You realize that human nature means that SOMEONE has to be using force right? I mean if the government stopped using it someone else would take it up and become the new government...

And I can't think of any scenario where this proviso wouldn't be met... Wait! What about the impact of human caused climate change on future people?!

I'd be happy if people simply recognized such force for what it is and stopped pretending it was something legitimate.

Again you seem to be assuming that future people have a right to the same climate we have now. That the status quo is somehow the "correct" climate. This is not possible, since it is going to change whether we try to stop it or not. And it's not like we are going to make the planet completely uninhabitable, or even significant portions of it. Some areas may even become more habitable. People will adapt.

The negative effects of current Fed policy may not become apparent until after Bernanke retires (as it was with Greenspan).

No, I'm assuming that damages caused by a human induced change of climate constitute "illegitimate harm". I don't need to assume anything about what the correct or optimal climate is. It's enough that climate science says we're changing the climate towards X and that all sorts of cost benefit analyses suggest that X would be really bad. Climate change predictions are contingent on what we're doing.
yeah it's no like earth is gonna venus in the next few decades so who cares!

coffee_monster, thanks for proving my point -- that you will post endlessly using elementary school logic disguised with 'eXprt internetZ arguing tactics!'. In all the words you wrote, you said much about nothing. The fact that you're sitting here going through great lengths to post, while posting **** like this with a straight face, under the pretense of being smart, is quite fascinating:
If I were to mimic your juvenile posting style, this would be something to "LMAO" about. Everything else you wrote was all lol as well, but I don't get off on playing your semantic musical chairs, multi-quoting endlessly game. You seem a bit OCD and tilt happy, I'm sure those attributes serve you well at the tables. And just saying things are so doesn't make them so.
Nice read champ, but no. I've made 7 figures+ in poker, which is pretty much a 100% lock to be more than you, but sure, if you'd like to carry on your charade and pretend you know what you're talking about in poker you can do that too. Tread carefully though, your ignorance is much more apparent when trying to talk poker than Econ for most people since, you know, this is a poker forum first and foremost. Your mentions of "GTO" and bluff frequencies are complete hogwash as far as the point you were trying to prove.

Uh, not that I really want to be the one subjecting Zygote to some long drawn out debate with a brick wall (the same person who claimed he'd post in a civil manner, then goes on to 'LMAOz' and ad hominem s2bp, I guess you just claim you'll post civilly as bait to sucker people in?), but he posted a long response to you at post #32 in this very thread, which you didn't respond to. He didn't ask you to (who would?), I just mentioned it because you seem to OCD post in every thread and tout how knowledgeable you are, so I found it interesting that it was one of the few occasions you actually left well enough alone and stfu.

You talk about me using elementary school logic whilst making the post above? I am truly sorry you don't understand what's being discussed, but that's no reason to start hurling elementary school insults.

And that's why I back up my reasoning with logic and arguments. It seems quite ironic that YOU would make the statement that just asserting things doesn't make them true. As far as I've seen, assertions are all you have.

Wow, you must have a big penis.

We weren't really talking about poker here either, nor how much people make, nor any other of the crap you're talking about. You brought up the useless analogy about HSNL versus people coming in. You made another useless (and misguided!) analogy with poker. I'd rather keep on topic than make those poker tangents. But I guess that's one other thing you have--assertions and bad analogies.

Actually, in my first reply, I didn't realize how much you misread what was said just so you could do some bragging. Here's what happened. You compared me (in this economics discussion) with someone (in a poker discussion) who doesn't know what they're talking about going into the HSNL forum and trying to lecture/educate the regs. Thus you were making the analogy between yourself (with respect to economics) and the knowledgeable HSNL regs. I was asking what your ECONOMIC qualifications were for comparing yourself to the HSNL regs in the analogy you were making.

So once again, you take something I'm saying, twist it horribly, and then act as if I've said something wrong. It seems to be an incredibly bad habit of yours since you've done that throughout this thread.

Wow, just wow. Perhaps you should take your own advice to heart.

BTW, I did ask you why exactly it was you were comparing yourself to the HSNL regs in your analogy. So again, what exactly makes you think your econ knowledge (or whatever it is you're claiming) makes that a good analogy?

I said I'd be civil to people who actually are here to discuss things. I specifically left people like you out. That is, those who aren't here to listen to the other side, those who continually misrepresent the other side, and those who continue to post in the way you have (with all the insults) I excluded from that statement.

And it sort of turned out s2bp was kind of like you. Just not as obvious and not as extreme.

OK, I may have missed someone post something. Wow. But there's no harm in asking me to reply to something I missed--I've seen plenty of people ask others to go back and address something that's been missed.

Typically I don't. I just started here because of your bad analogy of this being like a HSNL forum where a donk comes in and tries to 'educate' the regs. I simply was pointing out that the analogy might be correct, but you have the roles reversed.

It is entertaining to me when you do things like that--ascribe motives to others based on some small observation. Perhaps you could actually learn from that, and realize that you aren't as smart as you think you are and that you can make mistakes.

We are also using up resources that future generations will have to make do without. Is that "illegitimate harm"? No, that's just how it goes. Just like if person B interviews for a job that person A really wants, and has a non-zero chance of getting the job. Clearly A is harmed, but it is not illegitimate.

Please to link to some scientifically accepted disaster predictions. The stuff I'm reading seems downright pleasant for some parts of the world.

The Earth has gone through thousands of cyclical climate changes much larger than the ones that are being predicted due to man made CO2. These will continue despite our activities. It is also likely that other forms of energy will overtake fossil fuels in economic viability before too much human caused change is done.

I'm not sure if you fit into this camp, but there are a lot of Bernanke haters who have been claiming since 2008 that his policies were going to lead to immediate, rapid, high level inflation that have now settled into claiming his policies are actually a ticking time bomb that is going to go off some undetermined time in the future.

Even if we forget about this, there are a lot of smart economists who feel that without his policies we would have ended up in the second Great Depression, and if this is true it doesn't matter what negative effects we feel in the future, as the negative effects we would have felt if he did nothing far outweigh them.

I will say that this is true and has certainly eroded my opinion of the Bernanke haters.

However, I simply cannot begin to imagine any process how what the fed is doing could really help the economy. It simply fails to make any sort of sense to me. Maybe I'm stupid, but damn, I get the idea of quantum mechanics, cosmology, biochemistry, etc, why would this economic stuff be so profoundly nonsensical to me?

Paul Krugman is supposedly a very smart economist.

I like Krugman for the most part and I'm pretty sure he has also said as long as hyperinflation doesn't hit the haters kind of don't have a leg to stand on.

Which one of the Fed's policies don't you think should work?

I'm in the ticking time bomb camp, but was never in the immediate inflation camp. And there are possibilities that could make the time bomb turn into a dud, such as some technological discovery, perhaps which enormously reduces the cost of energy, increases productivity, or something of that nature. Something that would boost the economy in a sustainable way so that tax revenue would increase. Barring that I do think there is a danger of the Fed losing control of inflation and interest rates, making it more costly to service the debt. This in turn will increase the deficit and grow the debt even more. This is not Bernanke's fault. His job would be much easier if the deficit was brought under control, and he has admitted as much. He's an enabler, but if he weren't one, he would be replaced.

I disagree that there was a danger of a second Great Depression. Many government policies exacerbated it back then, and some lessons were learned. I do believe there is a chance of a Japan style long malaise, or, as I said above, loss of control. I'm not so sure this would be better.

Hyperinflation can always be averted. Shut off the "printing presses" and the currency will devalue but stabilize. But this leads to default. These would be the choices in the loss of control scenario.

I only skim over your gibberish at this point since it's just a sideshow with no real substance, so when I saw you asking for my qualifications with a few key words like "HSNL","2+2", etc, it seemed you were asking about poker -- especially since my post was lol'ing at your poker analogy. You asking about poker or econ "qualifications" is just more "coffee_monster coffee_monstering" though, since the central point I was making was clear.

Yawn. Attempting to further distort what's really going on here. S2bp made a poker analogy illustrating what was wrong with what you were saying, you tried to respond with a refined poker analogy that you thought was closer to correct. It wasn't and was laughably bad/wrong. I pointed out how your recurring theme of thinking you're knowledgeable about something was surfacing in the poker tangent as well.

No, it's just easier to categorize everyone disagreeing with you as just "misrepresenting" what you're saying. In reality, you have the same gimmick/cliche posting style as others who word things in a way to wiggle out later, not take real stances on anything, and then when saying things that are wrong/ridiculous turning it into a semantic side show.

For those still wasting time following along, the statements hidden at the heart of all the coffee_monster theatrics and posts:


And him disagreeing with this statement:

LMAO. You admit you reply to stuff without reading them carefully or even fully, and then you rip on me. I see you're avoiding the question though.

Here it is in case you missed it: you were comparing yourself ITT (on an economic level) with HSNL regs (on a poker level). I simply asked what makes you think that comparison is apt. I think it's a fair question, especially since you were the one touting your qualifications (albeit indirectly). Though I can see why you'd try to avoid it and somehow spin it into something negative about me.

Sideshow with no substance? smh. I don't think you know what substance is, especially given your contributions ITT.

More assertions that I don't know what I'm talking about when it comes to economics? Hilarious! Nice assertions though.

Well, when you don't read what I'm saying and only skim--I hope you can understand that the misrepresenting might actually be just that. Perhaps not intentionally but just from laziness or something.

Nope, I've not 'wiggled' out of anything. I've been clear and consistent in what I've been saying. You were saying something about being misrepresented earlier?

BTW, if it is because you don't understand something and it has to be clarified (so you *think* I'm saying one thing and then you're corrected), that's not me wiggling out of anything. There's a difference.

Note the reference to markets and not economy. Note also that s2bp hasn't 'corrected' me on this, it's just b4m who seems to be confused about what is actually going on. Perhaps it's because he doesn't care to learn, just 'skims' what I write but continues to argue with it.

So not only are you sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting 'NA NA I CAN'T HEAR YOU' but you're also then claiming what I'm saying is wrong.

BTW, (actually it was TomCowley--got the thread *and* the person wrong), as I said I didn't mean to get into a huge discussion about the particulars of the paper I posted but to give you a feel. I'll probably look through it a bit more and comment on your comments (your point 1 seems definitely true and does have some not-so-great implications). Note, I guess that was in the other thread...

This is like saying that it's not the hitman's fault that a person was killed, because if he wasn't willing to be a hired assassin, he would be replaced.

I disagree with this. Bernanke's academic standpoint has always been that the Fed didn't do enough to prevent the Great Depression (and made things worse with what they tried to do). He got the absolute perfect chance to put his money where his mouth is in the wake of the financial crisis. In my opinion his theories have been totally vindicated. 2007 was a rough equivalent of 1929. 2008 was a rough equivalent of 1930, so I disagree that we were not headed for depression if he did nothing. However 1931, 1932 and 1933 have simply not happened this time around.

So you think it is the job of the Fed to balance the budget?

I just gave up posting because you seemed to be more concerned with making yourself look good at all cost rather than actually trying to understand or explain something that makes sense.

It's clear that your idea of how "a non-perfect, yet well functioning system (like a market, a business or a winning poker strategy), if forced to make a random decision, will only have a 50% chance of doing worse off" is wrong. The reason is of course that most of the decisions made by this system are correct.

After you refused to acknowledge this, it was clear what you were posting here for. So I just stopped. It's sad in a way, because I used to like discussions with you and reading your posts. Maybe you'll come around at some point in the future.

No, I stopped reading closely when your posts degenerated into only ad hominems and after you'd already put your foot in your mouth with the poker analogy and claim about 50% chance of being better off. It was at that point that you were grasping for straws and looking for any miss step in posting that you could cling to to try to make a point. Just reaching, in similar fashion to the series of posts you just made in regards to me interpreting your question being about my qualifications being about poker. Twisting and spinning it into something that's not there like a champ. "oH well seE! see, you mistakenly thuoght I was asKing BOUT ur poker credentials even though you were just lol'ing about my poker analogy and I made comments about reading 2+2, this CLEArLy must mean you didn't read anything else!!1111! gotchaaa!". No.

I ignored it because it's clear that the direction you're attempting to take things with that question is a waste of time. But look, I'll save you the trouble since you seem to be salivating at the mouth at the chance to discuss my/your economic qualifications -- very few people here will be impressed with whatever degree you have in Econ that you think makes you knowledgeable. Really no different than the people with advanced degrees in health/nutrition waltzing onto a bodybuilding forum and asking what the qualifications are of the respected posters or the general community there too. Apparently they don't have any, but in this day and age with the internet, a community of people collectively analyzing studies, researching/reading, and debating different viewpoints objectively, will be far more knowledgeable than your random grad being spoonfed dated information from textbooks.

The exact details of the analogy are not relevant, it's the comparison being made. Typical coffee_monster though to want to spin a simple analogy where the central point just has to do with me saying I interpret your posts as an uninformed individual coming and posting things that have already been debated at lengths, into specifically asking about "HSNL qualifications". Even if you change the analogy to "a home game player who beats his co-workers in $5 games while watching football, waltzing onto the SSNL forum preaching about what he's learned through experience", it's the same concept.

I already explained why I know better than to waste time trying to make actual arguments with you. That reason is evidenced by the very back and forth we're having right now, even when it comes to non-substance related discussions you use the same gimmicks. Same reason s2bp just said he gave up talking with you and the reason another poster said he doesn't know why anyone wastes time arguing with you. One of my first posts in the thread already mentioned that I know your MO -- post endlessly, take things out of context, strawman, dodge and shift, etc. The fact that you do it to this extent even over blatantly terrible claims and analogies such as the ones I already quoted, is a clear indication that attempting to debate more obscure and detailed economic concepts would be a complete waste of time.

lol. At best you're just strawmanning through more semantic musical chairs, at worst you're highly confused.

Yeah, this was around the time when I stopped reading closely since clearly if he's willing to bob and weave endlessly around a claim such as this, the idea of discussing something more involved makes you want to do cartwheels into oncoming traffic. The follow up poker analogy regarding "GTO" and "bluff frequencies" was even more amusing though.

Sure...

So let me get this straight. In my argument I'm assuming that the market isn't perfect, but my argument is wrong because most of the time the market is perfect? Well, yeah, if you assume the opposite of my assumptions the following logic isn't going to be correct, ldo. But you can't do that.

That is, I'm saying "if A then B". You're saying -A, so my logic is wrong. That just isn't a correct argument against my argument.

Wat?

As I said, I was making an argument that was "If A then B". If you want to dispute A, that's fine. If you don't think A is true, well, we could have a discussion on that. But I believe the logic is fine.

To put it in the context of what b4m was 'trying', let's look at the 7-year-old making a decision for a company. Again, to apply the analogy to my argument, we'll let the 7-year old make a slight change to *one* decision that wasn't made optimally.

So let's say this company is making only one good, and it's profit function looks like

-100 + 10Q - Q^2. (say Q is finely divisible--or measured in thousands or something like that)

The optimal choice for this company is given by setting the derivative equal to zero, or 10 - 2Q = 0 or Q=5 (thousand). Well, suppose this company is producing Q=5.5 (thousand)--that is, not optimally. We let our 7-year old flip a coin and decide to produce one more (Q = 5.501) or one less (Q=5.499). One of those leads to more profit and one to less. Since there are two choices and one leads to a higher profit (the one getting closer to Q=5), the probability that a random decision in this case gets closer to optimal is the aforementioned 50%.

LOL

Sheesh, I wasn't saying 'gotchaaaa!' You misinterpret things a lot, don't you?

Now you're trying to claim a parallel between yourself and a 'respected poster'? Wow, just wow. Reminds me of that Dilbert cartoon where an engineer is claiming he's smart because he's an engineer and engineers are smart. Just because you're part of a group, b4m, does not confer properties of the group to you. And that's assuming the group actually has the properties you're trying to give it. A bunch of people who have no idea what they're talking about don't necessarily get smarter by getting together and reinforcing their misconceptions.

Still just asserting my posts are uninformed? That's priceless.

And still quite incorrect.


I might post a lot. That's probably the only part of my 'strategy' you got correct.

Seems your only strategy is just to assert things to be correct. See below:

Well, it's obvious to me you're not following the arguments I'm making.

I don't see any arguments of yours to follow, except for assertions with no evidence or logic presented. It's obvious why you're posting.

I'm sorry you couldn't follow the analogy. Hopefully the post above helps with that.

I really should have followed my own advice earlier and been done with you, b4m (and maybe s2bp). In all seriousness, it's obvious what your train of thought is and why you're posting here. You've drunk the kool-aid and refuse to even consider anything else, hence you don't put the time in to try to understand arguments that go against 'markets perfect, anything else makes things worse' worldview.

BTW, I'll pull this little bit out and make two comments.

1. Yes, we know your first post (not one of your first, but first) was exactly like what you're accusing me of--ad-hominem attacks and a general wish that I could be silenced.

2. Because of your obvious lack of open-mindedness, your continued attacks, and your lack of providing *any* arguments to back up what you're saying, I will no longer read or reply to any of your posts, as you have nothing to offer.

Good day, sir.

All of the pro gold standard people need to read this article: http://www.slate.com/articles/busine...and_next_.html

And then tell the rest of us why it's completely wrong about everything. If you can't coherently attack this article your opinion basically isn't heavy enough to matter.

I'm not saying that there isn't a reasonable case to be made for a gold standard, just that the people who make the argument are usually kind of dumb.