The Automobile, Good or Bad? [Archive]

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 06:05

This is something I've been pondering recently, is the automobile really something that is positive for society?

I have, of late, come to the conclusion that the automobile actually has a very negative impact on society. This can be seen in several categories, such as their influence on foreign policy. I will also later post some of the effects of cars on other spheres of life. So please, let me hear your opinions. Let me know if you think I'm dead on, or if you think I'm full of shit, or whatever the hell it is. Let's have some discussion on what cars really mean for society, and how they shape our lives.
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Automobiles and Foreign Policy

Oil is a finite resource. Oil is also an increasingly expensive resource. And guess what, in the US, cars are essentially responsible for 2/3 of all oil consumption. In a world where there are dwindling oil supplies and our lifestyles are basically utterly dependent on cars, it is not unimaginable that we would attack others for the sake of oil. Even before the invasion of Iraq, there were talks about how things would be carved up (things didn't go to well at first though), however new progress is being made at exploiting Iraq's oil. While not everyone agrees with the above statement, it is undeniable that our reliance on oil has forced us to be friendly with regimes which we should not be supporting. Why did we support Saddam for so long, it's because he had oil. Why do we support Saudi Arabia so much, because they have oil. Our desire to fuel our cars indirectly gives despots around the world a little more slack then they should be getting.

As well, let's not forget that some car's are, in themselves, an extension of militarism. For instance, the SUV is originally based on a military vehicle. In the post-9-11 world, many Americans have felt increasingly insecure. But when rolling around in an SUV, one feels almost impenetrable, a moving fortress transporting a little piece of civilization within. The SUV, like the Hummer, symbolizes masculinity and ruggedness, the same feelings which often help states propagandize their populations in preparation for war.

To put it simply, when one sees a Hummer, they don't just see a car. Most people will either be thinking, "Man, that's fucking badass" or "What a fucking asshole, why the hell does he need a fucking tank?". This is because cars are more than just a way to move around, they symbolize something. Cars become an extension of ourselves.
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Philosopy

03-07-2008, 06:26

I like cars.

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 06:30

I like cars.

Why?

By the way, is there anyway the mods can change the title to "The Automobile, Good or Bad?"

Philosopy

03-07-2008, 06:32

Why?
No idea, they're just a bit of a hobby. I'm afraid that's about all I can manage when I'm still waking up. :)

By the way, is there anyway the mods can change the title to "The Automobile, Good or Bad?"
Yeah, just make a thread in the moderation forum and ask them politely if they can.

I'm glad you've said there is a problem with it - I was staring at it for ages trying to work out what the code meant. :p

Soviestan

03-07-2008, 06:32

I hate cars personally. I view them as unnecessary, polluting, deathtraps. Expensive too. Mass transit, bikes and walking make far more sense than those bloody things.

Philosopy

03-07-2008, 06:34

I hate cars personally.

It seems that they feel the same way about you. Did you two have some sort of bad break up?

Lord Tothe

03-07-2008, 06:42

Glen-Rhodes

03-07-2008, 06:45

I would not enjoy walking or riding a bike 5 miles to work each day. I enjoy getting to work in 10 minutes, so that I don't have to wake up crazy early. Call me lazy. I call it convenient.

Cars are good. Emissions are bad.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 07:02

This is something I've been pondering recently, is the automobile really something that is positive for society?

I have, of late, come to the conclusion that the automobile actually has a very negative impact on society. This can be seen in several categories, such as their influence on foreign policy. I will also later post some of the effects of cars on other spheres of life. So please, let me hear your opinions. Let me know if you think I'm dead on, or if you think I'm full of shit, or whatever the hell it is. Let's have some discussion on what cars really mean for society, and how they shape our lives.

Wow, this is the thread I always wanted to start. Hope I don't wreck it. ;)

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Automobiles and Foreign Policy

All good points, but it's a bit odd that you don't address the possibility of electric cars.

My feeling is that cars are a terrible influence on society, and still will be even if they burn no oil at all.

As well, let's not forget that some car's are, in themselves, an extension of militarism. For instance, the SUV is originally based on a military vehicle. In the post-9-11 world, many Americans have felt increasingly insecure. But when rolling around in an SUV, one feels almost impenetrable, a moving fortress transporting a little piece of civilization within. The SUV, like the Hummer, symbolizes masculinity and ruggedness, the same feelings which often help states propagandize their populations in preparation for war.

That's a long bow to draw. Far simpler, surely, to note the heavy industrial base necessary to manufacture cars. Arguably, the Japanese would have won the Pacific war but for the enourmous industrial capacity of the US ... which would have been far smaller without the car manufacturing industry.

My major objection to cars is that not everyone can drive one. Some people are not competent to drive a car, either from age or disability. Some people are not temperamentally suited to driving a car (even if they do drive) either by recklessness or timidity. And of course, many people cannot afford to drive a car (while a basic car has gotten cheaper, the fuel and other recurrent costs have increased.)

Another thing is that car traffic tends to increase to fill the available road space, even as we build more roads. Thus busses (and trams! Trams rock) are always slower than cars, having to share the same road.

I know I'm not going to get all those cars off our roads just by wishing for it. We have to invent something better, which everyone can use and afford.

To put it simply, when one sees a Hummer, they don't just see a car. Most people will either be thinking, "Man, that's fucking badass" or "What a fucking asshole, why the hell does he need a fucking tank?". This is because cars are more than just a way to move around, they symbolize something. Cars become an extension of ourselves.

This is profound. I'll see if it's been taken up in the thread before replying.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 07:06

I hate cars personally. I view them as unnecessary, polluting, deathtraps. Expensive too. Mass transit, bikes and walking make far more sense than those bloody things.

You're not the ally I would choose, but you're better than none.

We are going to get set apon by the car nuts of this forum. They are mighty touchy about anyone criticizing their baby ;)

Wilgrove

03-07-2008, 07:07

Meh, I don't care that much about cars myself, for me they're just something that gets me from Point A to Point B, and on weekends, to point C! However, some people are car people and hey whatever they want to spend their money on is fine with me.

New Manvir

03-07-2008, 07:14

I hate cars personally. I view them as unnecessary, polluting, deathtraps. Expensive too. Mass transit, bikes and walking make far more sense than those bloody things.

pfft...hippie :p

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 07:20

pfft...hippie :p

Heh, I can't imagine the hempcloth and dreadlocks crowd getting into one of these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:ULTra_001.jpg

EDIT: Huh? We can't link to pics from WikiPedia?? Oh well:

Podcar. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_rapid_transit)

Cannot think of a name

03-07-2008, 07:26

I absolutely love cars, I love the feel, I love the sound, I even love the smell.

Having said that, there is a whole bagload of bad that comes with them, and just because I enjoy them doesn't mean that I turn a blind eye to all of that.

They gobble up a finite resource, as noted, they spew a cocktail of polutants, then there's things that are unique to them, like congestion, noise, etc.

The problem is that we've artificially built a reliance on them, tearing up rails and infrastructure to move people and goods about and spreading our population out in difficult to sustain suburbs and the like. How stupid is it to live 30 to 50 miles away from where you work? (and I say this as someone who lived 75 miles away at one point and moved reluctantly-I get it, that doesn't mean it's not stupid). Or that far away from services needed? Unless you're growing your needs out that far, it's just indulgent.

The way our society is arranged right now we've created a need for cars, but it's a created need, not a real one. One way or another we're going to have to change the way we organize our lives and society, because it is unsustainable. We're not going to find another 'magic elexir' like oil and we shouldn't be looking for it. Part of oils problem was its universal...use...backed myself in a corner with that sentence...anyway...

There is a place in this world for the car. Honestly, I dream of the day when very few people actually need a car and the people who do have them are just enthusiasts.

You can like something and still be realistic about it.

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 07:34

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 07:37

Wow, this is the thread I always wanted to start. Hope I don't wreck it. ;)

All good points, but it's a bit odd that you don't address the possibility of electric cars.

My feeling is that cars are a terrible influence on society, and still will be even if they burn no oil at all.

That's a long bow to draw. Far simpler, surely, to note the heavy industrial base necessary to manufacture cars. Arguably, the Japanese would have won the Pacific war but for the enourmous industrial capacity of the US ... which would have been far smaller without the car manufacturing industry.

My major objection to cars is that not everyone can drive one. Some people are not competent to drive a car, either from age or disability. Some people are not temperamentally suited to driving a car (even if they do drive) either by recklessness or timidity. And of course, many people cannot afford to drive a car (while a basic car has gotten cheaper, the fuel and other recurrent costs have increased.)

Another thing is that car traffic tends to increase to fill the available road space, even as we build more roads. Thus busses (and trams! Trams rock) are always slower than cars, having to share the same road.

I know I'm not going to get all those cars off our roads just by wishing for it. We have to invent something better, which everyone can use and afford.

This is profound. I'll see if it's been taken up in the thread before replying.

I definitely agree about how cars are exclusionary, and I'll probably try and post something on that later. I also want to talk about how cars structure roads and public space in general, but then again that requires some serious typing. And on the matter of them being electric, I believe that electric powered cars are no better in the status quo because a large amount of electricity is generated through coal and other dirty sources. Even if this wasn't the case, cars structure society in a particularly negative way. So yeah, we fundamentally agree on the issue.

Skalvia

03-07-2008, 07:43

Im sorry but, i didnt Climb my way to the top of Civilization to ride a Horse dammit...

Cars were a good thing...Cars that run on a Clean Renewable Resource will be a GREAT thing...

No Cars...Would completely and totally suck...

Jachel

03-07-2008, 07:44

I hate cars personally. I view them as unnecessary, polluting, deathtraps. Expensive too. Mass transit, bikes and walking make far more sense than those bloody things.

Yes but without cars we'd be very primitive in terms of movement, how would we walk for miles, especially in urbanated areas?

Intangelon

03-07-2008, 07:46

The automobile is a tool and cannot be good or bad in and of itself. How people USE tools is something that can be so judged. As such, it seems to me that the use of the automobile started out good. Then when it was made the only way to get around by various corporate interests lobbying Congress, and sold as a beacon of personality, individuality and freedom to the point that people can actually say, with a straight face, that they "love" their cars. That was a bad use/selling of a tool.

As it is now, it takes gas at over $4 (US) a gallon to get some people to re-think their suburban assault vehicles and put their precious spawn into an actual fucking car. Ridiculous. And those who are resentful of the move to downsize and get off the horsepower teat often claim that it's "social engineering" to get them out of SUVs and insanely unnecessary levels of gas-robbing horsepower. Well wasn't it social engineering that got us into cars and stuck with freeways in the first damned place? Did most cities tear out light rail to make way for roads only to have to replace that infrastructure decades later (Seattle's old Interurban streetcar once ran reliably from Tacoma to Everett and is now largely a bike trail...I bet those idiots regret the hell outta that call).

Until the masses wake up and realize that the party's over, smaller is better for everyone as a whole, and your car says nothing about you but what you can afford to pay (or how much debt you're willing to sink yourself into) for what is, after all, a kind of luxury -- nothing will change for the better.

/rant

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 07:52

Cars are inherently exclusionary vehicles. For the sake of going 70 miles an hour, we as a society, have sacrificed massive amounts of public space for the sake of building highways, particularly around cities. This is probably one of the single worst aspects in my opinion. Cars require this infrastructure, which, cuts down on public space. While highways are technically "public", there are many people that cannot afford cars. As well, cheaper vehicles, such as bicycles still do not solve the problem because bicyclists would get killed on a highway, or at least ticketed.

The mass building of roads to satisfy a car-centric society has several major implications:

The carving up of public space in a way that is highly detrimental to urban life. For those living in the city, life is rather public. Cars on the other hand, are a means to travel from one's private residence to another place, privately. This cuts down on communication and contact between people's, which I would say is bad for society, if not partly to blame for enforcing stereotypes. As well, by eating up space that was once open to all (such as parks, empty room, etc.), there are less places for the urban resident to "experience" life.

And for the urban poor, roads are far worse. In fact, they contribute highly to poverty. For one, highways and roads allow the wealthy to live in the suburbs and commute to the city for work. The majority of their wealth and local taxes end up going to the suburbs, allowing for their constant growth. Anyone with a good car and the money for a small house would be considered "wealthy". On the other hand, those without money would be left in the city. Because they have less money, they give less taxes and this helps perpetuate urban decline. This is why the city collapses while the suburban sprawl extends. Furthermore, those in poverty are often living in an area surrounded by roads. Because they do not have cars, they do not have a means of escaping the region and trying to find a better place to live/work. And, not only this, but one should notice that those in the suburbs do not want those in the cities coming in, this is partly the reason why very few city mass-transit systems extend into suburban areas, to keep out the poor. Thus, roads help perpetuate poverty, if not racism towards "the other".

Cars also effect other transport in the city adversely. The fact is, I don't want to ride my bicycle in the city, precisely because of cars. Let's face it, most car drivers are in a fucking hurry and if I make a wrong move, I get run over. I don't remember the exact statistics, but I think something like 30,000 bicylists die each year (around the world) in cities. Cars make the roads unsafe for pedestrians and bicyclists, and the roads ultimately give cars priority.

Intangelon

03-07-2008, 07:52

Yes but without cars we'd be very primitive in terms of movement, how would we walk for miles, especially in urbanated areas?

"Urbanated"? President Bush, is that you?

How is mass transit primitive? How is a bicycle primitive? How is carpooling primitive? Hell, how is even WALKING primitive (aside from being the original mode of transportation)? How would you walk? Uh...you'd walk, that's how. Is it that complicated? Shit, we might lose some weight in this country for a change.

I understand that some people need cars, and many need larger vehicles for their jobs. I'm not on about them. I'm on about suburbanites who were sold eight-passenger SUVs for a family of four, and who use them as taxis.

I understand that some people commute. Well, that's not a luxury most people can afford anymore. That means we'll have to move closer to work (shocking!). After spending three years in North Dakota, I'm well aware of the fact that a car is vital in the wintertime, and I'm not begrudging the Upper Midwest the "luxury" of not freezing to death on the way to work. I will tell them, though, that the Ford Excursion is not necessary for the trip and takes a hell of a lot longer to heat up than a Honda.

Skalvia

03-07-2008, 07:55

"Urbanated"? President Bush, is that you?

How is mass transit primitive? How is a bicycle primitive? How is carpooling primitive? Hell, how is even WALKING primitive (aside from being the original mode of transportation)? How would you walk? Uh...you'd walk, that's how. Is it that complicated? Shit, we might lose some weight in this country for a change.

Not primitive just impractical...I point you to people who live more than Ten Miles away from the nearest grocery store, how are they going to get provisions? I ask you, When was the last time you Cycled Ten Miles BEFORE your Milk went Sour?

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 07:58

This is both an attack on the usage of automobiles in transport and on against people claiming that they'd rather have cars than ride horses and what not.

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If I ride a bike from Point X to Point Y, and a car from Point X to Point Y, what is the difference?

The car gets their faster, but the bicycle uses less energy overall, and is better for my individual health as well as the "health" of society in general.

Please tell me how this makes sense, to get three miles away, we strap ourselves into a giant hunk of metal many times heavier than ourselves, and then burn fossil fuels to get to the place where we want to go. On the other hand, we could travel those same three miles on foot or on bicycle using food as fuel, a much more energy efficient way of doing so.

There's also no reason why one should live 20-30 miles away from their workplace, which is one of the few reasons one should need to use a car everyday. If we lived closer to work we would lose less time in transit and waste less energy.

Ultimately, I'm not saying that we ban cars, but just that the way society is structured around them is not good.

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 08:00

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 08:02

Not primitive just impractical...I point you to people who live more than Ten Miles away from the nearest grocery store, how are they going to get provisions? I ask you, When was the last time you Cycled Ten Miles BEFORE your Milk went Sour?

Why the FUCK is the grocery store ten miles away from my house? Why isn't it closer? If we didn't have our society built around cars, we wouldn't have to go so far away to get to a grocery store.

Obviously, there are some major problems in undertaking a complete restructuring of society and cities as we know them, but I think it would still well be worth the social, health, and environmental benefits of doing so.

Skalvia

03-07-2008, 08:02

There's also no reason why one should live 20-30 miles away from their workplace

Yes there is, do you realize how much it would fucking Cost to live in a City? The price of my Four Bedroom House is half that of a NYC Apartment...

Not to mention the fact that Society didnt structure around cars, there were Rural Areas before cars and there still are, in fact there is far less of them, the difference is in the fact that not everyone owns their own Farm these days, for the same reason, Impracticality....

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 08:02

You who live in the city are free to shun the car, but I don't live in the city and have no desire to do so. I like automobiles. I live in a very rural part of the USA, and even if there were mass transit where I live, it wouldn't go where I want to go. My family lives outside a small town about 30 miles from where I live, and I have friends even further away. In an area like this, a personal transportation option that is available whenever I want it is necessary.

Remember that the train and the truck are absolutely essential to the survival of the modern metropolis, and circumstances would be far worse with animal labor. Horse crap is nasty stuff when it coats every street, and the grain to sustain such a herd of work beasts would drive the price of grains to astronomical levels. Overall, the automobile is a beneficial invention.

That's just the thing. It isn't really an invention so much as an adaptation of the horse-drawn carriage. The only significant adaptation was to move the passengers to the centre of the vehicle, since it's safer and no-one needs to control the horse any more. Beyond that, it has all just been incremental improvements in safety and comfort.

In a line from ancient rome to the present, one thing remains in common: the carriage is a luxury for the rich (a status symbol and a convenience) and to a lesser extent the tool of a trade (eg, trucking and delivery.)

I take your comments about rural transport in good part. Two hours to get to school because the bus has to drive up every little road for miles around to pick up just one or two students there makes it pretty clear that public transport cannot practically replace the car at low population densities.

But I would argue that your "car is better than horse carriage" argument for big metropoli rather misses the point. The big metropolis was made possible by cars -- it's a valid view -- but just as much the big metropolis is made the way it is to accomodate the car. Laying down a new suburb, the first thing in is a road grid, and if you look you can see space set aside for new or bigger roads to be added later. Big intersection ... where the shopping-mall goes. There could just as easily be a train-station there. It's cheap infrastructure, but the residents end up paying the expensive part, which is keeping a car. For some reason, our governments have lost the will to build expensive infrastructure like the subways of old metropolises which will eventually pay off for all residents, drivers included.

To your first statement: not only are city residents free to shun the car, but they can use their numbers to make car-driving impractically expensive in the city and reclaim much of the road for other uses. But first, they need an alternative which is equally practical and roughly the same cost per head of population.

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 08:03

Yes but without cars we'd be very primitive in terms of movement, how would we walk for miles, especially in urbanated areas?

Has anyone here advocated banning cars? I am yet to hear of anyone attempting to do so. I am merely advocating that automobiles currently have an overly large, and thus negative impact on society today.

Intangelon

03-07-2008, 08:05

*snip the excellence*

You can like something and still be realistic about it.

Spot on, CTOAN. Well said.

Not primitive just impractical...I point you to people who live more than Ten Miles away from the nearest grocery store, how are they going to get provisions? I ask you, When was the last time you Cycled Ten Miles BEFORE your Milk went Sour?

Impractical is a better word -- say what you mean.

If you can't ride a bike 10 miles before milk goes bad, your problem is either that you live in a ridiculously mountainous area or you're in really, really bad shape. If it really DOES take you an hour to cycle ten miles, your solution is an insulated or cooler-type backpack for $30, not a $30,000 SUV.

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 08:07

Yes there is, do you realize how much it would fucking Cost to live in a City? The price of my Four Bedroom House is half that of a NYC Apartment...

Not to mention the fact that Society didnt structure around cars, there were Rural Areas before cars and there still are, in fact there is far less of them, the difference is in the fact that not everyone owns their own Farm these days, for the same reason, Impracticality....

Right, and why would you live there if it's so costly? Why do you have to live near NYC if you're unable to do so?

Society, after the 1920s, has overwhelmingly structured around cars. And again, I'm not saying we should just abandon cars, but that it would be better if we were in a society where we didn't need them all that much. Obviously, if one lives in a rural area they would need some way to get to a more populated area once in a while, that's not what I'm criticizing.

I guess I should have elucidated this earlier, my biggest, biggest problem with cars is how often they are used for very short trips (0 - 3 miles). In a 10 mile trip, I believe ninety percent of the emissions from the car are from the first one mile. There really is no reason to have to use cars for short trips, and there's no reason that ten mile trips should be a necessity in our lives.

Skalvia

03-07-2008, 08:08

Has anyone here advocated banning cars? I am yet to hear of anyone attempting to do so. I am merely advocating that automobiles currently have an overly large, and thus negative impact on society today.

That may have some truth to it...

But, its NOT going to change, for the same reason that no one is going to go back to having but one phone chained to the Wall, its a step backwards that no one wants to take, or at least not enough to make a serious impact...

Restructuring Society's again, just not practical, If you want to improve the Environment and our Dependence on Oil its got to come from the Top to the Bottom, not the other way around...

If you want Recycling, its gotta come from the Trash Companies...If you want cars that dont pollute its gotta come from Car Companies/Government...

And so on, I cant afford to move, and I dont have the time to Cycle everywhere, and Biloxi, even being the second largest Metropolitan area in MS(not saying much, lol) is still too spread out for an effective Mass Transit System...and id say its the same in 85% of the US that isnt at least the size of New Orleans or Atlanta...

Intangelon

03-07-2008, 08:10

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 08:10

Im sorry but, i didnt Climb my way to the top of Civilization to ride a Horse dammit...

Did someone seriously suggest that going back to horses was a practical response to the disadvantages of cars? I must have missed that.

But just to prod you a bit, a horse would be a pretty cool way to get home from the pub. If you fall asleep, the horse will just take you home if it knows the way ... whereas the car will dash your brains out against a tree or wall. :p

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 08:15

That may have some truth to it...

But, its NOT going to change, for the same reason that no one is going to go back to having but one phone chained to the Wall, its a step backwards that no one wants to take, or at least not enough to make a serious impact...

Restructuring Society's again, just not practical, If you want to improve the Environment and our Dependence on Oil its got to come from the Top to the Bottom, not the other way around...

If you want Recycling, its gotta come from the Trash Companies...If you want cars that dont pollute its gotta come from Car Companies/Government...

And so on, I cant afford to move, and I dont have the time to Cycle everywhere, and Biloxi, even being the second largest Metropolitan area in MS(not saying much, lol) is still too spread out for an effective Mass Transit System...and id say its the same in 85% of the US that isnt at least the size of New Orleans or Atlanta...

And that's exactly what I disagree with. Change has to come from the bottom-up. Have you ever heard of Critical Mass? If you dismiss the activism simply because you don't think it's "practical", then nothing will ever be accomplished. To succeed, one cannot fear failure. For instance, had African American activists cowered in the fear of white retaliation in the 1960s, what would have happened to the Civil Rights Movement? Had Gandhi and his followers, along with the many others involved in the movement for Indian Independence given up because they did not want to be imprisoned or punished by the British, where would their movement have gone?

We, as citizens in a democracy, have the ability to push our demands on the government. And if enough of us discuss this and come together, our demands will become a coercion, it will force the government to act. As well, we can all make changes in our lifestyle that will at least ameliorate some of the problem (walking or riding a bicycle for short trips). It is grass roots activism that leads to action from the top, not the other way around.

Conserative Morality

03-07-2008, 08:19

The answer is obvious:

RIDE GIANT SAND WORMS! *Gets thumper and maker hook*

Skalvia

03-07-2008, 08:21

And that's exactly what I disagree with. Change has to come from the bottom-up. Have you ever heard of Critical Mass? If you dismiss the activism simply because you don't think it's "practical", then nothing will ever be accomplished. To succeed, one cannot fear failure. For instance, had African American activists cowered in the fear of white retaliation in the 1960s, what would have happened to the Civil Rights Movement? Had Gandhi and his followers, along with the many others involved in the movement for Indian Independence given up because they did not want to be imprisoned or punished by the British, where would their movement have gone?

Yes, but you see, those are things that are ONLY practical from the Bottom up, The Government was too overrun with Racists for the Civil Rights movement to succeed from that end, and British India...was well, Owned by the British...

But, you see your missing the point, those cases are not comparable to this topic, because those werent Lifestyle Changes, just because your no longer intolerant of blacks doesnt mean you have to change your daily habits any, or Move, or Restructure your whole city...Which is what the Masses not using Cars would mean...

Its a totally different issue...

Intangelon

03-07-2008, 08:21

The answer is obvious:

RIDE GIANT SAND WORMS! *Gets thumper and maker hook*

New from Ford! The 2009 Shai-Hulud!

Zayun2

03-07-2008, 08:27

Yes, but you see, those are things that are ONLY practical from the Bottom up, The Government was too overrun with Racists for the Civil Rights movement to succeed from that end, and British India...was well, Owned by the British...

But, you see your missing the point, those cases are not comparable to this topic, because those werent Lifestyle Changes, just because your no longer intolerant of blacks doesnt mean you have to change your daily habits any, or Move, or Restructure your whole city...Which is what the Masses not using Cars would mean...

Its a totally different issue...

This is more reason why it has to be done from the bottom up, precisely because this requires a cultural change. That is what discussion is for, once you get over the fact that this is a difficult goal to accomplish, and instead focus on the fact that this change is if not necessary, positive, we can begin to accomplish something. In fact, this thread functions, at least for me, as a dialogue to at least educate and get the idea that "car culture" has some very negative consequences for society out there.

And furthermore, right now, the government is too overrun by car and oil companies to engage in such policies. Again, grassroots activism is the only way to have any hope of truly engaging the system.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 08:29

That may have some truth to it...

But, its NOT going to change, for the same reason that no one is going to go back to having but one phone chained to the Wall, its a step backwards that no one wants to take, or at least not enough to make a serious impact...

Restructuring Society's again, just not practical, If you want to improve the Environment and our Dependence on Oil its got to come from the Top to the Bottom, not the other way around...

You are rather unintelligible today. Could you try a little harder please?

Are you saying "society has to just be left to evolve" or "we need leadership and strong government" ? Those seem like opposites, and I'm not sure which one you really mean.

If you want Recycling, its gotta come from the Trash Companies...If you want cars that dont pollute its gotta come from Car Companies/Government...

And so on, I cant afford to move, and I dont have the time to Cycle everywhere, and Biloxi, even being the second largest Metropolitan area in MS(not saying much, lol) is still too spread out for an effective Mass Transit System...and id say its the same in 85% of the US that isnt at least the size of New Orleans or Atlanta...

That's the dilemma of mass transit. It would be a brilliant solution even for sparse suburbs ... if everyone used it. As it is, it's an expensive stopgap for those who can't have a car for whatever reason.

And the worst drawback of public transport is the lack of privacy while travelling. That's a particular objection in big metropoli (anonymity + audience = dickwad as the theory goes). Any solution which would obsolete the car has to either provide privacy, or outweigh it with some advantage cars cannot match, like high speed with safety.

And wow, Biloxi looks like exactly what Zayun and I were talking about, a place where the rights of drivers trumped everything else from way back. You could have a beach ... beaches are nice ... except that there's a stinking great freeway there. (Awful location for an airport, too.)

Skalvia

03-07-2008, 09:05

You are rather unintelligible today. Could you try a little harder please?

Are you saying "society has to just be left to evolve" or "we need leadership and strong government" ? Those seem like opposites, and I'm not sure which one you really mean.

That's the dilemma of mass transit. It would be a brilliant solution even for sparse suburbs ... if everyone used it. As it is, it's an expensive stopgap for those who can't have a car for whatever reason.

And the worst drawback of public transport is the lack of privacy while travelling. That's a particular objection in big metropoli (anonymity + audience = dickwad as the theory goes). Any solution which would obsolete the car has to either provide privacy, or outweigh it with some advantage cars cannot match, like high speed with safety.

And wow, Biloxi looks like exactly what Zayun and I were talking about, a place where the rights of drivers trumped everything else from way back. You could have a beach ... beaches are nice ... except that there's a stinking great freeway there. (Awful location for an airport, too.)

Actually, we have lots of Beaches, like, the whole city is Beach, this whole section of State is Beach...the freeway is a few miles to the north...

But, I was saying that we need strong government to do it...A Cultural change isnt what we need, it wont do the trick, If you want to do it your way youll need a Lifestyle change, which i dont think is going to happen on its own, or through activism, PETA can march all they want, but people are not going to stop eating meat...

same situation, just like the majority of the population is not going to start eating a vegitarian lifestyle over an Omnivorous one, your not going to get the majority of the population to use Mass Transit or Cycle rather than use cars...

The more sensible solution would be too use Clean Renewable Energy burning Cars...and Clean Renewable Energy burning Power Plants...

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 12:34

Brother Skalvia, I apologize for the extreme length of this post. I've cut as much out of it as I can.

Of course, I am addressing the whole forum (don't we always?) and I'm rather surprised at how much I had to say. But it was your generous post which brought it out of me, so reply or not, and reply at any length you choose to any part of my post.

Five drinks. Five drinks is the essay dose for me. ;)

Actually, we have lots of Beaches, like, the whole city is Beach, this whole section of State is Beach...the freeway is a few miles to the north...

I'm really glad you didn't take offence at that. I've lived in some pretty low-rent suburbs with big roads, airports, factories and so on nearby, and come to the conclusion that good people in a hell-hole is a better community to live in than selfish bastards in a candy-box suburb.

I've got the beautiful environment and the good people around me just now. Dunno how I got this lucky :)

But, I was saying that we need strong government to do it...A Cultural change isnt what we need, it wont do the trick, If you want to do it your way youll need a Lifestyle change, which i dont think is going to happen on its own, or through activism, PETA can march all they want, but people are not going to stop eating meat...

I'm for strong government too. I have no qualms about high taxes, because I believe that though there is a lag between taking the taxes and the government spending showing results, government can take risks which private enterprise won't. Government can also make investments which don't pay off for twenty years or more, as long as they're funding out of tax revenue not from debt.

I'm not sure exactly how it works, but it seems inescapable that anyone who spends money they don't have will pay interest on it one way or the other. Public/private partnerships I don't like much at all -- the private partner is far more optimized to make money and has the option of bankruptcy, so the government partner gets screwed.

Hmm. I haven't seen Neu Leonstein around in a while. I'm sure he'd have something to say about that. :p

Anyway, my point is that a government which cares about the long-term well-being of their people and all people, would use the assets it already has to hasten this process of obsoleting oil. Government has (or should have) oversight of corporate research-and-development (they give them tax breaks for it, they're entitled to audit it) and should be able to detect market-fixing and patent-squatting. They should bust that, and take their money back in fines.

But government's golden asset which is neglected are academics. Pure science, academia, is the wellspring of knowledge, it's where science lives. The ideas that become technologies are born decades earlier in pure theory.

When government has the need to hothouse technology, the scientists are who they should turn to. Manhattan project. Apollo project. The 'science' of economics had it's turn in the eighties to collaborate with government, and now we should let the chemists and the physicists have a turn. Oh, and geologists and political scientists and anyone who can contribute as judged by the first few core researchers chosen. It's "pick your own team."

Academia is 50% love of knowledge, 50% love of easy roots with undergrads. I'm sure an expert panel could pick the difference.

The United States has corrupted their academia. When the governments of the seventies should have been pouring money into their universities, they instead starved them of funds (is it petty of me to say that maybe they feared the unwashed, protesting students?) and turned a blind eye as the corporations took over the funding, let those corporations take their pound of flesh in patents and commercial-in-confidence over the "science" done there.

But the US is not the whole world. Many significant countries have sound universities, doing real science (real science does not keep secrets, at least not for long) and they have this option: over ten years (not to corrupt academia with easy money) double the budgets of universities while keeping the student load constant. Appeal to academics to work on this issue of national and global importance, and move them into an Energy Project if they have the inclination and the talent.

If private enterprises, trusts or other NGO's want to contribute, fine, but: no commercial-in-confidence. No patents. The entire project should be utterly open to anyone, Iranians even, even if the discoveries and possibilities are potentially weaponizable.

This is a thing some, many or all governments should do. For the good of us all, and if they need a government-centric reason, to rehabilitate themselves as an altruistic body which can do things Corporations won't, and NGO's can't afford. To rescue government from irrelevancy (it is so easy to take the altruistic for granted.)

same situation, just like the majority of the population is not going to start eating a vegitarian lifestyle over an Omnivorous one, your not going to get the majority of the population to use Mass Transit or Cycle rather than use cars...

But it doesn't have to be a majority! Every little bit helps.

It's odd that you chose the example of vegetarianism. (I'm a vego, btw, but not a fanatic.) While people still eat meat pretty widely, most omnivores eat a lot less than they did twenty years ago. I'm pretty sure that's mainly for health reasons rather than ecology or being humane to animals. But those would be factors too.

And that is just how this revolution in personal transport should go.
The few who will pay more or inconvenience themselves for a principle do their little bit (and maybe it's magnified by them putting their money where their mouth is, it's persuasive) and we shouldn't mock them for it. Let them buy their hybrid car and drive around feeling all virtuous. It's doing less harm than them driving a petrol-only car and it's influencing the car market in a positive way. Why criticize?

That isn't going to revolutionize the industry by itself. But it helps by widening the market from the consumer side.

Every alternative, even very minor market-share ones, makes it easier for both manufacturers and consumers to consider new options. The car industry is a victim of its own success, in a way: selling people new and fashionable cars is like giving candy to children, so competition between the companies has optimized them to their market too well, they can't afford to take five-year, let alone twenty-year risks. Competition, which works so well in small business to reward innovations and risks, does rather the opposite when the corporation has whole departments of second-guessers.

And then, after all that, the revolution will happen more or less by accident. Just like the Oil revolution happened: oil was for lamps and cosmetics, it was far too expensive to consider burning for power (coal was cheap and plentiful, STILL IS) because hardy sailor-types had to go out and kill a whale for it. Then some jackass in Texas or somewhere discovered that all you had to do was dig a hole, and mineral oil came spurting out of the ground!

First applications were military. Oil-powered fleets beat coal-powered fleets on paper and on the sea. Mineral oil was cheap, and when refined worked just great in internal combustion engines.

Nobody planned this. It was, quite simply, a breakthrough.

*crosses fingers*

The more sensible solution would be too use Clean Renewable Energy burning Cars...and Clean Renewable Energy burning Power Plants...

Easier said than done.

My opinion has almost completely reversed on this in the last few months. I used to disparage the idea of running cars from the electricity grid, because I assumed that that would just mean burning more coal (worse than burning oil, pollution and greenhouse-wise).

But I've rather turned around. Living without oil would be more practical than living without electricity (and imagine the price of oil if all our electricity came from burning oil!). Electricity generation is where we MOST NEED the breakthrough for non-polluting, non-globalwarming, sustainable and up-scalable energy production ... not in portable fuels.

Batteries are getting better quickly. Breakthroughs there are very likely, it's a bright prospect which doesn't need urgent government intervention.

So, the more cars we move onto using grid electricity, the more attention we must direct to the primary energy need: clean, sustainable, growable Electricity generation.

Electricity and Oil grew up together. They're like brother and sister, negotiating boundaries and filling all the available space within their parent's love. They're like twins!
We can't afford to support them both. We are the only available parents. We have to kill one of them.

'Twas better it were done quickly.

The Smiling Frogs

03-07-2008, 12:48

I like cars.

Me too. The invention of the automobile allowed otherwise homebound folk to roam about and move to locations they wished to be with relative ease. It also allowed commerce and the economies of several nations to flourish through their use since trucks are far cheaper than trains. Without the automobile you would be wondering where all the horse shit would go and how your government was going to deal with it.

This is a stupid question anyway. It would be like asking if the industrial revolution was good or bad. Without it you wouldn't have a car, a computer, or much of a life.

Rambhutan

03-07-2008, 12:51

Well until I can send myself somewhere as an email attachment or I suddenly develop an ability to teleport myself...

...once the crack clean fuel and are made so they cannot crash it will be fine. It won't be long.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 12:58

Me too. The invention of the automobile allowed otherwise homebound folk to roam about and move to locations they wished to be with relative ease.

WTF? The most ancient societies we know of were nomadic.

It also allowed commerce and the economies of several nations to flourish through their use since trucks are far cheaper than trains.

Fucking crap. Complete, off-the-top-of-your-head, made-up, delusional bullshit.

Without the automobile you would be wondering where all the horse shit would go and how your government was going to deal with it.

While this isn't very strong, I feel obliged to commend it as slightly more historically accurate than your first two punts.

This is a stupid question anyway. It would be like asking if the industrial revolution was good or bad. Without it you wouldn't have a car, a computer, or much of a life.

Cars =/= Industrial revolution.

I don't know what the fuck you know anything about (your profusions on morality seem to have some substance, but morality is something that it is easy to fake) but I advise you to stay away from professing on History until you have ... well ... learnt some?

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 13:51

Oops. I didn't mean to crush you, just rough you up a bit.
I'll try again.

Me too. The invention of the automobile allowed otherwise homebound folk to roam about and move to locations they wished to be with relative ease.

So you're talking about ... um ... the 1920's? 30's?

I dispute the "relative ease" part of it. Cars were expensive in the early days, really damn expensive. Rather like having a private jet nowdays. The Model T, the first cheap car if I understand correctly, was an investment comparable to buying a second house.

And cars weren't very reliable. They might get you there but not get you back. Plus, people swore at you rather in the way people swear at people in SUV's nowdays.

It also allowed commerce and the economies of several nations to flourish through their use since trucks are far cheaper than trains.

I'm glad you mentioned trains. The development of railroads was where the United States went wrong, leaving it to the States to subsidize (and be ripped off by) speculators on the Wild West money market of the asinine Stock Exchange. Fools and their money, as they say.

There's a damn good reason that railways are significant infrastructure still in Europe (also India and Russia) but very marginal in the US, despite the vast amounts of money 'spent' on railroads in the US. Government stepped up to the plate and either built the railroads themselves, or strictly controlled them to avoid fraud.

Trucks are cheaper than trains NOW. What would you expect, when one infrastructure (roads) is subsidized by car drivers, people who by definition (can buy and run a car) have money and can be taxed ... and the other is burdened with people who largely don't have money (can't afford the convenience and comfort of a car) ... ?

Government dropped the ball on railways, in almost every country. They simply chickened out from investing enough to keep them competetive. Build the roads, let the rich buy the cars, tax and fine them for using the roads. Screw the poor, they don't pay enough tax to matter. Democracy fails ... on class lines ... oh, except it doesn't in real democracies, like those of Europe.

What is a "real" democracy? One where all minorities have a unique voice in government. Proportional representation, unbridled by pork-barelled "electorates" which can have only one representative. My country, Australia, has States elected by geographical region, and a Federal government elected likewise. I would prefer a single parliament, national, elected proportionally.

Without the automobile you would be wondering where all the horse shit would go and how your government was going to deal with it.

Horse-shit is fertilizer. Thrown on the ground (not on the street, I admit that is a problem) it enhances the ability of soil to grow food.

This is a closed-cycle. Horses eat food, horse-shit grows food. It takes work to get the shit from the street to the field ... but it takes work to build a new steel car every five years, too.

So let's cut to the chase: cars are better than horses because horses have a top-speed of 60 km/h (40 mph) maximum, at a gallop with no load.

No, let's really cut to the chase. Cars have a top speed of 80 km/h on a suburban road, no more than twice that on a freeway made for speed over long distances. It's poor, and the way cars will be obsoleted is by one or both of: (a) much higher average speed from A to B, or (b) microsecond, infallible reaction time of 'driver', allowing those higher speeds with reasonable safety.

These "top speeds" I take from law. From a century of experience, those top speeds are correct. Above them, too many people are killed by other drivers. It's a huge issue even at the legal speeds, because car accidents (unlike heart attack or cancer) predominantly kill the young.

Cars are up against it. Longer life-expectancy and stricter legal standards are actually reducing legal driving speeds around the world. Roads which are safe at higher speeds are EXPENSIVE, they need to be wide, flat, and straight. Once, corner properties at intersections were prime real estate ... now, to make intersections safer, that real estate needs to be be road property to afford a line of sight to the intersecting road. That COSTS.

I bet that drivers here hate bus lanes. Well, don't worry. Soon you won't have to look at all that empty road with a bus parked on the horizon while grandmothers check their bag before tottering onboard! Where that lane was will be a big white tube, and you won't have to feel bitter about the podcars doing 400 km/h past you because you won't be able to see them.

Then, when the tube moves underground and your favourite road is sold as prime residential land, you'll be a part of a tiny minority wailing about the public not respecting your right to have fun on their publicly-owned land. Then your grand-daughter will charm you with stories and pictures about the way she decorates the inside of her 'pod, and you'll finally admit that the car has gone the way of the horse.

This is a stupid question anyway. It would be like asking if the industrial revolution was good or bad. Without it you wouldn't have a car, a computer, or much of a life.

A life is made by the one who lives it. A life is not a collection of things.

I hope you understand this before you die. It would be rather sad for you to live a life defined by the things you own ... or even by the things you can do.

Neo Bretonnia

03-07-2008, 14:03

Anyone who thinks automobiles are bad has clearly never driven a Mistubishi 3000GT twin turbo.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 14:08

Anyone who thinks automobiles are bad has clearly never driven a Mistubishi 3000GT twin turbo.

BWWAHAHA!

Anyone who pities me for being all crazy has clearly never driven my brain!

*does a burnout all the way to 400 km/h*

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 14:14

Johnny B Goode

03-07-2008, 14:18

Bokkiwokki

03-07-2008, 14:23

The Automobile, Good or Bad?

Mostly Ugly. :p

Aurill

03-07-2008, 14:23

Do you drive mostly for pleasure, or mostly to get places quickly?

I drive, mostly, to get to places I need to go in a reasonable amount of time. I live 45 miles from work, and would rather not have to get up a 3am in the morning to shower, dress, eat breakfast, take care of a few chores and ride my bike in to work. The 2 hour bike ride is just too much, that isn't reasonable. On the other hand the 25 minutes by car is very reasonable.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 14:26

Honestly, now that there are so many of them, they're starting to become seriously not worth it.

Hummers?

What we need is a virus, which gets into their 'lectronics, and causes them to mate with each other on sight.

Like when people take their big, noble-looking mastiff for a walk ... and it humps the lamp-post, and the post-woman, and the chihauhau. They stop taking their big, noble-looking mastiff for walks.

Neo Bretonnia

03-07-2008, 14:28

No, but seriously Neo Bretonnia:

Do you drive mostly for pleasure, or mostly to get places quickly?

It's important to me, in order to judge whether your opinion should be taken as a political, debating opinion or an "I like candy" opinion.

You do seem to debate sincerely, usually, as if you are trying to persuade others. I want to give you that opportunity. You're good when you choose to be.

Well, I said what I said in jest, because the 3000GT is a damn fun car to drive...

But 99% of my driving these days is for the sake of transportation, nothing more. We traded in the little car for a minivan to fit myself, my wife, and 4 kids. Gas mileage is a poor joke so we use it as little as possible.

Having said that, I do think that driving for pleasure is a perfectly legitimate use of a car, and I have no problem with the fact that some cars are designed for that exclusive purpose.

Automobiles, generically, provide rapid transport of goods, personnel and services that DO solve vastly more problems than they create. Anybody whose ever ridden in an ambulance certainly appreciates the value of the automobile.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 14:34

I drive, mostly, to get to places I need to go in a reasonable amount of time. I live 45 miles from work, and would rather not have to get up a 3am in the morning to shower, dress, eat breakfast, take care of a few chores and ride my bike in to work. The 2 hour bike ride is just too much, that isn't reasonable. On the other hand the 25 minutes by car is very reasonable.

Since you answered a question (a rather specific one, which I notice has a rather specific answer after yours) which wasn't addressed to you, I will leave you for anyone else.

I guess if I was the OP, my question could be taken as addressed to Everyone. Zayun2 is the OP. Perhaps addressing Z2's first post would be a better way into the thread for you.

Aurill

03-07-2008, 14:36

What is a "real" democracy? One where all minorities have a unique voice in government. Proportional representation, unbridled by pork-barelled "electorates" which can have only one representative. My country, Australia, has States elected by geographical region, and a Federal government elected likewise. I would prefer a single parliament, national, elected proportionally.

I simply have to say this because it needs to be said. The US is a republic not a democracy. A republic works in the same manner as a democracy, but is representative of the electorate. In a true democracy the electorate gets to vote on everything the government does. It is extremely inefficient and makes decision making painful. On that note, I will be silent on the issue any more

Horse-shit is fertilizer. Thrown on the ground (not on the street, I admit that is a problem) it enhances the ability of soil to grow food.

This is a closed-cycle. Horses eat food, horse-shit grows food. It takes work to get the shit from the street to the field ... but it takes work to build a new steel car every five years, too.

You are right that it takes work to build a new car, just as it takes work to shovel horse-shit. One is far cleaner and much more appealing job. Can you guess which one?

So let's cut to the chase: cars are better than horses because horses have a top-speed of 60 km/h (40 mph) maximum, at a gallop with no load.

No, let's really cut to the chase. Cars have a top speed of 80 km/h on a suburban road, no more than twice that on a freeway made for speed over long distances. It's poor, and the way cars will be obsoleted is by one or both of: (a) much higher average speed from A to B, or (b) microsecond, infallible reaction time of 'driver', allowing those higher speeds with reasonable safety.

For the vast majority, having a car is not about top speed. I have never driven a car anywhere near its top speed, and I am sure that most people haven't There simply isn't a need to do that.

The reality is that its all about convenience, and time. If I had a convenient mass transit system in my area that offered high speed internet, I would be taking it every day. I could sit on the bus or train, connect to work and get started before I get there. Since that isn't an option I need a car to get to and from work; its convenient and timely.

And this is where you are correct about the government dropping the ball on railway. They have a long way to go before trains will be used as much as they should be. The funny part is the higher gas prices go, the more cities are cutting back on mass transit, which is exactly the opposite of what they should be doing. Instead they need to increase fairs as more people use it.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 15:17

Well, I said what I said in jest, because the 3000GT is a damn fun car to drive...

But 99% of my driving these days is for the sake of transportation, nothing more. We traded in the little car for a minivan to fit myself, my wife, and 4 kids. Gas mileage is a poor joke so we use it as little as possible.

Having said that, I do think that driving for pleasure is a perfectly legitimate use of a car, and I have no problem with the fact that some cars are designed for that exclusive purpose.

"Having said that" indeed. For those two points rather conflict I think.

Money is about laundering values. Washing crime out of them, and virtue too.

Person A can't afford to drive his wife and four children around much because 'gas' is so expensive.

Person B can afford to burn even more petrol than person A would need, and that's fine because person B can afford it.

The money may be morally neutral, but the market is not. If the whole class of "person B"'s only drove as much as they had to, the whole class of "person A's" could afford to drive more. With their partner and four kids. To actually get somewhere and do something.

I would not apply this "market justice" to every commodity. But Oil is rather special, central and pivotal to many real values (necessities) of all people.

And let's not forget Person C, who can't even dream of owning a car but needs rice or wheat to feed their spouse and four kids. Both person A and person B are participating in this market for petrol (Gas) and driving up the cost of tractor fuel, and the cheapest available fertilizer, phospate from oil, and fuel for trucks to transport the rice or wheat.

I would never criticize you for driving to work, or driving your kids around.

But starving other people's kids, for the thrill of driving a nice car for fun? Yes, I think I might criticize you for that.

Automobiles, generically, provide rapid transport of goods, personnel and services that DO solve vastly more problems than they create. Anybody whose ever ridden in an ambulance certainly appreciates the value of the automobile.

That is ridiculous. There would be ambulances, firefighting vehicles, police cars and quite likely licensed goods trucks, without privately owned cars.

I am opposed to cars primarily because everyone cannot drive a car. I live in a rich country, I have several talents ... I ask you to trust me that I am not embittered against cars because I can't afford one or can't drive one. I don't enjoy driving, but it doesn't totally freak me out. I'm happy for my mother that she has her own car, and doesn't have to walk to the station or take the risks I do riding a bicycle to the station.

(Now, I just spent five minutes watchin some odd Chinese movie without reading the subtitles. I wasn't really thinking about anything, then I looked back to this screen and was quite certain this next is what I want to say. A moment of meditation, perhaps.)

I was set against driving a car long before I was of legal age to drive. I bear a grudge against adults (even now that I am one) for that privilege.

Neo Bretonnia

03-07-2008, 15:30

"Having said that" indeed. For those two points rather conflict I think.

Money is about laundering values. Washing crime out of them, and virtue too.

Person A can't afford to drive his wife and four children around much because 'gas' is so expensive.

Person B can afford to burn even more petrol than person A would need, and that's fine because person B can afford it.

The money may be morally neutral, but the market is not. If the whole class of "person B"'s only drove as much as they had to, the whole class of "person A's" could afford to drive more. With their partner and four kids. To actually get somewhere and do something.

But there's two points I'd make here.

1)If gas suddenly became cheaper I wouldn't start driving more just because of it. The nature of my vehicle is that one doesn't typically drive a minivan for pleasure, and I bought it for its capacity, not mileage.

2)I don't begrudge the person who drives for pleasure. I could, if I chose, drive my van for pleasure (weird as that is). I have enough disposable income to afford to do so, I just don't hold the opinion that it's worthwhile.

I would not apply this "market justice" to every commodity. But Oil is rather special, central and pivotal to many real values (necessities) of all people.

And let's not forget Person C, who can't even dream of owning a car but needs rice or wheat to feed their spouse and four kids. Both person A and person B are participating in this market for petrol (Gas) and driving up the cost of tractor fuel, and the cheapest available fertilizer, phospate from oil, and fuel for trucks to transport the rice or wheat.

Typically people in that position either don't use tractors in the first place, or gain some sort of Government subsidy.

I would never criticize you for driving to work, or driving your kids around.

But starving other people's kids, for the thrill of driving a nice car for fun? Yes, I think I might criticize you for that.

I think it's a bit melodramatic and a lot unfair to set up a direct causal link between the poverty of one family and the ability of another person to spend money driving. If you want to find a real target for blame for the poverty of the farmer, there are certainly far more direct causes than Joe and his Corvette.

Demand is certainly a factor affecting oil prices, but it's not the main factor, at least, not anymore. The price of crude has jumped dramatically over the last few weeks even though overall demand has decreased as people make adjustments to conserve. How does one account for that? It's certainly not Joe and his ridiculously fast yet stunningly elegant Candy Apple red Corvette.

That is ridiculous. There would be ambulances, firefighting vehicles, police cars and quite likely licensed goods trucks, without privately owned cars.

Privately owned cars are used to transport emergency medical patients to the hospital at least as often as ambulances are. Are you suggesting we force everybody to rely exclusively on ambulances to get to medical centers?

What about people like your mom, who have a real and practical need for a private automobile?

I am opposed to cars primarily because everyone cannot drive a car. I live in a rich country, I have several talents ... I ask you to trust me that I am not embittered against cars because I can't afford one or can't drive one. I don't enjoy driving, but it doesn't totally freak me out. I'm happy for my mother that she has her own car, and doesn't have to walk to the station or take the risks I do riding a bicycle to the station.

I don't understand... If you're not bitter over an inability to drive or afford a car, then why is the fact that not everyone can have a car a reason to oppose them? Not everybody can privately own an airplane or a motorcycle either. For that matter not everybody can own a computer yet obviously you have one ;) What is the difference?

(Now, I just spent five minutes watchin some odd Chinese movie without reading the subtitles. I wasn't really thinking about anything, then I looked back to this screen and was quite certain this next is what I want to say. A moment of meditation, perhaps.)

I was set against driving a car long before I was of legal age to drive. I bear a grudge against adults (even now that I am one) for that privilege.

Why?

Skip rat

03-07-2008, 16:08

Automobile Good

Gets me to work quickly (UK public transport is a joke outside major towns), gives me flexibility as to when I go places, allows me to take my daughter to her after school classes safely - I would have a much harder time without one.
I don't drive for pleasure - I drive to somewhere to have pleasure. I would use public transport if I could (cost comes into this too) and would cycle to work if it wasn't over 20 miles.

Perhaps if I became a cyclist I could be one of those who thinks that traffic lights and road signs don't refer to them, cycle on the pavements and put their dirty hands on my car in traffic;)

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 16:14

I simply have to say this because it needs to be said. The US is a republic not a democracy. A republic works in the same manner as a democracy, but is representative of the electorate. In a true democracy the electorate gets to vote on everything the government does. It is extremely inefficient and makes decision making painful. On that note, I will be silent on the issue any more

Likewise. It is off-topic.

You are right that it takes work to build a new car, just as it takes work to shovel horse-shit. One is far cleaner and much more appealing job. Can you guess which one?

Our definitions of work differ.

I refer to the "work" adjusted for productivity. The factory worker's hours MULTIPLIED by the immense capacity of the factory. Yet your definition of "work" is taken from a century ago, demeaning manual labour.

We still have jobs that are minimally automated. Cleaning toilets for example.

Can you doubt that if we still used horses, we would have found some multiplier of human labour, some labour-saving device, to clean shit off the streets? Labour is expensive nowdays (unless you count the labour of poor people in our new workhouses, the third world, but these cannot clean our streets), simple economics demands that no-one would "shovel shit." Hell, we would have bred horses to only shit when told to.

And even so, even so ... perhaps I would prefer to shovel shit in the street, exchanging coarse humour with the snobs in their carriages ... than to work in a factory with a million health-and-safety checks, repeating the same motions over and over lest I fall out of synch with the machines.

I've never actually worked in a factory. I'm just guessing that I couldn't hack it, since I can't do the same thing twice the same way. It galls me to even say the same thing twice.

For the vast majority, having a car is not about top speed. I have never driven a car anywhere near its top speed, and I am sure that most people haven't There simply isn't a need to do that.

I referred to legal speed limits. It was long, you skimmed it. That's fine.

The reality is that its all about convenience, and time. If I had a convenient mass transit system in my area that offered high speed internet, I would be taking it every day. I could sit on the bus or train, connect to work and get started before I get there. Since that isn't an option I need a car to get to and from work; its convenient and timely.

Bingo! NOT steering the car allows the passenger to do better things, more satisfying things, for how ever long it takes to get where they are going.

Being a lazy bastard who likes to sleep in, I'd always imagined my personal pod as having a bed in it, which would turn into a horizontal shower or perhaps bath, then a blow-dryer and perhaps a dresser, so I don't have to go through all that irritating, half-awake business with getting the underpants on backwards.

But broadband during transit, well ... bingo! We'd need coupons or something to establish identity (letting people on the net without identifying them is a legal minefield) but Fuck Yeah.

And this is where you are correct about the government dropping the ball on railway. They have a long way to go before trains will be used as much as they should be. The funny part is the higher gas prices go, the more cities are cutting back on mass transit, which is exactly the opposite of what they should be doing. Instead they need to increase fairs as more people use it.

The mistake of the last few decades, at least in Australia, is to think that rail and bus services should pay for themselves. So they raise fares as much as the market will bear. Travelling regularly by public transport is roughly as expensive as owning and driving a car! This is crap.

Public transport should be subsidized, not just to be price-competetive to driving a car, but to a nominal cost to consumers. To a fraction of the cost of driving a car. (Fuck, I'd make it free if I thought that had a chance.)

Every person who uses public transport by preference to driving their car takes one more car off the street. Considering the cost of owning and driving a car, that's a huge payback to those who still drive, in less traffic (no jams) and greater safety. Considering how much tax drivers already pay, they should consider public transport worth paying tax for, since even the public-transport users are paying tax. As the proportion of people using public transport increases, it approximates user-pays anyway, even with nominal fares!

So the only question that remains is: how to make public transport more attractive in so many respects that no-one but a car-fetishist or ambulance driver would drive their own car?

I'm really not about forcing my great idea on people. It needs to be better in as many respects as possible, so it's just taken up on its merits. And to me, the two jokers which trump all else are Speed and Safety.

*adds Wireless Broadband to the ammo belt*

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 16:20

could be one of those who thinks that traffic lights and road signs don't refer to them, cycle on the pavements and put their dirty hands on my car in traffic;)

Ah, you must be one of those nice drivers. You've never had the rock through through the back window.

Yep, all us cyclists carry handy, tossable rocks. Don't fuck with us! :p

Aurill

03-07-2008, 16:27

This is something I've been pondering recently, is the automobile really something that is positive for society?

I can understand your frustrations; I do not believe automobiles really aren’t the problem. While they do currently use a majority of the oil we produce, automobiles are only devices for the consumption of energy. They serve a simple purpose of allowing the population of a country get to where they want to go in a convenient and timely manner, nothing more, nothing less.

While there are people that use them as status symbols, those people are in the minority. Most of the people use an automobile as a source of transportation for themselves, their families, their produce, or their livelihood. They simply provide a “cleaner” alternative to the other forms of transportation for the same purposes.

Using a horse and buggy is a dirty option, and once Henry Ford built the first automobile, cities appeared to become cleaner than they had been at any point in history. There was just less to clean up, which saved the cities money.

Overall, I believe the automobile has had a positive impact on society. People are able to get to reach each other across great distances and build relationships that were not possible before. Additionally, they have made cities cleaner than they had been prior to their invention. Granted combustion has several major downfalls that cause pollution problems, but those are not specifically the fault of the automobile.

Automobiles and Foreign Policy

Oil is a finite resource. Oil is also an increasingly expensive resource. And guess what, in the US, cars are essentially responsible for 2/3 of all oil consumption. In a world where there are dwindling oil supplies and our lifestyles are basically utterly dependent on cars, it is not unimaginable that we would attack others for the sake of oil. Even before the invasion of Iraq, there were talks about how things would be carved up (things didn't go to well at first though), however new progress is being made at exploiting Iraq's oil. While not everyone agrees with the above statement, it is undeniable that our reliance on oil has forced us to be friendly with regimes which we should not be supporting. Why did we support Saddam for so long, it's because he had oil. Why do we support Saudi Arabia so much, because they have oil. Our desire to fuel our cars indirectly gives despots around the world a little more slack then they should be getting.

Oil is a finite resource, but there is far more of it available that we actually know. Earth is a very large place, and mankind has really only scratched its surface. There are several areas throughout the world that are completely untapped.
Besides, the automobile isn’t the cause for our support of repressive regimes. We support Saurdi Arabia not because of automobiles, but cause our thirst for energy keeps increasing.

Megaloria

03-07-2008, 17:02

Without cars, what the hell would transformers turn into? I hereby support the automobile.

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 18:40

*snip, I said enough on that*

Typically people in that position either don't use tractors in the first place, or gain some sort of Government subsidy.

Umm. It was a little convoluted but I was referring to the price of basic food. It increased quite markedly over the last year, mainly due to rising oil costs which impact world food costs at several steps of food production. (Agricultural machinery, fertilizers, transport and perhaps some others.)

And another thing which was probably confusing: I shifted from talking about "Citizens of affluent countries" to "humans of Earth"

It probably wasn't a fair point, because comparing the average citizen of the US, Australia, Britain or Western Europe with the average citizen of Sub-equatorial Africa, Sri Lanka, Middle Asia or even China always returns the same result: we are capitalist scum, filthy rich from no virtue of our character, and kids starve so you can have a plasma TV.

No, seriously: the global inequalities of wealth and opportunity are obscene. Since I'm not doing much to fix that, I should shut up about it.

At the very least, not dump it on people without warning as a debate tactic.

So, even within any one developed economy, the inequalities of wealth and opportunity are obscene. Our societies are structured wrongly, if "competition for mutual benefit" can produce such obvious classes of winners and losers by the terms of the competition. The winners play it like it's a game, when it is nothing less than brutal oppression. It's only a "game" if it has an end, a shaking of hands and quitting of grudges. But poverty persists over generations, it cripples lives, it ain't no fucking game.

Dragging that late-night rave back to the subject: when government sets to the task of building (or at least regulating) infrastructure, the first priority should be social equity. We're installing transport infrastructure? It should be equally accessible to everyone who will live here.

Including children. I stand by that little message from my memory. Children have the same right to travel and visit their friends or go to some other safe location, without having to be driven there on their parent(s)'s valuable time, and without having to go out in public. The exact same right an adult has to get in their car and go somewhere.

Subject to their parent(s)'s permission, but not at the cost of their parent's time.

As a child, I walked to the houses of my friends. I understand that parents nowdays, and in different places than where I grew up, aren't comfortable with that.

Parents: you should be able to lend your kid the 'pod. It takes them nowhere but where you programmed it to, and it takes them in more safety than your own car could provide, in privacy. And you don't have to spend time driving, extra careful because there's a kid in the car. The time you would spend with your kid can be spent some other time, without you driving a damn car at the time. It's not "quality time" when you have life and death in your hands, can't play or give your full attention. Driving your kid is a burden, and they know it even if you don't.

I think it's a bit melodramatic and a lot unfair to set up a direct causal link between the poverty of one family and the ability of another person to spend money driving. If you want to find a real target for blame for the poverty of the farmer, there are certainly far more direct causes than Joe and his Corvette.

I put my hand up to "melodramatic." I am a performer, but I play to the audience. This is NSG, not a Chekhov play.

It's unfair. I go in hard on this subject.

This is the way we need to see it now. It's not "boys and their toys" it's vital to economies, and it's probably vital to preventing horrendous wars over a resource that will run out no matter what we do. And when the wars fail to solve the problem, what other course do we have than to smash everybody else's shit up, so we stand a better chance of coming out ahead when we have to rebuild our industry from roughly where the Chinese are, coal and steel.

Oil is like a bad smack habit. We bust it somehow, or we die. This is not a matter of "oh, a little bit won't do any harm." It's high stakes of human suffering. Every litre you use should come with a cost of guilt. That guilt should hurt you more than the $1:60 a litre.

I burn a bit of petrol mowing lawns. It comes with guilt for me, I dream of grazing sheep to keep the grass down. I sure as fuck don't think "big roaring noise of wasted fuel makes me big man."

Fuck Joe Corvette. He's my class enemy.

Demand is certainly a factor affecting oil prices, but it's not the main factor, at least, not anymore. The price of crude has jumped dramatically over the last few weeks even though overall demand has decreased as people make adjustments to conserve. How does one account for that? It's certainly not Joe and his ridiculously fast yet stunningly elegant Candy Apple red Corvette.

"Peak Oil" was a naive theory. It assumed that Peak would happen without any market mechanisms affecting it ... in the most traded commodity on earth.

I won't even try to explain short-term fluctuations in the price of oil. Let's just say "evil big investors creating uncertainty, to profit from inside knowledge of its causes" and be done with it.

Privately owned cars are used to transport emergency medical patients to the hospital at least as often as ambulances are. Are you suggesting we force everybody to rely exclusively on ambulances to get to medical centers?

As long posts get longer replies, it is necessary to cull something.
Enough with the ambulances. You're not even cutting bait there.

What about people like your mom, who have a real and practical need for a private automobile?

She doesn't really. It makes her happy, lowers the bar to get out and visit her many friends and get into the community activities.

You offered your family, I offered mine as an example of benefit from petrol-powered cars. In principle, I want them gone right now, in practice I wouldn't inflict that kind of suffering on real people.

I'm happy for her. I'd rather she could get out and do all those things just as easily without burning petrol ... and not least because she feels a bit guilty about it too. I absolutely would not lay the kind of guilt-trip on her that I may have laid on you, because I care for her far more than I do you.

You're just the "devil's advocate" to me, right? You know I'm not trying to hurt your feelings, just using what you say to make my points.

I'm a lot more sympathetic towards an SUV with four kids in the passenger seats, than to an SUV with only the one hale and hearty adult at the wheel. I do recognize degrees of need ... which is why Joe Corvette better give me half a lane if he doesn't want to get four panels resprayed.

I don't understand... If you're not bitter over an inability to drive or afford a car, then why is the fact that not everyone can have a car a reason to oppose them? Not everybody can privately own an airplane or a motorcycle either. For that matter not everybody can own a computer yet obviously you have one ;) What is the difference?

I will pick just one of those examples. You cannot seriously expect me to answer them each individually.

Everyone can own a computer. Quite usable computers (for what we are doing now) lie around in spare rooms, even go to the tip because they are considered worthless by people who have newer and faster computers. (I have six or so which could, awkwardly, get a post onto NSG)

Everyone can own a computer. Everyone should own a computer, if they consent (not 'want,' that brings into play the question of weighing it against other priorities.) Every person on earth should be given a computer and broadband access if they consent to receive it. (this would be quite cheap, if you consider the economy of huge production runs.) For you see, I find that the computer fulfils several unique functions which paper, or television, or carrier pigeons do not.

I don't see cars that way. I see alternatives to cars which fulfil all the roles they do. Perhaps not all in the one package, but certainly quite different from trying to find an alternative to a computer. (Don't throw handhelds at me, they are computers in any real sense, even an ipod is a computer, though a dumb one.)

Everyone cannot have a car because operating a car incompetently endangers the lives of others. Operating a computer incompetently harms no-one. Operating either maliciously is a crime.

And again, it all comes down to electricity. Electricity is the single factor which makes universal computer ownership problematic. Certainly computers can be adapted to use far less power, yet still some electricity is needed.

The internet is not a highway. Everyone can use some part of the internet without being run over and killed.

Why?

I forget what that was a question to.

It's 3:12 AM here. This was a good day, though I regret not going to the chess club.

Tomorrow I will be better, because I will get some exercise in the morning (when I get up anyway.) Hopefully I will be back in about 14 hours ... I'm not done with this thread, not one little bit!

Nobel Hobos

03-07-2008, 18:47

Besides, the automobile isn’t the cause for our support of repressive regimes. We support Saurdi Arabia not because of automobiles, but cause our thirst for energy keeps increasing.

"Energy" in the case of Saudi Arabia is Oil.

According to another poster in this thread, 60% of US oil usage is by automobiles.

Which would make you 40% correct.

Spin that how you like. :p

Aurill

03-07-2008, 18:57

"Energy" in the case of Saudi Arabia is Oil.

According to another poster in this thread, 60% of US oil usage is by automobiles.

Which would make you 40% correct.

Spin that how you like. :p

As I said, automobiles aren't the problem. Its where we get our energy that is the problem. The Earth has hundreds of resources for producing energy, many of which are renewable. The problem has been for the last 200 years human beings really haven't been forced to change their source of energy much. Of course, prior to the discovery of oil we were using wood and that lasted us severl thousand years.

Now the cost of getting our energy is increasing, it is forcing many people to rethink where their energy comes from and how they use it. This is a good thing. It spurs innovation and helps to advance our society. In essence, the fact that automobiles use 60% of our current energy is actually beneficial to society. It puts us back on track where we should have been 40 years ago. Looking for better way to get from one place to another in an equally convenient way that uses less energy.

Besides, the US has plenty of potential energy resource within or near its own borders, the country or states simply refuse to consider affecting the lifestyles of their citizen to get to it. We really need to look into become less dependant on these oppressive regimes, and depend more on ourselves. We need to plan to exploit all our available resources to help fuel our country, not change how we get around. Frankly, tapping all of our resources, is far easier, and less expensive than simply gong back to the horse and buggy.

New Manvir

03-07-2008, 20:54

Heh, I can't imagine the hempcloth and dreadlocks crowd getting into one of these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:ULTra_001.jpg

EDIT: Huh? We can't link to pics from WikiPedia?? Oh well:

Podcar. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_rapid_transit)

That's pretty cool. Reminds me of Minority Report (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minority_Report_(film)).

http://courses.arch.hku.hk/ComGraphics/02-03/students/ywlam/dissert/all.files/image081.jpg

Intangelon

03-07-2008, 21:03

Five drinks. Five drinks is the essay dose for me. ;) *Brilliance snipped*

*applauds*

Well said, NH. Your oratory and rhetoric are unimpeachable.

Anyone who thinks automobiles are bad has clearly never driven a Mistubishi 3000GT twin turbo.

Yes, because they'd think "are all Mitsubishi cars THIS unreliable, uncomfortable, noisy and poorly constructed?"

I drive, mostly, to get to places I need to go in a reasonable amount of time. I live 45 miles from work, and would rather not have to get up a 3am in the morning to shower, dress, eat breakfast, take care of a few chores and ride my bike in to work. The 2 hour bike ride is just too much, that isn't reasonable. On the other hand the 25 minutes by car is very reasonable.

Suburbia: part of the problem since 1947.

You are right that it takes work to build a new car, just as it takes work to shovel horse-shit. One is far cleaner and much more appealing job. Can you guess which one?

Cleaner? Have you ever been to a vehicle assembly plant? How many carcinogens are in horseshit?

Zayun2

04-07-2008, 03:58

I can understand your frustrations; I do not believe automobiles really aren’t the problem. While they do currently use a majority of the oil we produce, automobiles are only devices for the consumption of energy. They serve a simple purpose of allowing the population of a country get to where they want to go in a convenient and timely manner, nothing more, nothing less.

While there are people that use them as status symbols, those people are in the minority. Most of the people use an automobile as a source of transportation for themselves, their families, their produce, or their livelihood. They simply provide a “cleaner” alternative to the other forms of transportation for the same purposes.

Using a horse and buggy is a dirty option, and once Henry Ford built the first automobile, cities appeared to become cleaner than they had been at any point in history. There was just less to clean up, which saved the cities money.

Overall, I believe the automobile has had a positive impact on society. People are able to get to reach each other across great distances and build relationships that were not possible before. Additionally, they have made cities cleaner than they had been prior to their invention. Granted combustion has several major downfalls that cause pollution problems, but those are not specifically the fault of the automobile.

Oil is a finite resource, but there is far more of it available that we actually know. Earth is a very large place, and mankind has really only scratched its surface. There are several areas throughout the world that are completely untapped.
Besides, the automobile isn’t the cause for our support of repressive regimes. We support Saurdi Arabia not because of automobiles, but cause our thirst for energy keeps increasing.

Cars are much more than just a way for people to move around quickly. But then again, this concept of "speed", of moving "quickly", is another part of the criticism. Why do you want to live your life at light speed? You can get from X to Y on foot or you can go by car, one uses up less energy, the other uses up less time. The difference however is that when we're not in a car, we can communicate with those around us, we can truly live. If you think living your life entirely off of car is life at all, you're simply wrong. I don't see any harm in people occasionally using cars for long trips, or maybe someday in the future for "leisure", but in the world of today, there are many other ethical commitments. And as well, when we use cars and roads for literally ALL of our travel, we destroy "the public". The car is a private vehicle, the road is a private means of transport, and we typically use the car and the road to go from one private place to another. This is the very antithesis of society, because there is minimal interaction with other people.

Everyone uses cars as status symbols, how can you possibly say it's a minority? When you see a Ferrari blazing down the road, you can definitely recognize it. It's been made famous, it's been imbued a value beyond the piece of metal that it is. Cars are a status symbol, in this there can be no doubt. At the very least, they tell others you have some wealth.

The pollution caused by horse shit isn't even comparable to the pollution from burning fossil fuels. And fossil fuels are certainly to blame because they are the primary "combusters" in our society. Horse shit can be wiped off the road, it's a whole lot harder to wipe CO2 and SO2 out of the atmosphere.

And I would say that the automobile has the potential to kill "society". It has the potential to destroy our relations with others, making life a loosely connected world of private spaces. And, to answer your other claim, the train made meeting people far away a possibility well before the car did. There is always a better alternative to the automobile in my mind, or at least there should be. However, the infrastructure in the US has specifically been set up to the advantage of cars at the expense of other means of transport.

I could care less if we'd tapped into oil or not, it's still a very limited resource. And I'll enlighten you on this lie you've probably heard. The truth is that there's still oil out there, but how much can we access right now, at this very moment? This is the true consideration, it takes a long time to set up infrastructure for steady oil production, and that is why places like Saudi Arabia, which have the potential to greatly increase their oil production and transportation at will, are of such importance.

As for your final blip, we do support Saudi Arabia mostly because the automobile. The only resource of great strategic importance they have is oil, and cars are responsible for 2/3 of our demand for oil. This means they are the biggest factor in our support of the Saudi Monarchy. And by the way, we burn very little oil for electricity (it's not about "thirst for energy", at least not in the sense I think you're thinking).

So yeah.

Zayun2

04-07-2008, 04:03

I drive, mostly, to get to places I need to go in a reasonable amount of time. I live 45 miles from work, and would rather not have to get up a 3am in the morning to shower, dress, eat breakfast, take care of a few chores and ride my bike in to work. The 2 hour bike ride is just too much, that isn't reasonable. On the other hand the 25 minutes by car is very reasonable.

Again, my question is this, why isn't there mass-transit from your place of residence to the place you work? Have you ever even requested the government build any?

And furthermore, why the hell do you live 45 miles from your place of work? I'll be honest with you, people that do that are fucking insane. Fifteen, twenty miles from work is really pushing it, but twice that is incomprehensible. Why don't you just live closer to your place of work? And if there's "no room", why don't you get a job somewhere else?

Trollgaard

04-07-2008, 04:43

Right, and why would you live there if it's so costly? Why do you have to live near NYC if you're unable to do so?

Society, after the 1920s, has overwhelmingly structured around cars. And again, I'm not saying we should just abandon cars, but that it would be better if we were in a society where we didn't need them all that much. Obviously, if one lives in a rural area they would need some way to get to a more populated area once in a while, that's not what I'm criticizing.

I guess I should have elucidated this earlier, my biggest, biggest problem with cars is how often they are used for very short trips (0 - 3 miles). In a 10 mile trip, I believe ninety percent of the emissions from the car are from the first one mile. There really is no reason to have to use cars for short trips, and there's no reason that ten mile trips should be a necessity in our lives.

So basically your saying people should be stuck to a small area around their homes and work, say 5 miles or so?

Nah, fuck that.

Cars give me the freedom to move. I can drive from one end to the country to the other if I wanted to. I can go where I want when I want.

New Malachite Square

04-07-2008, 05:03

Trollgaard

04-07-2008, 05:16

Aren't you the anarcho-primativist?

Not so much anymore.

Might as well live it up while the going is still good.

New Malachite Square

04-07-2008, 05:24

Not so much anymore.

Might as well live it up while the going is still good.

Fair enough.

Trollgaard

04-07-2008, 05:39

Zayun2

04-07-2008, 05:42

So basically your saying people should be stuck to a small area around their homes and work, say 5 miles or so?

Nah, fuck that.

Cars give me the freedom to move. I can drive from one end to the country to the other if I wanted to. I can go where I want when I want.

The very post you just quoted said that I wasn't advocating the banning of cars. You can still move around, by car, train, airplane, etc. On the other hand, what is inherently good about driving 45 miles to work everyday? It would be much better to work closer to home and have a better relation with the area and those around you.

Zayun2

04-07-2008, 05:45

@Zayun:

What is the big deal with cars being private space anyway? When I'm in a car I don't want to be bothered by other people. I listen to music, loudly, sometimes, or talk with friends. The car is my little bubble of space. What's the big deal?

Well this is part of the reason people these days are messed up. Rather than meet "the other", those strange people you don't seem to like for no comprehensible reason at all, you get to seclude yourself in your own little world. Rather than meet others, learning to live with and understand those with differences, you have everything "your way". There's nothing wrong with having some privacy, some choice, but honestly, cars really aren't a necessity. That's why we have houses/apartments/etc, it's your little bubble of space.

Zayun2

04-07-2008, 05:53

As I said, automobiles aren't the problem. Its where we get our energy that is the problem. The Earth has hundreds of resources for producing energy, many of which are renewable. The problem has been for the last 200 years human beings really haven't been forced to change their source of energy much. Of course, prior to the discovery of oil we were using wood and that lasted us severl thousand years.

Now the cost of getting our energy is increasing, it is forcing many people to rethink where their energy comes from and how they use it. This is a good thing. It spurs innovation and helps to advance our society. In essence, the fact that automobiles use 60% of our current energy is actually beneficial to society. It puts us back on track where we should have been 40 years ago. Looking for better way to get from one place to another in an equally convenient way that uses less energy.

Besides, the US has plenty of potential energy resource within or near its own borders, the country or states simply refuse to consider affecting the lifestyles of their citizen to get to it. We really need to look into become less dependant on these oppressive regimes, and depend more on ourselves. We need to plan to exploit all our available resources to help fuel our country, not change how we get around. Frankly, tapping all of our resources, is far easier, and less expensive than simply gong back to the horse and buggy.

The real question is that's it's not what fuel, but why fuel? We can't simply focus on cleaner energy, we also need to look at efficiency (and few modes of transport can compete with a car when it comes to energy inefficiency). Again, my point has consistently been that we can get from X to Y with multiple modes of transport, but that the car is one of the least efficient of all of them. As well, let's not forget the way cars kill public space and re-enforce poverty (I posted on this a couple pages back). All in all, the problems of the car go far, far beyond simply oil.

So you're saying high cost of oil good? And in reality, people aren't rethinking fuel so much as energy generation. There's been a lot more advance in things like windmills than there has in hydrogen fuel cells.

That's the problem with your ideology. Resources are lying around just so that "you", can exploit them. Without going into some crazy ecology debate though, the point is that if we use the oil in this country, it will run out. And furthermore, this potential oil you talk about is not currently tapable, and won't be for quite awhile. And by the way, bicycles are much better than horses for city travel, just so you know. I would not recommend going back to the days of horse drawn carriage.

Trollgaard

04-07-2008, 05:59

The very post you just quoted said that I wasn't advocating the banning of cars. You can still move around, by car, train, airplane, etc. On the other hand, what is inherently good about driving 45 miles to work everyday? It would be much better to work closer to home and have a better relation with the area and those around you.

I never said anything about driving 45 miles to work. I drive less than 10 miles to work. It would make more sense for people not to commute long distances to work, but in many cases work is in the cities, and cities are shit holes. People don't want to live in shit holes, so they live in the suburbs and commute. Make the cities into not shit holes, and maybe your plan would make more sense.

Well this is part of the reason people these days are messed up. Rather than meet "the other", those strange people you don't seem to like for no comprehensible reason at all, you get to seclude yourself in your own little world. Rather than meet others, learning to live with and understand those with differences, you have everything "your way". There's nothing wrong with having some privacy, some choice, but honestly, cars really aren't a necessity. That's why we have houses/apartments/etc, it's your little bubble of space.

I don't mind meeting other people at all. But there are too many damn people to meet. People need their bubbles of space. I really don't think the car and the home are too much to ask.

Also, your concluding that because I drive a car, I cannot accept others with differences? Where the hell does that come from?

Zayun2

04-07-2008, 07:44

I never said anything about driving 45 miles to work. I drive less than 10 miles to work. It would make more sense for people not to commute long distances to work, but in many cases work is in the cities, and cities are shit holes. People don't want to live in shit holes, so they live in the suburbs and commute. Make the cities into not shit holes, and maybe your plan would make more sense.

I don't mind meeting other people at all. But there are too many damn people to meet. People need their bubbles of space. I really don't think the car and the home are too much to ask.

Also, your concluding that because I drive a car, I cannot accept others with differences? Where the hell does that come from?

And why are cities shit holes? Because of cars and the infrastructure along with them. For instance, in the 1960s, whites, with money, decided to get out of the city, since things weren't segregated anymore. Because many of them had the money to buy cars, they could leave through through the highways, into the suburbs. Those that were poor were locked into the city, they had no means of getting out (one cannot go on a highway with a bicycle or on foot). Thus, suburban America gained new, somewhat-wealthy/wealthy inhabitants, whose taxes and spending helped fuel suburban growth. On the other hand, mainly the poor were left in the actual cities, and because of this, the city generated less revenue and infrastructure began to deteriorate. Why is it that these people are trapped in the cities, and why is it that the wealthy can live in the suburbs and still get to the city for work? It is because of highways, and why do we have highways? Because of cars, so that we can travel quickly.

As well, as the city began to deteriorate, new problems developed. Increased poverty and crime lead to less trust in the government, and those in the government (particularly people who work for the census) would be much less willing to enter the inner city. Because there has to be an interview (or something to that extent) for a person to be counted in the US census, and thus because of this mistrust and fear, the inner city populations are always massively undercounted in the census. And it is the census numbers which decide how much funding a region gets for what, all of this further contributes to the collapse of the city.

So yeah, one of the main reasons cities are messed up is because of the automobile itself.

As for your other argument, I am saying that your attitude demands that you always get what you want. If there are "too many damn people" to talk to, you clearly haven't learned how to tolerate living in a city, because the automobile conditions you otherwise. And it's not just about toleration, it's about interaction with other people. When you're in a car, you essentially see the world in 2-D, through your windshield. There is minimal room for interaction with those outside of your car, and I would say this is at the very least, not good for society. A thriving urban culture requires interaction between urbanites, it's that simple. If everyone just goes in cars and never says anything to anyone else, it'd be a pretty boring city.

East Coast Federation

04-07-2008, 08:40

I love cars, Hell I own 3 at the moment, and I plan on getting more. Hell my family is in love with cars to.

Cars I personally own and Pay for.

1. 2007 Honda Civic SI
2. 1995 V8 Thunderbird
3. 1990 Volvo 740 Turbo

( I do have a drag car, but it doesn't see the road, as its not road legal ).

I love driving cars, I Love working on cars, I love modifying cars. My GF is the same way, she wont work on them or anything, but sometimes a drive to nowhere in the big Lazy T-bird is just you need on a nice afternoon.

For me, driving like crazy on the back roads in my SI is fun, but for me sometimes I just like to take the big V8 T-bird out onto a deserted stretch of road and really open it up.

Cars my Family owns:

Road Legal:

2008 Ford F350 FX4 in Blue
2007 Mercedes S Class ( SL550 )
2003 Jaguar X-type
1997 Camaro Z28
2000 Saab 9-5 Aero
1993 Ford F250 ( No longer in use, its for sale )
1980 Triumph TR7
2000 Ford Taurus

Non Road Legal:

1988 Ford Mustang= Built Drag car that runs 11's
1991 Ford Crown Victoria
1964 Honda S600 ( under restoration )

As you can see, my family loves cars, and I love cars. And I do not plan on giving them up. EVER.

I'll walk 20 miles to work when hell starts existing, and then freezing over. Sure if its a nice day and traffic isnt bad, I'll ride my bike, but normally its the car.

Sure I might be biased, and a car is just a A-B machine, but it doesn't mean you cant have fun along the way!

The Top speed of a Bike is about 20 miles an hour. And can only go that fast as long as the person riding it can.

A cheap 2001 1.9 Liter http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXrz3Sxy-a0 Saturn can get to 60miles an hour in 12 seconds, and stay there for 300 miles at time, and can go anywhere where theres a road any time. You Decide.

BUT I ASK THIS: Without the car, how is 70% of America supposed to get around? And do not say Public Transit, because its not an option.

Cameroi

04-07-2008, 08:52

in combination with excessive human population it creates something of a problem for biodiversity, upon which our own existence, which is by no means seperate and apart from that of other life on our planet, ultimately depends.

only partially due to byproducts of its propulsion, but also even more from habitat loss due to road building and other degenerative rural activities.

cleaner propulsion is of course possible, less land consumption is also possible, not only by much smaller scale of personal vehicules where population density is too low to support more efficient means of mechanical mobility, but all the more effectively by putting it on very narrow gauge rails, or other small form factor guideways.

mechanical transportation need not be thrown out with the bathwater entirely by any means, nor loss of what bennifits it does provide, but this can be done better, much better, much more environmentally and even socially harmoniously, by other forms then the car as we know it remaining, as it has only been for less then a hundred years, the primary means of mechanical mobility. something i feel was a major error ever to have made it.

in cameroi we have no laws against possessing an automobile. no laws against POSSESSING anything. we simply have no roads to drive them on, no gas stations to fuel them at, and no place to get them fixed or buy them, but no problem with hobbiest who build there own and provide their own places to drive them at their own expense. instead we have lots and lots of little people sized 'trains', minivan sized stored and or clean energy propelled, multiple unit 'trains', running on very narrow gauge railways and other guideway structures.

in such places as population density really IS too low to support even the very smallest of these, something like the hobbiest ride on miniature railways seen in some places on earth, just big enough to ride ON, people sometimes ride a kind of very small construction and agricultural maching called a masterbot. something of similar proportion to those little hernia guage trains but also equiped with hydraulic leg/arms with which they are able to climb over obsticals much as a person on foot wood.

emergency services (a question that always seems to come up) use such tecnologies as anti-gravity and teleportation.

actually there ARE two lane 'bicycle' paths that double as single lane emergency vehicule access when neccessary, which is seldom.

=^^=
.../\...

Trollgaard

04-07-2008, 13:17

And why are cities shit holes? Because of cars and the infrastructure along with them. For instance, in the 1960s, whites, with money, decided to get out of the city, since things weren't segregated anymore. Because many of them had the money to buy cars, they could leave through through the highways, into the suburbs. Those that were poor were locked into the city, they had no means of getting out (one cannot go on a highway with a bicycle or on foot). Thus, suburban America gained new, somewhat-wealthy/wealthy inhabitants, whose taxes and spending helped fuel suburban growth. On the other hand, mainly the poor were left in the actual cities, and because of this, the city generated less revenue and infrastructure began to deteriorate. Why is it that these people are trapped in the cities, and why is it that the wealthy can live in the suburbs and still get to the city for work? It is because of highways, and why do we have highways? Because of cars, so that we can travel quickly.

As well, as the city began to deteriorate, new problems developed. Increased poverty and crime lead to less trust in the government, and those in the government (particularly people who work for the census) would be much less willing to enter the inner city. Because there has to be an interview (or something to that extent) for a person to be counted in the US census, and thus because of this mistrust and fear, the inner city populations are always massively undercounted in the census. And it is the census numbers which decide how much funding a region gets for what, all of this further contributes to the collapse of the city.

So yeah, one of the main reasons cities are messed up is because of the automobile itself.

As for your other argument, I am saying that your attitude demands that you always get what you want. If there are "too many damn people" to talk to, you clearly haven't learned how to tolerate living in a city, because the automobile conditions you otherwise. And it's not just about toleration, it's about interaction with other people. When you're in a car, you essentially see the world in 2-D, through your windshield. There is minimal room for interaction with those outside of your car, and I would say this is at the very least, not good for society. A thriving urban culture requires interaction between urbanites, it's that simple. If everyone just goes in cars and never says anything to anyone else, it'd be a pretty boring city.

Do you even know how the highway system started?

It came into being under President Eisenhower as a system to move troops around the country quickly in case of war.

I have heard of the so called white flight you spoke of in your first two paragraphs. Though I'm sure the people of the cities had cars well before the 60s. I was not alive then, so I do not know all the reasons behind the 'white flight'. All I know is that cities are too loud, too busy, and crime ridden for my liking. I would never consider living in one. I would rather be a poor dirt farmer first.

Damn straight I have not learned to tolerate living a city. I've never lived in one, and never want to. I absolute cannot stand cities. Just going to a city requires a major effort of will, and I cannot stay for more than a few hours before my temper starts thinning. A thriving urban culture? I absolutely detest urban culture. I'd rather have a dead urban culture than a thriving one.

Nobel Hobos

04-07-2008, 13:26

*applauds*

Well said, NH. Your oratory and rhetoric are unimpeachable.

Nixon was unimpeachable. Like me, he was smart enough to know when to quit. :p

Seriously, thanks. It's nice to be read, and I'll try not to let your praise go to my head. You're one of the best!
Cleaner? Have you ever been to a vehicle assembly plant? How many carcinogens are in horseshit?

Both jobs have risks. Breathing the ammonia from horseshit couldn't be good for a person, but the biggest risk was probably being run down by some rich bastard in a hurry.

If there were horseshit-shovellers nowdays, they'd be protected from that latter risk by public defenders, in the courts. This highlights the farcical nature of defending cars as "better than what came before."

================

Not so much anymore.

Might as well live it up while the going is still good.

You offended me once, and I stated my resolve not to reply to you again.

I'm replying now, because I see you so shamelessly changing your mind. I respect that, and I need to do it myself.

The quote from Edward Abbey in your sig can't be taken ironically, though. You might want something from Blake. The second last line of my sig, were you to google it, might appeal to you too. :)

Haoaera

04-07-2008, 13:55

Why?

Use a bike and a train to get to work for a year or two, particularly during winter months, and you'll understand why.

Gift-of-god

04-07-2008, 14:38

Cars give me the freedom to move. I can drive from one end to the country to the other if I wanted to. I can go where I want when I want.

Provided that there is a road there, and a gas station every few hundred kilometers. And an experienced mechanic. And you have the

I love cars, Hell I own 3 at the moment, and I plan on getting more. Hell my family is in love with cars to....BUT I ASK THIS: Without the car, how is 70% of America supposed to get around? And do not say Public Transit, because its not an option.

I remember you. You were the one who didn't care if kids get lung cancer from pollution as long as you got to drive. Ignoring the immorality of your position, why do you feel that your right to operate a motor vehicle trumps a child's right to life and health?

Use a bike and a train to get to work for a year or two, particularly during winter months, and you'll understand why.

I bike to work every day, all year long, in Montreal. I also have two small children who I take to school as well. In the winter. With my bike. I know exactly what it takes. I still find it easier and faster than owning an automobile.

The car has a place in modern life. It is necessary for the independence and movement of rural people and those who have difficulty getting around (e.g. the elderly, those who use wheelchairs, etc.), as well as moving perishable goods, and most importantly: emergency vehicles such as ambulances, fire trucks and police cars.

In my opinion, we should ban cars from urban areas that have a certain developmental density. At the same time, public transport within these areas has to be improved to allow free and easy movement and access for all of the people in the society. Perishable goods can be driven in on small electric vehicles. The emergency vehicle infrastructure could remain as is until our technology improves. So would the rural infrastructure, at least here in North America. Other areas may have other solutions.

If that means commuters have to park their cars and then get on a bus to get to work each morning, so be it.

Nobel Hobos

04-07-2008, 14:40

Do you even know how the highway system started?

It came into being under President Eisenhower as a system to move troops around the country quickly in case of war.

A nifty idea from the Nazis! Despite the wild improbability of a land war on US soil.

I have heard of the so called white flight you spoke of in your first two paragraphs. Though I'm sure the people of the cities had cars well before the 60s. I was not alive then, so I do not know all the reasons behind the 'white flight'. All I know is that cities are too loud, too busy, and crime ridden for my liking. I would never consider living in one.

But driving into one, making them noisier, and busier, at the expense of those who live there, doesn't worry you at all. You aren't the victim of that.

The work is in the city. Yes, one poor person who must move to the work (to the city) can rise by their talents and hard work. But can they all? If each of them had talent and worked hard, could they all be rich?

As to the crime: crime is promoted (I won't quite say "caused") by social inequality. The poorest feel excluded from wealth (correctly or not) and when a society is predominantly wealthy, they thereby feel excluded from society. So they break the social contract, ie break laws.

Sure, some of the poor are scumbags. Some of them would break laws for the notoriety, from principle not as the line of least resistance to get by. (They're poor for the same reason they are criminals. Question this if you will, the answer is an essay.) But the vast majority of the poor are honest, they truly do their best, and honour the social contract (don't break laws) even when that contract is clearly not in their favour.

If you would use their home suburbs as a thoroughfare, a way to get from your nice suburb to your place of work, you might want to consider a small charitable donation to them. Turn the pike, pay the fee. This is how roads once were, you paid to pass through people's property. Kings (government!) busted this usury. But it had a certain justice: build an airport next to my place, compensate me for the noise and pollution.

I've lived in the inner city of Sydney. They are "slums" in part, but gentrified in part too. The heavy industry is gone, but the polluting, noisy, dangerous main roads remain. Away from the arterial roads, yet within an easy commute of the clustered places of employment (office blocks) is very desirable real-estate.

No more arterial roads (roads which pass through, not to, the residential suburb) ... no more slums. And don't throw Rio de Janeiro at me, that is a different scenario of people flocking to an illusion, like a Gold Rush. Aspirant society; quite unlike the slums of the 'first world' where most of the poor grew up poor and stayed where they were born.

Yeah, I'm done. It would be entirely honourable for you not to reply to me, since I have in sense ambushed you (holding my peace for reasons of my own).

I'm quite happy to debate Zayun2 ... since they are the strongest debater in the thread (by this measure: E x (A-to-power M) x P, where E=expected strength, M=median strength of NSG poster, with median defined as 1 and worst ever poster defined as 0, A=Average strength of posts to thread, and P=number of words posted to thread. And of course excluding myself, since my self-assesment has no bearing on my judgement of other posters.)

Also, Zayun2 said several things I think are wrong, but I ought to pick a side because debates are supposed to have two sides.

Zayun2: if or when Trollgaard folds their hand, I have some bones to pick with you!

Nobel Hobos

04-07-2008, 14:59

Gift-of-God, good to see you.

I honestly never knew you were a cyclist, but it only improves my opinion of you (one of the best).

Is not the bicycle one of the most elegant inventions ever? It goes from behind to in front, its shape expressing its purpose. The only compromises it makes in its form (sticking-out bits to either side) are to accommodate the relatively primitive source of power (legs) and means of steering (arms.)

Knowing the principle, I think Ug the cave-human could fashion a bicycle from reeds and sticks. Even if Ug could only manage a velocipede, Ug could display his/her fine gluteal muscles to passing motorists!

(I'm kinda drunk, in case it doesn't show. Considering posting in different colours to show my blood-alcohol level.)

Geniasis

04-07-2008, 17:48

I have heard of the so called white flight you spoke of in your first two paragraphs. Though I'm sure the people of the cities had cars well before the 60s. I was not alive then, so I do not know all the reasons behind the 'white flight'.

Yeah but...

All I know is that cities are too loud, too busy, and crime ridden for my liking. I would never consider living in one. I would rather be a poor dirt farmer first.

So you kind of do know the main reasons, even if you don't know you know. Also, the suburbs were places us white people could go where the black people really couldn't follow.

Sirmomo1

04-07-2008, 18:36

Gift-of-god

04-07-2008, 19:17

Is not the bicycle one of the most elegant inventions ever? It goes from behind to in front, its shape expressing its purpose. The only compromises it makes in its form (sticking-out bits to either side) are to accommodate the relatively primitive source of power (legs) and means of steering (arms.)

Knowing the principle, I think Ug the cave-human could fashion a bicycle from reeds and sticks. Even if Ug could only manage a velocipede, Ug could display his/her fine gluteal muscles to passing motorists!

(I'm kinda drunk, in case it doesn't show. Considering posting in different colours to show my blood-alcohol level.)

The bicycle has many technological advantages that make it useful for urban living in a post-industrial world:

It requires no fuel.
It is easy to repair with common tools.
It can be used by children, the elderly, the poor, and others who are typically excluded from car society.
It does not require a huge infrastructure that is costly to maintain.
Parts can be manufactured locally from recycled sources.
Bicycles are inexpensive.
It's a good way to get in shape, or stay in shape. My ass, for example looks as good as it did when I was eighteen.
It does not spew toxic gases.
It is light enough and slow enough that even a major collision is usually not enough to require medical intervention, and death is extremely rare.

And of course, we should not neglect the important role that bicycles have played in historic struggles of emancipation:

"I think [the bicycle] has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world," feminist pioneer Susan B. Anthony (http://cyclingsisters.org/node/3242) said in 1896. "It gives a woman a feeling of freedom and self-reliance. The moment she takes her seat she knows she can't get into harm unless she gets off her bicycle, and away she goes, the picture of free, untrammeled womanhood."

Drunk, eh? That reminds me: it's also really hard to drink beer and pedal at the same time.

Neesika

04-07-2008, 19:43

It's a good way to get in shape, or stay in shape. My ass, for example looks as good as it did when I was eighteen.

I'm sorry, I'm just not going to take your word for that. ;)

Neesika

04-07-2008, 19:45

I avoided driving for years. I only got my license very recently, and I loathe having to drive. I mean, it's fine, the actual process of driving. It's the needing to do so that bothers me. The way this damn city is built, there are very few places you can live where you can access essential services (schools, daycares, grocery stores, liquor stores and bookstores) without driving to get to them. I detest that fact, and detest the huge, new sprawling suburban developments that seem hellbent on making the situation even worse.

The only reason you should have to drive in my opinion, is to get out of the city and into the deep bush for a while.

Sirmomo1

05-07-2008, 05:35

Again, my question is this, why isn't there mass-transit from your place of residence to the place you work? Have you ever even requested the government build any?

The typical argument as to why mass transit "doesn't work" seems to be that it doesn't exist to a significant degree. Well, how the hell do you think Holland, France, Britain, Japan etc got mass transit? They installed it. And they voted for politicians who wanted to build it without crying "socialism" or running to their cars to give it a hug.

The car-centered infrastructure and way of life is, for me, one of the worst things about America.

Trollgaard

05-07-2008, 05:59

A nifty idea from the Nazis! Despite the wild improbability of a land war on US soil.

But driving into one, making them noisier, and busier, at the expense of those who live there, doesn't worry you at all. You aren't the victim of that.

The work is in the city. Yes, one poor person who must move to the work (to the city) can rise by their talents and hard work. But can they all? If each of them had talent and worked hard, could they all be rich?

As to the crime: crime is promoted (I won't quite say "caused") by social inequality. The poorest feel excluded from wealth (correctly or not) and when a society is predominantly wealthy, they thereby feel excluded from society. So they break the social contract, ie break laws.

Sure, some of the poor are scumbags. Some of them would break laws for the notoriety, from principle not as the line of least resistance to get by. (They're poor for the same reason they are criminals. Question this if you will, the answer is an essay.) But the vast majority of the poor are honest, they truly do their best, and honour the social contract (don't break laws) even when that contract is clearly not in their favour.

If you would use their home suburbs as a thoroughfare, a way to get from your nice suburb to your place of work, you might want to consider a small charitable donation to them. Turn the pike, pay the fee. This is how roads once were, you paid to pass through people's property. Kings (government!) busted this usury. But it had a certain justice: build an airport next to my place, compensate me for the noise and pollution.

I've lived in the inner city of Sydney. They are "slums" in part, but gentrified in part too. The heavy industry is gone, but the polluting, noisy, dangerous main roads remain. Away from the arterial roads, yet within an easy commute of the clustered places of employment (office blocks) is very desirable real-estate.

No more arterial roads (roads which pass through, not to, the residential suburb) ... no more slums. And don't throw Rio de Janeiro at me, that is a different scenario of people flocking to an illusion, like a Gold Rush. Aspirant society; quite unlike the slums of the 'first world' where most of the poor grew up poor and stayed where they were born.

Yeah, I'm done. It would be entirely honourable for you not to reply to me, since I have in sense ambushed you (holding my peace for reasons of my own).

I'm quite happy to debate Zayun2 ... since they are the strongest debater in the thread (by this measure: E x (A-to-power M) x P, where E=expected strength, M=median strength of NSG poster, with median defined as 1 and worst ever poster defined as 0, A=Average strength of posts to thread, and P=number of words posted to thread. And of course excluding myself, since my self-assesment has no bearing on my judgement of other posters.)

Also, Zayun2 said several things I think are wrong, but I ought to pick a side because debates are supposed to have two sides.

Zayun2: if or when Trollgaard folds their hand, I have some bones to pick with you!

I don't drive to the city to work. I rarely visit the city. I live and work in the suburbs.

Tolls suck, but I don't mind paying them the few times I have to pay them.

I never said all poor people are criminals- I don't think I insinuated that. I agree that most work hard and are good people.

I think there will always be crime, but I'd rather not live in places where it seems most crime takes place- the cities.

@ Sirmomo:
"If "cities are shit holes" and "people don't want to live in shit holes", do you have any suggestions as to why property prices in London and New York are the highest in the world?"

Beats the hell out of me. I don't understand the appeal of cities.

Zayun2

05-07-2008, 06:23

Do you even know how the highway system started?

It came into being under President Eisenhower as a system to move troops around the country quickly in case of war.

Not quite right. Part of the reason the highway was pushed was for speedy troop transport (not that it's likely the US would ever be in a ground war on our own soil, but we were pretty impressed by that Autobahn), however, it was pushed for very heavily by automobile manufacturers and it's primary purpose was to facilitate private and commercial transport.

I have heard of the so called white flight you spoke of in your first two paragraphs. Though I'm sure the people of the cities had cars well before the 60s. I was not alive then, so I do not know all the reasons behind the 'white flight'. All I know is that cities are too loud, too busy, and crime ridden for my liking. I would never consider living in one. I would rather be a poor dirt farmer first.

That's not responsive to my argument, in fact, it only strengthens it. You've pretty much conceded everything about how the highway and car exclude those without a large portion of money, and how it reinforces poverty (by taking away tax dollars and a large portion of business, as well as leading to a decaying infrastructure because of massive census undercount and poverty, which by the way is often a vicious cycle). You also haven't responded to how roads eat up space that was once "public" and turn it into room for the priveleged few with cars.

When it comes to strengthening my argument, the fact that you absolutely detest the city is just proof as to how the automobile foster this arrogance, this hostility towards the public, towards "real civilization". It makes your entire life a private one, which may be joyful to you. However, many people today feel like their lives are empty, and I would argue that this is particularly because public life is decaying.

Also, you don't respond how cars are complicit in this poverty (I've discussed this above and in great detail in previous posts) and the very noise (cars are loud, this is one argument you can't win, period) and business that makes you detest them. If people weren't in such a damn hurry, going so fast (because of cars and the mentality fostered by them), they wouldn't be so busy.

And in the US, it's rather difficult to be a poor dirt farmer. In a society of modern technology, you've got to have a good bit of money to get started and to raise enough to sell at the prices necessary to succeed. Of course, I'm cool with you being a farmer, just letting you know it's very difficult to do without some starting money, which is all the more reason why the poverty caused by cars not only destroys urban life, but makes rural life more difficult as well (all for the comfort of the suburbs).

Damn straight I have not learned to tolerate living a city. I've never lived in one, and never want to. I absolute cannot stand cities. Just going to a city requires a major effort of will, and I cannot stay for more than a few hours before my temper starts thinning. A thriving urban culture? I absolutely detest urban culture. I'd rather have a dead urban culture than a thriving one.

This has been responded to above. However, you have made an interesting argument, so let's talk about urban culture. The fact is that urban culture is the lifeblood of any civilization. The Roman times were times of large cities, cities of art, trade, culture. Forward to the barbarian invasions and the increasing insecurity felt by people (sound like any contemporary events already discussed), the increasing flight from cities into the country. Thus we had the feudal system, one of stagnation, of little development, little new, a rather boring time. And then, centuries later, urbanization yet again. It was the Italian cities, centers of trade, in which the Renaissance was able to flourish. It was these city-states which lead the way in technology as well as culture (painting, sculpture, music, etc.), until Northern Europe began to develop larger, wealthier cities. And since then, urbanization has continued, and the production of culture, the production of technology has continued to speed up. Large, wealthy cities are the lifeblood, the essence, the cultural and technological centers of any civilization. And with the fall of cities, we have seen the fall of civilizations.

By the way, you can see this pattern with other civilizations as well, it's no unique phenomena.

In summary, cities are the place where both trade and industry occur. They are the place where the money should be, the place where the arts flourish. In their vitality lies the vitality of any civilization, and that is why they are good.

So you may not like the city, but you should at least recognize it's importance, as well as the automobiles negative impact on it.'

Use a bike and a train to get to work for a year or two, particularly during winter months, and you'll understand why.

From a debate context, it doesn't matter what my personal lifestyle is. I can argue the value of a certain action or lifestyle without engaging it. However, I walk to most of the places I need to go, often in 90 degree weather, if not hotter.

Zayun2

05-07-2008, 06:46

...

I'm quite happy to debate Zayun2 ... since they are the strongest debater in the thread (by this measure: E x (A-to-power M) x P, where E=expected strength, M=median strength of NSG poster, with median defined as 1 and worst ever poster defined as 0, A=Average strength of posts to thread, and P=number of words posted to thread. And of course excluding myself, since my self-assesment has no bearing on my judgement of other posters.)

Also, Zayun2 said several things I think are wrong, but I ought to pick a side because debates are supposed to have two sides.

Zayun2: if or when Trollgaard folds their hand, I have some bones to pick with you!

I appreciate the compliment, and I'd also like to hear what you disagree with me on.

The bicycle has many technological advantages that make it useful for urban living in a post-industrial world:

It requires no fuel.
It is easy to repair with common tools.
It can be used by children, the elderly, the poor, and others who are typically excluded from car society.
It does not require a huge infrastructure that is costly to maintain.
Parts can be manufactured locally from recycled sources.
Bicycles are inexpensive.
It's a good way to get in shape, or stay in shape. My ass, for example looks as good as it did when I was eighteen.
It does not spew toxic gases.
It is light enough and slow enough that even a major collision is usually not enough to require medical intervention, and death is extremely rare.

And of course, we should not neglect the important role that bicycles have played in historic struggles of emancipation:

Drunk, eh? That reminds me: it's also really hard to drink beer and pedal at the same time.

I completely agree.

Let's also not forget that:

In the typical city, bicycles are a faster form of travel on average for trips less than five miles.

Bicyclists rarely don't kill people, and the majority of casualties for bikers are caused by them being run over by some hot-headed car driver.

Bicycle companies don't wreak massive environmental damage and civil rights abuses as well as support wars for oil.

Etc.
The typical argument as to why mass transit "doesn't work" seems to be that it doesn't exist to a significant degree. Well, how the hell do you think Holland, France, Britain, Japan etc got mass transit? They installed it. And they voted for politicians who wanted to build it without crying "socialism" or running to their cars to give it a hug.

The car-centered infrastructure and way of life is, for me, one of the worst things about America.

And again, I agree. However, we should recognize that both corporations and people are complicit in our lack of a good mass transit system. Of course, this is all the more reason why we as individuals need to change our lifestyles (in mass) and lobby the government, there's no other way to counteract car/oil corporations.

Zayun2

05-07-2008, 06:51

I don't drive to the city to work. I rarely visit the city. I live and work in the suburbs.

Tolls suck, but I don't mind paying them the few times I have to pay them.

I never said all poor people are criminals- I don't think I insinuated that. I agree that most work hard and are good people.

I think there will always be crime, but I'd rather not live in places where it seems most crime takes place- the cities.

@ Sirmomo:
"If "cities are shit holes" and "people don't want to live in shit holes", do you have any suggestions as to why property prices in London and New York are the highest in the world?"

Beats the hell out of me. I don't understand the appeal of cities.

The fact that there will always be crime isn't a responsive argument either. There is crime in the suburbs, believe it or not. The main difference however is that the suburbs are wealthy, the cities are not. If cars didn't entrench city poverty, the crime rate would be the same as the suburbs if not lower.

As for the appeal of cities, some simply like "living". They, as social beings (that's what most humans are), like being around other humans. They like being able to work, live, see art, sports, play games, visit parks, all in the same place. I've already addressed the importance of cities in the post two above this one as well.

Nomala

05-07-2008, 10:32

So basically you are saying that, if we would have no need to do what cars allow us to do, we wouldn't need cars, thus cars are bad. Even better, if we could replace the car with something else that allows us to do exactly what cars allow us to do, then we wouldn't need cars. :rolleyes:

Your argumets rely completely on fictional situations where cars would not be needed. In the reality our societies rely on cars. This does not make the cars bad or good, the society might be good or bad. In my opinions the judges are still out on that one.

Rather than blaming the actual culprit, the human who uses his/hers car, you choose to place the blame on the car. Would it be unthinkable that the average Joe really was responsible for something?

greed and death

05-07-2008, 10:56

Cars are neither bad or good. they are tools.

you think they are bad then don't own one. move to a city where they are not needed.

Intangelon

05-07-2008, 18:21

Cars are neither bad or good. they are tools.

you think they are bad then don't own one. move to a city where they are not needed.

My point exactly. Well said.

Sirmomo1

05-07-2008, 18:24

@ Sirmomo:
"If "cities are shit holes" and "people don't want to live in shit holes", do you have any suggestions as to why property prices in London and New York are the highest in the world?"

Beats the hell out of me. I don't understand the appeal of cities.

You might not understand the appeal of cities but you should recognise that most people do. Generally speaking, the reason people move out of cities is because property prices are cheaper and they can now afford a big house with a yard.

JuNii

05-07-2008, 18:48

is the automobile really something that is positive for society?
like any tool, it's not the item itself, but how it's used.

sure you pointed out some negative aspects of the car. but let's look at the positive.

The lives saved due to an ambulance getting an injured person to the hospital on time.

The crimes solved because cops can get to the crime scenes quickly to gather evidence or even apprehend the crook while they're still there.

homes and lives saved because the Firetrucks could get to the fire quickly.

sick people who can get to the doctors on time.

groceries and cargo that are moved by the automobile...

it's not the car that is good or bad, but how they're used.

Intangelon

05-07-2008, 22:18

JuNii

05-07-2008, 22:58

All non-starters.

Nobody's talking about vehicles in public service. We know the value to society of EMS/police/fire/mass-cargo vehicles and the like. We're talking about building the entire culture around commuters in single-person gas-hogs.

true, and even if we kept it to a non-public service...

the automobile also allows for greater rage of travel and thus better genetic diversity.

it also allows for tougher immune systems as people from different regions intermingle and thus get's exposure to various diseases.

people in remote areas rely on the automobile for medicines and other services (this is concerning doctors visiting people in remote areas, not public serivces.)

of course, this isn't to say that the automobile is a God send. after all, it's a major pollutant, it contributes to obesity, laziness, and due to careless use; a cause for many deaths.

Trollgaard

05-07-2008, 23:58

Not quite right. Part of the reason the highway was pushed was for speedy troop transport (not that it's likely the US would ever be in a ground war on our own soil, but we were pretty impressed by that Autobahn), however, it was pushed for very heavily by automobile manufacturers and it's primary purpose was to facilitate private and commercial transport.

Makes sense.

That's not responsive to my argument, in fact, it only strengthens it. You've pretty much conceded everything about how the highway and car exclude those without a large portion of money, and how it reinforces poverty (by taking away tax dollars and a large portion of business, as well as leading to a decaying infrastructure because of massive census undercount and poverty, which by the way is often a vicious cycle). You also haven't responded to how roads eat up space that was once "public" and turn it into room for the priveleged few with cars.

People can buy used cars for cheap. For a few hundred bucks. Many poor people have cars, some spend most of their money on cars they can't really afford. I still don't see how cars enforce poverty.

Roads eat up space, yes. But so do railroads. Some form of road or railroad would have to connect different towns.

When it comes to strengthening my argument, the fact that you absolutely detest the city is just proof as to how the automobile foster this arrogance, this hostility towards the public, towards "real civilization". It makes your entire life a private one, which may be joyful to you. However, many people today feel like their lives are empty, and I would argue that this is particularly because public life is decaying.

Hostility towards the public? Your are reading too much into this, buddy. I have no problem going out and about. I just don't like doing it in cities. My entire life isn't a private one. I don't sit around in my house all day long like some sort of recluse...

Also, you don't respond how cars are complicit in this poverty (I've discussed this above and in great detail in previous posts) and the very noise (cars are loud, this is one argument you can't win, period) and business that makes you detest them. If people weren't in such a damn hurry, going so fast (because of cars and the mentality fostered by them), they wouldn't be so busy.

Cars are loud, yes. So? Don't live next to the road. And if you do, buy some good insulation. Going fast is fun. And many times people go fast so they go out and do stuff. They'd rather be at going wherever to do whatever than in a car...so they can get on with their lives.

And in the US, it's rather difficult to be a poor dirt farmer. In a society of modern technology, you've got to have a good bit of money to get started and to raise enough to sell at the prices necessary to succeed. Of course, I'm cool with you being a farmer, just letting you know it's very difficult to do without some starting money, which is all the more reason why the poverty caused by cars not only destroys urban life, but makes rural life more difficult as well (all for the comfort of the suburbs).

Dirt farmer wasn't the right word. Subsistence farmer is what I meant.

This has been responded to above. However, you have made an interesting argument, so let's talk about urban culture. The fact is that urban culture is the lifeblood of any civilization. The Roman times were times of large cities, cities of art, trade, culture. Forward to the barbarian invasions and the increasing insecurity felt by people (sound like any contemporary events already discussed), the increasing flight from cities into the country. Thus we had the feudal system, one of stagnation, of little development, little new, a rather boring time. And then, centuries later, urbanization yet again. It was the Italian cities, centers of trade, in which the Renaissance was able to flourish. It was these city-states which lead the way in technology as well as culture (painting, sculpture, music, etc.), until Northern Europe began to develop larger, wealthier cities. And since then, urbanization has continued, and the production of culture, the production of technology has continued to speed up. Large, wealthy cities are the lifeblood, the essence, the cultural and technological centers of any civilization. And with the fall of cities, we have seen the fall of civilizations.

By the way, you can see this pattern with other civilizations as well, it's no unique phenomena.

I don't give a damn about civilization. I was born into it, but I don't give a damn about it. I'd be fine being a farmer who's never seen a city, a hunter-gatherer, or whatever. I'd rather be a barbarian than a damn 'civilized' person any day. Your are preaching to the wrong person.

In summary, cities are the place where both trade and industry occur. They are the place where the money should be, the place where the arts flourish. In their vitality lies the vitality of any civilization, and that is why they are good.

So you may not like the city, but you should at least recognize it's importance, as well as the automobiles negative impact on it.'

And again, I don't give a damn about that. I wouldn't give a shit one way or the other if every city in the world disappeared.

I recognize the importance of cities, but I cannot see how people could live in such a place.

The fact that there will always be crime isn't a responsive argument either. There is crime in the suburbs, believe it or not. The main difference however is that the suburbs are wealthy, the cities are not. If cars didn't entrench city poverty, the crime rate would be the same as the suburbs if not lower.

Like I said. Poor people have cars (maybe not all, but a lot). Housing prices are usually cheaper in the suburbs. Why don't the poor just move?

As for the appeal of cities, some simply like "living". They, as social beings (that's what most humans are), like being around other humans. They like being able to work, live, see art, sports, play games, visit parks, all in the same place. I've already addressed the importance of cities in the post two above this one as well.

So people can only live in the cities to be social? There are only other humans in cities, eh?

I am plenty social, and am around enough people where I live.

Zayun2

06-07-2008, 04:55

like any tool, it's not the item itself, but how it's used.

sure you pointed out some negative aspects of the car. but let's look at the positive.

The lives saved due to an ambulance getting an injured person to the hospital on time.

The crimes solved because cops can get to the crime scenes quickly to gather evidence or even apprehend the crook while they're still there.

homes and lives saved because the Firetrucks could get to the fire quickly.

sick people who can get to the doctors on time.

groceries and cargo that are moved by the automobile...

it's not the car that is good or bad, but how they're used.

I should have been more specific, my beef is mainly with "car culture", "automobility", the "car-centric" society. Not necessarily with cars in all cases, the ambulance is one such example.

When it comes to groceries though, you can actually pedal stuff on a bike (you can get baskets for them), or carry it by hand.

true, and even if we kept it to a non-public service...

the automobile also allows for greater rage of travel and thus better genetic diversity.

it also allows for tougher immune systems as people from different regions intermingle and thus get's exposure to various diseases.

people in remote areas rely on the automobile for medicines and other services (this is concerning doctors visiting people in remote areas, not public serivces.)

of course, this isn't to say that the automobile is a God send. after all, it's a major pollutant, it contributes to obesity, laziness, and due to careless use; a cause for many deaths.

That's not unique to cars, trains, air-planes, and boats all allow a great range of travel which applies to your first two arguments.

On the other hand, automobiles are sometimes necessary to transport medical services, but there's no reason why medical services shouldn't be closer to those that need them.

Makes sense.

People can buy used cars for cheap. For a few hundred bucks. Many poor people have cars, some spend most of their money on cars they can't really afford. I still don't see how cars enforce poverty.

Roads eat up space, yes. But so do railroads. Some form of road or railroad would have to connect different towns.

Hostility towards the public? Your are reading too much into this, buddy. I have no problem going out and about. I just don't like doing it in cities. My entire life isn't a private one. I don't sit around in my house all day long like some sort of recluse...

Cars are loud, yes. So? Don't live next to the road. And if you do, buy some good insulation. Going fast is fun. And many times people go fast so they go out and do stuff. They'd rather be at going wherever to do whatever than in a car...so they can get on with their lives.

Dirt farmer wasn't the right word. Subsistence farmer is what I meant.

I don't give a damn about civilization. I was born into it, but I don't give a damn about it. I'd be fine being a farmer who's never seen a city, a hunter-gatherer, or whatever. I'd rather be a barbarian than a damn 'civilized' person any day. Your are preaching to the wrong person.

And again, I don't give a damn about that. I wouldn't give a shit one way or the other if every city in the world disappeared.

I recognize the importance of cities, but I cannot see how people could live in such a place.

Like I said. Poor people have cars (maybe not all, but a lot). Housing prices are usually cheaper in the suburbs. Why don't the poor just move?

So people can only live in the cities to be social? There are only other humans in cities, eh?

I am plenty social, and am around enough people where I live.

That's completely false, most of the "poor" don't have cars. And, even if they bought shitty used cars (which by the way would need frequent repairs and constant refills because of low gas mileage), the cost of maintenance and fuel would quickly surpass that of the car itself and become a massive financial burden.

Right, the difference is that I can pay a few dollars and go by rail where I want for the next week. I can't do the same on a car road, particularly because taxis aren't everywhere and they are more expensive than mass transit (add this to the fact that the poor have little money in the first place). As well, if we had mass-transit going everywhere, which is more "land-efficient", we would use less land up and we wouldn't need as many car roads.

Well you sure seem hostile towards cities, which is where most of "the public" lives.

This doesn't respond to the fact that you dislike cities "because they're loud" and that cities are "loud because of cars". You claim that it "lets you get on with your life", but tell me what life you're living? Obviously, you might enjoy your life style, but a lot of people don't, and my aim is to try and help them realize what's missing, interaction.

The rest of the post doesn't really need response.

Ultimately, you also haven't really defended the effects of "car culture". You're yet to address wars for oil, health and environmental impacts, the death of urban society/culture, the reinforcement of poverty, or any other major issue that I've brought up.

Trollgaard

06-07-2008, 05:36

That's completely false, most of the "poor" don't have cars. And, even if they bought shitty used cars (which by the way would need frequent repairs and constant refills because of low gas mileage), the cost of maintenance and fuel would quickly surpass that of the car itself and become a massive financial burden.

Right, the difference is that I can pay a few dollars and go by rail where I want for the next week. I can't do the same on a car road, particularly because taxis aren't everywhere and they are more expensive than mass transit (add this to the fact that the poor have little money in the first place). As well, if we had mass-transit going everywhere, which is more "land-efficient", we would use less land up and we wouldn't need as many car roads.

Well you sure seem hostile towards cities, which is where most of "the public" lives.

This doesn't respond to the fact that you dislike cities "because they're loud" and that cities are "loud because of cars". You claim that it "lets you get on with your life", but tell me what life you're living? Obviously, you might enjoy your life style, but a lot of people don't, and my aim is to try and help them realize what's missing, interaction.

The rest of the post doesn't really need response.

Ultimately, you also haven't really defended the effects of "car culture". You're yet to address wars for oil, health and environmental impacts, the death of urban society/culture, the reinforcement of poverty, or any other major issue that I've brought up.

I don't know, a lot of poor people I see do have cars.
I have nothing against implementing some improved mass transit, though. That'd be a great idea.

Do you think cities are the only public places around? What about small towns? Aren't they public? And the suburbs? In fact, small towns are probably more public, as people know each other better and have better interactions than in cities. In cities you are just another person.

Oh the quest for oil has brought about some major negative things, but cars don't account for the majority of oil usage. That's in industry. Having more efficient cars and more mass transit seems like the way to go to limit further environmental damage.

As I said before, I don't care about the urban culture, and would rather see it dead. I want to see it a die an ugly, horrible, agonizing death. I'm not convinced about roads and cars reinforcing poverty though. I can see how it could play a part, but a major one? I don't know. I'd wager that it isn't...

The simple fact is the car is essential to the current American society. Should society start to change? Yes.

In what way? There are probably a million different ways society can go. Whichever one you like most, feel free to spout it out.

For the moment, as I said earlier, I think more efficient cars and more mass transit are the two most obvious solutions.

Zayun2

06-07-2008, 06:23

I don't know, a lot of poor people I see do have cars.
I have nothing against implementing some improved mass transit, though. That'd be a great idea.

Do you think cities are the only public places around? What about small towns? Aren't they public? And the suburbs? In fact, small towns are probably more public, as people know each other better and have better interactions than in cities. In cities you are just another person.

Oh the quest for oil has brought about some major negative things, but cars don't account for the majority of oil usage. That's in industry. Having more efficient cars and more mass transit seems like the way to go to limit further environmental damage.

As I said before, I don't care about the urban culture, and would rather see it dead. I want to see it a die an ugly, horrible, agonizing death. I'm not convinced about roads and cars reinforcing poverty though. I can see how it could play a part, but a major one? I don't know. I'd wager that it isn't...

The simple fact is the car is essential to the current American society. Should society start to change? Yes.

In what way? There are probably a million different ways society can go. Whichever one you like most, feel free to spout it out.

For the moment, as I said earlier, I think more efficient cars and more mass transit are the two most obvious solutions.

Of course cities aren't the only public places around, but towns often imply suburbs. It is this "sprawl" that I disagree with. I'm actually very fine with having a decentralized system, but each node, each section of that system should be independent and closely-knit. If you live in a town, work in that town, buy things (usually) in that town, then it's fine. On the other hand, if you spend 30 minutes a day driving by yourself to work, you're wasting a lot of energy (again, what's easier to move, a giant hunk of metal or a human body?). So if you take the wastefulness, the destruction of urban society, the reinforcement of poverty, everything is fine. But that's not the world of today.

When it comes to oil wars, I've already told you that 2/3 of our oil usage every year is from automobiles. They certainly hold a bigger part in wars for oil than any other single factor.

Cars definitely entrench poverty. If I'm a poor person looking for a job, then I will be hard-pressed to find one in the city (unemployment is never at 0% in modern society, there's never enough jobs (and this is intentional, but that's for another conversation)). However, the rich people have all left through the highway into the suburbs, and their wealth creates new opportunities. However, these poor urbanites are literally encircled by highways, they are stuck in the city. They don't have the money to get out, and they have to get out to make money. I've also already explained the drainage effect of the wealthy leaving the city. So yes, automobiles are very much complicit in urban poverty and social exclusion.

Efficient cars is a nice step, but the system needs an overhaul, that's the only long term solution. We need to build essential services closer together, sprawl our communities less. It's either that, or a bunch of people die (though the effects of this will be felt mainly in poorer nations, so most Americans won't give a shit).

Johnny B Goode

11-07-2008, 22:13

Hummers?

What we need is a virus, which gets into their 'lectronics, and causes them to mate with each other on sight.

Like when people take their big, noble-looking mastiff for a walk ... and it humps the lamp-post, and the post-woman, and the chihauhau. They stop taking their big, noble-looking mastiff for walks.

Nah. Just cars in general.

Vault 10

11-07-2008, 22:17

This is something I've been pondering recently, is the automobile really something that is positive for society?
Well, it's fun.

And you probably live in Suburbia. Without car, it would be unthinkable of, to have both a private house and a job in the city.

Intangelon

11-07-2008, 22:24

true, and even if we kept it to a non-public service...

the automobile also allows for greater rage of travel and thus better genetic diversity.

rage[/B]. That springs from this same sense of entitlement some car owners seem to feel, and that we're discussing here. Back to replying to what you meant to say.]

Greater [I]range than the airplane, boat or train? No. Greater frequency, yes.

it also allows for tougher immune systems as people from different regions intermingle and thus get's exposure to various diseases.

Uh, no. Same reason.

people in remote areas rely on the automobile for medicines and other services (this is concerning doctors visiting people in remote areas, not public serivces.)

Agreed. Nobody's talking about doing away with sparse populations' cars because those populations are...wait for it...sparse. Anyone in Bismarck, ND ever complain about traffic jams? Not in the three years I was there.

of course, this isn't to say that the automobile is a God send. after all, it's a major pollutant, it contributes to obesity, laziness, and due to careless use; a cause for many deaths.

You make Zayun2's point for him. Kind of you.

JuNii

11-07-2008, 22:57

I should have been more specific, my beef is mainly with "car culture", "automobility", the "car-centric" society. Not necessarily with cars in all cases, the ambulance is one such example. true, but that's what happens when the car becomes a status symbol.

When it comes to groceries though, you can actually pedal stuff on a bike (you can get baskets for them), or carry it by hand.ahh... but you are limited to how much you can carry on a bike and at least you get excercise with that bike. ;)

That's not unique to cars, trains, air-planes, and boats all allow a great range of travel which applies to your first two arguments. yep, but boats are limited to coastal/riverside trave. Planes and trains are run on THEIR schedule (unless you talk about private planes, then you add the location of an airfield...)

On the other hand, automobiles are sometimes necessary to transport medical services, but there's no reason why medical services shouldn't be closer to those that need them. medical and other emergency services. thus one of the 'pros' for the auto.

[I know that's a typo, but ironically, it's also very correct, given road rage. That springs from this same sense of entitlement some car owners seem to feel, and that we're discussing here. Back to replying to what you meant to say.] while I would err.. argue about that typo... a child here was shot when some idiot fired on another car. :(

Greater range than the airplane, boat or train? No. Greater frequency, yes.depends on how you determine the range ;) after all, trains are limited to the tracks laid down. Airplanes are limited to where they can land, and boats are limited to water. we have communities here that can only be reached by boat and car, or plane and car and some only by car (no trains yet in Hawaii.)

More frequent, yes, and more convienent than boat, plane and/or train.

Uh, no. Same reason. see above. there are villiages all over that can only be reached by car and not by the other methods.

Agreed. Nobody's talking about doing away with sparse populations' cars because those populations are...wait for it...sparse. Anyone in Bismarck, ND ever complain about traffic jams? Not in the three years I was there. remember, I'm giving both pro's and cons for the auto and I took the OP to be talking about the Auto Culture in GENERAL. not just limiting it to a certain number of population and below.

and yes, traffic is a problem here. ;)

You make Zayun2's point for him. Kind of you.
well, a while ago, I did suggest a 'no-car' diet. Losing weight by not using your car. :p

I did say I was presenting both pro's and Con's. :p

NationStates Jolt Archive

The Automobile, Good or Bad?