits. Launch a project to mine the moon, get a bunch of investment capital, run at a loss for years while insisting that it will become profitable at some point, then take the money you made, sell it off, and watch the enterprise go bust. Money can be made off of unprofitable things but there are ethical concerns in there somewhere as someone is generally left holding the bag.

Maybe something will change. A specific resource will skyrocket in value or there is something unique on the moon that is difficult to obtain on Earth which might make the whole thing viable but that is speculation. Until then I tend to trust the more conservative skeptical voices. I want moon mining to be viable. It is amazing. It is exciting. I am also aware I am not alone in this sentiment and a lot of other people have a vested interest in wanting to believe it will be viable. The argument that it is viable has been around for half a century and no one has proven it yet and I have not heard anyone propose what resources will be worthwhile to haul to Earth at the projected costs. Saying ‘it will get cheaper’ or ‘we will find something’ doesn’t convince me.

I want to believe but I don’t.

[The Nehor]

21 hours ago, Stargazer said:

Here we are in country where the poorest can afford to own automobiles, personal computers, smart phones, and all sorts of interesting products. Those with lower incomes can afford them very easily, because mass production makes that possible. And it isn't just our country. 

It is weird how these are redefined as luxuries when in most cases they are necessities if you want a job. Most can’t use public transit to get to and from work and good luck getting a job without a cell phone or trying to explain to your boss that you can’t receive texts or emails with work or schedule updates.

Reminds me of those “poor aren’t that poor” news reports from a few years back acting shocked at how most of the poor have refrigerators and microwaves.

Edited December 26, 2021 by The Nehor

[Calm]

2 hours ago, Moneymaking said:

they would be better off financially by keeping it. The other reason is because he and his wife are very generous. 

But is there any significant sacrifice by giving it away?  Is there any necessity they are doing without for a short time at least or risking by giving money away?

I am not saying it only means something if it puts one in a difficult situation to give.  We don’t donate at that level because we don’t want to take risks, especially given our daughter’s situation ,(we want her sitting very pretty when we can no longer take care of her because it does not appear she will ever be able to work and we don’t want her to be dependent on others’ choices for her).

But I will be honest and say I think it a great thing for anyone to donate and I will give anyone a pat on the back or even a hug if they do it for any reason besides protecting their money and control of money (added to clarify meaning they desire the money, not that they are thinking about a safety net for the future), it brightens my day hearing of such generosity; but I am only impressed when it is both done wisely (handing a beggar your last 20 bucks when you don’t know if they will spend it on drugs may hurt them rather than help, we should take the time to be sure our giving won’t  actually make things harder for someone or that we don’t need something more than they do as it is not right to put that burden on someone else by gift giving when you shouldn’t) and in such a way that it actually hurts, makes life significantly harder for the person giving (they give up the trip to go see their grandchild they have never seen and give the money to someone to buy a car they need for a new job, they have to make meals from scratch and don’t go out to restaurants or movies because they give generous fast offerings, etc.).

Edited December 26, 2021 by Calm

[Calm]

5 minutes ago, Moneymaking said:

Why does it have to be a “significant sacrifice” to be a good thing?

If you read the rest of my post, that is not what I said.

[The Nehor]

19 minutes ago, Moneymaking said:

Make sure you and your immediate family are taken care of first. Nothing worse than working and saving your way to retirement and finding you now have to pay all of mom and dad’s bills as well. Don’t ask me how I know- ha. 
 

Really though you should make sure you can finance your own care otherwise someone else will be writing the checks. 
 

Do whatever you want after that. Go on a mission, take fun trips with the wife, rent a beach house for the family to they can afford a nice vacation if they couldn’t otherwise. Donate time and funds to charities of your choice. Just don’t risk your future over worrying that some may not think you are giving away enough of your wealth.

The only exception is if God thinks you aren’t doing enough you may want to chat with Him over how to help people.

[The Nehor]

4 minutes ago, Moneymaking said:

I agree. The rest of us do not have much business wasting our time judging how their wealth is used. 

It is mostly a divergence. I may have started it with talking about wealth inequality but I was talking about systemic issues and not trying to argue that the ultra-wealthy do or do not use their wealth wisely. Some do, most don’t. Same with every other income class.

[Stargazer]

6 hours ago, The Nehor said:

I am aware of the possible uses of mass drivers and it is clever. The usual target for the payload though is one of the Lagrange points and not sending it back to Earth so you still need to get it down and still expensive.

I am not arguing it is impossible. It is very possible. We can do a lot of things. I am arguing it is unlikely to be economically viable if profit is the motive. Mining the moon is not beyond humanity’s capabilities. There are some engineering problems but they Making money doing it is not as easy or likely. We are not sure what quantity of resources there is on the moon (our earlier trips were not prospecting expeditions) so there may not be enough of value to bother with. Even if there are valuable resources there it is unlikely it will be cheaper to harvest them there as compared to getting them on Earth.

If we find resources in quantities that are viable and if we can get a space elevator anchored to something at a Lagrange point and use a rail gun to shoot resources it might be worth it primarily to take advantage of the zero-g environment to take care of specialized manufacturing enhanced by zero-g environment. Even then unless you are using what you build in space you have to get it back down to Earth.

Vision is wonderful but it isn’t going to magic profit out of nothing. Well, I guess you could get profits. Launch a project to mine the moon, get a bunch of investment capital, run at a loss for years while insisting that it will become profitable at some point, then take the money you made, sell it off, and watch the enterprise go bust. Money can be made off of unprofitable things but there are ethical concerns in there somewhere as someone is generally left holding the bag.

Maybe something will change. A specific resource will skyrocket in value or there is something unique on the moon that is difficult to obtain on Earth which might make the whole thing viable but that is speculation. Until then I tend to trust the more conservative skeptical voices. I want moon mining to be viable. It is amazing. It is exciting. I am also aware I am not alone in this sentiment and a lot of other people have a vested interest in wanting to believe it will be viable. The argument that it is viable has been around for half a century and no one has proven it yet and I have not heard anyone propose what resources will be worthwhile to haul to Earth at the projected costs. Saying ‘it will get cheaper’ or ‘we will find something’ doesn’t convince me.

I want to believe but I don’t.

OK, thanks for that. You were sounding like some kind of super-Luddite in previous posts. So you understand the engineering and economic problems, and doubt that they can be overcome. That's perfectly reasonable. I understand them, too, but feel they can be overcome. Maybe not quickly, but eventually.

As to running on empty, as it were, or at a loss, Amazon.com ran that way for some time before it got into profitability, and made its founder, Jeff Bezos, into a multi-billionaire. Of course there are plenty of failed enterprises as well.

The writer Jerry Pournelle once wrote a book of essays on these very issues. The title was "A Step Farther Out," and it was published in 1980, I believe. As a technologist and scientist, I felt that he had some kind of insight into the matter, and it was his opinion that we would eventually overcome the obvious problems.

[Stargazer]

3 hours ago, The Nehor said:

It is weird how these are redefined as luxuries when in most cases they are necessities if you want a job.

It used to be that they were luxuries. 

3 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Most can’t use public transit to get to and from work and good luck getting a job without a cell phone or trying to explain to your boss that you can’t receive texts or emails with work or schedule updates.

Reminds me of those “poor aren’t that poor” news reports from a few years back acting shocked at how most of the poor have refrigerators and microwaves.

And then there is the fact that most of the "poor" in the US are living like kings in comparison to the poor in certain other countries.

One of my great-great grandmothers grew up in northern California at first living in partially earthen lodges, pounded acorns on stone metates for food, and wore clothing made out of plant fibers harvested from the landscape. And then she married a man who came to California from Vermont, and learned to make bread from wheat grown on farms, wore clothing made from cloth manufactured in large mechanized factories, and when she died she died in a wood-framed house constructed by her husband from machine-cut lumber, forged metal nails and other hardware, and bricks. She went from the stone age to the modern age in a single lifetime. I don't know why I mention it, but sometimes I think of her transition and marvel at the changes she had in her life.

[Calm]

55 minutes ago, Moneymaking said:

Actually it is the very first sentence of your reply.

Which is why I clarified in the rest of the post exactly what I meant by that.