From: Randy Smith (randysmith101@hotmail.com)
Date: Wed Oct 17 2001 - 23:14:10 MDT
>From: "Robert J. Bradbury" <bradbury@aeiveos.com>
>Reply-To: extropians@extropy.org
>To: Extropy List <extropians@extropy.com>
>Subject: Re: the waves of immigration that now plague this nation
>Date: Wed, 17 Oct 2001 17:51:16 -0700 (PDT)
>
>
>Ahemmm! I think I will speak to this question.
>
>I believe that I am a 12th generation American citizen (those on
>the list who can trump that (native Americans excepted) please
>feel free to do so). Rafal, would I believe, be considered a
>0th generation American. Yet I find myself siding more with
>Rafal than with Randy.
>
This issue has NOTHING to do with genealogy! It has to do with long term
future of this country, and the short term future of our wallets.
As for myself, I have American ancestors going back to ~ 12000 BP.
And, as someone else pointed out, West European genes have been found in
very very old Americans, and they probably were here in America around 20000
BP.
>The "Extropian Game" is *NOT* "horde the wealth". The Extropian
>Game is to spin the wheel and promote complexification.
The Extropy game is *supposed* to be about keeping our precious brain matter
from the ravages of Entropy....
>Randy's
>points are ill-suited for the Extropian list unless he makes a
>clear and falsifiable arugment that the admission of "educated"
>immigrants over "uneducated" immigrants will clearly promote
>a greater rate of complexification.
When you cross the street and see a bus bearing down on you, do you postpone
running until an "clear and falsifiable argument" is presented that the bus
will run you down unless you hustle your butt to the sidewalk?
>
>Sure, there are arguments that admitting half-a-billion people
>with less than a high-school education is likely to reduce the
>USA to chaos and bankrupt us.
Yeah. And just a wee tad of common sense points you in that direction, too.
However, there are a number of excellent studies done on the matter of
immigration, including by the GAO. They are on the Net, but unsurprisingly,
they are politically incorrect, and little talked about.
And there are arguments that
>excluding people like Rafal (no offence Rafal) could be beneficial
>because that would presumably make physicians scarcer, driving
>up their salaries that would be invested in mutual funds that
>would promote capital formation in the economy. Lord knows,
>those waves of uneducated, illiterate masses would be incapable
>of such sophisticated actions that promote capitalism and
>complexification. Thus we end up in Randy's position that
>allowing the immigration of people like Rafal but denying
>the immigration of people with very low skill levels is
>desirable.
>
>NOT!
>
>Perhaps those uneducated illiterate masses free up enough time
>of the educated that they are able to devote more time to the
>optimization of their investment portfolios and that serves to
>increase complexification.
>
Maybe they defecate potpourri and piss rosewater, too. That sure could
freshen up a room! Why don't you investigate? :-)
>(No slights intended -- from each according to his or her means to
>each according to his or hero skills and desires).
>
>Do we measure ourselves by how much we have or by how much
>we have contributed?!? This is a fine line in the Extropian Game.
>
>First there is nobody citing peer-reviewed economic studies
>that in any way justify their positions.
Borjas, the Harvard economist--there ya go.
You are contributing
>to the *NOISE* and not to the *DATA*! I'm in the Anders camp
>here -- YOUR OPINIONS COUNT FOR LITTLE MORE THAN NOTHING unless
>you can link them back to scientific data -- *THAT* is what
>extropianism is all about. (I'm willing to listen to speculative
>hypothesis but the Subject line (ARE YOU LISTENING PEOPLE?)
>should read:
> SPECULATIVE HYPOTHESIS: US should only allow educated immigation
>
>DATA (good) EVIDENCE (good) OPINION (bad)! (unless you can back it up)
>
>Randy -- I *challenge* you -- how do you KNOW *they* are witches?
Sometimes the problem is so complex that obtaining complete information is
impractical. IN that case, no action is the best path. No action == no
immigration. But however, there is evidence---against immigration. Just
search the Net, the studies are out there....So then you may say that there
are studies FOR immigration. I am sure there are. And I know that there is
plenty of money to finance such studies. So you have some for and some
against. And...the American are generally against current levels of
immigration. Hey, that might be a tiny factor, too...
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