The end of capitalism has begun (2015) - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jul/17/postcapitalism-end-of-capitalism-begun <comment><USER2> TL;DR: The author conflates "capitalism" with state controlled economic systems.

The author commits the cardinal philosophical sin of not defining his terms. What exactly is "postcapitalism?"

"Capitalism" is simply the description of who owns the means of production (regardless of the good). Namely that individuals without legal means of physical coercion control production rather than a state with the legal means for physical coercion. So anything that is post-capitalism by definition means that production isn't held by individuals - which is the opposite of what the author seems to be advocating for.

Markets exist irrespective of whatever the formal mechanism of trade is sanctioned by the state. So even in the most socialist/communist of systems, there exist markets. It just happens that in those systems the state has the plurality of pricing controls (ie. controlling supply and demand). In fact the more top-down controls there are in a market the more there are non- sanctioned, non-connected markets (black & grey markets as an example).

The author seems to be saying primarily that there is an increasing number of grey and black markets that are forming and being utilized because the official sanctioned markets are "failing." Ok, nothing new here really other than speed and scale.

This is how capitalism works. Markets will clear eventually, and it will probably be really bad for a lot of people. There isn't a "solution" to this. People will need to adapt to the demands of the people around them, as has always been the case.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think you assessment of the article is fair. It's not the best piece I've read on this topic, but I found it interesting enough to share on HN.

Do you think it's possible we'll get to the point where technology makes labour so cheap that capitalism and markets as we know them now will no longer make sense?

With software that already replaces a lot of human labour, and things like 3D printing continually improving, it seems like it's at least possible for us to reach a point where the means of production are so easily available and so dispersed throughout the population that the current system as we know it won't really make sense anymore.

So I'm not even sure "postcapitalism" would be the right word to describe it. Things will still be produced, and the idea of markets won't go away. But this new system might not be recognizable to us at all. I often wonder if we can even envision how the transition could happen, because we're so used to reality as it exists for us now.

I don't mean to sound like a naive technological utopian. I suspect that something better than what we have now is possible, but the transition, if it happens, will be messy and painful.

<comment><USER2> _Do you think it 's possible we'll get to the point where technology makes labour so cheap that capitalism and markets as we know them now will no longer make sense?_

The short answer is yes I do - in fact I'm betting on it.

The functional problem however is distribution of resource production/demand. A functional market requires that some Agent A has some resource X that they can trade with Agent B for resource Y for some exchange rate. The medium of exchange (currency) is an important aspect to the efficiency of this but is too complicated to factor in to this discussion.

If the plurality of Agents do not have a resource that is in demand then they have nothing to trade and thus their optionality is severely limited.

For all periods of time individual labor was the default resource that people traded. Either they traded it to themselves in the form of time for output of land (farming for ones self), they traded it for goods from someone with those goods, or they traded it for a medium of exchange (currency).

If the "market" effectively drives the price of labor to 0 then the productive input for any Actor basically evaporates. That doesn't mean the market evaporates, it simply means that individuals have no pricing power inside of it. So the idea of your average individual controlling the means of production is put into jeopardy - which I think is what the Author meant to say.

Ok, so then what? Well that's when you see projects to redistribute resources to Actors with no pricing power introduced - such as UBI. Such schemes however rely on an increasingly small number of Actors to provide the resources which are then redistributed into the system. The libertarian proponents of such systems assume that the small groups will voluntarily redistribute these resources, which could be the case. Pro-state proponents suggest making the state redistribute the resources - essentially ending the "capitalism" \- though the author doesn't suggest this.

I think functionally this redistribution at scale is impossible with the human animal. IMO the human desire for unfettered agency is too strong to accept such a construct.

I'm not sure what the answer is but I think it's gonna get nastier before it gets better.

<comment><USER3> How do you bet on a future like this occurring? It's hard for me to see how to ensure that you get a positive payout if this happens. Owning machines (stocks?) would seem like a sensible bet, but how do you ensure that your part of the capital won't be obsoleted?

<comment><USER2> _How do you bet on a future like this occurring?_

You build it.

 _how do you ensure that your part of the capital won 't be obsoleted?_

Best as I can figure is be the one that builds the machines taking over.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> _" Second, information is corroding the market's ability to form prices correctly. That is because markets are based on scarcity while information is abundant. The system's defence mechanism is to form monopolies – the giant tech companies – on a scale not seen in the past 200 years, yet they cannot last. By building business models and share valuations based on the capture and privatisation of all socially produced information, such firms are constructing a fragile corporate edifice at odds with the most basic need of humanity, which is to use ideas freely."_

Can anyone explain what the heck the above paragraph is supposed to mean? Can anyone translate the above into a logical or evidence backed argument? It's hard for me to take anything in the article seriously when it contains unsubstantiated indecipherable mumbo-jumbo like the above.

Edit: After much thought, I think the author is claiming that corporations are building their entire business models around the artificial scarcity of goods (information) that are in fact abundant. Maybe this argument holds water in the case of some technology companies like Facebook, and maybe those companies will one day be disrupted by free, open-source alternatives. But that still leaves the vast majority of the marketplace, such as cars, electronic devices, food, furniture, clothes etc etc which are indeed scarce. Just because some goods in the economy are becoming cheap & abundant, doesn't mean that the entire marketplace is going to collapse.

<comment><USER5> I cannot because the author is simply wrong.

"information is corroding the market's ability to form prices correctly."

Information is essential for the market's ability to set prices.

"markets are based on scarcity while information is abundant"

That's only part of the story. They are also based on value. Information may be abundant but valuable information is scarce and the creators of valuable information are scarcer still.

"The system's defence mechanism is to form monopolies"

Here the author contradicts himself. Just like you cannot form an 'air monopoly' since it is so abundant. If the author is arguing that information cannot be intrinsically valuable because it is so abundant, you cannot create a monopoly on top of it.

"By building business models and share valuations based on the capture and privatisation of all socially produced information"

That is not what these companies are doing. They are creating platforms that enable the creation of valuable information or finding valuable information out of a sea of worthless information.

"most basic need of humanity, which is to use ideas freely."

Information and data are not ideas. And, while it is useful to use valuable ideas, it is also useful to create them which means it is useful to incentivize the creation of valuable ideas which is difficult when they are used freely.

In short, the author is wrong at almost every turn.

<comment><USER6> > valuable information is scarce

His point is that valuable information is only scarce because of monopolies on that information. If it were allowed to move freely, it would not be scarce anymore because of zero-cost lossless reproduction.

> Just like you cannot form an 'air monopoly' since it is so abundant.

Information monopolies only work because they were established _before_ information became abundant. And even then, only with government intervention. See, for example, the history of book printing prior and up to the invention of copyright.

> They are creating platforms that enable the creation of valuable information > or finding valuable information out of a sea of worthless information.

That doesn't mean their business model can't (or won't) be disrupted. 30 (or even 20) years ago, no one could've imagined a free encyclopedia written by enthusiasts.

> it is useful to incentivize the creation of valuable ideas which is > difficult when they are used freely.

There are a lot of people who create valuable ideas which are then used freely. They're called scientists.

<comment><USER5> Most impactful scientists are paid. Either they work for a university, hold patents, sell books, speak, consult, or work for private industry.

If we expect them to create to the level we currently enjoy, we would be wise not to cut their legs out from under them. In fact, it may be a good idea to figure out how to reward scientists more efficiently so the good ones aren't globe trotting to their consulting or speaking gigs, spending inordinate amount of time writing popular science books, or getting sucked into the trade secret black hole of private industry.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> As a developer who writes software that does work that replaces the work of people, I've often wondered if my work is somehow pushing us toward the end of capitalism. I've also wondered what that end of capitalism and post capitalism will look like if and when it happens.

My hypothesis has been that while it would be nice to live in a world where we're free to spend more time with friends and family doing things that actually, actually getting there will be a long, messy, and painful process. Perhaps some of the upheaval we've seen in the Western world lately is part of that?

A lot of the recent anger and anti-establishment sentiment seems to be centered around jobs disappearing. That collective anger is easy to exploit - savvy leaders and politicians can direct it toward things like immigrants and outsourcing, because I think it is easier for people to conceptualize their job disappearing because another person took it, rather than disappearing because it was automated.

And I don't mean that as political criticism, or as criticism of people who are angry about lost jobs. I think it's rational to be angry about it, and it's rational and smart for politicians to address it.

It seems to me that the desire for cheaper labour is the ultimate cause of all of this, and that immigration and outsourcing are just transient proximate causes - hiring less expensive immigrants (legal or otherwise) or outsourcing to a low cost country are contributing factors _right now_ , but they're becoming less so as technology becomes less expensive. I expect that trend to continue.

What I wonder is whether eventually, the collective anger about job loss will be increasingly directed at those of us (both people and companies) who are creating the technology that replaces human labour.

<comment><USER7> There are tail wagging dog problems.

Is the purpose of an economic system to generate the largest pile of capital and damn those obnoxious humans for getting in the way or expecting a quality life or even expecting to survive? Whats important is the piles of money in themselves.

Or is the purpose of an economic system to make people happy... or happy enough, anyway?

The French Revolution can be looked at on a large scale of trying to run a sem-industrial pre-industrial nation using an agricultural medieval economic operating system. It simply didn't work anymore and the population was suffering horribly from it. Trying to do the wrong, old fashioned thing harder, mostly resulted in making people even unhappier and more guillotine chops in the end. Likewise if the capitalist system means almost everyone is going to be very poor, very angry, and very desperate, then trying to do more of the same old thing that screwed everything up is just going to result in the guillotines being busier sooner this time around.

Not so much OPs post, but I see a lot of free floating condescension on HN along the lines of, well, I guess people with an IQ below 120 just won't be participating in the economy anymore. Oh they had the misfortune of being born in the wrong geographic area? Their parents weren't rich, too bad. Should have pulled themselves up by their bootstraps. Won't happen to me. As for them, well all thats certain is it sure sucks to be them! However realize that historically "it sucks to be them" for only a certain integrated quantity of suck and time, before heads start filling baskets and things are much worse in the short term and staggeringly better in the long term.

No man has ever watched his child starve and die, thinking to himself, well, it was for the maximal efficient allocation of capital, so its OK, in fact here's my other kid, if it'll only help boost the DJIA some more.

<comment><USER2> _Or is the purpose of an economic system to make people happy... or happy enough, anyway?_

There is no purpose.

Markets arise out of aggregated self interest eg. I need to eat and I can work on something that someone else wants that they will give me food for; or I want to play sports, people will pay to watch me play sports.

The history of humanity is that we build technologies that optimize for most efficiently satisfying human needs and wants and we are doing amazingly well at it. Worldwide poverty is at an all time low, violent deaths are at an all time low etc...

Currently the majority of humanity choose not to produce their basic food needs, so about 2% of people do that work.

Ok, now extend that to everything, both need and want.

In such a system if an individual wants to build their own X and company Y produces it more efficiently, and the plurality of others choose that more efficient one, then they will not be able to compete and there is nothing for them to do.

It's not a value proposition it's a math problem. It's also not condescension, it's reality. Do you feel bad for horse carriage makers?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Capitalism is not dyying. Capitalism without state intervention, one person to another, is the most pure form of capitalism.

<comment><USER9> > the most pure form of capitalism.

purer than pure, so to speak

</comment></comment><comment> V-2 The inevitable and imminent demise of capitalism, it's been "beginning" for nearly 200 years now.

<comment><USER10> Exactly, and, in my own humble opinion. The capitalism thing just started.

<comment> V-2 The left-wing critique of capitalism has its roots in the dated, 19th century mindset of an Engineer. It has never really moved on from the _" era of the telegraph and the steam engine"_, as the author puts it. The core of it is the belief that social world has to be set up like a precise mechanism.

The direct outcome of that was the idea of central planning, of course, but in principle this school of thought values categorizing, configuring and arranging _everything_ , even humans. Case in point - Fourier's phalanstères (influential early socialist who _" believed that there were twelve common passions which resulted in 810 types of character, so the ideal phalanx would have exactly 1620 people"_, and so forth).

Today's musings are less naive, but the common utopian theme is still that once we arrive at the ideal order of things, we're "liberated" and all that's left is maintenance work, winding the great clock up so it never stops ticking.

They conceal this sentiment better these days, but it still comes out in perceiving every system that's everchanging and highly adaptive as "corroding", "collapsing" etc. If there's no Big Project behind it, it's flawed in their eyes.

Is capitalism _as we know it_ living its days out? Of course - _always_.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The author sees abundant, cheap data and information as eroding Capitalism...I see it as lubricating Capitalism and re-invigorating it with the efficiency gains into areas that may, according to very old labels, might superficially look like collectivism. But the old capitalist incentives still fuel the machine. We don't have to declare a collectivist utopia and force everything to fit in that mold. We can let the market decide where it works.

</comment><comment><USER11> I think the core premise of this article is flawed.

The trend we've actually seen is increasingly socialized risk. This applies to all areas of the economy, from the artificial demand for high risk mortgages to the allowance of a bank's arbitrary assets to be used as risk capital.

Also, congress has gutted the PBGC to the point where it is far from being actuarially sound. Social security and medicare are budgeted such that cuts are guaranteed, etc.

None of these are capitalist enterprises whatsoever. They are state-run markets with various ministers and officials dictating the prices and claiming to understand supply and demand better than markets, and allocating "welfare" to various interest groups (individuals and firms).

Note that nearly all justifications for the overreach in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis were welfare oriented. Prices stopped being an indication of supply and demand but were considered "good" or "bad" and government was called upon to help make prices "more good". This is profoundly dangerous, and has had significant consequences.

More recently, the ACA was passed which codified a massive redistribution of wealth from young to old.

The trends we're seeing emerge are things like credit being a right rather than a function of supply and demand for risk capital.

So soon we'll find that a job is a right, credit is a right, healthcare is a right, etc. The tough question about healthcare is not whether we should care for the sick and indigent, but what are the proper incentives for a healthcare system to have. Rather than addressing the real questions we got a simple wealth redistribution from young to old and from consumers to incumbent firms, an emerging class of Halliburtons of healthcare.

Both political parties lack any desire to exist in a capitalist society; both would rather make big promises and undertake massive projects that have no counterfactual data with which to judge their success or failure.

Trump has promised to continue the work done by Clinton and Bush and Obama to remove regulatory barriers to risk aggregation, which appeals strongly to firms now that we all know that regardless of whatever (arbitrary) underwriting requirements the law sets, the government will underwrite any losses that could result in insolvency. Employees of those firms stand to collect performance bonuses each quarter until the firm turns out (oops) to be over-leveraged.

The nice thing about socialism is that it is a simple ideology of preventing class power from emerging. What we have in the US today is a highly corrupt form of crony capitalism and public/private schemes designed to enrich specific firms and cronies. That there still exists any rhetoric that talks about capitalism, individualism, etc., is simply due to some politicians finding it useful to rally a small number of constituents, but it means nothing and has zero impact, other than to fuel articles like this that disparage it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you think that technology has the potential to take the power away from politicians and companies and put it back in the hands of the people?

I'm by no means a technological utopian. But it would be nice if we could develop to the point where technology helps make things like health care inexpensive enough that we don't have to ask questions about whether it is a right. It'll just be something that everyone has access to, and it would seem weird to think otherwise. Of course, right now the primary reason for people and companies have for developing that kind of technology is the potential for a financial return. I'd personally work for less money for an organization with a goal like making health care, or clean water, etc. available to everyone at low cost. But I'm not sure how such an organization would compete against the massive corporate incumbents in those fields.

Along those lines, cheap and powerful technology can also be used be groups who are already powerful (mainly large corporations and governments) to consolidate their power. I think we're already seeing that happen.

<comment><USER12> "But it would be nice if we could develop to the point where technology helps make things like health care inexpensive enough that we don't have to ask questions about whether it is a right."

Its worked like that in Europe for years.

<comment><USER6> I don't know. I think it was more like an agreement from most parties that it is better (more efficient, more moral, etc.) to have affordable healthcare for everybody, rather than dealing with a grossly sick underclass.

<comment><USER12> Different means to the same end.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This is strange, I watched Paul Mason's presentation at Google yesterday[1]. I recommend it.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQyr9l22fLE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQyr9l22fLE)

</comment><comment><USER14> > _individualism replaced collectivism and solidarity_

If the risk of fighting for the expansion of individual rights is that it reduces collectivism and solidarity then the progressive left has a fundamental inner conflict to resolve.

</comment><comment> norea-armozel I think at the heart of the 2016 US elections is this panic over the decline of capitalism. It'll be interesting to see what the alt-right does when the world doesn't need the old systems of manufacturing and military to sustain societies.

<comment><AUTHOR> Maybe just the decline of capitalism as we know it?

As others have pointed out, if people are still making things and providing services, and there are markets in which people exchanges those goods and services, that's still capitalism.

But not capitalism as we know it right now. Our current system puts a lot of power in the hands of big corporations and governments. That's worked pretty well (for the Western world, at least) for a long time, in terms of quality of life.

So I understand the widespead desire to maintain what we've got right now. I just wonder how long it'll be possible to do that for. Technology that enables people and small groups to create things for themselves offers the opportunity to put more power back in the hands on individuals. But technology also enables groups that are currently powerful to consolidate their power.

I suspect that we'll _eventually_ reach a point where individuals have more control over their circumstances, but not before we go through a period where powerful governments and companies becomes even more powerful.

<comment><USER15> >As others have point it out, if people are still making things and providing services, and there are markets in which people exchanges those goods and services, that's still capitalism.

Capitalism: the means of production are controlled by private individuals, and operated by wage-laborers, to accumulate profit.

Anything other than that _is not capitalism_. Personal trade and markets in goods preexisted capitalism by thousands of years. They will probably survive well after capitalism is dead and gone, if anyone at all is alive at that point.

Capitalism itself, though, is teetering now as it did in 1930. There were ways to save it then: break up overlarge firms, enforce competition with the hand of the state, use the welfare state to prop up the working class's standard of living. Frankly, I think those can still work, but it's also much more desirable to shift to codetermination, socialized finance, and worker cooperatives in the first place.

<comment> norea-armozel The problem with that solution is that it's kicking the can down the road for another generation to reset the system once it returns to the gigantism of old. The best solution, the hardest one because it will hurt the most, is to place all ownership of capital in a common trust. No more Bill Gateses. No more George Soroses. Just everyone having a common share in the same pool of capital from which to subsist. This doesn't mean you can't have personal property, it just means you can't plant a flag on some land and declare "I am the king of my own kingdom" as it were.

<comment><USER16> But capital is dynamic and ever-changing. Also, a huge amount of it, quite possibly a majority in how you measure it, is in human skills and knowledge.

Capital is not a pool of objects that, once made, forever provide a return. All machines wear out or are obsoleted, buildings require maintenance or become badly located, people change throughout their lives, products and preferences change, making old capital lose value and new capital emerge. Making a "common trust" of capital changes none of this, and it cannot be comprehensibly divided into shares.

And the personal-property/capital distinction is flawed. Is a car personal property? Does it matter if I use it to commute to work, or to deliver pizzas? There's essentially no comprehensible criteria to distinguish personal property from capital property.

And I really don't see how "placing all ownership of capital in a common trust" is not gigantism. It's the most total gigantism, the ultimate monopoly. Whosoever operates that trust really is the king of all.

<comment> norea-armozel >But capital is dynamic and ever-changing. Also, a huge amount of it, quite possibly a majority in how you measure it, is in human skills and knowledge.

Again, this doesn't reflect the historicity of the ownership of capital. Today's equivalent to land monopoly would be intellectual property where individuals and firms have effectively monopolized lawful use of labor to produce a wide variety of products. This is especially disastrous when it comes to patents since there's no reasonable justification for such monopolization since it is by definition rent seeking. Therefore, I ask why do you feel it's logical to continue down the path of further monopolizations which inevitably harm the economy as a whole and individuals in their pursuit of material betterment?

>And the personal-property/capital distinction is flawed. Is a car personal property? Does it matter if I use it to commute to work, or to deliver pizzas? There's essentially no comprehensible criteria to distinguish personal property from capital property.

No it's not flawed because capital is the means of production itself. Your car isn't a means for production that can be naturally monopolized. But if you demanded a toll for a stretch of road that happens to be out front of your house that would be capital and it would be rent seeking since the act of ambulation isn't improved by the mere act of crossing your part of the road. The act of demanding a toll for the road crossing is what capitalism does as a whole. It says "I will use force to extract rents on things which clearly are a necessary component to life without adding value in said transaction nor pay for the socialization of the costs/risks of my ventures."

>And I really don't see how "placing all ownership of capital in a common trust" is not gigantism.

It's not gigantism because it's not done at a national level. I support radical localism.

<comment><USER16> > Therefore, I ask why do you feel it's logical to continue down the path of > further monopolizations which inevitably harm the economy as a whole and > individuals in their pursuit of material betterment?

Why do you assume I'm in favour of a particular form of patent law? (Let alone any patent law?) I'm not (though it's not a super-strongly held prior), and I think that this is perfectly consistent with supporting a very market-based system. I think a no-patents system would probably be more innovative and competitive than what we have now.

>But if you demanded a toll for a stretch of road that happens to be out front of your house that would be capital and it would be rent seeking since the act of ambulation isn't improved by the mere act of crossing your part of the road.

Are you talking about somebody charging a toll on a road they don't own and don't maintain? Because that's not what I'm talking about or proposing.

I mean, who built the road? Someone has to build it and maintain it. It must be refreshed constantly with new investment. It's also not a monopoly on anything - no more than the door in a house is a monopoly on entry into that house. And "ambulation isn't improved by the mere act of crossing a road"? I think roads (and sidewalks, and boardwalks) very much improve ambulation and transportation of all kinds. Building a road and then tolling it is not rentiership in any sense.

Capital is not a fixed pool of items or goods. Owners of capital are not inherently rentiers. They can be, in many cases, but that's not because they own capital.

> It's not gigantism because it's not done at a national level. I support > radical localism.

Well, now you're back to, essentially, private property. Some "radically local" entities are going to be more successful than others, and become more prosperous, making membership in them more valuable. They will have to trade between themselves, making prices and property (even if collective) necessary. And unless you're prepared to keep people in their locality permanently, you're going to see localities that change size radically. And if you're going to keep localities of a similar size, who enforces that? And if they do, you're back to gigantism.

<comment> norea-armozel >I think a no-patents system would probably be more innovative and competitive than what we have now.

Glad we agree at least on this point

>Are you talking about somebody charging a toll on a road they don't own and don't maintain? Because that's not what I'm talking about or proposing. >I mean, who built the road? Someone has to build it and maintain it.

The road analogy is specifically dealing with the idea that land itself can be an exclusive good and thus individuals who naturally exclude others (someone's home, factory, farm, etc are the property on the land but not the land itself) should cover for the loss through the exclusion. Allowing people to exclude others but also to extract rents through mere passage or occupancy without actually producing any value (land speculation and slum lords are an example of this). This ultimately leads to a social order where those who own title to land can reign supreme over others who rent the land.

>Capital is not a fixed pool of items or goods. Owners of capital are not inherently rentiers.

If you have a monopoly on the capital goods in question then you are a rentier. There's no way around it and it needs to be addressed if you want to fix the fundamental problems that plague society.

>Well, now you're back to, essentially, private property.

Property is a necessary but not sufficient condition of capital. And property isn't the issue (read Proudhon) but rather the title acting as impersonal property over personal property as use. Meaning that one with title can exclude others from its use even if they're not using it or even care to use it ever (again land speculators and patent trolls are a great example of this).

>Some "radically local" entities are going to be more successful than others, and become more prosperous, making membership in them more valuable.

Cooperatives in themselves are a union among workers thus you can't elevate yourself above fellow workers in the cooperative in terms of economic primacy. All have their say in equal capacity (as in shares != more votes).

>They will have to trade between themselves, making prices and property (even if collective) necessary.

And none of this is capitalism. I think the onus is on you to show me how a market needs a capital owner and not the other way around. Because at it's heart two individuals free of exclusivity that comes with capitalism trading among themselves is no more a capitalist than is a musician a capitalist just because they're paid big bucks to sing at concerts. You're not a capitalist either just because you decide to use your car to drive Uber fares part time because the act of work itself isn't excluding others from working (i.e. being Uber drivers themselves). A capitalist by definition can and will extract rents from capital and exclude others from its use (be it labor, machines, factories, ideas, or land) via the State or equivalent institutions. None of this in any form is necessary to the definition of a market system. A market system is merely free exchange of goods at some price (social credit, barter, money, etc). That's it, nothing else defines a market. And as such it takes a capitalist to make capitalism; no ands, ifs, or buts.

<comment><USER16> > The road analogy is specifically dealing with the idea that land itself can > be an exclusive good and thus individuals who naturally exclude others > (someone's home, factory, farm, etc are the property on the land but not the > land itself) should cover for the loss through the exclusion. Allowing > people to exclude others but also to extract rents through mere passage or > occupancy without actually producing any value (land speculation and slum > lords are an example of this).

I don't see why land is special. Sure, it has a few peculiar properties, but it's not that different. Land has value for all sorts of reasons - perhaps it has fertile soil (which must be stewarded), perhaps it has valuable buildings or infrastructures near or on it (which must be built and maintained), perhaps it has certain climactic advantages - but this doesn't mean that anybody who owns some has a "monopoly" on it, any more than the owner of any other thing has a "monopoly" on that particular object. There's a limited number of, say, aluminum atoms on earth, does that mean that anyone who owns some aluminum is a monopolist?

I mean, I can go buy a swathe of desert and put a fence around it, it doesn't mean I've got a monopoly on anything. Land ownership - especially urban land ownership, where most of the value is - is hugely fragmented, there's no monopoly to be found.

I exclude others from my home, and the land it's on. Why should I be able to exclude people from my house legitimately, but not the attached land components?

>If you have a monopoly on the capital goods in question then you are a rentier.

What capital goods do people actually have a monopoly on, though, which has not been granted to them by special law? Any capital good you can think of (outside patent or copyright) can be, and usually is, owned by many people.

> Meaning that one with title can exclude others from its use even if they're > not using it or even care to use it ever (again land speculators and patent > trolls are a great example of this).

How do you define use, though? (Patent trolls we've covered.) What if I leave land fallow for the pure enjoyment of it, or for natural restoration? What if I use it in a way that others don't like? Who decides? A "land speculator" is investing in the possibility of future returns - what if the "speculator" intends to build houses on a lot, but is still trying to raise money to do so? What's the difference between a land buyer employed by a homebuilder, and a freelance one? Is it only speculation if a profit is returned? (I can speculate on land for years and make no money.) Speculation is nearly impossible to clearly define.

> Cooperatives in themselves are a union among workers thus you can't elevate > yourself above fellow workers in the cooperative in terms of economic > primacy. All have their say in equal capacity (as in shares != more votes).

Great, what if a cooperative fails, as they will? Those people will have to go find new or other cooperatives to work for. Will all cooperatives be required to take those people in and give them an equal say, even though they've not contributed the same amount of time and may have helped cause a failure? Can you fire people from a cooperative if they're no good? If everyone else in your cooperative besides you leaves, can you still have a single-person cooperative?

> I think the onus is on you to show me how a market needs a capital owner and > not the other way around.....You're not a capitalist either just because you > decide to use your car to drive Uber fares part time because the act of work > itself isn't excluding others from working (i.e. being Uber drivers > themselves). A capitalist by definition can and will extract rents from > capital and exclude others from its use (be it labor, machines, factories, > ideas, or land) via the State or equivalent institutions.

Because all goods are essentially capital - or rather, all capital is essentially just goods. There's no obvious distinction. Let me recast your example: "You're not a capitalist either just because you decide to use your garage workshop to build chairs part time because the act of work isn't excluding others from working (i.e. making chairs themselves.)" And you can expand that - "You're not a capitalist because you decide to use your factory to create steel...."

If you own a car you're excluding others from using _that car_ \- but you're not inherently a monopolist rentier, because others can make and own cars. If you own a factory you're excluding others from using _that factory_ \- but you're not inherently a monopolist rentier, because others can make and own factories.

<comment> norea-armozel >Land has value for all sorts of reasons... Land is only valuable due to scarcity. You really can't make more of it even if you dig up parts of another bit of land to dump into a bay (like how they made the airport in Tokyo).

And the infrastructure on it doesn't make land any more valuable because those things (buildings, roads, farms, etc) are property in the sense they can be put just about anywhere and require labor to make them all. Land doesn't require any labor to exist. It's just a given like air and fresh water. It's the baseline from which all economic transactions can operate.

>but this doesn't mean that anybody who owns some has a "monopoly" on it

If you own the land in an area by definition you got a monopoly there. And it becomes a problem the ownership of land becomes centralized to the point that corporations like what you see with slums not improving the property on the land (due to property tax as one significant factor) and still extracting rents above market level from tenants. But that's a special case and it's one that really suggest you read up on when you have free time.

>What capital goods do people actually have a monopoly on, though, which has not been granted to them by special law? Any capital good you can think of (outside patent or copyright) can be, and usually is, owned by many people.

1\. There's no such thing as a "special" law. There's just laws of certain types. Sorry for the pedantry but I think trying to sequester a significant social and legal trend as "special" hides the deeper problem attached to the fact that those laws exist (see Enclosure Act from 19th century England as an example of this).

2\. And of those people, does it seem logical to allow them impede the utilization their capital when they leave it fallow or otherwise try to depress wages while utilizing it as a practice of employment? Again, this the point that I think you're missing or otherwise discounting. Specifically, that the ownership of capital should be held in common so that everyone can have equal access (not necessarily equal opportunity as achievement) to the means to sustain themselves. This doesn't need something as rigid as a Five Year Plan or any Soviet-era bureaucracies. It can be as simple as a cooperative shared among members of the neighborhood or the city.

>What if I leave land fallow for the pure enjoyment of it, or for natural restoration?

Then you should have no issues with paying for a land value tax (which would be lower than a property tax in most cases) for that use.

>Great, what if a cooperative fails, as they will?

What if publicly traded corporations fails, as they will? A cooperative isn't some radically new concept or institution. Your local credit unions are a form of cooperative in the current legal framework. You have also utility cooperatives, farming cooperatives, and so on. None of these fail any more or less than a private/public corporation. I think you need to study this part of the matter on your own because honestly HN isn't the place to go indepth with alternative incorporation schemes and laws. Best to ask someone who's done this sort of thing. Best bet is to look for someone who's in a diary cooperative. Lots of food fanatics use them to get unpasteurized milk.

>Because all goods are essentially capital...

No. Just, no. The burger I'll eat today for lunch is no more capital than the notebook I use to write my notes on. Capital are goods which can directly make more goods. Think ore, timber, machines, patents, corporate assets (money, stocks, etc). These are capital. Individual's personal cars, homes, and skills aren't capital by any definition from any school of economics that I'm at least aware of (there might one but I seriously doubt it's considered orthodox).

<comment><USER16> > Land is only valuable due to scarcity. You really can't make more of it even > if you dig up parts of another bit of land to dump into a bay (like how they > made the airport in Tokyo).

Well, the majority of the land extensions in Tokyo (and elsewhere) have generally been created by using the spoils from tunneling. So in this sense, the total land area has indeed been increased with no reduction _in area_ elsewhere.

Secondly, I would say that land isn't valuable "only due to scarcity". Demand matters too. Lots of land on Earth is not in demand for much of anything, because it's not near anything useful to anybody, or has nothing useful upon it. The overwhelming majority of land value is due to the proximity of economically useful things (the aforementioned buildings and infrastructure and so on.)

The reason to have private property in land is _because_ many things are necessarily tied to specific parcels of land. If you don't have private land ownership, then all land-attached investments are insecure. (UPDATE: That is to say, _private_ land-attached investments are insecure.)

> If you own the land in an area by definition you got a monopoly > there.[...cut for length...] But that's a special case and it's one that > really suggest you read up on when you have free time.

Firstly, this salty suggestion of yours that I need to "read up on" land economics "when I have free time" is pretty unnecessary. I did my reading, six years of it, in the process of two degrees in urban geography/economics. I have been through literally thousands of pages of reading on this subject. Now, you may disagree with me and that's totally fine! But maybe stash the assumptions about what I have and have not done, alright?

To say that someone has a monopoly on land because they own _some small amount_ is to excessively broaden the meaning of the word. A monopoly doesn't exist in a situation where there is a wide range of substitutable goods available from multiple owners/suppliers. The fact that a good is limited in supply does not make any owner of a small fragment of the total supply a monopolist. And _people_ are mobile - the fact that land is generally immobile doesn't mean that people are unable to exercise choice, since they can do so through movements, even quite small ones.

Centralized land ownership is almost never a case of corporations or private individuals - indeed, it's usually the case that the largest land ownership centralizers are municipalities and other governments. Many of the reasons that slums exist is due not to the private ownership of land, but other factors: rent controls drive down returns from buildings, making upkeep uneconomic, high taxes overconsume the returns in a similar way, insecure property rights lead to underinvestment (this last one is most common in low- income countries.) The private land owners of most cities are usually huge in number - competition does exist, and monopoly, at least due to private owners, typically does not.

I'll further note that while land is, in a sense, limited in supply, the _services provided by land_ are much less so. This is the whole reason behind urban density and building upwards (and down). Land ownership is just a prerequisite to these investments.

> 1\. There's no such thing as a "special" law. There's just laws of certain > types.

I was referring, apparently too obliquely, to things like patent law, which I agree are different. (Since by _copying_ an idea, one does not seize or destroy the original.)

>2\. And of those people, does it seem logical to allow them impede the utilization their capital when they leave it fallow or otherwise try to depress wages while utilizing it as a practice of employment?[...cut for length...] It can be as simple as a cooperative shared among members of the neighborhood or the city.

Firstly, I don't think "leaving fallow" is something easily defined or decided. Of course, the original "fallow" was to let the land rest after a harvest - indeed, it was an investment (foregone consumption in expectation of future returns.) But even land owned "speculatively" and _appearing_ to be fallow may be serving an important purpose. For example, let's say I might be building out a large area one piece at a time. So first, I'll be extending and improving infrastructure. I'd like to get the maximum benefit of that investment, though, so I'll buy up a large amount of land around it ahead of time, even though I'll not be building anything on it for a while. Or, to give another example, let's say I'm an investor hoping that housing demand will cause land in an area to become more valuable. So I'll buy it up and wait, hoping to build on it later - what the sellers get is _money now_ , which is more valuable to them than their expected money later. What I'm doing is taking a risk - it might pan out, it might not - but by selling to me, the previous owners transferred that risk to me in exchange for a known upfront payout. These are perfectly reasonable things to do, even if they look like "land speculation".

And "equal access" is of course not guaranteed by collective ownership. There's nothing about a collective that ensures that its capital will give good returns. And if you've got things on the scale of a neighbourhood or a city, then naturally some neighbourhoods or cities will have much better capital than others. Then all that happens is that some localities are wealthy and some are not - "equality" is only within the cooperative. Yet if cooperatives aren't fixed and mandatory, the failing ones will just evaporate and be bought out. And you're back to inequality.

>Then you should have no issues with paying for a land value tax (which would be lower than a property tax in most cases) for that use.

And I'm not objecting in principle to a land value tax. It's perfectly compatible with private land ownership, although I'm a bit skeptical of it being a particularly effective or progressive tax. But that's neither here nor there.

>What if publicly traded corporations fails, as they will? [...cut for length...] I think you need to study this part of the matter on your own because honestly HN isn't the place to go indepth with alternative incorporation schemes and laws.

I have nothing against cooperatives at all, they're a perfectly reasonable ownership structure, albeit one disadvantaged by a number of tax and liability laws. I have been a _member_ of a number of cooperatives, and have done a reasonable amount of research on them. (Again - your assertion that I "need to study this on my own" is rude and a non-argument.)

What I was referring to was _your_ argument that land and "capital" should all be owned by cooperatives. (Perhaps I should have said "Norea-Armozel-model cooperatives" or something.) What I was arguing is that, if people in these cooperatives are free to leave them, free to start them, free to exclude non- current-members, and free to be in a one-person cooperative, then you're right back at private ownership of land and capital. The only way you can ensure continued collective ownership of capital is by blocking off these avenues of choice.

>No. Just, no. The burger I'll eat today for lunch is no more capital than the notebook I use to write my notes on. Capital are goods which can directly make more goods. Think ore, timber, machines, patents, corporate assets (money, stocks, etc). These are capital. Individual's personal cars, homes, and skills aren't capital by any definition from any school of economics that I'm at least aware of (there might one but I seriously doubt it's considered orthodox).

The capital/consumption distinction is not one inherent to the good itself, though. It's a useful economic concept but is different from the public/private/club/common distinction. What I was saying is that this distinction is not a hard-and-fast one, but more like the distinction between a tropical storm and a hurricane - a line you draw somewhere for the purposes of analysis.

You say, "capital are goods which can directly make more goods". Well, take that private vehicle for example. Now, transportation is needed somehow to get the workers to a factory - it is essential to the production process. So at first the employees drive their own vehicles. Then, let's imagine that the factory owners have the bright idea of starting a company carpool van service, to cut down on parking needed. They buy a bunch of vans and start bringing employees to work in them. The service of transportation is still rendered, but now the vans are "capital goods" because they are used to make the factory's operation possible. It's still a vehicle - did anything change about the _good itself_? Not really, no.

I mean, are kitchenwares capital goods or not? They certainly directly make more goods - but does that mean that all kitchenwares should be collectively owned? What if somebody starts making and selling food in their own home? A dentist owns many tools which produce a good/service - clean and healthy teeth. They seem to be capital. But many of these same tools, providing quite similar services, in people's homes, are not capital? (As the old question goes, "do I get to own my own toothbrush?") Beds, walls, and bathrooms, when in a hotel, produce a good/service. But those same goods in the home are not capital? (And what about BnBs?) Capital is distinguished from consumption goods just as a helpful measurement category; the goods - and their potential to be owned - do not change.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Lyme Disease Cases Are Exploding - <AUTHOR> https://elemental.medium.com/lyme-disease-cases-are-exploding-and-its-only-going-to-get-worse-5d3c3a2de5c5 <comment><USER2> My father nearly died of [what we believe to be] Lyme disease. A few years ago he started getting awful bouts of pain all over his body. He couldn't eat, was losing weight, was losing muscle mass fast. It got the the point where he was using a walker (he was less than 60 years old at the time) and could barely lift a 5 pound weight. He went to a bunch of different doctors, had all kinds of scans run, and only kept getting worse. At one point my mother noticed that every test any doctor gave for Lyme disease came back "inconclusive". She pointed out to one of the doctors, who said that it didn't mean anything as apparently the test is not very reliable. Finally, they found a doctor who prescribed medication to treat Lyme disease without a definitive test because apparently there was a low risk of side effects. Within a couple of weeks of starting the medication, my father was visibly better, within a few months he was basically back to normal, and is basically fully recovered now. (Sorry folks, I don't know any of the specific drugs or medical terminology.)

We have no idea how or when he got infected. As far as he knows, he never had a bullseye rash, although apparently that doesn't always happen. Now I slather myself in DEET whenever I go into a an even semi-woodsy environment.

<comment><USER3> I would greatly appreciate it if you could find the name of that medication. My sister has Lyme Disease and is still suffering health effects from it despite various treatments.

<comment><USER4> Most non-Lyme Literate Medical doctors prescribe Doxycyclin. If you are seeing a Lyme Literate Medical doctor they'll put you on a cocktail (often Clarithromycin, Doxy, Alinia (anti-parasitic), and a few others. This also depends if you have co-infections or not.

<comment><USER5> The UK NICE guidelines suggest doxycycline, and have a section discussing the evidence for that:

[https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng95](https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng95)

"Lyme literate" seems to be a pseudoscience term related to the ME-like crypto-syndrome "chronic Lyme disease" \- for example, see towards the end here:

[https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/legislative- alchemy-2014-so...](https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/legislative- alchemy-2014-so-far/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Unfortunately there's no way to know that one _currently has_ Lyme disease unless the symptoms are close in time to a tick bite.

Treatment is with antibiotics, usually doctors will use a combination of two types of antibiotics (eg doxycycline and cefdinir) for which there is some research suggesting better results. In rare cases IV antibiotics may be required, especially if evidence of cardiac or neurological involvement. Duration of treatment is for 1 to 4 months. There's next to no evidence you should go longer than that.

After treatment patients may also need immune modulation treatment due to autoimmune reaction to the infection. High dose ivig in serious cases. Some patients also find benefit using low dose naltrexone for this though it can have a very nasty side effect of causing depression so watch yourself using it.

Almost everything else is a scam. And unfortunately with Lyme, while the patients are clearly very sick, there are an aweful lot of quacks ready to part them with their cash so be weary.

It's important to know there are other illnesses that people need to rule out too, check for dysautonomia, POTS, ME/CFS, MS, and aaSFPN for example.

<comment><USER7> Any advice on POTS treatment avenues? There seems to be poor GP knowledge around the condition, apart from giving fluids via a port to reduce symptoms.

<comment><USER6> I'm mostly familiar with POTS in patients with other chronic symptoms such as fatigue. I've been on high dose IVIG and it's been helping my POTS a lot.

Take a look at a video on YouTube by a Harvard doctor Anna Louise Oaklander called Small Fibers Big Problem about the association they are making with something they label aaSFPN. Also take a look at some results for adrenergic and muscinaric auto antibodies, which are showing up in patients with POTS and other dysautonomias.

<comment><USER7> Thank you very much for providing this information, those are some great leads I'll follow up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Surprised to see Lyme disease on HN, since bringing affordable DNA testing for B. burgdorferi & other pathogens to the public is the startup I've been working on since 2014.

Relevant Plug: [https://www.tickcheck.com/](https://www.tickcheck.com/)

As mentioned in other comments, serological tests fall short in various ways (accuracy, time). If you keep the tick that bit you, we can test it for the presence Lyme, and several other pathogens. If negative, we can effectively rule out much of the risk. Super quick & accurate, too.

<comment><USER9> Interesting. I got bit by 2 blacklegged ticks in the past 3 months but I couldn't find any free tick tests, so I never had them tested. Both were within a few hours so I assumed based on CDC advice that I was still in the green zone. It sounds like one of those things that health insurance companies would be out of their minds to not cover.

Separately: Bay Area hikers beware -- change your clothes immediately after getting home, do complete body checks after hiking -- ideally, shower immediately.

<comment><USER10> > Both were within a few hours so I assumed based on CDC advice that I was > still in the green zone.

I wouldn't trust the CDC data. Notice that there is no primary source on their webpage.

Here is a paper by someone who took an independent look into it: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4278789/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4278789/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've recently gotten into backpacking and learned that the most effective way of dealing with mosquitoes and ticks in nature is Permetherin. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permethrin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permethrin).

It is intended for clothing and not the skin. The best way to apply it is to soak your clothes and let it dry. Spray on applicators are also available. Once it is dry, it is very stable and safe. It does breakdown with UV and washes, so it will need more applications. It is also available for sale and the pre-treated clothing does last through more washes.

Note: Permetherin is harmful to cats when it is wet so if you have cats at home, please read up more on it. Once it is dry, it is safe around cats.

<comment><USER12> Ticks can drop out of trees on your head, or attach to your hair when your head brushes past some leaves on a tree. Also, if your bare skin is not covered in insect repellent, that could also be a route that they get to the rest of your body.

The most effective method of not getting bitten is not to go in to the woods at all.

<comment><USER13> > The most effective method of not getting bitten is not to go in to the woods > at all.

your profile reads:

He who lives without folly is not as wise as he thinks. \-- Rouchefoucald

<comment><USER14> A funny saying I've heard is that "The difference between a smart person and a stupid one is the smart person knows he is full of stupidity".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I may or may not have had chronic lyme disease. I definitely had many many ticks. (Never cared about em, just pulled them off). And I definitely was sick for over a decade. And I definitely tested positive on the Western Blot multiple times. (And chronic lyme is definitely a bit of a catch-all diagnosis for a host of auto-immune stuff we don't quite understand yet)

It was awful, something I wouldn't wish on anyone.

If you do get a deer tick (they are the small ones, not the giant gross ones) save it, there are a number of places you can send it for peace of mind that it was not infected.

Also consider brief antibiotic prophylaxis: 1-3 doses of doxycycline are often recommended. I'm not in favor of anti-biotic overuse, but if lyme can turn into chronic lyme and that was indeed what I dealt with for 10 years of pain and crushing fatigue, then you want to avoid it.

(edit: typos)

<comment><USER16> Just a note, Chronic lyme disease isn't really a thing.

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4477530/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4477530/)

This isn't to say you haven't been dealing with a lot of garbage, just that you might need to seek different medical care if your doctors are telling you that you have chronic lyme disease.

<comment><USER15> I appreciate your concern. I certainly had something. It certainly sucked. I certainly shared a lot of symptoms and remission factors with other people who identified as having chronic lyme. I certainly had Lyme at some point in my past.

I agree that "alternative medicine" can be a hotbed of pseudo-science and sketchy treatment, but I also think that in terms of a lot of these chronic auto-immune related conditions, our evidence base is still pretty small and there's a lot we don't know. And the dominant Western medical system tends to do much better with acute conditions with a clear etiology of cause/effect than nebulous clusters of symptoms (see also, all of mental health).

My hunch is that chronic lyme, just like for example chronic fatigue that lasts for years after Epstein-Barr, is some sort of auto-immune condition triggered by the initial infection, even if the initial infection is gone. With Lyme it is a little more complicated because there are spirochetes involved.

I assure you I've probably read everything that the NIH has put out about Lyme all the way to some of the wackiest all caps blinking sketchy sell-me-vitamin treatment websites out there, as well as chronic fatigue (I spent the first 7 of those years considering it CFIDS). It nearly destroyed all of my 20s.

Treat prophylatically or not, but try not to get Lyme, that's all I'm saying.

<comment><USER17> Did you get better? What treatments did you use, what did you do?

<comment><USER15> I got better. I also struggled with severe depressive tendencies, panic attacks, social anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive tendencies. I got better from those as well.

All these things were linked, yet separate. You cannot tell me the chronic fatigue was just my depression, as I can tell a difference, but neither was my depression just from not being able to be active for more than about 2-3 hours each day. Mental health issues pre-dated chronic fatigue, but chronic fatigue intensified them.

I did many treatments, though I chose to never have a PICC line installed for months of IV antibiotics - that seemed like chemotherapy to me then and now, and not without its own risks. Everything from antibiotic regimens to homeopathy to humming with crystals in my hands. Sometimes I was raw vegan, other times I smoked heavily, drank heavily, because nothing worked anyway, why not have fun, etc.

Too long for one comment here, but find me privately if you are struggling with chronic immune stuff.

I'm unsure what eventually worked, and what was time. A lot of it, cliche as it is, was the very strong love of a very supportive partner that saw I could still live, even if I thought I couldn't.

I would say the following things all had major effects, though I don't use any currently - many of them provide symptomatic relief for some things, I'm not sure why things shifted underneath it all.

#1) regular injections of methyl-B12 even with normal cyano-b12 levels

#2) low dose Abilify and modafinil and (sparingly) stimulants

#4) regular yoga practice that provided low-impact exercise, mindfulness amidst the fear that my life was over, and a way back into an awareness of my body that didn't only have me think it was the enemy that was killing me, and of a self that transcended whatever I thought I was

#5) treatment for orthostatic hypotension including low dose steroids, salt pills, compression stockings, etc

#6) psychotherapy

#7) A few times rounds of abx when I was at my worst seemed to help a lot

#8) supplemental testosterone for 2 years when mine was low-normal (is normal- normal now without supplements)

#9) eliminating all processed anything from my diet for about 4 years, all gluten for about 5, all refined sugars for about 5 (can eat anything now without ill-effect) and drinking home made bone broth regularly

(I also know some people will read this and hone in on a few things and be like oh! he just needed some psych drugs, therapy, and exercise! Those can def all be helpful things, but I assure you it was a strange and complicated journey through the mindbody, I still have no sample size other than me, and the methyl-B12 was by far the most helpful even though that largely falls under the pseudo-science perpetuated by people searching for autism cures...)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Explosion of deer and rodent populations is definitely not helping. We were walking with our dog at a local natural area we frequent. A deer crossed the path and we all stopped to take photos, and then moved on. That day we found ticks all over our dog. The deer are literally swimming in them.

Both rodents and deer are part of the lifecycle of the tick. Suppressing deer populations and encouraging red foxes and other rodent predators would have to help.

<comment><USER19> Most people still see deer as cute, but its starting to change. When I see deer I just see disease carrying vermin. Deer populations have exploded. I wish they were systematically culled. Time talked about this a while back, I havent seen anything since. [https://time.com/709/americas-pest-problem-its- time-to-cull-...](https://time.com/709/americas-pest-problem-its-time-to-cull- the-herd/) [https://vet.uga.edu/population_health_files/scwds-150wtdeer5...](https://vet.uga.edu/population_health_files/scwds-150wtdeer507080-2012.jpg)

<comment><USER20> I know what you mean.

However we might not be awash in deer if we hadn't first 'culled' all the predators. Wolves for example.¹

1: [http://www.uky.edu/OtherOrgs/AppalFor/Readings/leopold.pdf](http://www.uky.edu/OtherOrgs/AppalFor/Readings/leopold.pdf)

<comment><USER21> The wolf population is slowly increasing in western europe.

Here's some wolf news for those who enjoy that sort of thing, in Dutch: [http://www.welkomwolf.be/node/238](http://www.welkomwolf.be/node/238)

<comment><USER19> I'd love wolves roaming around my local forest, but my neighbors with pets and local farmers wouldn't let it happen.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I was bit by a tick and I got sick. No doctor could figure out what was wrong. I tested negative for Lyme. I took antibiotics (Biaxin) and 3 months later I was fine. I stopped taking antibiotics. Within 2 months I was sick again. I took Biaxin for 6 months. I felt great. I stopped antibiotics. Within 2 months I was sick again. I took Biaxin for a year. I felt great. I stopped taking antibiotics. Within 2 months I was sick again.

This time, the symptoms were completely different. I assumed it was a new illness. Doctors were mystified. One said it was psychosomatic. I was off antibiotics for more than 6 months. I got sicker and sicker. I was in bad shape when I decided this illness was the same as the previous illness. I took a combination of Cipro and Zithromax for 1 year. I got better. Then I stopped. I got sick again.

I was eager to get back to my career so I tried a few antibiotics that might be light, cheap, easy and sustainable. A friend of mine, as a teenager, had acne and the doctors had them on antibiotics for 4 years to deal with the acne. They'd taken something similar to doxycycline. I tried it but it did nothing for me. I tried hyperbaric oxygen therapy, which gave me great energy but did not cure me. Then I tried Amoxicillin. That worked great. I took that for 11 years. Then I quit and got sick again. I went back to Biaxin, and took that for another 2 years. My business was going well so I could not focus on my health. I was busy. The simplest thing was to take antibiotics, which kept me healthy so I could focus on work. So long as I took antibiotics the illness kept its distance. In that sense, the illness was similar to leprosy — I could live a normal life but only if I took antibiotics every day.

But I was irritated with my business partner (I've written about that elsewhere). So I sold my share of the business.

Now I had time to focus on my health. What had I not yet tried? What about fasting?

I went 2 weeks without food. I took antibiotics the first week but not the second. I felt sick. The fast ended. I had a vegetarian meal. I fell asleep. I woke up the next day and had a large vegetarian meal. That night I felt funny. The feeling was similar to that moment, if you have a flu, when the fever breaks. With a flu, you get sicker and sicker till a moment the fever breaks and then you know that your immune system has kicked in. That was exactly the feeling that I had then.

I have not taken any antibiotics since that fast, and I've been blessed with excellent health.

<comment><USER23> Now I'm no medical expert but antibiotics resolve an infection after a certain amount of time. Even for Lyme and leprosy. There may be health after-effects but those would not be resolved by antibiotics since the infection is gone. What could possibly outlast 20 years of continuous antibiotics that isn't either completely killed or mutates and renders the antibiotics ineffective? And then be resolved with a fast?

<comment><USER22> Teenagers with acne often take antibiotics for many years. I had one friend with severe acne who took antibiotics well into adulthood.

Those teenagers, who take antibiotics, with a microscope at home can do this simple experiment: prick your finger with a needle and put a drop of blood on steriled glass, then put that under a microscope. Do you see bacteria? Yes, of course you do. Even if you take antibiotics for 20 years, your body will still be seething with bacteria. There is no way to get rid of the bacteria on your body. That isn't what antibiotics do. Antibiotics work with your immune system to bring bacterial load back to a reasonable level. If antibiotics killed all bacteria then people with compromised immune systems could be kept safe from bacteria with antibiotics. But there isn't a doctor in the world who thinks that's possible.

<comment><USER24> I'm under the impression that blood is very sterile. That's the point of your immune system.

<comment><USER22> " _that blood is very sterile_ "

Please, if you can find a microscope, go look. Use your eyes. Your blood system is absolutely not sterile, that is a wildly non-scientific thing to say. Your immune system can not possibly go after ever protein it meets, otherwise you would be allergic to all food, and you would die. When you see an article such as "The dormant blood microbiome in chronic, inflammatory diseases" ask yourself, what is a dormant blood microbiome?

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4487407/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4487407/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Even if there's only one mention of it in the article, I'm glad they included it: alpha-gal syndrome. Not a ton of people seem to know about it and yet I continue to meet more and more people that are affected by it.

For those unaware, it causes a person to develop an allergy to red meat and there's currently no treatment for it other than to wait. Granted, it's not as serious as Lyme Disease, I hope it gets to be well known so there's increased chances of finding a cure for it.

<comment><USER26> My friend's brother was bitten by a lone star tick on Long Island and since has developed that syndrome. It's been pretty funny trying to figure out what we can cook for him at our BBQ's since apparently the meats he's able to eat now are essentially chicken, fish, duck, and human.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> I read about this issue in a runners World article. Most people assume that the tics jump from trees down onto people. But that's not how they said it goes.

They said that the tics which spread Lyme disease get spread onto runners from Tall Grass that people run through as you make contact with the grass they get onto you.

<comment><USER28> I had a friend who was in the Marines and he told me once that they wore panty hose when training in areas with ticks. He said the only downside was that they can be hot in the summer time.

<comment><USER29> ...but is that the _only_ downside?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I've got ticks a few times a year just running in the woods (the last one was Saturday). During holidays in the Pyrenees with my family, we had to scan our bodies for ticks every day, and every day we found several -- up to a dozen -- on each of us.

Now the article is very light on the main question: why did ticks multiply that much recently?

<comment><USER31> _why did ticks multiply that much recently?_

It's because of warmer winters and an exploding deer population. People need to take up hunting again to reduce the numbers of those tick motherships.

<comment><USER32> > People need to take up hunting again to reduce the numbers of those tick > motherships.

... or, as others have said elsewhere in the thread, restore a balance to the ecosystem by reintroducing and protecting natural predators (wolves, foxes, etc.).

<comment><USER31> You'd think that putting wolves and bears into suburbia would attract even more resistance than bowhunting from tree stands. Something must be done about the deer overpopulation, they raid peoples' gardens, they prevent forest regeneration, they are a pest. Maybe we could start by withdrawing from the suburbs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> I remember standing in line at a coffee shop, after walking some dogs on a nature trail. I felt a sharp pain on my hip flexor and knew right away it was a tick bite, even though I had never had one before. I rushed into the bathroom and lo and behold, it was a tick. In a panic I asked all the women in the coffee shop if they had tweezers. They must have thought I had a screw loose. None of them did so I rushed home to pull it off. I kid you not, as I pulled it, I heard its jaws (or whatever) snap. P.S. you don't need to burn them unless they've already burrowed.

<comment><USER34> I had dozens of ticks as a kid. Lyme disease hadn't spread to Canada yet, so it wasn't a big deal. I never once felt them bite; they produce an anesthetic so you don't feel it. Sometimes you could feel them crawling on you, but most of the time you didn't even feel that.

And you didn't hear the jaws snap when you pulled it off, you heard the mouth parts tearing. You have to be careful pulling a tick off or the mouth parts will stay in your skin, causing irritation and inflammation.

<comment><USER35> You should avoid pulling, instead hold it with a tool and turn it. After about two or three turns it usually comes right off.

<comment><USER36> I've heard of such a tool, but never seen one. Otherwise, twisting a tick using tweezers or your fingers is a great way to break its head off under your skin.

<comment><USER37> There are "tick cards", sized like a credit card with narrowing cuts which you move long the tick until it comes off. Also very practical.

[https://www.amazon.de/s?k=tick+card](https://www.amazon.de/s?k=tick+card)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Might be time for a CRISPR Gene Drive to eradicate ticks in some zones. Plausibly more critical than mosquitoes.

Obviously we need to be very careful about trying to rebalance what we've put out of balance, and study to be sure that we are not eliminating a critical food source for other links in the food web.

[https://psmag.com/magazine/deleting-a-species-genetically- en...](https://psmag.com/magazine/deleting-a-species-genetically-engineering- an-extinction)

</comment><comment><USER39> The advice we were given in my veterinary entomology course was to tweeze as close as you could from the base and pull perpendicularly to the skin.

You shouldnt yank it, more along the lines of the force you'd use to open a zipper.

<comment><USER40> I've had 100+ ticks always removed them using wet cloth with a tiny bit of (solid) soap turning counter-clockwise. Somehow clockwise never worked for me, counter-clockwise it was out after the 2nd rotation. We had both lyme and tick-borne encephalitis in the family, not too bad if caught early.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Shout-out to Nicholas Zachas (@slicknet, [https://humanwhocodes.com](https://humanwhocodes.com)). Thanks for the great JavaScript books, and praying you feel better!

<comment><USER42> CTRL-F Nicholas

Yeah, he's mentioned once or twice that his is so bad that he can't even write reliably, let alone do speaking gigs or consulting work. Stuff like this scares the shit out of me.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> This isn't a joke. In New England where I live, in the early 2000's, car accidents involving moose had become so common that Vermont attempted to halve the moose population by increasing hunting permits.

Today, the population in New England has been shockingly decimated by ticks... researchers are pulling upwards of ten thousand ticks off of dying moose. They've been bled dry, thanks to warmer winters and reduced tick dormancy periods.

<comment><USER14> Wow, "first dominated by dinosaurs, then humans, the third age of the earth arrived in 2050, dominated by ticks"

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Bullshit, they're not exploding. Lyme disease confirmed cases are occurring at roughly the same rate in 2017 as 2007. Look at the CDC data yourself: [https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/stats/graphs.html](https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/stats/graphs.html)

<comment><USER45> You can call "bullshit" by picking a random year, sure.

I can pick 2010 (22,561) vs 2017 (29,513)

Their data set begins at 1997 and ends in 2017 though:

1997: 12,801

2017: 29,513

<comment><USER44> Exploding doesn't just mean increasing, it means accelerating. No one would look at that graph and say the rate is increasing. No doubt they excluded it from their article, and instead chose to cherry-pick years like you're saying, because it discredits their title.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Lyme disease is awful, and ticks are truly evil creatures. The intellectual disabilities it causes are especially scary to me as a knowledge worker. It's about time we start treating this as the public health crisis that it is and targeting concerted efforts towards eradicating ticks.

</comment><comment><USER47> When we go hiking, we won't leave the house without a tick card or something similar, e.g tick squeezers. When we get back we scan everyone from head to toe for ticks. At least Lyme disease can be prevented quite successfully if the tick is removed within the first 24 hours.

[https://www.cdc.gov/features/lymedisease/index.html](https://www.cdc.gov/features/lymedisease/index.html)

</comment><comment><USER48> It's too bad LYMErix was taken off the market due to anti-vaccine marketing in the 90s...

[https://www.vox.com/science-and- health/2018/5/7/17314716/lym...](https://www.vox.com/science-and- health/2018/5/7/17314716/lyme-disease-vaccine-history-effectiveness)

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2870557/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2870557/)

<comment><USER49> Surprised this isn't well known. I found out on my own a few months ago and nobody I've talked to about it since knew that this was available.

I would definitely pay money for this if they brought it back. Probably up to hundreds of dollars.

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> I grew up in a Lyme hotspot. Every early outdoor memory of mine involved checking for ticks afterwards.

My younger brother had the bullseye as a very young child. My mother had a different very debilitating tick borne illness, Babesiosis, but was only treated for Lyme for months.

I had a blood test when I was 20, and was told I was positive for Lyme. I had zero symptoms of Lyme, and had been spending most of my time living out of the region at college, though I had complained of some general fatigue. They put me on doxycycline, and I dutifully took it. I still don't know whether I actually had Lyme. My father, a chronic hypochondriac, was put on a Lyme regimen at one point too, though it was never clear exactly what symptoms he had.

I'm not entirely sure the point I'm getting at with these anecdotes. Doctors in Lyme hotspots may diagnose Lyme too readily. More specifically, they may order too many blood tests, which from my naive research do not look to be especially accurate for Lyme.

</comment><comment><USER51> [https://outline.com/CXBe5a](https://outline.com/CXBe5a)

</comment><comment><USER52> Don't know about US products. But in Europe, this is one of the few ones guaranteed to work:

[https://www.amazon.co.uk/Anti-Brumm- Forte-150-ml/dp/B006ZL4H...](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Anti-Brumm- Forte-150-ml/dp/B006ZL4HNY)

<comment><USER53> OFF! Deep Woods

[https://www.amazon.com/OFF-Deep-Woods-Insect- Repellent/dp/B0...](https://www.amazon.com/OFF-Deep-Woods-Insect- Repellent/dp/B019ZTXU2G)

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> One of my neighbours when I was growing up in Australia had apparently chronic Lyme disease, however every doctor she went to told her that there was indisputably "no Lyme disease in Australia" [0]. This went on for years. Eventually she had to go on a trip to IIRC the UK to get prescribed the relevant medication, which she smuggled back to Australia.

[0] - [https://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Conte...](https://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/Content/ohp- lyme-disease.htm)

</comment><comment><USER55> Foley's wrong about California's tick problems getting worse as the climate gets hotter and drier. California's western fence lizard has a protein in its blood that kills the bacterium responsible for Lyme and shares the exact same climate requirements as the ticks. California doesn't get the tick unless the lizard is there and the combination keeps Lyme disease in check.

[https://www.latimes.com/opinion/la-xpm-2013-aug-20-la-ol- lym...](https://www.latimes.com/opinion/la-xpm-2013-aug-20-la-ol-lyme-disease- lizard-20130820-story.html)

</comment><comment><USER45> A few years ago I got bitten by something after being close to a deer but never saw any kind of insect. I had a large inflamed area (one circle IIRC) for a while, experienced mild flu symptoms for a few weeks, and then some wrist pains a few weeks after that. Doctor wouldn't give me antibiotics.

I haven't had any physical symptoms since, but I'm pretty sure my mood and cognitive ability has taken a hit. There are of course so many factors not controlled for, but it's always at the back of my mind.

</comment><comment><USER56> I was bitten by little nymph/larval (not sure which) ticks on Bay Trail in Mountain View, CA. Had to stop riding my bicycle there (which I absolutely loved) because I just can't afford to be debilitated by Lyme's disease.

I've become violently genocidal towards these little bloodsuckers. If it was up to me, I'd wipe them out with almost any means, and at whatever cost ;-)

After looking into the anti-tick options I actually started fantasizing about some kind of super lightweight "earth suit" (like an astronaut's space suit).

Something that you could put on, fully seal yourself in, and then just enjoy the outdoors with reckless abandon. I know it sounds a bit crazy but I think it could potentially be a transformative way of exploring the outdoors.

I love the idea of being rattlesnake/tick/spider/thorn-proof. I could sleep outdoors in the middle of fields, under trees, in puddles, etc.

<comment><USER57> FWIW, lyme disease is exceedingly rare on the west coast..

<comment><USER56> Yes, but there are other infectious diseases spread by ticks. And most importantly, I really don't want to be one of the unlucky few!

[https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/datasurveillance/index.html](https://www.cdc.gov/lyme/datasurveillance/index.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER58> This new book, Bitten, describes some of the mystery surrounding the origins of the disease in the US in the 1960s. [https://www.amazon.com/Bitten-History- Disease-Biological-Wea...](https://www.amazon.com/Bitten-History-Disease- Biological- Weapons/dp/006289627X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1H1E4KW1SW0I1&keywords=bitten+kris+newby&qid=1561500221&s=gateway&sprefix=bitten%2Caps%2C402&sr=8-1)

</comment><comment><USER59> We actually have a vaccine for Lyme disease that was pulled due to the Antivax hysteria. I believe an article was posted here on Hacker News before, but here is a link to one otherwise: [https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/science-and- health/2018/5/7...](https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/science-and- health/2018/5/7/17314716/lyme-disease-vaccine-history-effectiveness)

We now live in a world where you can vaccinate your dog for Lyme disease but not yourself.

<comment><USER18> We don't vaccinate dogs for lyme disease. We give them a topical or oral systemic insecticide that permeates their skin and bloodstream so as to kill ticks on contact.

Dogs have short, and I guess less valuable, lives. So this is considered an acceptable practice for prevention. And there are many many dogs with severe reactions to these medications, including some fatalities.

Would you really want to do that to yourself?

<comment><USER60> [https://www.zoetisus.com/products/dogs/vanguard- crlyme/index...](https://www.zoetisus.com/products/dogs/vanguard- crlyme/index.aspx)

> For vaccination of healthy dogs 8 weeks of age or older as an aid in the > prevention of clinical disease and subclinical arthritis associated with > Borrelia burgdorferi.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> The CDC says post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome or 'chronic lyme' doesn't exist. While i am suspicious of this claim, I know people who say they have it, and have subjected themselves to every treatment under the sun without any success.

<comment><USER60> > The CDC says post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome or 'chronic lyme' doesn't > exist.

You're conflating two terms. PTLDS exists, in patients who had Lyme but experience post-treatment symptoms.

"Chronic Lyme" is different, and is largely problematic because the folks who believe they have it tend to have never actually _been_ exposed to Lyme in the first place.

[https://www.niaid.nih.gov/diseases-conditions/chronic- lyme-d...](https://www.niaid.nih.gov/diseases-conditions/chronic-lyme-disease)

</comment></comment><comment><USER62> [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4920391/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4920391/)

</comment><comment><USER63> Are these all real cases or some psychogenic ones? I was under the impression that a lot of "chronic Lyme" cases were something else.

<comment><USER64> There's no such thing as "chronic Lyme disease":

[https://www.fasebj.org/doi/10.1096/fj.10-167247](https://www.fasebj.org/doi/10.1096/fj.10-167247)

[https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/does-everybody-have- chronic...](https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/does-everybody-have-chronic-lyme- disease-does-anyone/)

<comment><USER65> I didn't read the links, but I've read a lot here [https://lymescience.org/](https://lymescience.org/)

and I also almost fell for "chronic Lyme" few years ago. There's something seriously unsettling around websites/online communities dedicated to chronic Lyme. From Lyme friendly doctors, to people doing and interpreting their own tests, to people ascribing all kind of ailments to this "condition", etc.

<comment><USER63> If you want to go down another rabbit hole, read about Morgellons

<comment><USER65> Uh. Interesting one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> Interviewee is wrong about movies. They exist and they're high grade Z movies.

</comment><comment><USER67> Well that's certainly an alarming symptom.

</comment><comment><USER68> Maybe it's wrong, but I'm happy that cases are exploding because that (hopefully) means there will be more research into better treatments and preventions.

</comment><comment><USER69> This scares me.

</comment><comment><USER70> Why is nobody eradicate ticks with genetic engineering? Ticks are a species that deserves to be eradicated. The health implications are vast and they don't contribute much to the ecosystem. They're a literal plague.

</comment><comment><USER71> Jack MacReady: It's obvious the bastard's got lyme disease!

Bill Pardy: What?

Jack MacReady: Lyme disease. You touch some deer feces, and then you... eat a sandwich without washin' your hands. You got your lyme disease!

Bill Pardy: And that makes you look like a squid?

</comment><comment><USER72> This article blames sprawl and climate change, but neglects the connection to the Plum Island Animal Disease Center right off the coast of Lyme CT. Borrelia has been in the US for ages, but wasn't known for causing the debilitating symptoms this modern strain causes.

<comment><USER60> [http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/04/02/lab.257/index.ht...](http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/books/04/02/lab.257/index.html)

> Moreover, a Department of Agriculture spokesperson, Sandy Miller-Hays, told > the news service that -- counter to Carroll's claims -- Lyme disease was > never studied at Plum Island.

As for symptoms, it was described in the 1760s as "exquisite pain [in] the interior parts of the limbs", neurological symptoms in the 1920s, etc. That it took a while to recognize the _cause_ of these things doesn't mean the disease didn't exist. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyme_disease#History](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyme_disease#History)

<comment><USER73> I think that a government spokesperson should not be considered a reputable source when speaking on potential misdoings by the same government. Is there an independent source that can speak to the Plum Island claims?

<comment><USER60> Given that it's impossible to prove a negative, the onus is on conspiracy theorists to provide evidence that Lyme research was performed there.

<comment><USER73> 15 years ago, conspiracy theorists were being asked to prove government spying. It's hard, and the coverup might leave only circumstantial evidence, but it doesn't mean its not true.

Either way, if you're trying to provide a source against the point being made, it needs to be better than that one. Is there any other?

Edit: I did a bit of looking into it.

Tick-borne diseases were definitely studied there, which means general subject was being researched. (a bunch of pubmed studies are listed here [1], and pubmed shows in the author information that they were from Plum Island. Ignore the site if you like, just look at the pubmed articles.)

The geography of the disease also fits a spread from the Plum Island facility. See the same article for a map.

I obviously can't go order and read a physical book off the cuff, but it seems like the Lab 257 book by Carroll is decently reliable, as far as can be expected when making claims counter to an official government position. From wikipedia: "The review in Army Chemical Review concluded 'Lab 257 would be cautiously valuable to someone writing a history of Plum Island'".

Anyway, in summary, there is enough evidence to ask a reasonable question: which puts the onus back on the government, or you, to provide credible evidence that Lyme was not developed there.

<comment><USER60> > The geography of the disease also fits a spread from the Plum Island > facility. See the same article for a map.

No, it doesn't, considering it was documented in Scotland in the 1700s. The Plum Island facility was started in 1954.

> From wikipedia: "The review in Army Chemical Review concluded 'Lab 257 would > be cautiously valuable to someone writing a history of Plum Island'".

The _actual_ quote is:

> The review in Army Chemical Review concluded "Lab 257 would be cautiously > valuable to someone writing a history of Plum Island, _but is otherwise an > example of fringe literature with a portrayal of almost every form of > novelist style. "_

In other words, "it gets the biographical stuff mostly right, before it goes nutty".

> Anyway, in summary, there is enough evidence to ask a reasonable question: > which puts the onus back on the government, or you, to provide credible > evidence that Lyme was not developed there.

Lyme's historical record predating the very existence of the lab is fairly conclusive proof that it wasn't developed there.

<comment><USER72> > No, it doesn't, considering it was documented in Scotland in the 1700s. The > Plum Island facility was started in 1954.

Yes, it does. This strain was before unseen in the US so much so it's very name references where it was first seen in the US, regardless of where it may have been elsewhere in the world.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Peity Charts via cUrl as base64 encoded images - <AUTHOR> http://peity.herokuapp.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> Built this in the last few hours to render tiny charts for devices that don't have canvas tag support. I'm thinking this might be nice method to generate/precompute tiny charts.</comment>


Facebook moved to new office - <AUTHOR> https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10101999874192881&set=a.612287952871.2204760.4&type=1&theater

<comment><USER2> "we designed the largest open floor plan in the world — a single room that fits thousands of people"

Sounds very unappealing to me.</comment>


There's a War Going on over Kamala Harris's Wikipedia Page - <AUTHOR> https://theintercept.com/2020/07/02/kamala-harris-wikipedia/ <comment><USER2> I think wikipedia is basically in a no-win situation on this. Is Harris' connections to Steve Mnuchin important? I don't know. I know a republican would tell you yes and a democrat would probably tell you no. Hell, a Republican might well tell you that it's an important fact about Harris' career whilst simultaneously not recognising that it's probably an important fact that should reflect very poorly on Steve Mnuchin who is currently serving a Republican president. I can see you could make an argument for either frankly - sweetheart deals are a problem and so is special treatment. Also she was a DA for 7 years and AG for 6 years and frankly it would be a miracle if she didn't have a few controversial decisions or dealt with some well known people. You could see a mirror of this article about her using her office to target a republican. I can certainly say the quote from the article seems to be leading - I know the article wants to imply that Harris' decision not to prosecute Mnuchin is linked to his donation to her campaign. I don't find that compelling and I certainly think its pushing a biased agenda.

Personally I would like to see Wikipedia take a step back in these political situations, draw clear lines about what should be in articles and draw those lines in such a way as to minimise the pay off for editorialising. You could for example, minimise her CV to literally just which jobs she had and when, and then you could have a separate article for the Attorney General of California, where specific instances can be documented.

<comment><USER3> I agree that this is a difficult position for Wikipedia to be in, but I don't think the solution is to simply scrub posts of most of their content. The reality is, for better or worse, that Wikipedia will be the first (or perhaps only) stop for many voters researching political candidates. If a voter can't even determine the basic characteristics of a candidate's political identity (there's a pretty wide gulf between the profile of a "tough-on-crime" prosecutor or AG and a "progressive reformer," for ex.) from Wikipedia's entry on that candidate, Wikipedia will provide very limited utility to them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The way most candidates should handle something like this, is to put out a book. Then reporter's questions can be addressed by saying, "Well, I wrote a book about it last year, and apologized for my past behavior, you can read the details there."

<comment><USER2> The problem with that is Kamala Harris didn't know what political position she needed to have last year. Last year's book might have needed to be a complete apology for her stance as tough on crime or it might have needed to be trumping her strong record. Only the events of the last year have made it clear exactly what position she wants to take.

<comment><USER5> That's why politicians should write multiple books to cover every possibility.

<comment><USER6> and thus the ghost writer industry turned to statistics to predict the tide of their topics for their esteemed hosts, whilst wall street made bets on which book ending would make it to final print.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> At the end of the day, a wiki (or any UGC system) is only as good as the admins who have the final say on what is published.

As good a Wikipedia is, it's dangerous for it to be the only "legitimate" one. Thanks to the open license, there should be many forks by people striving to do better or with a different editorial tilt (without needing to all the way to fringe like Conservapedia and even Rationalwiki.) Even Uncyclopedia deserves some competition.

</comment><comment><USER7> I have noticed that Wikipedia has become pretty terrible for anything political recently. It's got a very left wing bias and doesn't come off as objective at all.

<comment><USER8> Its generally difficult for political positions that lack evidence to take a seat at the table of sourceable information.

If you have specific points then that may be discussable, but making grand general statements like that doesnt yield any productive discussion.

<comment><USER7> Ok, here is an example:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Racial_views_of_Donald_Tr...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Racial_views_of_Donald_Trump)

<comment><USER8> In this example the argument is made that all statements should be treated equally, but the argument is also made that the weight and intentions of statements matters more. I'd argue that's true given that public figures and people in general walk back their statements after being called out. It doesn't mean they don't mean the original statement. So in the search for truth the most honest and supported position is the evidence presented on Trump's racism. Which is sourced.

So I'm not following on how that's a good example of 'bias' unless there's something specific I'm missing.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Language is by its nature non-neutral.</comment>


Draw images with your online codes - <AUTHOR> http://ideone.com/fngpT

<comment><AUTHOR> <http://ideone.com/ntqCb> \- similar example in VB .NET</comment>