Thanks 
No problem. BTW, this thread ended at post #248. You’re welcome.
I would have said it ended at post #2 or at the latest at post #12.
Then there’s no need for you to post any more. And certainly no need for you to tell me whether you agree with the following statement:
lol u suk lol
Are the Mini or SUV housed at Al Gore’s house?
brazil84, as one with no dog in this fight, let me give you an outside perspective, so to speak.
I have followed some threads that you participate in, and have seen you post well-written replies regarding issues you feel strongly about.
I like GD. I rarely post there, but enjoy reading well-reasoned debates. I even like to see good rebuttals to the “side” I take in the debate. I have reconsidered long held opinions after reading stuff here.
But dude, you come off as such a pedantic, nitpicking, context/word-twisting dipshit, whenever I see a thread you are posting in, I just say “not reading that crap.”
This does not bolster your side, it makes you look whiny and petulant.
Remember, on a message board such as this, the people who read your posts vastly outnumber the people who respond to them.
Good. But do you agree or disagree with the statement?
I don’t give a shit.
Sure, if you like.
As I said before, I always try to respond to the best reasonable argument of my opponents. Compare that to someone like QED who, in this thread is clearly trying to put an unreasonable spin on my words.
If I had claimed in another thread that “the sky is blue,” QED would probably be knocking me for not stating “the sky is generally blue on Earth during the daytime when viewed from the surface.”
Besides, details often matter. For example, I have basically been accused of splitting hairs by trying to draw a distinction between what I (now) refer to as CAGW and AGW. This may seem pedantic to you, but the disctinction is absolutely critical, as far as I can tell.
Here is another example of nitpicking:
Suppose that in another thread, I made the following claim:
Strictly speaking, that’s incorrect. For example, if you consumed a lethal dose of cyanide a few seconds before being shot (and killed) by a firing squad, then the lethal dose of cyanide did not in fact kill you.
By QED logic, the statement is promoting misinformation.
However, reasonable people understand the statement as follows:
So it’s nitpicking to claim that the statement promotes misinformation.
Your use of other examples is not persuasive. Rather, it looks as though you’re failing to address his point.
His point was (as I understand it) that sometimes, the sale of an individual item does not necessarily increase demand for that item. Not always, but sometimes. He gave an example: if you sell a house that’s already been lived in, then the relationship between a consumer’s getting rid of the item and a consumer’s gaining the item is exactly equal. Overall demand for the item remains the same when the merchant is also a consumer of the item. Selling an energy-inefficient house (or, if you like, purchasing one that’s already been lived in) does not increase demand)
Conversely, if you buy a house that’s energy efficient, but you purchase it from the previous resident, you do not increase demand for such houses, because your gain of the house corresponds exactly to the previous resident’s loss of the house.
Rather than talking about cyanide or SUVs, or digging up your high school economics textbook and using it for a gotcha moment, it’d behoove you to address this point that QED raised.
Daniel
Actually, I think that you need to read my post more carefully:
Here’s what I said in Post #240:
(my bold)
I don’t think you are making quite the same argument that QED was making, but there it is.
If the owner of a big house decides to move to a small house, one can arguably characterize it either way: As a decrease in demand for big houses, or as an increase in supply of big houses. But it would appear to be a distinction without a difference, as the net effect is the same.
I disagree, and one can see this by magnifying the scenario you describe. Let’s suppose that next week, a million Americans decide that it’s important to move from normal houses to energy efficient houses (to simplify things, let’s assume that it’s impossible to convert a normal house into an energy efficient house).
In that case, what can one expect to happen? Well, prices for energy efficient houses can be expected to go up. One can expect CNN’s financial correspondent to say something like “Demand for energy efficient houses has gone through the roof!!!”
An economics textbook might say something like this:
“As each additional homeowner decides to switch from a normal house to an energy efficient house, the aggregate demand curve will shift”
As I said, I don’t think you are raising quite the point that QED did, but I do think it’s worth responding to.
God, you people.
Christmas with the Brazil family…
Chile84: Here we go Brazil84, here is your turkey and gravy.
Brazil84: Wait just a moment, I never said I wanted any turkey.
Chile8: But, but, you came for christmas dinner! You said you liked turkey and gravy?
Brazil84: Thats just a lie, show me one example of where I said I like turkey.
Chile84: What? What are you on about?
Paraguay84: Hey come on Brazil84, take it easy.
Brazil84: No, Chile84 is a liar. Show me three QUOTES where I said I like turkey and I will apologise, but you wont find any, so you are all liars.
Paraguay84: What about that time you argued with the chef in McDonalds about whether turkey was better with gravy or without?
**Brazil84: ** Lol. Are you saying people cant eat gravy? Good gravy. Show me one QUOTE where I said anything about gravy, or else Chile84 is a liar.
Paraguay84: What? What the fuck?
Venezuela84: Brazil84, you really ARE a turkey.
Brazil84: Lol. If thats what you think then Chile84 is a liar.
**
Venezuela84:** What the hell?
Brazil84: Lol, you are talking, but I notice you havent produced any QUOTES!
Venezuela84: What? I’m not looking for quotes, I dont care about quotes, I just think you are a twat.
Brazil84: Lol. If you say anything that isnt a QUOTE then I win and Chile84 is a liar.
Venezuela84: But I dont care? I’m not searching for quotes?
Brazil84: Lol. Then Chile84 is a liar.
**
Ecuador84:** Christ on a stick Brazil84, are you still acting the prick?
Brazil84: Lol. I will not respond to you Ecuador84. You are on my banned list since you would not debate honestly about the chicken we had at Thanksgiving.
Ecuador84: But we had originally been talking about turkey?
Brazil84: Then Chile84 is a liar. Jeez you South Americans sure are dumb.
If the owner abandons the big house to the wolves, then yes, I agree. But if the owner sells it, then the net effect is zero: her decreased demand for a big house is exactly counterbalanced by the purchaser’s increased demand for a big house. No new houses are built or prevented from being built.
The other thing one can expect is that prices for normal houses will drop, and demand for them will therefore rise. Virtually every family who moves from their normal house to an energy efficient one will sell their normal house to someone else. Do you disagree?
As such, as long as the families aren’t buying NEW houses, there won’t be a net increase in the number of energy efficient houses. The normal house number will stay the same.
Daniel
Great analogy, bucketybuck.
brazil84 is a fuckwit.
Er, no. Don’t tell me what my logic means, since you clearly don’t understand it. You keep moving the goalposts and coming up with new analogies which are not equivalent. Take this latest one, for instance. Clearly, if someone ingests a lethal dose of cyanide, then almost certainly that’s what he’s going to die from. Positing a possible death from some other cause immediately after ingestion is ridiculous. However, the case of an individual sale of an item, be it house or SUV, is not nearly so clear cut. Now, I don’t know if the odds of an increase vs. a decrease are exactly 50-50, but I’ll wager it’s close enough to make the situation inherently unpredictable. That’s why it’s not unreasonable or inconsistent to say your statment about demand increasing is false, but at the same time, your putative statement about cyanide poisoning is not.
Now, if I were going to nitpick your poisoning statement, it wouldn’t be because the reason you wrongly put forth, but because there is no such thing as a lethal dose. There is only an LD-50, that dosage which will result in death for 50% of subjects. Of course, some ridiculous amount will result in death 100% of the time, but we have no way of pinning down that precise number.
One further point. If I’m being particularly nitpicky regarding your statement on demand increase, it’s because you kept petulantly throwing down the gauntlet and demaning QUOTES and proof and being an overall baby about the whole thing, so I was determined to find something. Anything. And I did. If I had been participating in the Gore thread, however, in the absence of any temper tantrums on your part, I wouldn’t have given your post a second thought.
You are incorrect, because the buyer’s demand need not change at all for him to go through with the transaction. All that’s necessary is that Al Gore cut his price enough. And that’s the whole point: All things being equal, if demand for large house drops (or their supply increases), one can expect the price to go down.
Not at all, but what will happen is that people selling their normal houses will have to take less money than they otherwise would have received. People selling energy efficient houses will be able to ask for more money than they otherwise would have received.
Sure, but there is overlap between the markets for new and used houses. What do you think developers will do when they see prices go up for energy efficient houses and down for normal houses?
Obviously, since they are trying to make money, they will build (relatively) more energy efficient houses.
:shrug: Either way, the point is that you should interpret people’s statements in a reasonable way.
Granted, cyanide poisoning is an extreme example, but the point stands.
If I say “cigarette smoking causes lung cancer,” reasonable people understand that I mean “regular cigarette smoking signfiicantly increases the risk of lung cancer for most people.”
If I say “the sky is blue,” reasonable people understand that I mean “Earth’s sky is normally blue if viewed during daylight hours from the surface.”
And if I say “each additional buyer causes demand to increase,” reasonable people understand that “generally speaking and all things being equal” is included.
Look, when you opened a pit thread about Leander, I don’t think it was babyish. He repeatedly posted jabs about google and you eventually called him out on it. It’s a normal reaction. If you want to call it a “temper tantrum,” then fine.
What Exit has repeatedly accused me of spreading misinformation, being dishonest, or whatever he’s been saying. I choose not to ignore it. For now anyway.