terrorists, Presidents. Quick run out and buy some and sponsor some bad sh1t.

This would explain a few things.

I agree greed is not healthy, you don't want to be governed by it. And greed is the motivation of capitalism. Capital has an intense desire for more capital. It is greedy.

When comparing socialist vs capitalist countries, perhaps you are measuring wealth as personal wealth?

Someone is wealthy who lives in a country with socialised, free, high quality health care and affordable high quality housing. Look at some Scandinavian countries.

In my country, the UK, the wealthiest capitalists want to privatise health care and buy up residential properties as assets to rent.

The wealthiest don't want to wait for healthcare and pay for the best doctors. They also see an opportunity to make money servicing the NHS. The NHS will suffer as a result, losing their talent to higher private wages, and paying ever increasing prices to capitalist suppliers. The majority of people get poorer health care as a result.

Capital competes to buy residential property to collect rents, artificially inflating prices. The young are priced out of home ownership, the investors profit from raising rents, the majority get poorer unable to own assets.

So I disagree based on the evidence. Capitalism makes a few wealthy at the expense of making the majority poorer.

Assuming you are US, you come from what appears to be a very binary tribal culture and politic, you are capitalist or socialist, republic or democratic. Try a bit of nuance, it's very unlikely we have evolved the best economic models yet.

You don't like the word greed.

Our language is great I am glad we share it. A word is like the tip of an iceberg. You have been triggered by the word greed.

One definition of greed is "an intense desire"

It's ok to be a little greedy, it's ok to be a little selfish. I have an intense desire to avoid hungry tigers. I am just too selfish to stop breathing to reduce CO2 levels. These are features of survival. And it's ok to desire to improve one's lot.

What we see in "bad" capitalist greed is a perversion of survival instinct. Destructive greed. It's also a consequence of competition and competition is good, it makes better products, but there are consequences, look at what we're doing to our planet. Will your descendants survive? Perhaps you don't care.

Capitalism tends to make most people poor and a few very rich. This gives the few tremendous power. We don't know much about them, we do know to be that wealthy takes ruthlessness and appetite. Greed and selfishness. They horde money like Dragons. We have a "Dragons Den" TV show and watch people get judged by them.

Being governed by the most greedy and selfish is not a good idea, the only thing we can trust is what they have shown in their life, they will always serve themselves before they serve you, even when it looks like they are serving you. Mr Trump maybe your best example.

We cant lay all the environmental woes on capitalism. I would lay them at the door of selfishness and greed. Capitalism appears to be the perfect distillation of selfishness and greed. It encourages it and we end up venerating it, dedicating our lives to it. Satan takes many forms, he's more likely to be a capitalist than a socialist.

As a parent I believe it will be my last service to show my kids how to die well. I guess we die as we lived. Live well brother.

Capitalism and self improvement are different things.

Capitalism is an economic system. Capitalist companies are greedy for profits, through growth, market domination, reducing costs etc... If "greed" sounds like a ugly word, that's because it is. We have an instinctive aversion to it. A pope made it a deadly sin.

You can improve yourself morally, physically, spiritually independent of politics and economics. Wealth rarely improves anyone, makes them arrogant, entitled and more selfish, and rarely happier in my experience. It's deluded to believe you can buy "improvement"

Capitalism is healthy when it is serving society, not the other way round. As it appears to be now.

Now get back to work peasant. 8)

Is that you Nigel?

Yes migrants will increase water demand. But the problem is leaks, maybe you didn't read that far ..

Privatisation of water companies hasn't delivered . Understandably the shareholders prioritised dividends over investment, why wouldn't they, they were given an instant monopoly. Greedy, short sighted neo liberal right wing nonsense is the reason we have no water, high bills and shit in the rivers. Reform will do the same to the NHS

Capitalism is good at cars and cornflakes. Consumer goods and services.

In my experience it's not good at public services, national infrastructure and security. It has a place to serve and supply them.

I accept that the motivator of capitalism is greed, in that respect it has a similar nature to cancer. Cancer's break out in our bodies all the time, and if we are healthy and lucky our immune system zaps them, keeps them regulated. If it doesn't cancer consumes the host. But cancer's arise from our bodies repairing themselves, replacing old cells, a process we need.

A better system is one where we exploit the opportunities capitalism brings and recognise and manage it's threat.

Who said it was bad?

There are many cases where people who are mostly useless are paid a great deal more for their time than those that are.

Execs, Directors, Presidents, Mr !0%; all those who say they work "hard" at doing little more than keeping up appearances and being professional whatever the fcuk that is supposed to mean. The only thing they are working hard at is doing as little for as much as they can.

"Working hard" is working on an oil rig or a 12 hour night shift for a nurse.

And that situation is a product of capitalism. Where we are working to generate and preserve capital for a few of the most selfish, greedy and ruthless amongst us. They will literally have to catch fire before they'd look up to consider what they can do for the environment and climate change. They are monstrous leaders and do not deserve respect.

So no trading time for money is not bad. But we can do a lot better than Capitalism. It causes a lot of suffering and is dumb and primitive. It will consume everything.

An interesting experiment, but it is a fugazi.

We are finding it useful for navigating our current knowledge base, but GenAI is most likely useful for generating more dross to drive advertising.
 

How does it transmit data? I get that small is better. And I can see how we explore the universe with remotes and robots. We are not a species built for space travel.

What is our fascination with Black Holes? I am not a physicist, but I work with them, is this an expedition to make the math add up. Much like Cern is? If the Math adds up we can do something with that? Fold space or get free energy or something ... ?

I read Homer's Odyssey years ago and the crew had a fear about being consumed by something whole, like a cyclops. My son went through a period where he was terrified at the thought of a Black Hole. I wonder if they represent death and annihilation and this quest to explain them is to go an look that in the eye and explain it. As a species we are always on the look out for threats and I guess a Black Hole is the biggest bully on the block.

I am not deranged by Trump at all. Or a Vegan. Or a Republican or Democrat. As for self control, are you showing much yourself ?

I am, like many around the world, disappointed that a country that produces men like Lovell is being led by a man like Trump. As I believe a lot of men like Lovell with honor, professionalism, integrity and other virtues are too. Can you imagine being a secret service agent considering they will have to take a bullet for a documented liar, cheat and very likely one of Epstein's perverts too.

We are all flawed in some way, some men are a lot more flawed than others. And so far your man Trump has broken more than he has fixed and made himself a great deal wealthier in the process. We can say at least as President he's acted the same as he has always has, shamelessly selfish and greedy.

If you believe in free speech the comment is valid and it stands.

Compare this man's heroism and character to the current oligarchy of the US.

The American people deserve better than their current administration. Celebrate your heroes America, Lovell showed the best Americans can be, Trump's government shows the worst.

Yes, we might even call it a conspiracy. Conquer an empire, give them your language and laws, then bugger off and let a common language show the way to peace and trade.

... ah my lovely adaptable language. We are the world's plucky mongrel.