[ExI] The Thirty Meter Telescope is now officially dead

[John Clark]

On Sun, Dec 29, 2019 at 7:09 PM ddraig at pobox.com <ddraig at gmail.com> wrote:


> > *None of us are sticking up for the mob,*
>

Bullshit. You're crying about past injustices, most centuries old, and
somehow think that wailing will magically help get the telescope built. It
won't.

> we're saying that ignoring the wishes of the people present is foolish.
>

If the wishes of the people of Hawaii were followed that magnificent
telescope would have been completed several years ago and be increasing our
storehouse of knowledge of half the universe right now because 77%
supported building it and only 15% opposed it. I admit that if you only
count native Hawaiians the approval rate was lower, among them* *only** 72%
wanted the telescope to be built.

Poll shows strong public support for Thirty Meter Telescope
<https://www.westhawaiitoday.com/2018/03/26/hawaii-news/poll-shows-strong-public-support-for-thirty-meter-telescope/>


But just as in the electoral college sometimes the majority or even the
plurality don't get their way. And although I'm sure they wish they could
there was no way the astronomers could ignore the wishes of the minority of
Hawaiians in that mindless mob marching up that mountain with blood in
their eye. And in the end all the mobs wishes came true and everybody lived
happily ever after, except for the scientists, and the majority of
residents in the state of Hawaii, and all rational people everywhere.


> > *None of us would be on the Extropians list if we did not support the
> building of the telescope.*
>

You'd think so wouldn't you, but funny things happen on this list. I once
thought nobody on this list would support a candidate who opposes
libertarian ideas like free trade or doing whatever you want with your own
body or was in favor of banning anti-libertarian things like end to end
encryption, but it turned out I was entirely wrong.

>> That line was about property rights and implied that landowners have the
>> right to do whatever they want with their land including not allowing
>> telescopes to be built there.
>
>
>
> *> Which they do.  Although it turns out that the mob does not own the
> land, which makes it even more stupid. *


Yes, stupid indeed. The question of who has the legal right to build on
that land turned out to be completely irrelevant because a mob of idiots
made sure that the rule of law can not prevail on that mountain. And
because the law is irrelevant I did not wish to debate the finer points
about what the law has to say about land ownership.

 >* Unfortunately, the mob has sway locally, *


Has sway locally... what a pleasant lovely sounding way to say that the
rule of law has broken down and the dark anti-enlightenment forces have
won.


> >> I cut off that line because I did not wish to debate it, and I did not
>> wish to debate it because it is IRRELEVANT.
>>
>
> *> Really?*
>

Yes really.

*> So the telescope is going to be built?*
>

No.


> >> And in no shape way or form do you agree with me. Every defender of
>> that evil ignorant anti-science anti-enlightenment mob has the same basic
>> mantra, "it would be nice if the telescope could be built *BUT* ..."
>>
>
> > NONE OF US ARE AGREEING WITH THE MOB- we are attempting to *understand*
> the mob,
>

I know. And if you are successful at the end of your long deliberations
you'll be able to understand why the mob is ignorant evil and stupid. But
after that you're right back to square one where you started because the
mob will be just as ignorant evil and stupid as they were before you
started to think about them. You seem to think it's the astronomers fault
for not casting some sort of magical spell that would have pacified the
protestors, but they were offered all sorts of compromises but the mob,
sensing total victory, saw no reason to compromise so they rejected them
all. I don't know what more the astronomers could have done without
resorting to animal tranquilizers.

>
> *> I understand why people on the list call you a troll.  you are a troll.*
>

Then Mr.Newbie I am the internet's longest living troll because I've been
on this list for close to a quarter of a century. Do you really think I'd
write a post about things I didn't believe in just to get the goat of a
silly pissant like you?


> >>That's not politics that's just crime.
>>
>
> *> It's all much the same.*
>

People like to say stuff like that because they think it makes them seem
street smart, worldly-wise, but I think it just makes them look dumb. What
you say in the above is not a skeptical view it is a cynical view and the
two things are opposites. A cynic believes in nothing he hears, and that is
closely related to a very naive person who believes everything he hears
because neither view requires any brain power whatsoever. But a skeptic
believes some things he hears but not others, and for that you need a brain.

>>>*No, it does not at all.  The American Revolution was illegal. *
>>>
>>
>> >>Illegal under one set of laws and legal or even mandatory under other
>> sets.
>>
>
> > Which sets?
>

I'm not sure I know what you mean by that question, I presume you want an
example, well the obvious one that I would have thought you could find on
your own would be the set of rules that existed in America in 1775 versus
the set in 1776. Another example would be England in the16'th and 17'th
century where things kept switching back and forth, for a while Catholicism
was mandatory and Protestantism was illegal and then a few years later
Protestantism was mandatory and Catholicism was illegal.


> *> Now you are going to spout some freedom rubbish when it was really
> about a small group of middle-class people not wanting to pay taxes.*
>

I think you're confusing me with a Trump suporter; I know you're new but if
you ask around you'll find that I'm not exactly the world's biggest fan of
that man.

*> Power comes from the barrel of a gun. *
>

So why did you complain that I didn't want to debate the finer points of
property rights if the only thing that matters is who has the bigger gun?


> > *Unfortunately the mob had the numbers and so the telescope was
> cancelled.*
>

The mob did NOT have the numbers, but they did have the bigger gun, and if
you've got that and the rule of law breaks down then you win.

> *Again - I'm fairly sure everyone on the list feels this was a bad idea,
> but* [...]
>

And there we have the same basic mantra again "it would be nice if the
telescope could have been built *BUT*"

*> unlike you, we are making an attempt to get our head around why it
> happened,*
>

It's no great mystery, it happened because evil stupid people prevailed. We
can speculate but it's impossible to know for certain what historic factors
conspired to make them evil and stupid and, unless you had access to a time
machine, it wouldn't help in the slightest even if you could pinpoint the
exact cause because they'd still be evil and stupid.


>
> *> what is needed is people with more of a clue about politics than you to
> counter-organise.*
>

And yet you support this list's radical new policy (at one time not so long
ago it was intensely political) of ignoring the elephant in the room. You
want to talk about political theory but don't want to talk about testing
how well those very abstract theories work in the real world. I would
humbly suggest that too many people talk about hole theory when they don't
know how to actually dig a hole.


> *> Perhaps I should just work on killfiling the obviously stupid people on
> the list*
>

EXCELLENT IDEA! I'm a libertarian so I'm not going to put a gun to your
head and make you read what I write. You think I'm stupid so just don't
read what I write. Problem solved. As for me I've never killfiled anyone in
my life and I think a few have been even stupider than you, but that's just
my preference and there is no debating matters of taste.

John K Clark
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