TBH,

You do trot out some rubbish.

Future private sector workers will fund a future public sector pension fund system that is more attractive that any that they will be able to access in the private sector.

You have this completely Ar$e about face.

You keep trying to persuade us how brilliant market mechanism are and pension provision in the private sector is governed by a market – that’s why bosses in the private sector have such amazing pensions (because they are irreplaceable, have to be paid the market rate etc etc.). You can’t have it both ways. 20 years ago when my wife started teaching I’m sure the whole pensions debate was very different. At that point private companies weren’t taking years off from making any contributions, or using their own pension funds to support their share prices. Just because the private sector has f****ed up it’s own pension arrangements doesn’t make it reasonable to hammer the public sector.

Far from the private sector being asked to unreasonably fund the public sector, what is actually happening is that the public sector is being asked to give up their agreed benefits to bail out the private sector.

Who say’s my answer is the “correct” one BTW?

The court didn’t think this was such a smart solution and sentenced the three survivors (including the captain – although I am not sure if he was a fat cat captain!!) to death, later commuted to a jail sentence.

I expect they got them on CCTV evidence.

Did you read this in the Daily Mail?

But if you are saying that all the 300,000 people who earn the top incomes have only done so because they have all abused a position of power, then that is simply silly. As silly as saying that all the people on low incomes are lazy.

Sometimes the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Risk and reward has been the foundation of society and a huge motivator in the development of society

True. But that was then. This is now.

Ok different scenario. You are now a doctor (NHS of course, no private sector bias here!!). You are in A&E and there are a range of patients that are in a critical way – one is in urgent need of a heart transplant, one needs blood and you have run out of supplies, one needs an new kidney, another a lung….(you see where I am going…)…All are about to die unless you do something now. And in cubicle 10, there is a healthy man with an ingrowing toe nail. On the same logic, are you tempted…..?

No, I’d kill the guy with the dodgy ticker and use his bits.

I thought you were the master of logic?

RPRT – we are both using hypothetical examples although mine was to make a point. I guess yours is more heartfelt.

No, I’d say my example was slightly more sensible than yours.

PS – I’d divert the train. Unless it was someone I knew of course.

THM,

Here’s a more typical example of how the rich get rich.

1. Would you like to live in a house or a hole in the ground?

2. Now, which bank would you like to borrow the money off?

3. Lets say Barclays.

4. So you borrow £100

5. You are now obliged to pay back £200

6. Lets say 1,000,000 other people do this.

7. Barclays have done rather well.

8. Nobody can complain, because it was all done voluntarily.

9. The people who work at Barclays are especially pleased, but they deserve to be because they are especially talented, and work really hard.

mashie,

Too many assumptions there for me I’m afraid.

Z11

Indeed! fair could quite easily be argued to be everyone paying an equal proportion of their income as tax. I’m yet to see anyone explain why this would be unfair…

I’ve tried.

Here it is again.

In our debt based economy money gets lent out by those who have it to those who don’t.

It has to be paid back with interest.

The only way for that to happen is for the economy to grow and for new money to be created.

As the cycle progresses those who made the loans end up with a higher proportion of the total wealth.

The rich get richer because they are rich.

edit: so we either change the system or redistribute through taxation.

2. I disagree that a one-dimensional “tax the rich bas****s” approach is the optimal solution

But don’t you think that even discussing (not us, people with influence) reducing taxes on the rich when 100,000 people are losing their jobs and many others are being asked wither to freeze or cut their pay (not to mention having their pensions slashed) is effectively giving 2 fingers to the majority of the population?

Sometimes I get the feeling people use words like ‘propaganda’, ‘fairness’, ‘right wing’ and so on, not becuase they know their definition, but because they have heard it through the socialist worker!

Is that right?

And which “people” did you have in mind specifically?

What a stupid comment.

The most important thing to learn from this thread is that new meccano is inherently not as good as old Meccano due to the cheap, coarse pitch, hex key bolts being inferior in every way to the fine pitch brass bolts of yore.

Thanks,

I knew I would eventually learn something useful if I hung around for long enough.

I’ve not expressed an opinion as to whether the 50p tax rate is effective or not – I merely flagged up in my OP that the BBC appeared to be doing some good propaganda for those who want to get rid of it.

And I’ve not said anything about elasticity of supply.

I have said (or certainly intimated) that I am in favour of radical redistribution of wealth because the current debt based economy has an inbuilt mechanism for concentrating wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer people that has very little to do with them “earning” it.

I have also pooh-poohed the undue respect given to economic growth as a measure of progress.

FWIW I’ve spent most of the day on PubMed looking at the research base for this stuff.

I look forward to your grovelling apology later on when you’ve had time to read some of it then.

I don’t read everything you say. I have a very short attention span and it is too busy thinking up something clever to say to read your posts properly.

Then can I have the last several hours of my life back please?

I thought you took this seriously. You were keen for me to give you some citations of papers you could go and read a minute ago.

Yes, but only while they were high on heroin.

I’m not trying to counter Dr Sigman’s views. As you point out, I haven’t read his book so I don’t know all his views.

I’m trying to support MSP’s point that content, rather than medium, is the important thing.

Then you are trying to counter Sigman’s views, because his view is that medium, rather than content, is the important thing.

I did point this out some time ago.

RPRT, your starting to have an almost religious zeal for Sigmans book, while ignoring anything that seems to disagree with its claims.

Not at all.

I just haven’t seen anything here to persuade me that he is wrong.

However, I note your attempt to discredit me by branding me as “religious”

Yes – hence why it backs up MSP’s point: it is about balance and filtering – not the medium. Do try to read my argument before attempting to dismiss it.

No it doesn’t.

You haven’t understood what you have quoted and why it does not counter the views put forward by Sigman.

The paper you quote seems to be saying that some programmes are better than others. It does not ask the question of whether any TV is better than no TV.

But the conclusion you draw is that the best thing for kids is “good quality” TV.

It does seem obvious than Sigman has cherry picked the data.

Not to me.

my general common sense when faced with a claim that Facebook causes cancer:

Ah yes. I believe that might have been an article in the Daily Hate? That wouldn’t automatically lead me to believe it was something that Dr Sigman said (or in fact that anyone said).

Because Goldacre says that Sigman is claiming things he isn’t claiming, then tries to shoot down the claims (that he didn’t make) – typical Straw Man stuff.

Watch the clip again.

Where did you get he idea that Dr Sigman had made any “dubious” claims BTW?

rightplacerighttime – so do you disagree with Dr Goldacre assertion that Dr Sigman is guilty of cherry picking evidence to back up his rather dubious claims?

Yes.

I think I might start a blog called “Bad Bad Science”

BTW – it is completely obvious even from the selected quote you have used in your second excerpt, that the paper is comparing different content, not making a comparison between viewing and not viewing

I know you are pretty anxious to show us how clever you are, but do try to read this stuff before you bung it up.

Graham,

You’ve found an article that appears to support your point of view – well done.

I’m not going to go and find one that supports mine. It would be pointless because I don’t claim to have sufficient background information and a knowledge of all (or for the terminally literate again, lets make that “much of“) the available literature. But I know a man who does!

Read the book.

The good thing about books like the one by Dr Sigman, is that it takes a whole load of scientific work and puts it into a context that a layperson can follow (although he does of course give lots of references).

To me this is more useful than batting back and forth selective quotes and individual references, which frankly I don’t have the time or more importantly the inclination to do.

Like I said, I read the book and found it compelling. You prefer not to read the book but to argue that it must be wrong.

I think you are pretty shortsighted in your approach, but there you go.

austin,

I’ve seen it before.

That’s exactly what it sounded like. Yes.
I’m sure your point was far subtler tho – perhaps I’m over-analysing.

OK then, for the terminally literal.

The point I was making was one I’d made earlier, which is that just because kids appear to be enjoying something, it doesn’t mean that it is doing them good.

Foolishly I rather assumed that everyone here would realise that heroin ISN’T generally regarded as a good thing for small children.

bazookajoe,

It’s not about judging individual parents, but when experts make rigorous studies of childhood development, doesn’t it make sense to try and spread their findings around?

I know I have the best intentions for my kids, but that doesn’t mean I’m not interested in hearing how I might do better by them.

there is an inevitable trade-off between redistribution and incentives. Greater redistribution will generally reduce economic efficiency.

I don’t take issue with this. What I take issue with is whether economic efficiency is as important as social cohesion.

But even in economic terms the argument is flawed because it fails to take into account (because it can’t) the economics of things like rioting.

Unfortunately “fairness” can’t be measured, but I think most people know it when they see it.

If you go back and edit big chunks into your posts I might miss something important :wink:

Are you really saying that loddrik might as well have given heroin to his daughter? That really is an infeasibly high horse you’re riding.

Do I really have to spell out everything I say in words of one syllable?

Do you really think I might be saying that an ipod is directly equivalent to heroin?

I’m suggesting that, contrary to the trite saying, one can look at the cover (and author) and judge a book.

And you think this applies to authors that you have never heard of before?

Are you recommending “Being Jordan” to me as a good read?

my 5 yr old daughter got an iPod Touch last christmas (bought off here in fact), she absolutely loves it, she has loads of games, talking books, music etc on it. Doesn’t detract in any way from the usual 5 yr olds toys. Before she got it she was always on mine and the wife’s iPhones, a bit like our 22 month old daughter does now.

my 5 yr old daughter got some heroin last christmas (bought off here in fact), she absolutely loves it, she has loads of mind altering experiences etc on it. Doesn’t detract in any way from the usual 5 yr olds toys. Before she got it she was always on mine and the wife’s heroin, a bit like our 22 month old daughter does now.

My point was rather that his other books sound like a broadside of self-help pop-psychology pulp.

But then of course, you are judging them entirely by their covers?

Somehow the FT managed to cover the IFS report without mentioning the 50p tax rate.

FT article

And yet the Torygraph came up with the headline “50p tax rate ‘costing Treasury £500m'” for its coverage.

Funny that, eh?

Well done Graham, you’ve persuaded me with your ability to nitpick and over-analyse a few selected words that the entire book I read must have been complete crap.

Obviously the fact that Dr Sigman has written some other books means that he can’t really have been concentrating when he wrote this one, and the fact that he is…

“a Fellow of the Society of Biology, an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, a recipient of the Chartered Scientist award from the Science Council and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine. He recently addressed the European Parliament Working Group on the Quality of Childhood in the European Union in Brussels, on the impact of electronic media. Dr Sigman addressed this year’s Headmasters’ & Headmistresses’ Conference: Meeting the Challenges.” (admittedly from his own website : proably lies)

… just shows how easily people can be taken in.

Thanks for bringing “balance” back into my life.

Graham, did you come here for the full half hour?

I would imagine your kids would prefer to be playing CoD on their gaming rigs

What’s CoD?

You have a point.

But not a very good one.

I expect that my kids would also prefer eating chocolate and marshmallows at every meal and never going to school too…

… so it’s a good job they’ve got two responsible adults looking after them and encouraging them to do things that will help them develop into happy, healthy, intelligent and thoughtful adults themselves.