aluminiumtrioxid

Moving the goal posts. What an intellectually dishonest position to take. You can't own up to the fact that you were wrong about what you said and I quote: "that even the mildest level of intellectual disability precludes a successful university application". But then again with your pride and ego, you could never admit you're wrong. That's a funny thing coming from the poster boy of being unable to read nine paragraphs of a medical definition that was right in front of his nose and then doubling down on the uninformed idiocy he was spouting, but hey, who am I to judge? If you're looking for an admission of having been wrong about the chances of people with intellectual disabilities to get into university, there you have it: I have been wrong. People with IDD can get into universities. Which, by the way, is a pretty cool thing, all in all, and I guess I owe you thanks for broadening my horizons with that new tidbit of information. So thank you.

Which is great but there's a difference between "intellectual disability as a catchall term for, well, intellectual disabilities" and "intellectual disability as a medical term which replaced 'mental retardation' (also called intellectual developmental disability or general learning disability), because let's face it 'mental retardation' is an awful term to use in this context" - and from the context of the discussion, it was pretty obvious I was using the term in the second sense. So... close but no cigar. Edit: moreover, while it's pretty cool that universities offer programs for people with intellectual disabilities, I'm pretty sure they're not the same programs those dastardly ess-jee-double-us attend, so there's that as well.

It's just becoming pretty painful to sit through most of these threads, where it seems like discussion has gotten especially repetitive and boneheaded lately. I especially get annoyed anytime people start doing those idiotic "gotcha"s people have been posting lately every time they reply and "prove" the other person wrong. Gettin' old. Well I'm sure this makes me a massive hypocrite considering I haven't done much to improve the atmosphere of the discussion around here, but... opting out doesn't really help. I mean, ideally, moderation would set standards of behavior that are conducive to a constructive exchange of ideas and clamp down hard on pointlessly antagonistic bull**** (which, again, I'm sure would get me banned in, like, two weeks but still) - but given that they apparently don't consider setting up such rules a priority, I think it falls upon the participants to combat that kind of crap. Which I'm not entirely sure how to do - I guess politely phrased, informative and topic-relevant posts in great enough numbers to drown out the noise would do the trick?

Wow. How's that hole your digging for yourself? Just when I thought you couldn't get any deeper, you do. So how's that reductio ad absurdum working out for you m8?

I'm not feeling up to engaging in an argument about whether it constitutes the worst kind of sophistry to say "these people are, no hyperbole, literally mentally retarded EXCEPT not in the medical sense but what can only assume, using the Oxford dictionary, to regardless mean 'reduced in a developmental capacity' that is somehow still meaningfully different from the medical definition". (But it totally does.) Nevertheless, I found your accusations of dishonesty chuckle-worthy. "HOW DARE YOU SAY I PROCLAIMED SJWs TO BE MENTALLY RETARDED? IN TRUTH, I CALLED MOST, IF NOT ALL OF THEM MENTALLY RETARDED AND/OR INSANE!"

You know, this is kind of have I've been feeling about most of the "serious discussion" threads lately... Elaborate.

It's about as inflammatory - or controversial - as saying that having no limbs precludes one from winning an MMA championship. Of course, I'm always ready to learn new things, and as soon as you provide me with statistics regarding successful university applications by people with sub-75 IQ, I'll revise my opinion.

Oh that's right. Because the argument from SJWs and yourself is, We're not retarded because retarded people with even the mildest form can't get into University. So let me reiterate what happened: - Vals, being his usual Vals self, grandly proclaims SJWs to be mentally retarded. This would normally be parsed as obvious hyperbole (because duh), but he also feels the need to add "this is absolutely the correct term to use", by which, one assumes, he refers to the actual medical definition of the term. - I gently point out that hammering on how a very specific medical definition is "absolutely the correct term to use" when describing one's political opponents just calls attention to the fact that it really, really isn't. - For some reason, people read the detailed medical definition I helpfully provided, and conclude that "yupp, this description of people who have trouble with basic self-care and mastering skills normally taught in elementary school sounds like something that would totally apply to everybody whose political opinions I sufficiently dislike". At this point, there's only a limited number of conclusions that can be reached: a/ The people who hold the opinion outlined above are literally delusional, not only believing that everyone who disagrees with their politics happens to be suffering from a condition that only affects 2.5-3% of the total population, but also thinking that despite this significant disadvantage, they somehow still manage to influence public policy and the media. b/ Alternatively, they are incapable of parsing about 9 paragraphs of very clearly written text (ie. the definition provided). c/ Lastly but not least likely, they're so caught up in their circlejerk that not only are they insisting that statements which would be a-okay (if needlessly inflammatory) as a rhetorical device are literal truth, they're actually doubling down on their bull**** when someone has the temerity to point out that they are wrong, wrong, wrong. I'll let the reader decide which of these is more ridiculous.

Actually, FR was never meant to be particularly tongue-in-cheek, and I think exploration of what (semi-)easily available sex-change magic means for how the inhabitants of the world perceive gender isn't fundamentally at odds with the tone of the setting (therefore comparisons to "startroopers" on Middle Earth or Spartan soldiers on a space station feel uncalled for). Of course, something more subtle and nuanced than "I slapped a girdle of masculinity/femininity on and feel awesome! Yay for cursed items!" would be better than what we got.

It's probably safe to say that even the mildest level of intellectual disability precludes a successful university application. 1. What's 85% of? It's right there in the quote. Y'know, if "ability to parse written text that is right in front of you" is an academic skill below the 6th grade level, I may actually have some bad news for you... In any case, I took the liberty of bolding it for your convenience. Using the numbers given in the source link and the wonders of simple arithmetics, we can easily determine that it covers 0,9-1.1 million people in the US. Symptoms: And yet you didn't answer the second part which is you're suggesting retarded people, even at the mildest level, can't get into University? In your own words, Y'know, if "ability to parse written text that is right in front of you" is an academic skill below the 6th grade level, I may actually have some bad news for you... Game. Over. I don't think there's anything ill-conceived about asking people to not call those who disagree with their political opinions developmentally challenged.

It's probably safe to say that even the mildest level of intellectual disability precludes a successful university application. 1. What's 85% of? It's right there in the quote. Y'know, if "ability to parse written text that is right in front of you" is an academic skill below the 6th grade level, I may actually have some bad news for you... In any case, I took the liberty of bolding it for your convenience. Using the numbers given in the source link and the wonders of simple arithmetics, we can easily determine that it covers 0,9-1.1 million people in the US. Symptoms:

Sure, if you have no idea what the term means. Definition Mental retardation is a developmental disability that first appears in children under the age of 18. It is defined as an intellectual functioning level (as measured by standard tests for intelligence quotient) that is well below average and significant limitations in daily living skills (adaptive functioning). I think he's right. The average is just really low now. Sure, if you have no idea what the term means. That definition fits SJWs to a t. Thanks for linking that definition because now we have a standard to measure SJWs by. In future, professionals should be able to address the root cause at an early age before the retardation sets in. "Hur hur people who disagree with my political opinions are developmentally challenged" would be a significantly less ass-backwards argument if either of you were capable of exhibiting even the most rudimentary reading comprehension skills. It's probably safe to say that even the mildest level of intellectual disability precludes a successful university application.

Sure, if you have no idea what the term means.

I haven't played SoD yet, is the transexual NPC in question one of the established NPC's from BG1 and BG2? Or a wholly new character? It's a new smile painted on Mona Lisa's face. It's Han Solo not firing first. It's a poorly written character, and an insult to transsexuals. It's Amber Scott's arrogant cackle. In other words: it's an optional NPC with two lines of optional dialogue.

That's not how it works, Bruce. Did Churchill's policies result in the death and suffering of millions? Yes, they did, and therefore the comparison has legs. You can't just say "well they were brown people and history books don't mention it so it doesn't count and anyways the good outweighs the bad".

I'm not entirely convinced those two capabilities can be meaningfully differentiated when one tries to assess the overall quality of a leader.

Weirdest boner material right there.

Finally a thread where bringing up my disturbing clone sex fantasies is entirely relevant to the subject at hand!

Please explain how guns make you safer by naming one significant situation in American history in the last 100 or so years where someone (a private person rather than an officer) owning a gun was to everyone's benefit and helped defuse a dangerous situation. The only situations I can think of involve a home owner shooting an intruder who did or did not have a weapon, and I believe I recall one news story about a mass shooter being shot first. This is dwarfed by all the accidental shootings, the cases similar the Trayvond Martin, mass shootings themselves, or even cases where a citizen ACKNOWLEDGED owning a firearm but a scared as **** cop shot them dead anyways with the attitude of "ask questions later." Uh.... I personally have witnessed at least two such events in my life off the top of my head, and have been told of a few by friends who have experienced such events. Such things really are not all that rare. The plural of anecdote isn't data. If you need 'data' to tell you that it is not uncommon for people to fart, engage in buttsex, be delusional, cut their toenails, eat their toenails, spout profanity, pray to Jobu, poop colors other than brown, etc., as well as about exactly how often they do it, even if you do none of these things and oodles of others for which accurate data can never be obtained, you live a truly sheltered life. My point: --> x --> Your head: O

Yeah, she... kinda does, doesn't she. I was expecting something more radical.

Nawp.

Please explain how guns make you safer by naming one significant situation in American history in the last 100 or so years where someone (a private person rather than an officer) owning a gun was to everyone's benefit and helped defuse a dangerous situation. The only situations I can think of involve a home owner shooting an intruder who did or did not have a weapon, and I believe I recall one news story about a mass shooter being shot first. This is dwarfed by all the accidental shootings, the cases similar the Trayvond Martin, mass shootings themselves, or even cases where a citizen ACKNOWLEDGED owning a firearm but a scared as **** cop shot them dead anyways with the attitude of "ask questions later." Uh.... I personally have witnessed at least two such events in my life off the top of my head, and have been told of a few by friends who have experienced such events. Such things really are not all that rare. The plural of anecdote isn't data.

Actually, yes, it is unusual - according to the NCVS, the intended victim pulling a gun on their assailant only happens in 0,9% of violent and 0,2% of property crimes, and it must be even more rare for this to have the intended effect (sadly, I have no numbers on that though). While it might be unusual, it doesn't really matter for the sake of the arguments at hand. Also, the NCVS has a number of fundamental problems with the methodology in which it's conducted, not the least of which is that it's generally only looking at data that law enforcement is ever told about, which is certainly not representative of reality. Believe it or not, there no small number of people out there who do not call the police when violence or threat of it occurs. In fact, I'd say it's probably safe to say that majority of the violence and especially the majority of the threat of violence that ever occurs in the U.S., aside from the kind that's very hard to hide (such as murder) is never reported to the government. The problem is that even if we assume severe underreporting, the numbers still remain tiny. Let's say there are twice as many cases where people scare criminals away than reported - now we're up to 1.8% of violent crimes and 0.4% (less than half percent!) of property crimes. Five times as many? 4.5% and 1%, respectively. Ten times as many? 9% and 2%. Given that the US has more guns than people (112.6 civilian-owned guns per 100 residents), these numbers are... less than encouraging. What other reasons could there be then? Should have a good reason to say someone shouldn't own something in a society. I'd imagine he was referring to the high rate of regular gun violence, accidents, and suicides. Much like terrorist attacks, your chances of being involved in a mass shooting are extremely low, but they get the bulk of the attention. Well yes, as I mentioned earlier, the average US resident is more than twice as likely to get killed in a firearm-related accident than a criminal is to die to an armed victim. Add to that the almost 40 thousand stolen firearms per year (which are overwhelmingly likely to end up in the hands of criminals, I'd wager), and, well, the ideas about a well-armed society being safer start to evaporate.

Actually, yes, it is unusual - according to the NCVS, the intended victim pulling a gun on their assailant only happens in 0,9% of violent and 0,2% of property crimes, and it must be even more rare for this to have the intended effect (sadly, I have no numbers on that though).

Problem is that while guns most certainly won't protect you from your own government, they're also pretty damn unlikely to protect you from criminals either. According to the Bureau of Justice's National Crime Victimization Surveys between 2012-2014, only 0.9% of intended victims of violent crimes and 0.2% of intended victims of property crimes even responded with threatening or attacking with a firearm (no stats about the effectiveness of such tactics as far as I can see). Moreover: over a five year period between 2009-2013, only 1114 cases of justified homicide (committed in self-defense with a firearm) were observed, according to FBI statistics. That averages out to about 220 per year. On the other hand, there were 548 cases of fatal unintentional shootings in 2012 - you're more than twice as likely to get killed in an accident than you are to kill a criminal threatening you! It's also worth noting that tens of thousands of firearms (230k plus change over six years - somewhat less than 40k per annum) are reported stolen each year - contrast that statistic with the tiny number of justified homicides, or even the incidence of firearm use or threats thereof during crimes, violent or otherwise (about 260k over three years - let's go with somewhat less than 90k per annum)! Having lots of firearms lying around does not make people safer, quite the opposite. That is a valid point. It may indeed be harder to implement such a change than the benefits would justify. Which is a fine reason in itself to be against gun control! There is no need for delusions about how "guns are the only thing protecting us from our government!" and "having guns makes us safer!".