National, Regional and Local News

[ti-amie]

Just think - US rail service may enter the 20th century

That will be difficult... If someone were to ask my advice I'd propose to concentrate majority of the rail portion money to enhancing rail based public transport in the nations largest cities. Long distance intercity rail is cool, but only makes a lot of sense if there is good public transport in the destination.

That's why I was amazed that people thought that Mayor Pete's portfolio was a minor one. NYC's MTA is already salivating at the money it'll get to make improvements in our antiquated system. I expect folks in other cities are doing the same.

[Suliso]

If greater NYC were to get a huge amount of money (say 50 billion over 5 years) for enhancing transport what would you like to see them do?

[ti-amie]

Add light rail systems where needed in transportation deserts. Update the subway system and improve bus service so you don't wait 20m for a bus and then a caravan arrives.

It's the little things.

[JazzNU]

That's why I was amazed that people thought that Mayor Pete's portfolio was a minor one. NYC's MTA is already salivating at the money it'll get to make improvements in our antiquated system. I expect folks in other cities are doing the same.

Still incredibly minor. The size of South Bend is a postage stamp at best.

[mmmm8]

Designated bus-only lanes
Fix constantly breaking subway signals and maybe I could see consistently clean subway stations in my lifetime.

[Suliso]

No grander plans in your mind? Like new subway and commuter rail lines, replacing all subway cars older than 20 years etc.

[Deuce]

You're free to adopt vegan lifestyle. Us trying to convince each other further would be pointless.

^ Yet you persist...
Ok...

Something else - our ancestors became smarter to a large extent by consuming more meat.

^ Are you seriously saying that, without meat, their intelligence would have been stunted?!
The fact is that 'intelligence' has evolved in humans over time - and would have done so with or without eating meat, of course. I know several extremely intelligent vegetarians and vegans...
Back in the days of our ancestors, eating meat was a very common thing - more so than it is today, per capita. It was the thing to do. There were few people eating alternatively. Had the great majority been vegetarians back then, the level of intelligence would have evolved in the same manner over time.
Or perhaps intelligence would have evolved at a greater pace had the majority of our ancestors been vegetarians... "My refusing to eat flesh occasioned an inconvenience, and I was frequently chided for my singularity, but, with this lighter repast, I made the greater progress, for greater clearness of head and quicker comprehension." - Benjamin Franklin

'Intelligence' is also very subjective. Many would say that our 'intelligence' today is ruining the planet, because we use it so selfishly. And so how 'intelligent' are we, really?

Modern agriculture needs to be industrial to some extent. No way to feed 7 billion people otherwise. No doubt it could be taken in a very unhealthy direction (see all the junk food) if not properly regulated. Remember virtually everything (99%+) you touch or see or eat today is a product of modern industry directly or indirectly.

^ Junk food is in no way the only problem with food today. Not by a long shot.
And I reiterate that the majority of people voluntarily close their eyes to the negative consequences of many things - especially when they are complicit. Animal industrial farming is one such thing. Most people would be horrified if they saw what goes on. And they know this - so they deliberately don't look, and thus 'trick' their conscience into believing that A) it isn't happening, and B) they aren't responsible for it.
“You have just dined; and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in a graceful distance of miles, there is complicity.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Yet, here we are, living longer lives than ever, having to deal with obesity as opposed to starvation, having to deal with too many people as opposed to vanishing populations. The evils of modern agriculture.

^ The astronomical advances in medicine might have something to do with that.

"While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth?” ~ George Bernard Shaw

[ponchi101]

...

'Intelligence' is also very subjective. Many would say that our 'intelligence' today is ruining the planet, because we use it so selfishly. And so how 'intelligent' are we, really?

...

Yet, here we are, living longer lives than ever, having to deal with obesity as opposed to starvation, having to deal with too many people as opposed to vanishing populations. The evils of modern agriculture.

^ The astronomical advances in medicine might have something to do with that.

"While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered beasts, how can we expect any ideal conditions on this earth?” ~ George Bernard Shaw

We are pretty intelligent. I know that this is a common "last resource" by the existentialists, doubting our intellect yet, this discussion is taking place between several people that are located thousands of kilometers away from each other, simply because our intelligence and our ability to manipulate tiny electrons allows us to send our thoughts and ideas basically everywhere around the world. In less than 2,000 years, the dream of telepathy has been achieved tenfold. We cannot only send our thoughts, we can send what we see and what we hear. Somewhere beyond Pluto, a little box the size of a piano travels onwards, sending us images and data from billions of miles away. Not too shabby.
All this ties to the fact that we started to eat meat. The correlation is uncanny: Homo Erectus, with a cranial cavity of about 300CC, started to eat meat. Cranial cavities have expanded ever since, although right now they are decreasing a bit. You also only have to look at meso-American and Andean populations, with very little meat in their diets, and see their weights and sizes compared to African or Asia-European stock. The sizes are much more favorable to the meat/lactose eating groups.
One issue that vegetarians miss is simple: those same animals that Bernard Shaw is so sensitive about would have been killed by another carnivore. It is the fate of all animals in nature, "red in tooth and claw". With extremely few exceptions, until very recently every animal would die either by the claws and teeth of a bigger animal, or would be weakened by disease and, again, would die in the mouth of some other creature.
Another point that non-meat-eaters miss is that the animals that "accepted" domestication made a trade: their "domesticated" genes are in no danger of extinction because attaching yourself to that bipedal primate gave those same genes protection. Bovines, equines, canines and felines (the small ones) are under no risk of fading away, courtesy of their liaison with H. Sapiens. Zebras, basically impossible to domesticate, pale in numbers when compared to horses, domesticated a long time ago. Industrial agriculture is just one spoke of the wheel upon which our civilization rides.

Off Topic

It boils down to that simple question posed by Pinker: if you could chose what time and era you would be born, but not be able to chose the place, you would chose now. Every single civilization and culture of the 21st century is better off than any same group 200 years ago. Are we in nirvana? Of course not. But progress does not work that way. A few steps forward (or the graph inching upwards) maybe one back (the graph dips). But over the last 500 years, our progress has been phenomenal.
Yep, we are not that dumb. We are so smart, actually, that we can discuss the things that we do wrong, and take corrective actions. We have been getting better at that for a few centuries now. No need to throw everything overboard.

[Deuce]

We are pretty intelligent. I know that this is a common "last resource" by the existentialists, doubting our intellect yet, this discussion is taking place between several people that are located thousands of kilometers away from each other, simply because our intelligence and our ability to manipulate tiny electrons allows us to send our thoughts and ideas basically everywhere around the world. In less than 2,000 years, the dream of telepathy has been achieved tenfold. We cannot only send our thoughts, we can send what we see and what we hear. Somewhere beyond Pluto, a little box the size of a piano travels onwards, sending us images and data from billions of miles away. Not too shabby.

... And anyone can provide thousands of examples of how we use our so-called 'intelligence' for harmful means.
Yes, we have this wacky internet thing. But the internet has also produced a huge increase in the sexual exploitation of children, in youth suicides, it has helped terrorists recruit members... and on and on it goes.
The internet also spreads nonsense and lies more rapidly and to a much wider audience than ever before.
“Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end... We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate…. As if the main object were to talk fast and not to talk sensibly. We are eager to tunnel under the Atlantic and bring the Old World some weeks nearer to the New; but perchance the first news that will leak through into the broad, flapping American ear will be that the Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough.” - Henry Thoreau

It's so easy to isolate the positives of something - such as human intelligence - and neglect to mention the massive negatives associated with it, for the purpose of furthering an agenda.
You cannot isolate 'positive intelligence' from 'negative intelligence'. The fact is that human intelligence is responsible for many wonderful things. And it is also responsible for many negative and tragic things - because the intelligence is intertwined with selfishness, greed, and insecurity.

All this ties to the fact that we started to eat meat. The correlation is uncanny: Homo Erectus, with a cranial cavity of about 300CC, started to eat meat. Cranial cavities have expanded ever since, although right now they are decreasing a bit. You also only have to look at meso-American and Andean populations, with very little meat in their diets, and see their weights and sizes compared to African or Asia-European stock. The sizes are much more favorable to the meat/lactose eating groups.

^ This is a tired and typical argument of meat eaters - that it is healthier to eat meat than not to. There are millions of very healthy vegetarians on the planet - just as there are millions of unhealthy meat eaters. And you can point to studies which claim to 'prove' that meat eaters are healthier... And I can point to at least as many studies which 'prove' that vegetarians are healthier...
Yawn...
Maybe we'll have to decide this on the tennis court - you and I... We're about the same age, and we've both been playing for a long while. We have to set it up for a neutral location, where the weather does not advantage either one of us... and just play until one of us drops. This will then prove to the entire world which diet is healthiest.

"One farmer says to me, "You cannot live on vegetable food solely, for it furnishes nothing to make bones with"; and so he religiously devotes a part of his day to supplying his system with the raw material of bones; walking all the while he talks behind his oxen, which, with vegetable-made bones, jerk him and his lumbering plow along in spite of every obstacle." - Henry Thoreau

One issue that vegetarians miss is simple: those same animals that Bernard Shaw is so sensitive about would have been killed by another carnivore. It is the fate of all animals in nature, "red in tooth and claw". With extremely few exceptions, until very recently every animal would die either by the claws and teeth of a bigger animal, or would be weakened by disease and, again, would die in the mouth of some other creature.
Another point that non-meat-eaters miss is that the animals that "accepted" domestication made a trade: their "domesticated" genes are in no danger of extinction because attaching yourself to that bipedal primate gave those same genes protection. Bovines, equines, canines and felines (the small ones) are under no risk of fading away, courtesy of their liaison with H. Sapiens. Zebras, basically impossible to domesticate, pale in numbers when compared to horses, domesticated a long time ago. Industrial agriculture is just one spoke of the wheel upon which our civilization rides.

^ I don't think non meat eaters 'miss' anything - and I find that rather condescending on your part.
Animals kill other animals for survival. It is pure instinct. Humans (today) kill other animals for pleasure and financial profit. The pleasure is to the palate.
Human intelligence (speaking of which) has figured out how to survive without consuming animals. And so, it cannot be said that consuming animals is necessary for human survival. Not at all.

And, as mentioned, the manners in which we exploit and treat animals today is far worse than in yesteryear. There is no longer a respect for the animal. Industrial farming treats animals as inanimate objects, while they abuse and torture them, making them suffer horribly before the final kill. Because this is the most financially expedient way. Money - not respect or compassion - makes every decision in industrial farming.
And I refuse to contribute to that, simply.

Human beings love to deceive themselves. The huge majority buy their meat with the same lack of consciousness as they buy a box of crackers. Were people made to watch the entire process of how their meat got to the neatly packaged container they buy at the grocery store, they would have second thoughts. It's like garbage collection - people put their garbage out to the curb where a magic truck comes to take it away to nevernever land - as if it simply vanishes into thin air. No thought of landfills killing the planet, etc. Out of sight, out of mind - just like factory farming. But if people had to bury their garbage in their own back yard, you can bet your ass that people would produce much, much less garbage.
This self-deception, which humans are experts at, is a prime example of 'negative intelligence'.

"If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian." - Paul McCartney.
While I don't believe that everyone would be vegetarian if the ugly realities of slaughterhouses and factory farms were inescapable, I do believe that a large majority would be. Because I believe that compassion is an inherent human trait. I have seen many meat eaters literally run away, or become sick, when viewing what happens in a typical slaughterhouse. When not conveniently escaping the reality, and facing it instead, the majority of people - including the majority of meat eaters - are disgusted. Because of human compassion. This is precisely why they train themselves to not think about it; to deceive themselves to believe a pretty illusionary comfort rather than the ugly truth.
I view being a vegetarian or vegan as simply living consciously, with this intrinsic human compassion - without the self-deception of conveniently fooling ourselves that what is truly occurring in industrial animal farming isn't really happening, and without deceiving ourselves that we are somehow not complicit in what is happening in industrialized animal farming today.

Off Topic

It boils down to that simple question posed by Pinker: if you could chose what time and era you would be born, but not be able to chose the place, you would chose now. Every single civilization and culture of the 21st century is better off than any same group 200 years ago. Are we in nirvana? Of course not. But progress does not work that way. A few steps forward (or the graph inching upwards) maybe one back (the graph dips). But over the last 500 years, our progress has been phenomenal.
Yep, we are not that dumb. We are so smart, actually, that we can discuss the things that we do wrong, and take corrective actions. We have been getting better at that for a few centuries now. No need to throw everything overboard.

^ Not me. I'd have much preferred to live a few hundred years ago. While my life may have been shorter, and there would be far fewer conveniences, the overall quality of life would have been better in my view.

Yes, the human population is thriving. It’s too bad that the planet can’t support this many humans, though. Because, as the human population increases, the destruction of the planet also increases, proportionally. Our human ‘progress’, so called, comes at a huge cost.
As humans have taken more and more space on the planet, today, over 1 million plant and animal species are currently at severe risk of extinction.
Since 1970, the populations of birds, mammals, and reptiles have been reduced by 60%.
Extinction is now happening 100 times faster than the natural evolutionary rate.
And this all has severe consequences for every living thing - including us. But, of course, most humans voluntarily close their eyes to it, because it's uncomfortable to contemplate. And because we are complicit.

In any event, this is a silly "What if", as the question proposed by Pinker inherently attempts to slant the response in favour of the author's agenda.

[mmmm8]

No grander plans in your mind? Like new subway and commuter rail lines, replacing all subway cars older than 20 years etc.

For my personal needs, I need the subway (and commuter rail) to run on time, to not be disgusting, and to not be poisonous (https://www.cityandstateny.com/articles ... %20disease)

If they do these basics/necessities, they'll be out of money again.

[ti-amie]

It looks like the war on drugs missed some folks...
BTW people from Grosse Pointe do not say they're from Detroit. #justsaying

[ponchi101]

Sorry, but then these are dumb smugglers. Why would you want to send a fishing boat 100 miles offshore to pick up the drone? Do what the Mexican/Colombian cartels do: get the drone to smoothly sale towards the shore, run aground there, and then simply pick up the drugs with regular divers (heck, you don't even need scuba, if it has run aground you just need snorkels). The Colombian cartels have been using semi-submersible, fiberglass submarines for years. They pain them blue so they are almost invisible to aircrafts, the fiberglass gives them buoyancy and better stealth against radar, and because they are semi-submergible that are powered by standard diesel engines that give them very long range. The GPS thing by now is super common and cheap.
These guys went for overkill.

[JazzNU]

[ti-amie]

A deadly distraction from Gaetz Gate. A capitol police officer has been killed.

The driver of the car was shot and later died.

[ti-amie]