On November 12 2009 02:32 lOvOlUNiMEDiA wrote: QibingZero, my friend,
Your understanding of Nietzsche's project is limited. His primary target was not Christians -- they were simply a symptom of the root cause --Pessimists-- (the pinnacle of pessimism was Schopenhauer). If you look at Nietzsche's work this will be clear. Or you can look to academic works like C. Janaway's "Willing and Nothingness" which lay out this connection baldly.
I discuss your "what if you were born as the weak one" example earlier. My reply is, "but I'm not." Your reply is "that's because your lucky." My reply is, "Fine. What's your point?" Your reply is "But it's not fair!" My reply is, " What does fairness have to do with it? Of course the weak ones will appeal to "fairness" It is their strongest move! They find themselves in a position of weakness and are left with no recourse but to damn strength! Of course I agree it would suck to be weak. Thus, I'll do all I can to stay strong!"
To be fair to QibingZero, some among the "Strong" will also appeal to the idea of fairness to direct the schadenfreude of the weak against the rivals of said "Strong." You will often find that it's best for any "Strong" to at least bribe some of the weak into being allies. Perhaps that's compassion? Perhaps it's just self-interest.
I do like the way you think though. Very interesting to see people study more philosophy. I sort of wished to have done it myself but that inclination never struck me while in school.
On November 12 2009 02:32 lOvOlUNiMEDiA wrote: QibingZero, my friend,
Your understanding of Nietzsche's project is limited. His primary target was not Christians -- they were simply a symptom of the root cause --Pessimists-- (the pinnacle of pessimism was Schopenhauer). If you look at Nietzsche's work this will be clear. Or you can look to academic works like C. Janaway's "Willing and Nothingness" which lay out this connection baldly.
I discuss your "what if you were born as the weak one" example earlier. My reply is, "but I'm not." Your reply is "that's because your lucky." My reply is, "Fine. What's your point?" Your reply is "But it's not fair!" My reply is, " What does fairness have to do with it? Of course the weak ones will appeal to "fairness" It is their strongest move! They find themselves in a position of weakness and are left with no recourse but to damn strength! Of course I agree it would suck to be weak. Thus, I'll do all I can to stay strong!"
To be fair to QibingZero, some among the "Strong" will also appeal to the idea of fairness to direct the schadenfreude of the weak against the rivals of said "Strong." You will often find that it's best for any "Strong" to at least bribe some of the weak into being allies. Perhaps that's compassion? Perhaps it's just self-interest.
I do like the way you think though. Very interesting to see people study more philosophy. I sort of wished to have done it myself but that inclination never struck me while in school.
Agreed. Another application of strength. Who would deny that Christianity -- the morality of ---meekness--- has been among the ----strongest---- institutions ever?
On November 11 2009 21:20 lOvOlUNiMEDiA wrote: The argument put forth for socialized health-care are, basically, (1) it works [[whatever that means]] and//or (2) it is immoral to let a sick person die if they can be (for a "reasonable price" -- government health-care has to limit treatment because, for example, with a billion dollars the government can keep someone in better health than it can with one million, or one-hundred thousdand etc etc.) treated.
Fortunately for me, I'm only interested in socialized health-care if it it is the strongest option.
Is it "wrong" to let someone die if one dollar would heal them? Not if I have other plans for the dollar!
Why?
There is no such thing as a "right" or "wrong" and, thus, letting poor people die, starve, etc. may be "mean" (whatever that means) but it's not "wrong."
Likewise, murder, incest, rape, etc. etc. are not "wrong" either.
The closest thing to "right" is being the strongest. Let's explore this notion:
What is implicit in the "everyone has a right to healthcare" view is a statement like "you wouldn't like that (dying because of an easily treatable disease//injury) if you were poor would you?"
But that is just to say "it sure would suck to be poor!" I don't know of any who disagrees. When someone tells me that I ask, instead, "But if I were rich, i wouldn't want to give my money to those who are poor, unless it makes me stronger!"
The reply is always, "Yes, but just a little bit of your money can save their life!" So what? What do I care for their life? The only reason to save their life is if it increases my power!
Then the reply is, "Yes, but that way of living will get you crushed! Your view of things will lead to the crumbling of society!" Aha! You've just endorsed my point. You are saying that I should want national health-care, or a pity-based morality, because a "might makes right" view leads to my destruction. But that is just to say that I should care about "morality" because if I don't I will be crushed. But that means that your advice to me is simply: do what doesn't get you crushed! That is, you agree that morality's fundamental directive to me is "Be Strong!"
I'd be the first to concede that in human affairs, being strong means working together. But that doesn't mean that a strong society saves the weak. A strong society might kill the weak. It might ship them away. It might use them for experiments. The point here is simply that "strength" is a scientific concept that has to be researched. It could be that a "strong" society won't experiment on it's own members because that would cause it to eventually collapse. Etc. Etc. That's why knowledge, philosophy (the foundation of knowledge), mathematics, physics, biology, chemistry, psychology, sociology, history and political science are so important. In the human world, knowledge is power. But knowledge is always embodied.
The upshot is that this way of approaching morality avoids all the hysterical screeching from weaklings whose only strategy for survival is to make the strong think that strength is evil.
Interesting. It has been quite some time since I have seen someone declare so openly and with such clarity that they are quite simply a deeply unpleasant human being.
Ha Ha, Such Philosophical Harshness is refreshing. I would suggest, Arb, that you pay heed to the edited version of his post and actually look up what Nietzschean philosophy entails (Nietzche is my favorite philosopher because of his non-dogmatism and the sheer insight of his views).
Such a philosophy is basically undercuts "You should".
The point is that normative statements are vacuous, often borne of the psychological make up of the individual who makes such declarations, you are in essence arguing over nothing these past however many pages.
Nietzsche' philosophy is not out and out egoist because he despises pity, it is rather a call to replace "You should" with "I will" (as in "I will it so").
I think 2 quotes sum up his philosophy for me (of course there is no 1 single interpretation of Nietzsche that would be patently missing the point).
"The noble man also helps the unfortunate, but not (or hardly) out of pity, but rather from an impulse generated by the super-abundance of power" Beyond Good and Evil.
"The way? This is now my way. Where is your? Thus answered I those that asked me "the way". For the way, it does not exist" Thus Spake Zarathustra.
Oh, I am quite familiar with Neitzschean philosophy, I just think it has very little weight.
Raimond Gaita once told me that he thought the most appropriate response to a true utilitarian was "a kind of urbane condescension". I think a similar response is appropriate for anyone who endorses the kind of "ethic" under discussion here, to be honest.
Once again there is a healthcare thread on TL, and once again the same stupid arguments are posted without a shred of actual evidence supporting them. Previous thread on TL regarding healthcare can be found here and here. Note that the arguments posted in the previous threads (particularly those supported by peer-reviewed study) have never been rebutted by those arguing against public healthcare. The reality is that the US spends far more on healthcare as a function of GDP compared to every other nation on the planet! And it's not a small difference either. Compared to Canada, they spend 50% more relative to their GDP. Furthermore, the US also restricts access to their health services by having people unable to afford basic coverage or by using the wonderful word "Denied!" even if you do have coverage.
Now one would think that there would be a positive output on their healthcare. After all, the US isn't spending a little extra on their healthcare, they're spending a gigantic fucking huge amount more. There should be some positive output, right? Yet, for all the dollars pumped into the system, they can't cover their entire population. Checking some basic health metrics such as life expectancy and infant mortality we see that there is a vast difference between the US trails horribly the behind the rest of the developed world. 50th in life expectancy. 45th in infant mortality.
Now when those that defend the US healthcare model (or some totally unregulated free-market model) are confronted with these facts will appeal to the US being special. However, there are no credible peer-reviewed studies that support this notion. None whatsoever. The US has its share of issues to contend with, but so does every other nation and there are certainly no reasons to account for the significant difference between US healthcare expenditure compared to the rest of the world. So where is all this money supposed to be going? You spend more. You cover less. You get worse outcomes. Surely the money must be going somewhere, right?
NEJM wrote: A system with multiple insurers is also intrinsically costlier than a single-payer system. For insurers it means multiple duplicative claims-processing facilities and smaller insured groups, both of which increase overhead. Fragmentation also raises costs for providers who must deal with multiple insurance products — at least 755 in Seattle alone — forcing them to determine applicants’ eligibility and to keep track of the various copayments, referral networks, and approval requirements. Canadian physicians send virtually all bills to a single insurer. A multiplicity of insurers also precludes paying hospitals a lump-sum, global budget. Under a global-budget system, hospitals and government authorities negotiate an annual budget based on past budgets, clinical performance, and projected changes in services and input costs. Hospitals receive periodic lump-sum payments (e.g. 1/12 of the annual amount each month).
The existence of global budgets in Canada has eliminated most billing and minimized internal cost accounting, since charges do not need to be attributed to individual patients and insurers. Yet fragmentation itself cannot explain the upswing in administrative costs in the United States since 1969, when costs resembled those in Canada. This growth coincided with the expansion of managed care and market-based competition, which fostered the adoption of complex accounting and auditing practices long standard in the business world.
Claims that the free market is more efficient doesn't seem to be reflected in the data. But it gets more interesting.
If we look at how health insurance premiums have changed over 2002-2007, we see that they've increase by 78%. That's a big fucking increase and certainly doesn't match inflation or wage increases. Given such a massive increase in price, can you honestly believe it's because of market efficiency? Doesn't this make you ask questions about the system? Wouldn't you think that you'd get a lot more service if you were paying 80% more?
But surely there must be some positive output, right? With all those profits being recorded by pharmaceutical companies, shouldn't we see big investments into R&D to develop new cures, right? Well, looking at the data:
The Public Library of Science wrote: From this new estimate, it appears that pharmaceutical companies spend almost twice as much on promotion as they do on R&D. These numbers clearly show how promotion predominates over R&D in the pharmaceutical industry, contrary to the industry's claim.
Behold the triumph of the US healthcare system:
The viagra commercial!
But it gets worse. The number one selling drug in 2004 was Lipitor. "But Syntax Lost," I hear you cry, "What does Lipitor do?" Well, I'm glad you asked. Lipitor used for fighting high cholesterol. But hang on, high cholesterol is almost always a by-product of lifestyle. This is not curing the disease at all. You can't cure a bad lifestyle with drugs. What this does is enable people to continue a bad lifestyle. Seriously, where does the moral hazard lie if this is the inevitable result of your healthcare system? Pharmaceutical companies are going to chase wherever the profits lie, and there is little question what types of drugs they're going to aim for given the enormous success of lifestyle drugs like Lipitor.
If a moral hazard does indeed lie in public healthcare, then certainly this should show up in the statistics associated with countries that operate with such a system, right? But where are the peer-reviewed studies to support such a notion.
Heck, even when we look at the US and look at programmes like Medicaid and SCHIP we see that:.
The article wrote: People who disenroll from Medicaid or SCHIP programs as a result of programmatic changes are not likely to replace public program insurance with private commercial insurance, because it is unlikely that people who live near the poverty level will be able to afford the premiums that are associated with private commercial health insurance.
[...]
Most states make programmatic changes in their Medicaid/SCHIP programs in an effort to decrease their costs for these programs. However, this study demonstrates that programmatic changes that result in disenrollment actually increase the total health care costs for the community. Most of the health care costs for the uninsured are paid by federal and state governments through Medicare and Medicaid in the form of disproportionate share hospital adjustments and indirect medical education payments in addition to other federal programs, such as funding for community health centers and the Maternal and Child Health Bureau. Indeed, federal and state funds have been estimated to cover 87% of the total costs of uncompensated care.11 Potential savings from programmatic changes in Medicaid/SCHIP also are offset by increased Medicaid medically needy spending, increased tax subsidies to private insurance, and increased costs that are associated with uncompensated care. In a previous analysis of Medicaid disenrollment in an agricultural community, we concluded that 10% disenrollment would increase the number of uninsured children by 21% and increase the community’s health care costs as a result of a shift in sites of care from less expensive ambulatory office sites to more expensive [emergency department]s and increased hospitalizations.
Seriously, how can anybody who reads this sort of study honestly be against public healthcare in the US? The data here very clearly shows that such programmes represent an overall decrease in cost in healthcare so it's not like you're going to end up paying more for it. You get fewer hospitalisation, better care at lower cost since you're able to shift the cost burden to less expensive alternatives. People that argue that they don't want to pay for others healthcare miss the picture in two big ways:
1. You're going to depend on healthcare sooner or later. You simply can't avoid it. Be it an accident, pregnancy, a sick spouse, child or relative--at some point, you or someone very close to you is going to have to depend on the healthcare infrastructure. 2. You're already paying for other's healthcare through your premiums, additional costs, interest rates.
TanGeng wrote: The biggest moral hazard in insurance isn't this part of socialization, but the insurance rate. The higher the insurance rate for health care the more likely people are going to in for silly unnecessary check up. This instance of moral hazard leads people to overuse healthcare. This effect is well documented.
In times like this, I like to quote the immortal blue words of Wikipedia:
"Citation needed."
TanGeng wrote: Now if insurance companies could discriminate based on lifestyle, then it's probably that the company could charge those individuals higher insurance premiums than non-smokers. Then, the smokers would faced with an additional cost for smoking, and that would be incentive to quit. It would also be an incentive not to start. All of this works on the margins, and you aren't going to get a controlled study that will provide definitive meaning conclusions. The statistics can always be massaged to suit the sponsor of the study. I've found conflicting scientific studies out there on various topics, so if that logic and example isn't enough, then I won't convince you.
Bwahahahaha! Simple translation: "This works because I say so. I have no real evidence to support my claims. I'm just going to claim studies posted in peer-reviewed journals are all false and hope nobody notices how ridiculous this claim actually is."
The reality would be that these statistics would be too difficult to find considering that statistics concerning cost smokers incur on companies does exist and it turns out they cost $2000 per employee per year.
TanGeng wrote: Dietary. US is one of the countries that consumes high-fructose corn syrup to a sickening degree. The rest of the word uses can sugar which is far more healthy.
Canadians also consume similar amounts of corn syrup. But the difference in health outcomes aren't small, they're huge. You're going to need an awful lot of corn syrup to make up the difference
Preterm birth. US has much higher preterm birth rates. For reasons that I won't go into, it looks like infant mortality is unexpectly higher.
Let's look into this more closely, shall we? According to the CDC, the occurrence of pre-term births in 2005 was 12.7%. Furthermore, they estimate that 68.6% of infant mortality is a result of pre-term births. The infant mortality itself is estimated to be 6.26 per 1000 live births in 2009. Now assuming that there is very little change in the statistics between 2005 and 2009 we can estimate that the pre-term contribution to infant mortality is 4.29 per 1000 live births. Consequently the mortality for term and post-term infants is 1.97 per 873 live births, or 2.25 per 1000.
The statistics for Canada show that the pre-term birth rate is about 8.1% in 2006/2007. They also estimate that 75% of infant deaths are a consequence of pre-term. This means of 5.04 infant deaths per 1000 live births, 3.78 are from pre-term births. Consequently the infant mortality rate for term and post-term infants is approximately 1.26 per 919 live births, or 1.37 per 1000.
The US has 65% greater infant mortality if you want to ignore pre-term infants! Want to continue with this line of reasoning?
Furthermore, it's important to note the huge difference between pre-term births between Canada and the US. Could it be because Canadians simply have better access to healthcare, again that's helping with this issue?
On November 11 2009 23:51 Not_A_Notion wrote: Edit, ooh took the bait, so I will repost
On November 11 2009 22:40 Arbiter[frolix] wrote:
On November 11 2009 21:20 lOvOlUNiMEDiA wrote: The argument put forth for socialized health-care are, basically, (1) it works [[whatever that means]] and//or (2) it is immoral to let a sick person die if they can be (for a "reasonable price" -- government health-care has to limit treatment because, for example, with a billion dollars the government can keep someone in better health than it can with one million, or one-hundred thousdand etc etc.) treated.
Fortunately for me, I'm only interested in socialized health-care if it it is the strongest option.
Is it "wrong" to let someone die if one dollar would heal them? Not if I have other plans for the dollar!
Why?
There is no such thing as a "right" or "wrong" and, thus, letting poor people die, starve, etc. may be "mean" (whatever that means) but it's not "wrong."
Likewise, murder, incest, rape, etc. etc. are not "wrong" either.
The closest thing to "right" is being the strongest. Let's explore this notion:
What is implicit in the "everyone has a right to healthcare" view is a statement like "you wouldn't like that (dying because of an easily treatable disease//injury) if you were poor would you?"
But that is just to say "it sure would suck to be poor!" I don't know of any who disagrees. When someone tells me that I ask, instead, "But if I were rich, i wouldn't want to give my money to those who are poor, unless it makes me stronger!"
The reply is always, "Yes, but just a little bit of your money can save their life!" So what? What do I care for their life? The only reason to save their life is if it increases my power!
Then the reply is, "Yes, but that way of living will get you crushed! Your view of things will lead to the crumbling of society!" Aha! You've just endorsed my point. You are saying that I should want national health-care, or a pity-based morality, because a "might makes right" view leads to my destruction. But that is just to say that I should care about "morality" because if I don't I will be crushed. But that means that your advice to me is simply: do what doesn't get you crushed! That is, you agree that morality's fundamental directive to me is "Be Strong!"
I'd be the first to concede that in human affairs, being strong means working together. But that doesn't mean that a strong society saves the weak. A strong society might kill the weak. It might ship them away. It might use them for experiments. The point here is simply that "strength" is a scientific concept that has to be researched. It could be that a "strong" society won't experiment on it's own members because that would cause it to eventually collapse. Etc. Etc. That's why knowledge, philosophy (the foundation of knowledge), mathematics, physics, biology, chemistry, psychology, sociology, history and political science are so important. In the human world, knowledge is power. But knowledge is always embodied.
The upshot is that this way of approaching morality avoids all the hysterical screeching from weaklings whose only strategy for survival is to make the strong think that strength is evil.
Interesting. It has been quite some time since I have seen someone declare so openly and with such clarity that they are quite simply a deeply unpleasant human being.
Ha Ha, Such Philosophical Harshness is refreshing. I would suggest, Arb, that you pay heed to the edited version of his post and actually look up what Nietzschean philosophy entails (Nietzche is my favorite philosopher because of his non-dogmatism and the sheer insight of his views).
Such a philosophy is basically undercuts "You should".
The point is that normative statements are vacuous, often borne of the psychological make up of the individual who makes such declarations, you are in essence arguing over nothing these past however many pages.
Nietzsche' philosophy is not out and out egoist because he despises pity, it is rather a call to replace "You should" with "I will" (as in "I will it so").
I think 2 quotes sum up his philosophy for me (of course there is no 1 single interpretation of Nietzsche that would be patently missing the point).
"The noble man also helps the unfortunate, but not (or hardly) out of pity, but rather from an impulse generated by the super-abundance of power" Beyond Good and Evil.
"The way? This is now my way. Where is your? Thus answered I those that asked me "the way". For the way, it does not exist" Thus Spake Zarathustra.
Oh, I am quite familiar with Neitzschean philosophy, I just think it has very little weight.
Raimond Gaita once told me that he thought the most appropriate response to a true utilitarian was "a kind of urbane condescension". I think a similar response is appropriate for anyone who endorses the kind of "ethic" under discussion here, to be honest.
It's funny that you mention Gaita because I read some of his work several months ago. His fundamental point is, something like, "The weak should not be preyed upon." Sadly, he, like all moral philosophers who defend a similar view, can never give an adequate justification of why. This goes hand in hand with their emotion-filled damnation of those who don't buy their moral code. I couldn't have chosen a better example of slave morality.
This is the problem -- what "standard" is used to describe someones techne as "good" or even a "techne" at all.
No it isn't. If you know what the greek concept of 'good' meant at the time, you'd know it was more akin to "this is a good knife" than "this is a good person". An art was a practical body of knowledge and one's proficiency in it was how 'good' he was in it.
So when you say:
You are certainly right that a skilled basketball player may fail to market himself --- but we are only speaking of the strength of his basketball skill -- not the strength of his marketing ability.
You admit that ruling and profiting from ruling are not the same Techne, which you stated was the 'flaw' in the argumentation.You have already accepted premises which completely dismantle your original objection.
When it comes to individuals and nations --- I'm arguing that entities that can be destroyed by other entities are "wrong."
If that's so, then everything material is 'wrong'. Nothing escapes decay or entropy. If you relate this concept to the theory of the forms, then everything is also right: the form/eidos of any object is indestructible because its a purely intellectual concept. The form of a chair is 'right' while every instantiation of chairs are 'wrong'? Your premise here is obviously false by reductio ad absurdum unless you again qualify right and wrong to mean something other than the moral suasion that was originally proposed, which means your original argument fails yet again.
So here we reach the end of the road where you acknowledge that you've purposely been using terms to mean multiple things and trying to profit from the confusion between unlike terms. Strength isn't being defined, right isn't being defined, wrong isn't being defined. In every subsequent post you revise your base premises too like here:
My position is that the norms that govern the use of force are the product of evolution
No, that's not what you said prior. You said right = strength, not that our common perception of rights regarding force are the product of evolution. I'd agree with the second statement, and not with the first.
Thus, the standard for "right" and "wrong" (for individuals and institutions) should be strong -- meaning (definition): best fit to survive.
This doesn't even flow logically from your premise. At best your evolution premise sets out that being 'fit' in the evolutionary sense is a requirement for being right given competition between different codes that form the basis of 'right', which is something else I'd agree with. It does not, however, make strength the source of 'rightness' it simply notes a relationship between the two.
On November 11 2009 23:51 Not_A_Notion wrote: Edit, ooh took the bait, so I will repost
On November 11 2009 22:40 Arbiter[frolix] wrote:
On November 11 2009 21:20 lOvOlUNiMEDiA wrote: The argument put forth for socialized health-care are, basically, (1) it works [[whatever that means]] and//or (2) it is immoral to let a sick person die if they can be (for a "reasonable price" -- government health-care has to limit treatment because, for example, with a billion dollars the government can keep someone in better health than it can with one million, or one-hundred thousdand etc etc.) treated.
Fortunately for me, I'm only interested in socialized health-care if it it is the strongest option.
Is it "wrong" to let someone die if one dollar would heal them? Not if I have other plans for the dollar!
Why?
There is no such thing as a "right" or "wrong" and, thus, letting poor people die, starve, etc. may be "mean" (whatever that means) but it's not "wrong."
Likewise, murder, incest, rape, etc. etc. are not "wrong" either.
The closest thing to "right" is being the strongest. Let's explore this notion:
What is implicit in the "everyone has a right to healthcare" view is a statement like "you wouldn't like that (dying because of an easily treatable disease//injury) if you were poor would you?"
But that is just to say "it sure would suck to be poor!" I don't know of any who disagrees. When someone tells me that I ask, instead, "But if I were rich, i wouldn't want to give my money to those who are poor, unless it makes me stronger!"
The reply is always, "Yes, but just a little bit of your money can save their life!" So what? What do I care for their life? The only reason to save their life is if it increases my power!
Then the reply is, "Yes, but that way of living will get you crushed! Your view of things will lead to the crumbling of society!" Aha! You've just endorsed my point. You are saying that I should want national health-care, or a pity-based morality, because a "might makes right" view leads to my destruction. But that is just to say that I should care about "morality" because if I don't I will be crushed. But that means that your advice to me is simply: do what doesn't get you crushed! That is, you agree that morality's fundamental directive to me is "Be Strong!"
I'd be the first to concede that in human affairs, being strong means working together. But that doesn't mean that a strong society saves the weak. A strong society might kill the weak. It might ship them away. It might use them for experiments. The point here is simply that "strength" is a scientific concept that has to be researched. It could be that a "strong" society won't experiment on it's own members because that would cause it to eventually collapse. Etc. Etc. That's why knowledge, philosophy (the foundation of knowledge), mathematics, physics, biology, chemistry, psychology, sociology, history and political science are so important. In the human world, knowledge is power. But knowledge is always embodied.
The upshot is that this way of approaching morality avoids all the hysterical screeching from weaklings whose only strategy for survival is to make the strong think that strength is evil.
Interesting. It has been quite some time since I have seen someone declare so openly and with such clarity that they are quite simply a deeply unpleasant human being.
Ha Ha, Such Philosophical Harshness is refreshing. I would suggest, Arb, that you pay heed to the edited version of his post and actually look up what Nietzschean philosophy entails (Nietzche is my favorite philosopher because of his non-dogmatism and the sheer insight of his views).
Such a philosophy is basically undercuts "You should".
The point is that normative statements are vacuous, often borne of the psychological make up of the individual who makes such declarations, you are in essence arguing over nothing these past however many pages.
Nietzsche' philosophy is not out and out egoist because he despises pity, it is rather a call to replace "You should" with "I will" (as in "I will it so").
I think 2 quotes sum up his philosophy for me (of course there is no 1 single interpretation of Nietzsche that would be patently missing the point).
"The noble man also helps the unfortunate, but not (or hardly) out of pity, but rather from an impulse generated by the super-abundance of power" Beyond Good and Evil.
"The way? This is now my way. Where is your? Thus answered I those that asked me "the way". For the way, it does not exist" Thus Spake Zarathustra.
Oh, I am quite familiar with Neitzschean philosophy, I just think it has very little weight.
Raimond Gaita once told me that he thought the most appropriate response to a true utilitarian was "a kind of urbane condescension". I think a similar response is appropriate for anyone who endorses the kind of "ethic" under discussion here, to be honest.
It's funny that you mention Gaita because I read some of his work several months ago. His fundamental point is, something like, "The weak should not be preyed upon." Sadly, he, like all moral philosophers who defend a similar view, can never give an adequate justification of why. This goes hand in hand with their emotion-filled damnation of those who don't buy their moral code. I couldn't have chosen a better example of slave morality.
I'll be sure to tell him of the insightful understanding of his "fundamental point" and convincing critique of his work published on a Starcraft site the next time I see him.
On November 12 2009 03:31 TwilightStar wrote: I'm neither democratic or republican... but that'll probably change soon enough.. Most republicans I have seen are idiots. ~_~
On November 12 2009 02:22 QibingZero wrote: I almost didn't think this thread could get any worse, but it has sure managed. Taking Nietzsche's 'morality' as anything other than a critique on the prevalence of religious morality at the time is absolutely insane. Furthermore, extending it to a single portion of today's politics (health care) is worthless, as Nietzsche very much used it as a critique against democracy in the first place. Face it - you have issue with the structure of society itself, not simply health care. Your position is completely disingenuous in this thread, and brings nothing of purpose to the discussion.
I wonder, though, if you've ever considered you might be born the same person under different circumstances, and how those would change what you would become. Obviously, it's not equally easy for the same person to obtain the same power regardless of in which elements he's introduced to the world. Would you accept the fact that you would be weaker than someone else based on factors completely separate from your individual being? Along the same lines, do you accept the fact that the children of the 'strong' automatically gain a large portion of that power, even if they obtain the 'worst' genetics of their parents? If everyone does not have an equal chance at obtaining strength, how can it possibly be a factor in determining morality?
I find it hard to believe your position is not just simply nihilism.
QibingZero, my friend,
Your understanding of Nietzsche's project is limited. His primary target was not Christians -- they were simply a symptom of the root cause --Pessimists-- (the pinnacle of pessimism was Schopenhauer). If you look at Nietzsche's work this will be clear. Or you can look to academic works like C. Janaway's "Willing and Nothingness" which lay out this connection baldly.
I discuss your "what if you were born as the weak one" example earlier. My reply is, "but I'm not." Your reply is "that's because your lucky." My reply is, "Fine. What's your point?" Your reply is "But it's not fair!" My reply is, " What does fairness have to do with it? Of course the weak ones will appeal to "fairness" It is their strongest move! They find themselves in a position of weakness and are left with no recourse but to damn strength! Of course I agree it would suck to be weak. Thus, I'll do all I can to stay strong!"
And, again, I don't believe that your presence in this thread (and likely in life itself) is even marginally above trolling. You reject and wish to turn back all of society's advancements in the name of some ridiculous appeal to moral nihilism. There's a disagreement on the most basic of levels here, and as a result there isn't even a real discussion to be had.
At this rate, I'm surprised you aren't arguing against the existence of TL itself. It would almost be more relevant than the rest of this nonsense you're injecting into a political thread regarding health care.
On a real note, thanks Syntax Lost for the time put into a relevant post that dispels a lot of the baseless rumors spread so far. That should be required reading for anyone even thinking of posting in this thread.
On November 12 2009 03:31 TwilightStar wrote: I'm neither democratic or republican... but that'll probably change soon enough.. Most republicans I have seen are idiots. ~_~
true that.. especially considering what's been going on recently with the town hall meetings, "teabaggers" (lol) and the fact that their leadership figures currently consist of Micahel Steele, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Bobby Jindal etc. etc. The wingnuts are not allowing any flexibility in their party.. no moderates allowed!! If you support abortion, gun control or gay marriage believe me they don't want you in their party.. even if your other ideologies are in line with theirs.
This being the case.. I think it's pretty safe to assume that anyone who still calls themself a republican is a complete moron.. (or a religious nut/totally ignorant)
Oh and please note I said "republican" not "conservative"... there are plenty of intelligent conservatives out there...
Well while were at emotional arguments, let me qoute Ayn Randi from the Something awful forums:
Ayn Randi wrote: Even if every single economic consideration didn't make UHC a better choice (they do), simple cost wouldn't make UHC a worse option. Any society that doesn't value the life and welfare of it's citizens above the ability of the well off to glut themselves on endless quantities of consumer goods is sick and diseased itself.
If you are against healthcare for everyone, the poor and needy included, you have lost touch with your common humanity. You are an aberration, you have set yourself apart as being outside society and the human community, but still demand a say in how it is run, so as it to enrich yourself at the expense of the suffering of others. You speak of productivity and point to the numbers in your bank account as validation of your worth as a human. You make the rich richer and laud yourself for your contribution to the great society of wealth. You are able to dehumanize others, turning them into abstract concepts beneath your concern by labeling them as lazy, useless, or otherwise unworthy of notice because they don't assist you to enrich yourselves and their existence helps invalidate the house-of-cards framework of justifications you've built up to allow your human conscience to excuse this atrocity. To accept that these are real people, with real lives, hopes, dreams, families and friends - to accept that whatever their circumstances, their situation may not be entirely their own fault - to accept the corollary of this, that your station in life is not the sole result of of your efforts - to accept that even if the destitute underclasses are there by their own doing, they are still human beings entitled to respect and dignity regardless - to do any of this would mean that the entire system of sink or swim free enterprise is flawed, and your own successes therefore not the pure well deserved reward for a life lived superior to others. So you will instead invent reasons and excuses to divest yourself of your humanity and your connection to others, quietly waiting for the day when you die, clutching your treasures to your chest as you are lowered into the dark earth. Forever removed from the human race you have scorned, a bodiless whisper as you slip into the void "yes... I kept it. I kept it all. fuck you.. I've got mine.. forever"
Die swiftly. You are an outsider to the community of humanity, and the world will be enriched by your passing.
On November 12 2009 03:01 Syntax Lost wrote: Once again there is a healthcare thread on TL, and once again the same stupid arguments are posted without a shred of actual evidence supporting them. Previous thread on TL regarding healthcare can be found here and here. Note that the arguments posted in the previous threads (particularly those supported by peer-reviewed study) have never been rebutted by those arguing against public healthcare. The reality is that the US spends far more on healthcare as a function of GDP compared to every other nation on the planet! And it's not a small difference either. Compared to Canada, they spend 50% more relative to their GDP. Furthermore, the US also restricts access to their health services by having people unable to afford basic coverage or by using the wonderful word "Denied!" even if you do have coverage.
Now one would think that there would be a positive output on their healthcare. After all, the US isn't spending a little extra on their healthcare, they're spending a gigantic fucking huge amount more. There should be some positive output, right? Yet, for all the dollars pumped into the system, they can't cover their entire population. Checking some basic health metrics such as life expectancy and infant mortality we see that there is a vast difference between the US trails horribly the behind the rest of the developed world. 50th in life expectancy. 45th in infant mortality.
Now when those that defend the US healthcare model (or some totally unregulated free-market model) are confronted with these facts will appeal to the US being special. However, there are no credible peer-reviewed studies that support this notion. None whatsoever. The US has its share of issues to contend with, but so does every other nation and there are certainly no reasons to account for the significant difference between US healthcare expenditure compared to the rest of the world. So where is all this money supposed to be going? You spend more. You cover less. You get worse outcomes. Surely the money must be going somewhere, right?
NEJM wrote: A system with multiple insurers is also intrinsically costlier than a single-payer system. For insurers it means multiple duplicative claims-processing facilities and smaller insured groups, both of which increase overhead. Fragmentation also raises costs for providers who must deal with multiple insurance products — at least 755 in Seattle alone — forcing them to determine applicants’ eligibility and to keep track of the various copayments, referral networks, and approval requirements. Canadian physicians send virtually all bills to a single insurer. A multiplicity of insurers also precludes paying hospitals a lump-sum, global budget. Under a global-budget system, hospitals and government authorities negotiate an annual budget based on past budgets, clinical performance, and projected changes in services and input costs. Hospitals receive periodic lump-sum payments (e.g. 1/12 of the annual amount each month).
The existence of global budgets in Canada has eliminated most billing and minimized internal cost accounting, since charges do not need to be attributed to individual patients and insurers. Yet fragmentation itself cannot explain the upswing in administrative costs in the United States since 1969, when costs resembled those in Canada. This growth coincided with the expansion of managed care and market-based competition, which fostered the adoption of complex accounting and auditing practices long standard in the business world.
Claims that the free market is more efficient doesn't seem to be reflected in the data. But it gets more interesting.
If we look at how health insurance premiums have changed over 2002-2007, we see that they've increase by 78%. That's a big fucking increase and certainly doesn't match inflation or wage increases. Given such a massive increase in price, can you honestly believe it's because of market efficiency? Doesn't this make you ask questions about the system? Wouldn't you think that you'd get a lot more service if you were paying 80% more?
But surely there must be some positive output, right? With all those profits being recorded by pharmaceutical companies, shouldn't we see big investments into R&D to develop new cures, right? Well, looking at the data:
The Public Library of Science wrote: From this new estimate, it appears that pharmaceutical companies spend almost twice as much on promotion as they do on R&D. These numbers clearly show how promotion predominates over R&D in the pharmaceutical industry, contrary to the industry's claim.
But it gets worse. The number one selling drug in 2004 was Lipitor. "But Syntax Lost," I hear you cry, "What does Lipitor do?" Well, I'm glad you asked. Lipitor used for fighting high cholesterol. But hang on, high cholesterol is almost always a by-product of lifestyle. This is not curing the disease at all. You can't cure a bad lifestyle with drugs. What this does is enable people to continue a bad lifestyle. Seriously, where does the moral hazard lie if this is the inevitable result of your healthcare system? Pharmaceutical companies are going to chase wherever the profits lie, and there is little question what types of drugs they're going to aim for given the enormous success of lifestyle drugs like Lipitor.
If a moral hazard does indeed lie in public healthcare, then certainly this should show up in the statistics associated with countries that operate with such a system, right? But where are the peer-reviewed studies to support such a notion.
Heck, even when we look at the US and look at programmes like Medicaid and SCHIP we see that:.
The article wrote: People who disenroll from Medicaid or SCHIP programs as a result of programmatic changes are not likely to replace public program insurance with private commercial insurance, because it is unlikely that people who live near the poverty level will be able to afford the premiums that are associated with private commercial health insurance.
[...]
Most states make programmatic changes in their Medicaid/SCHIP programs in an effort to decrease their costs for these programs. However, this study demonstrates that programmatic changes that result in disenrollment actually increase the total health care costs for the community. Most of the health care costs for the uninsured are paid by federal and state governments through Medicare and Medicaid in the form of disproportionate share hospital adjustments and indirect medical education payments in addition to other federal programs, such as funding for community health centers and the Maternal and Child Health Bureau. Indeed, federal and state funds have been estimated to cover 87% of the total costs of uncompensated care.11 Potential savings from programmatic changes in Medicaid/SCHIP also are offset by increased Medicaid medically needy spending, increased tax subsidies to private insurance, and increased costs that are associated with uncompensated care. In a previous analysis of Medicaid disenrollment in an agricultural community, we concluded that 10% disenrollment would increase the number of uninsured children by 21% and increase the community’s health care costs as a result of a shift in sites of care from less expensive ambulatory office sites to more expensive [emergency department]s and increased hospitalizations.
Seriously, how can anybody who reads this sort of study honestly be against public healthcare in the US? The data here very clearly shows that such programmes represent an overall decrease in cost in healthcare so it's not like you're going to end up paying more for it. You get fewer hospitalisation, better care at lower cost since you're able to shift the cost burden to less expensive alternatives. People that argue that they don't want to pay for others healthcare miss the picture in two big ways:
1. You're going to depend on healthcare sooner or later. You simply can't avoid it. Be it an accident, pregnancy, a sick spouse, child or relative--at some point, you or someone very close to you is going to have to depend on the healthcare infrastructure. 2. You're already paying for other's healthcare through your premiums, additional costs, interest rates.
TanGeng wrote: The biggest moral hazard in insurance isn't this part of socialization, but the insurance rate. The higher the insurance rate for health care the more likely people are going to in for silly unnecessary check up. This instance of moral hazard leads people to overuse healthcare. This effect is well documented.
In times like this, I like to quote the immortal blue words of Wikipedia:
"Citation needed."
TanGeng wrote: Now if insurance companies could discriminate based on lifestyle, then it's probably that the company could charge those individuals higher insurance premiums than non-smokers. Then, the smokers would faced with an additional cost for smoking, and that would be incentive to quit. It would also be an incentive not to start. All of this works on the margins, and you aren't going to get a controlled study that will provide definitive meaning conclusions. The statistics can always be massaged to suit the sponsor of the study. I've found conflicting scientific studies out there on various topics, so if that logic and example isn't enough, then I won't convince you.
Bwahahahaha! Simple translation: "This works because I say so. I have no real evidence to support my claims. I'm just going to claim studies posted in peer-reviewed journals are all false and hope nobody notices how ridiculous this claim actually is."
The reality would be that these statistics would be too difficult to find considering that statistics concerning cost smokers incur on companies does exist and it turns out they cost $2000 per employee per year.
TanGeng wrote: Dietary. US is one of the countries that consumes high-fructose corn syrup to a sickening degree. The rest of the word uses can sugar which is far more healthy.
Canadians also consume similar amounts of corn syrup. But the difference in health outcomes aren't small, they're huge. You're going to need an awful lot of corn syrup to make up the difference
Preterm birth. US has much higher preterm birth rates. For reasons that I won't go into, it looks like infant mortality is unexpectly higher.
Let's look into this more closely, shall we? According to the CDC, the occurrence of pre-term births in 2005 was 12.7%. Furthermore, they estimate that 68.6% of infant mortality is a result of pre-term births. The infant mortality itself is estimated to be 6.26 per 1000 live births in 2009. Now assuming that there is very little change in the statistics between 2005 and 2009 we can estimate that the pre-term contribution to infant mortality is 4.29 per 1000 live births. Consequently the mortality for term and post-term infants is 1.97 per 873 live births, or 2.25 per 1000.
The statistics for Canada show that the pre-term birth rate is about 8.1% in 2006/2007. They also estimate that 75% of infant deaths are a consequence of pre-term. This means of 5.04 infant deaths per 1000 live births, 3.78 are from pre-term births. Consequently the infant mortality rate for term and post-term infants is approximately 1.26 per 919 live births, or 1.37 per 1000.
The US has 65% greater infant mortality if you want to ignore pre-term infants! Want to continue with this line of reasoning?
Furthermore, it's important to note the huge difference between pre-term births between Canada and the US. Could it be because Canadians simply have better access to healthcare, again that's helping with this issue?
Wall of text crits Undisputed for 23907423047302 damage.
So many stats kiddies in here.
Yeah... you don't get it. The bill is BROKEN, even if it passes (it won't) it still won't insure everyone and the uninsured will have to pay heavy tax penalties to punish them for their misfortune.
The new system is less responsive to patient preferences and choices (bureaucrats in washington make them for you, obviously the government knows better!). The House bill would create a new federal office a "Health Choices Commissioner" to make health choices for the entire nation, specifying precisely what services health plans must cover, may cover, and (perhaps) must not cover.The House bill also requires the Health Choices Commissioner to determine the premiums private health plans can charge (who needs competition anyway lol).The House bill does not actually impose a single-payer, Canadian-style health care system, it does give federal bureaucrats enough power to impose such a system without any further congressional action. Americans would face higher premiums and higher taxes.
The bills impose taxes on medical devices and (in the case of the Senate bill) prescription drugs and health plans. The bills would tax those who need health care, to pay for health reform.
Paying More and Getting Less
Luckily the majority of Americans are against giving over 1/6 of the U.S. economy to the government and having inferior health care.
On November 12 2009 02:32 lOvOlUNiMEDiA wrote: QibingZero, my friend,
Your understanding of Nietzsche's project is limited. His primary target was not Christians -- they were simply a symptom of the root cause --Pessimists-- (the pinnacle of pessimism was Schopenhauer). If you look at Nietzsche's work this will be clear. Or you can look to academic works like C. Janaway's "Willing and Nothingness" which lay out this connection baldly.
I discuss your "what if you were born as the weak one" example earlier. My reply is, "but I'm not." Your reply is "that's because your lucky." My reply is, "Fine. What's your point?" Your reply is "But it's not fair!" My reply is, " What does fairness have to do with it? Of course the weak ones will appeal to "fairness" It is their strongest move! They find themselves in a position of weakness and are left with no recourse but to damn strength! Of course I agree it would suck to be weak. Thus, I'll do all I can to stay strong!"
To be fair to QibingZero, some among the "Strong" will also appeal to the idea of fairness to direct the schadenfreude of the weak against the rivals of said "Strong." You will often find that it's best for any "Strong" to at least bribe some of the weak into being allies. Perhaps that's compassion? Perhaps it's just self-interest.
I do like the way you think though. Very interesting to see people study more philosophy. I sort of wished to have done it myself but that inclination never struck me while in school.
I can't see how anyone would want to study philosophy if the results it grants are the apparently solid but completely uninteresting low-level rants about the baselessness of fairness/etc in this thread. :/
Ayn Randi wrote: Even if every single economic consideration didn't make UHC a better choice (they do), simple cost wouldn't make UHC a worse option. Any society that doesn't value the life and welfare of it's citizens above the ability of the well off to glut themselves on endless quantities of consumer goods is sick and diseased itself.
If you are against healthcare for everyone, the poor and needy included, you have lost touch with your common humanity. You are an aberration, you have set yourself apart as being outside society and the human community, but still demand a say in how it is run, so as it to enrich yourself at the expense of the suffering of others. You speak of productivity and point to the numbers in your bank account as validation of your worth as a human. You make the rich richer and laud yourself for your contribution to the great society of wealth. You are able to dehumanize others, turning them into abstract concepts beneath your concern by labeling them as lazy, useless, or otherwise unworthy of notice because they don't assist you to enrich yourselves and their existence helps invalidate the house-of-cards framework of justifications you've built up to allow your human conscience to excuse this atrocity. To accept that these are real people, with real lives, hopes, dreams, families and friends - to accept that whatever their circumstances, their situation may not be entirely their own fault - to accept the corollary of this, that your station in life is not the sole result of of your efforts - to accept that even if the destitute underclasses are there by their own doing, they are still human beings entitled to respect and dignity regardless - to do any of this would mean that the entire system of sink or swim free enterprise is flawed, and your own successes therefore not the pure well deserved reward for a life lived superior to others. So you will instead invent reasons and excuses to divest yourself of your humanity and your connection to others, quietly waiting for the day when you die, clutching your treasures to your chest as you are lowered into the dark earth. Forever removed from the human race you have scorned, a bodiless whisper as you slip into the void "yes... I kept it. I kept it all. fuck you.. I've got mine.. forever"
Die swiftly. You are an outsider to the community of humanity, and the world will be enriched by your passing.
On November 12 2009 03:01 Syntax Lost wrote: Once again there is a healthcare thread on TL, and once again the same stupid arguments are posted without a shred of actual evidence supporting them. Previous thread on TL regarding healthcare can be found here and here. Note that the arguments posted in the previous threads (particularly those supported by peer-reviewed study) have never been rebutted by those arguing against public healthcare. The reality is that the US spends far more on healthcare as a function of GDP compared to every other nation on the planet! And it's not a small difference either. Compared to Canada, they spend 50% more relative to their GDP. Furthermore, the US also restricts access to their health services by having people unable to afford basic coverage or by using the wonderful word "Denied!" even if you do have coverage.
Now one would think that there would be a positive output on their healthcare. After all, the US isn't spending a little extra on their healthcare, they're spending a gigantic fucking huge amount more. There should be some positive output, right? Yet, for all the dollars pumped into the system, they can't cover their entire population. Checking some basic health metrics such as life expectancy and infant mortality we see that there is a vast difference between the US trails horribly the behind the rest of the developed world. 50th in life expectancy. 45th in infant mortality.
Now when those that defend the US healthcare model (or some totally unregulated free-market model) are confronted with these facts will appeal to the US being special. However, there are no credible peer-reviewed studies that support this notion. None whatsoever. The US has its share of issues to contend with, but so does every other nation and there are certainly no reasons to account for the significant difference between US healthcare expenditure compared to the rest of the world. So where is all this money supposed to be going? You spend more. You cover less. You get worse outcomes. Surely the money must be going somewhere, right?
NEJM wrote: A system with multiple insurers is also intrinsically costlier than a single-payer system. For insurers it means multiple duplicative claims-processing facilities and smaller insured groups, both of which increase overhead. Fragmentation also raises costs for providers who must deal with multiple insurance products — at least 755 in Seattle alone — forcing them to determine applicants’ eligibility and to keep track of the various copayments, referral networks, and approval requirements. Canadian physicians send virtually all bills to a single insurer. A multiplicity of insurers also precludes paying hospitals a lump-sum, global budget. Under a global-budget system, hospitals and government authorities negotiate an annual budget based on past budgets, clinical performance, and projected changes in services and input costs. Hospitals receive periodic lump-sum payments (e.g. 1/12 of the annual amount each month).
The existence of global budgets in Canada has eliminated most billing and minimized internal cost accounting, since charges do not need to be attributed to individual patients and insurers. Yet fragmentation itself cannot explain the upswing in administrative costs in the United States since 1969, when costs resembled those in Canada. This growth coincided with the expansion of managed care and market-based competition, which fostered the adoption of complex accounting and auditing practices long standard in the business world.
Claims that the free market is more efficient doesn't seem to be reflected in the data. But it gets more interesting.
If we look at how health insurance premiums have changed over 2002-2007, we see that they've increase by 78%. That's a big fucking increase and certainly doesn't match inflation or wage increases. Given such a massive increase in price, can you honestly believe it's because of market efficiency? Doesn't this make you ask questions about the system? Wouldn't you think that you'd get a lot more service if you were paying 80% more?
But surely there must be some positive output, right? With all those profits being recorded by pharmaceutical companies, shouldn't we see big investments into R&D to develop new cures, right? Well, looking at the data:
The Public Library of Science wrote: From this new estimate, it appears that pharmaceutical companies spend almost twice as much on promotion as they do on R&D. These numbers clearly show how promotion predominates over R&D in the pharmaceutical industry, contrary to the industry's claim.
But it gets worse. The number one selling drug in 2004 was Lipitor. "But Syntax Lost," I hear you cry, "What does Lipitor do?" Well, I'm glad you asked. Lipitor used for fighting high cholesterol. But hang on, high cholesterol is almost always a by-product of lifestyle. This is not curing the disease at all. You can't cure a bad lifestyle with drugs. What this does is enable people to continue a bad lifestyle. Seriously, where does the moral hazard lie if this is the inevitable result of your healthcare system? Pharmaceutical companies are going to chase wherever the profits lie, and there is little question what types of drugs they're going to aim for given the enormous success of lifestyle drugs like Lipitor.
If a moral hazard does indeed lie in public healthcare, then certainly this should show up in the statistics associated with countries that operate with such a system, right? But where are the peer-reviewed studies to support such a notion.
Heck, even when we look at the US and look at programmes like Medicaid and SCHIP we see that:.
The article wrote: People who disenroll from Medicaid or SCHIP programs as a result of programmatic changes are not likely to replace public program insurance with private commercial insurance, because it is unlikely that people who live near the poverty level will be able to afford the premiums that are associated with private commercial health insurance.
[...]
Most states make programmatic changes in their Medicaid/SCHIP programs in an effort to decrease their costs for these programs. However, this study demonstrates that programmatic changes that result in disenrollment actually increase the total health care costs for the community. Most of the health care costs for the uninsured are paid by federal and state governments through Medicare and Medicaid in the form of disproportionate share hospital adjustments and indirect medical education payments in addition to other federal programs, such as funding for community health centers and the Maternal and Child Health Bureau. Indeed, federal and state funds have been estimated to cover 87% of the total costs of uncompensated care.11 Potential savings from programmatic changes in Medicaid/SCHIP also are offset by increased Medicaid medically needy spending, increased tax subsidies to private insurance, and increased costs that are associated with uncompensated care. In a previous analysis of Medicaid disenrollment in an agricultural community, we concluded that 10% disenrollment would increase the number of uninsured children by 21% and increase the community’s health care costs as a result of a shift in sites of care from less expensive ambulatory office sites to more expensive [emergency department]s and increased hospitalizations.
Seriously, how can anybody who reads this sort of study honestly be against public healthcare in the US? The data here very clearly shows that such programmes represent an overall decrease in cost in healthcare so it's not like you're going to end up paying more for it. You get fewer hospitalisation, better care at lower cost since you're able to shift the cost burden to less expensive alternatives. People that argue that they don't want to pay for others healthcare miss the picture in two big ways:
1. You're going to depend on healthcare sooner or later. You simply can't avoid it. Be it an accident, pregnancy, a sick spouse, child or relative--at some point, you or someone very close to you is going to have to depend on the healthcare infrastructure. 2. You're already paying for other's healthcare through your premiums, additional costs, interest rates.
TanGeng wrote: The biggest moral hazard in insurance isn't this part of socialization, but the insurance rate. The higher the insurance rate for health care the more likely people are going to in for silly unnecessary check up. This instance of moral hazard leads people to overuse healthcare. This effect is well documented.
In times like this, I like to quote the immortal blue words of Wikipedia:
TanGeng wrote: Now if insurance companies could discriminate based on lifestyle, then it's probably that the company could charge those individuals higher insurance premiums than non-smokers. Then, the smokers would faced with an additional cost for smoking, and that would be incentive to quit. It would also be an incentive not to start. All of this works on the margins, and you aren't going to get a controlled study that will provide definitive meaning conclusions. The statistics can always be massaged to suit the sponsor of the study. I've found conflicting scientific studies out there on various topics, so if that logic and example isn't enough, then I won't convince you.
Bwahahahaha! Simple translation: "This works because I say so. I have no real evidence to support my claims. I'm just going to claim studies posted in peer-reviewed journals are all false and hope nobody notices how ridiculous this claim actually is."
The reality would be that these statistics would be too difficult to find considering that statistics concerning cost smokers incur on companies does exist and it turns out they cost $2000 per employee per year.
TanGeng wrote: Dietary. US is one of the countries that consumes high-fructose corn syrup to a sickening degree. The rest of the word uses can sugar which is far more healthy.
Canadians also consume similar amounts of corn syrup. But the difference in health outcomes aren't small, they're huge. You're going to need an awful lot of corn syrup to make up the difference
Preterm birth. US has much higher preterm birth rates. For reasons that I won't go into, it looks like infant mortality is unexpectly higher.
Let's look into this more closely, shall we? According to the CDC, the occurrence of pre-term births in 2005 was 12.7%. Furthermore, they estimate that 68.6% of infant mortality is a result of pre-term births. The infant mortality itself is estimated to be 6.26 per 1000 live births in 2009. Now assuming that there is very little change in the statistics between 2005 and 2009 we can estimate that the pre-term contribution to infant mortality is 4.29 per 1000 live births. Consequently the mortality for term and post-term infants is 1.97 per 873 live births, or 2.25 per 1000.
The statistics for Canada show that the pre-term birth rate is about 8.1% in 2006/2007. They also estimate that 75% of infant deaths are a consequence of pre-term. This means of 5.04 infant deaths per 1000 live births, 3.78 are from pre-term births. Consequently the infant mortality rate for term and post-term infants is approximately 1.26 per 919 live births, or 1.37 per 1000.
The US has 65% greater infant mortality if you want to ignore pre-term infants! Want to continue with this line of reasoning?
Furthermore, it's important to note the huge difference between pre-term births between Canada and the US. Could it be because Canadians simply have better access to healthcare, again that's helping with this issue?
I remember why I hate defending the "free market" health care system of US. It's nothing like the free market. FDA, patent law, state medical boards, state insurance regulations, medicare, and medicaid means that the health care industry is the most highly regulated market in the US.
As for your statistics about pre-term births, Canadian population and US population differ in racial distribution people of African origin are nearly twice as likely to have pre-term births. Theses studies also do not factor induced births after 37 weeks. But many more women in the US have induced births even if it's just one or two weeks (the difference between 37 weeks and 39 weeks).
In a way, statistics just lumps everything into one big black box without describing what actually happens to make the US health care system expensive or look expensive.
The money in the statistic computation of health care costs doesn't directly flow into making people healthier. A huge percent of the cost associated with the US health care system is used to decrease moral hazard and comply with government regulations. A large part of what you get for your health insurance is the masses of insurance administrators and hospital administrators. This is a characteristic of insurance systems. If you want to argue that the insurance system is broken, I'm right there with you.
Beyond that money that flows into the health care system goes to accessibility like parking lots, comfortable waiting rooms, and short waiting lines or customer relations activities like marketing, having a friendly reception, and having a respectable store front.
Then after money flows toward innovation, so the American population get their unfulfilled wants first. Apparently one of those wants was for elderly males to be sexually active, and the FDA wants to classify that as healthcare. Personally, I would consider that as a recreational/lifestyle enhancement service and not health care, but all that is being included in these cost of health care statistics being compiled by the government. Other drugs that fall into this category of health care are personality modifiers and other "psychological enhancement" drugs like Prozaic. This is the pharmaceutical equivalent of recreational drugs except legal in the US and much more expensive.
There are plenty of reasons why US health care system sucks a lot. Not being socialist or regulated isn't one of them. As far as a "real" debate with tons of cited articles and the such, it takes too much time and I'm lazy.
-- rather if I could do that I could probably get a job as an economist. This has also reminded me why I hate macroeconomics. All the statistics found on the macroeconomic level are complete BS without discreet careful examination of all factors.
On November 12 2009 02:28 Mischy wrote: lOvOlUNiMEDiA, to answer you in respective order:
Para 1: ok I thought you'd already have that nailed
Para 2: I can't see where you are coming from. Your first sentence is dangerously phrased. It's hard to understand, it could mean several things. Can you explain what you think could be used to measure the strength of a moral code, or a course of action (because I can't tell what you are referring to)?
Para 3: ok, well I thought your point is that if something is strong it's right.
Para 4: the argumentation necessary to sufficiently validate such assertions is circuitous and irrelevant. In brief, however, I am saying that there is a normal distribution of personalities and moral codes in society, based on humanity's need as a species to have inventors, rulers, moneymakers, fighters, artists, lovers, whatever. You are just a fluctuation in the equation that is a successful species. To such an extent, none of your opinions will ever be more than controlled by your place in this equation, and your place in society.
By calling you a yang, I am calling you destructive. The male side of the coin of humanity = destruction, creation, change. The female, ying = stability and compassion. Seeing as humanity has always required both sides to be at balance in society, I fail to see how one side can actually ever be considered right or more valuable. And I don't want to have to go into explaining why humanity requires a balance of change and stability, because I'm sure you catch my drift. If you find the inclusion of terms such as ying, yang and the number crunch idea, then hopefully you can divorce the words from the notion I put forward.
-HamerD
You are a pessimist. Your view is that ---volition--- & ---spirit--- count for nothing but instead are determined by the needs of some cosmic human species. Your assertions are groundless or meaningless. I'll let you pick which.
Of course volition and spirit count for nothing. Why would it be any different? Your will is a product of your personality, upbringing, genetics and mood. Unless you believe in souls, where is your argument?
I know it's a cliche but I'm not a pessimist (at least philosophically), I'm a realist. You still haven't responded to my comments about paragraph 2, also. Why do you consider strength to be the be all and end all of moral dynamics? Sounds like a reductionist's desperate attempt to simplify the complicated.
"As for your statistics about pre-term births, Canadian population and US population differ in racial distribution people of African origin are nearly twice as likely to have pre-term births."
-People of African origin account for maybe 10-15% of population, and maybe 12-17% of births. Even if your figure were true it would in no way address the discrepancy that was well documented.
Are you being willfully ignorant or do you honestly not realise how much cognitive dissonance you are employing in order to maintain your 'lack of socialised medicine is not the problem in us' stance?
On November 12 2009 03:01 Syntax Lost wrote: Once again there is a healthcare thread on TL, and once again the same stupid arguments are posted without a shred of actual evidence supporting them. Previous thread on TL regarding healthcare can be found here and here. Note that the arguments posted in the previous threads (particularly those supported by peer-reviewed study) have never been rebutted by those arguing against public healthcare. The reality is that the US spends far more on healthcare as a function of GDP compared to every other nation on the planet! And it's not a small difference either. Compared to Canada, they spend 50% more relative to their GDP. Furthermore, the US also restricts access to their health services by having people unable to afford basic coverage or by using the wonderful word "Denied!" even if you do have coverage.
Now one would think that there would be a positive output on their healthcare. After all, the US isn't spending a little extra on their healthcare, they're spending a gigantic fucking huge amount more. There should be some positive output, right? Yet, for all the dollars pumped into the system, they can't cover their entire population. Checking some basic health metrics such as life expectancy and infant mortality we see that there is a vast difference between the US trails horribly the behind the rest of the developed world. 50th in life expectancy. 45th in infant mortality.
Now when those that defend the US healthcare model (or some totally unregulated free-market model) are confronted with these facts will appeal to the US being special. However, there are no credible peer-reviewed studies that support this notion. None whatsoever. The US has its share of issues to contend with, but so does every other nation and there are certainly no reasons to account for the significant difference between US healthcare expenditure compared to the rest of the world. So where is all this money supposed to be going? You spend more. You cover less. You get worse outcomes. Surely the money must be going somewhere, right?
NEJM wrote: A system with multiple insurers is also intrinsically costlier than a single-payer system. For insurers it means multiple duplicative claims-processing facilities and smaller insured groups, both of which increase overhead. Fragmentation also raises costs for providers who must deal with multiple insurance products — at least 755 in Seattle alone — forcing them to determine applicants’ eligibility and to keep track of the various copayments, referral networks, and approval requirements. Canadian physicians send virtually all bills to a single insurer. A multiplicity of insurers also precludes paying hospitals a lump-sum, global budget. Under a global-budget system, hospitals and government authorities negotiate an annual budget based on past budgets, clinical performance, and projected changes in services and input costs. Hospitals receive periodic lump-sum payments (e.g. 1/12 of the annual amount each month).
The existence of global budgets in Canada has eliminated most billing and minimized internal cost accounting, since charges do not need to be attributed to individual patients and insurers. Yet fragmentation itself cannot explain the upswing in administrative costs in the United States since 1969, when costs resembled those in Canada. This growth coincided with the expansion of managed care and market-based competition, which fostered the adoption of complex accounting and auditing practices long standard in the business world.
Claims that the free market is more efficient doesn't seem to be reflected in the data. But it gets more interesting.
If we look at how health insurance premiums have changed over 2002-2007, we see that they've increase by 78%. That's a big fucking increase and certainly doesn't match inflation or wage increases. Given such a massive increase in price, can you honestly believe it's because of market efficiency? Doesn't this make you ask questions about the system? Wouldn't you think that you'd get a lot more service if you were paying 80% more?
But surely there must be some positive output, right? With all those profits being recorded by pharmaceutical companies, shouldn't we see big investments into R&D to develop new cures, right? Well, looking at the data:
The Public Library of Science wrote: From this new estimate, it appears that pharmaceutical companies spend almost twice as much on promotion as they do on R&D. These numbers clearly show how promotion predominates over R&D in the pharmaceutical industry, contrary to the industry's claim.
But it gets worse. The number one selling drug in 2004 was Lipitor. "But Syntax Lost," I hear you cry, "What does Lipitor do?" Well, I'm glad you asked. Lipitor used for fighting high cholesterol. But hang on, high cholesterol is almost always a by-product of lifestyle. This is not curing the disease at all. You can't cure a bad lifestyle with drugs. What this does is enable people to continue a bad lifestyle. Seriously, where does the moral hazard lie if this is the inevitable result of your healthcare system? Pharmaceutical companies are going to chase wherever the profits lie, and there is little question what types of drugs they're going to aim for given the enormous success of lifestyle drugs like Lipitor.
If a moral hazard does indeed lie in public healthcare, then certainly this should show up in the statistics associated with countries that operate with such a system, right? But where are the peer-reviewed studies to support such a notion.
Heck, even when we look at the US and look at programmes like Medicaid and SCHIP we see that:.
The article wrote: People who disenroll from Medicaid or SCHIP programs as a result of programmatic changes are not likely to replace public program insurance with private commercial insurance, because it is unlikely that people who live near the poverty level will be able to afford the premiums that are associated with private commercial health insurance.
[...]
Most states make programmatic changes in their Medicaid/SCHIP programs in an effort to decrease their costs for these programs. However, this study demonstrates that programmatic changes that result in disenrollment actually increase the total health care costs for the community. Most of the health care costs for the uninsured are paid by federal and state governments through Medicare and Medicaid in the form of disproportionate share hospital adjustments and indirect medical education payments in addition to other federal programs, such as funding for community health centers and the Maternal and Child Health Bureau. Indeed, federal and state funds have been estimated to cover 87% of the total costs of uncompensated care.11 Potential savings from programmatic changes in Medicaid/SCHIP also are offset by increased Medicaid medically needy spending, increased tax subsidies to private insurance, and increased costs that are associated with uncompensated care. In a previous analysis of Medicaid disenrollment in an agricultural community, we concluded that 10% disenrollment would increase the number of uninsured children by 21% and increase the community’s health care costs as a result of a shift in sites of care from less expensive ambulatory office sites to more expensive [emergency department]s and increased hospitalizations.
Seriously, how can anybody who reads this sort of study honestly be against public healthcare in the US? The data here very clearly shows that such programmes represent an overall decrease in cost in healthcare so it's not like you're going to end up paying more for it. You get fewer hospitalisation, better care at lower cost since you're able to shift the cost burden to less expensive alternatives. People that argue that they don't want to pay for others healthcare miss the picture in two big ways:
1. You're going to depend on healthcare sooner or later. You simply can't avoid it. Be it an accident, pregnancy, a sick spouse, child or relative--at some point, you or someone very close to you is going to have to depend on the healthcare infrastructure. 2. You're already paying for other's healthcare through your premiums, additional costs, interest rates.
TanGeng wrote: The biggest moral hazard in insurance isn't this part of socialization, but the insurance rate. The higher the insurance rate for health care the more likely people are going to in for silly unnecessary check up. This instance of moral hazard leads people to overuse healthcare. This effect is well documented.
In times like this, I like to quote the immortal blue words of Wikipedia:
TanGeng wrote: Now if insurance companies could discriminate based on lifestyle, then it's probably that the company could charge those individuals higher insurance premiums than non-smokers. Then, the smokers would faced with an additional cost for smoking, and that would be incentive to quit. It would also be an incentive not to start. All of this works on the margins, and you aren't going to get a controlled study that will provide definitive meaning conclusions. The statistics can always be massaged to suit the sponsor of the study. I've found conflicting scientific studies out there on various topics, so if that logic and example isn't enough, then I won't convince you.
Bwahahahaha! Simple translation: "This works because I say so. I have no real evidence to support my claims. I'm just going to claim studies posted in peer-reviewed journals are all false and hope nobody notices how ridiculous this claim actually is."
The reality would be that these statistics would be too difficult to find considering that statistics concerning cost smokers incur on companies does exist and it turns out they cost $2000 per employee per year.
TanGeng wrote: Dietary. US is one of the countries that consumes high-fructose corn syrup to a sickening degree. The rest of the word uses can sugar which is far more healthy.
Canadians also consume similar amounts of corn syrup. But the difference in health outcomes aren't small, they're huge. You're going to need an awful lot of corn syrup to make up the difference
Preterm birth. US has much higher preterm birth rates. For reasons that I won't go into, it looks like infant mortality is unexpectly higher.
Let's look into this more closely, shall we? According to the CDC, the occurrence of pre-term births in 2005 was 12.7%. Furthermore, they estimate that 68.6% of infant mortality is a result of pre-term births. The infant mortality itself is estimated to be 6.26 per 1000 live births in 2009. Now assuming that there is very little change in the statistics between 2005 and 2009 we can estimate that the pre-term contribution to infant mortality is 4.29 per 1000 live births. Consequently the mortality for term and post-term infants is 1.97 per 873 live births, or 2.25 per 1000.
The statistics for Canada show that the pre-term birth rate is about 8.1% in 2006/2007. They also estimate that 75% of infant deaths are a consequence of pre-term. This means of 5.04 infant deaths per 1000 live births, 3.78 are from pre-term births. Consequently the infant mortality rate for term and post-term infants is approximately 1.26 per 919 live births, or 1.37 per 1000.
The US has 65% greater infant mortality if you want to ignore pre-term infants! Want to continue with this line of reasoning?
Furthermore, it's important to note the huge difference between pre-term births between Canada and the US. Could it be because Canadians simply have better access to healthcare, again that's helping with this issue?
EPT
