Are we living in the Matrix?

[ozimoron]

Just now, JensenZ said:

Mega rich people donate more money to charity than any other people on earth. Just for starters look up Bill Gates and Warren Buffet.

 

How many charities did you donate to this year? Warren Buffet promised to give away all his money before he dies.

Plenty. They shouldn't have to. Charities should not even exist.

[JensenZ]

1 hour ago, thaibeachlovers said:

IMO the babies are just a result of the activity that men they enjoy. Do they really want all those kids?

Yes, they actually do want the children. The more they have, the more likely some will survive and be able to support them when they are old. So it's a win-win. They enjoy more AND get more children.

[JensenZ]

3 minutes ago, ozimoron said:

Plenty. They shouldn't have to. Charities should not even exist.

There's just no way you will praise a mega rich person for their huge donations to charity? The richer they get, the more they can donate.

 

They don't have to - they want to.

 

I have no idea what you mean by "charities should not even exist"?

[ozimoron]

Just now, JensenZ said:

There's just no way you will praise a mega rich person for their huge donations to charity? The richer they get, the more they can donate.

 

They don't have to - they want to.

 

I have no idea what you mean by "charities should not even exist"?

Yeah, nah it;'s just a tax deduction for them. The amount of tax they don't pay blows any altruism they have out of the water.

[Hummin]

2 minutes ago, JensenZ said:

Yes, they actually do want the children. The more they have, the more likely some will survive and be able to support them when they are old. So it's a win-win. They enjoy more AND get more children.

Good public healthcare, prevention, valid information and education contribute to less children on this planet. 

[Hummin]

3 minutes ago, JensenZ said:

There's just no way you will praise a mega rich person for their huge donations to charity? The richer they get, the more they can donate.

 

They don't have to - they want to.

 

I have no idea what you mean by "charities should not even exist"?

Charity provides new supply lines and markeds for the rich. If they want to grow more, then charity programs provides bilateral deals. 

[Kwasaki]

1 hour ago, Lacessit said:

I agree. 50 - 100 years.

By 2050, modelling of the Tibetan glaciers predicts water that supplies the Ganges, Brahmaputra and Mekong rivers will be halved in volume, and there are over 1 billion people who depend on those rivers.

Unless Govt's do something as usual nothings done until things get to a late stage. 

[Kwasaki]

1 hour ago, thaibeachlovers said:

IMO the babies are just a result of the activity that men they enjoy. Do they really want all those kids?

I wanted all my kids and still have them from my 4 wives. 

[Orinoco]

1 hour ago, Phnom Penh Trader said:

So back on topic all this utter nonsense about population growth and global warming is utterly irrelevant,as none of it is real and all it needs is a programming change and reboot of the Matrix and it all disappears overnight!

Maybe they will change things today, just for you. 

 

.

 

[Phnom Penh Trader]

3 minutes ago, Orinoco said:

Maybe they will change things today, just for you. 

 

.

 

Yes if they could do this to you it would be perfect?

[JensenZ]

45 minutes ago, ozimoron said:

Yeah, nah it;'s just a tax deduction for them. The amount of tax they don't pay blows any altruism they have out of the water.

Waren Buffet has given away $48 billion to date and promised to give it all away when he dies. What does this have to do with tax deductions? If he can give away more due to tax deductions, that's a good thing.

[JensenZ]

Just now, Phnom Penh Trader said:

Because I don’t particularly like or see any reason to kowtow to Muskrat purely for financial reasons,you quite obviously consider yourself to be a cut above the rest so please enlighten us as to why that might be don’t keep us in the dark?

Please show me the comment I made that gave you the impression that I'm a "cut above". That's total garbage, again.

[GammaGlobulin]

3 hours ago, Walker88 said:

Lots of silliness here.

 

A guy with a set square at the pyramids? And he could tell with that simple instrument nobody could build to those tolerances today? Did an alien make his set square that can measure those tolerances so precisely?

 

53 years ago man went to the moon using computers with about as much ooomph as a $50 mobile phone and the quality control in spacecraft construction not much better than a Yugo..

 

Humans have long been resourceful.

 

The Romans constructed a long aqueduct to bring water to Nimes. The structure had to cross the Gard River. 2000 years ago they built a bridge to cross the Gard and carry the water. Since they had no electric pumps, gravity was their only 'power' to move the water along. The portion that crosses the Gard is several hundred meters long. The slope from one side to the other drops about 2 cm....just enough to keep the water flowing. Romans, not aliens, built that. Oh, and there is no mortar used in the construction. Roman masons cut the slabs so exact that one would be hard pressed to slip a razor blade  between 10-ton slabs....which are dozens of meters above ground.

 

As stated, humans have long been resourceful.

 

The Mayans built exacting structures and even figured out the length of a year to within an hour or so, as well as establishing the orbit of planets. You see, when there was no Netflix or World Cup or Twitter or Facebook, the more clever humans had time to sit and look at the sky....day in and day out---and note the changes from one night to the next.

 

That pyramid-like structures exist in many disparate places don't not imply aliens or cross fertilization; it merely says that such a structure is about as strong as then-technology could muster. Today, kids build houses of cards using a similar principle. No need for any aliens to teach kids how to do that, just as there was no need for aliens to teach humans how to pile rocks on top of each other.

 

The pyramids required a few bright engineers, plus tens of thousands of very cheap workers, i.e., slaves. The Indians used the same technology to build the Taj Mahal 4000 years later......they built ramps a kilometer long with a gentle slope, and then had humans and elephants pull heavy rocks up the slope to move rocks into position. (Having visited both the pyramids and Taj, one thing I know is that there is plenty of sand to build the slopes). The Indians also sourced ebony from Sri Lanka, dug deep cylindrical holes in the ground, filled them with water, dropped the ebony beams (very slow rotting wood) into the holes, then built the Taj on top, the ebony serving as a clever cushion in the event of an earthquake.

 

No aliens required.

 

One would think if aliens were going to make a few billion mile trip to Earth, they would teach humans how to make something like the new Steinway Building on Central park in NYC, rather than just pile some rocks on top of each other.

 

Even more astonishing than piles of rocks or ebony columns supporting a massive tomb, was what James Clerk Maxwell figured out 150 years ago...and without any assistance from aliens. Besides his equations regarding electromagnetism, do you know Maxwell---using only math---determined what made up the rings of Saturn?

 

Humans have long been resourceful.

Have you ever witnessed a Nobel laureate derive Maxwell's Equations on the blackboard, using nothing but chalk? 

 

I have. 

 

It was magnificent!!! 

 

But, why did he do it? 

 

Three reasons, maybe. 

 

a. He had drunk too much coffee before class. 

b. He loved Neutrinos too much. 

c. He thought that, by using up so much chalk, he might just be able to encourage at least one gifted student in the class to see the beauty of it all. 

 

Deriving Maxwell's Equations, from scratch, on the blackboard, requires much Japanese chalk, these days. 

 

Back in the day, before, Hagoromo Fulltouch Chalk, it was more difficult to write so many equations on the blackboard at an American university. 

 

 

 

[ozimoron]

3 minutes ago, JensenZ said:

Waren Buffet has given away $48 billion to date and promised to give it all away when he dies. What does this have to do with tax deductions? If he can give away more due to tax deductions, that's a good thing.

How much tax did he avoid during his life?

[Phnom Penh Trader]

Just now, JensenZ said:

Please show me the comment I made that gave you the impression that I'm a "cut above". That's total garbage, again.

You are the one that keeps talking about how none of understand Muskrat and it is nothing but envy,the man is an absolute car crash I wouldn’t want his life for all the tea in China.

Unfortunately you seem incapable of comprehending that and I cannot understand why,as I said before if money is your god then you are blinded to the really important things in life and I have nothing but sympathy for you?

[Phnom Penh Trader]

7 minutes ago, GammaGlobulin said:

Have you ever witnessed a Nobel laureate derive Maxwell's Equations on the blackboard, using nothing but chalk?

No but the next time I am suffering from insomnia I will give you a call!

 

Have you ever seen the sun come up over the valley in Sant Rafel de sa Creu,Ibiza in Privilege the world’s largest nightclub with Manumission running the show probably not?

 

It is horses for courses and that pretentious nonsense is for people that have no idea what living really is,that’s the saddest thing of all?

[GammaGlobulin]

"Plato said that the first thing to happen if someone broke out of the cave was that they would be blinded by all the light in the outside world: the real world." 

 

This, according to the linked article provided by the OP... 

 

BLINDED. 

 

 

Edited December 4, 2022 by GammaGlobulin

[JensenZ]

11 minutes ago, ozimoron said:

How much tax did he avoid during his life?

We can let Warren Buffet answer that:

 

"Buffett says that philanthropy can be a powerful tax shield, if donors want it to be. Buffett’s donations, he said yesterday, resulted in only 40 cents in tax savings per $1,000 given. The reason his tax bill is so low, he said, was because he earns relatively little in wages, amassing most of his wealth from his holdings of Berkshire Hathaway stock, which isn’t taxed until it’s sold."

 

He recently gave away $4 billion, so that would be $1.6 million in saved taxes. 

 

I hope that helps.

 

"Buffett says that he has given more than $41 billion to charity over the years. He announced $4.1 billion in donations yesterday. This comes weeks after a ProPublica exposé based on confidential I.R.S. data revealed how much the richest Americans paid in taxes. The article noted that Buffett paid $23.7 million in taxes from 2014 to 2018, a period when his wealth grew by an estimated $24 billion."

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/24/business/dealbook/buffett-philanthropy-taxes.html#:~:text=Buffett's donations%2C he said yesterday,t taxed until it's sold.

[ozimoron]

Just now, JensenZ said:

We can let Warren Buffet answer that:

 

"Buffett says that philanthropy can be a powerful tax shield, if donors want it to be. Buffett’s donations, he said yesterday, resulted in only 40 cents in tax savings per $1,000 given. The reason his tax bill is so low, he said, was because he earns relatively little in wages, amassing most of his wealth from his holdings of Berkshire Hathaway stock, which isn’t taxed until it’s sold."

 

He recently gave away $4 billion, so that would be $1.6 million in saved taxes. 

 

I hope that helps.

 

"Buffett says that he has given more than $41 billion to charity over the years. He announced $4.1 billion in donations yesterday. This comes weeks after a ProPublica exposé based on confidential I.R.S. data revealed how much the richest Americans paid in taxes. The article noted that Buffett paid $23.7 million in taxes from 2014 to 2018, a period when his wealth grew by an estimated $24 billion."

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/24/business/dealbook/buffett-philanthropy-taxes.html#:~:text=Buffett's donations%2C he said yesterday,t taxed until it's sold.

I doesn't help unless you can prove that 1.6 million is an equitable tax burden against 4 billion.

[GammaGlobulin]

20 minutes ago, Phnom Penh Trader said:

No but the next time I am suffering from insomnia I will give you a call!

 

Have you ever seen the sun come up over the valley in Sant Rafel de sa Creu,Ibiza in Privilege the world’s largest nightclub with Manumission running the show probably not?

 

It is horses for courses and that pretentious nonsense is for people that have no idea what living really is,that’s the saddest thing of all?

You are correct.

I agree with you...

 

It is living that is the saddest thing of all.

[toofarnorth]

PPT asked are ..........................do strange things happen just at the right time.

I think if we want something we have to go and look for it.  If we need something the world provides.

 

Many years ago , about 1963 as I was going to English classes at a nearby Tech. college then , one Sat. morning as in those days A sat. morning at work was par for the course , I ran for the train and saw I had minutes to spare by the station clock. I thought I must get a watch ( last one was broken ).

I could have sat in any compartment being a quiet Sat.   I got on the train and a watch was sitting on the arm rest , I nearly put my elbow on it.

Another time same year and going to the station on leaving the college at about 7pm it had been snowing . I had a couple of cigarettes and a couple of matches , they were damp and wouldn't light.

The train before had gone and light snow covered the platform , Walking along virgin snow I saw a black patch on the platform , I looked down and it was a Ronson lighter , not only that but it worked.

Coincidences but perfect timming.

[Phnom Penh Trader]

2 minutes ago, GammaGlobulin said:

"Plato said that the first thing to happen if someone broke out of the cave was that they would be blinded by all the light in the outside world: the real world." 

 

This, according to the linked article provided by the OP... 

 

BLINDED. 

You are just trying to impress people with what you have been assured by those still firmly plugged into the Matrix will achieve that,fortunately I unplugged myself 35 years ago so therefore remain suitably unimpressed thankfully?

[JensenZ]

28 minutes ago, Phnom Penh Trader said:

You are the one that keeps talking about how none of understand Muskrat and it is nothing but envy,the man is an absolute car crash I wouldn’t want his life for all the tea in China.

Unfortunately you seem incapable of comprehending that and I cannot understand why,as I said before if money is your god then you are blinded to the really important things in life and I have nothing but sympathy for you?

I asked you why you thought I considered myself a "cut above"? Instead of answering the question you keep regurgitating more nonesense about Musk. You can keep repeating that cr*p all day long - doesn't make it true.

[Phnom Penh Trader]

4 minutes ago, JensenZ said:

We can let Warren Buffet answer that:

 

"Buffett says that philanthropy can be a powerful tax shield, if donors want it to be. Buffett’s donations, he said yesterday, resulted in only 40 cents in tax savings per $1,000 given. The reason his tax bill is so low, he said, was because he earns relatively little in wages, amassing most of his wealth from his holdings of Berkshire Hathaway stock, which isn’t taxed until it’s sold."

 

He recently gave away $4 billion, so that would be $1.6 million in saved taxes. 

 

I hope that helps.

 

"Buffett says that he has given more than $41 billion to charity over the years. He announced $4.1 billion in donations yesterday. This comes weeks after a ProPublica exposé based on confidential I.R.S. data revealed how much the richest Americans paid in taxes. The article noted that Buffett paid $23.7 million in taxes from 2014 to 2018, a period when his wealth grew by an estimated $24 billion."

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/24/business/dealbook/buffett-philanthropy-taxes.html#:~:text=Buffett's donations%2C he said yesterday,t taxed until it's sold.

Is this the same Warren Buffett that admitted he paid less in taxes than his cleaning ladies?

 

Just shooting fish in a barrel here! ????

[ozimoron]

Just now, Phnom Penh Trader said:

Is this the same Warren Buffett that admitted he paid less in taxes than his cleaning ladies?

 

Just shooting fish in a barrel here! ????

Indeed, And when you realize that Buffet is probably the best of them it says a lot.

[Phnom Penh Trader]

2 minutes ago, JensenZ said:

I asked you why you thought I considered myself a "cut above"? Instead of answering the question you keep regurgitating more nonesense about Musk. You can keep repeating that cr*p all day long - doesn't make it true.

You keep telling us all how jealous and envious we are of mega rich people intimating that you belong in that bracket,what you are failing to understand is that being mega rich isn’t the end of all your problems it is the beginning?

[Hummin]

if we are living in a plot with each and one of us with a role controlled by matrix, then it is a quite interesting thought, or a try to escape the reality we have to deal with on daily basis. Your pick. 

[JensenZ]

3 minutes ago, ozimoron said:

I doesn't help unless you can prove that 1.6 million is an equitable tax burden against 4 billion.

I need to get his tax records to prove to you how much he saves on taxes? I don't care what you believe and it's not important. The important thing is that he gives a truck load of money to charties - more than any other mega rich person. If your theory was correct, then the richer people like Musk would be giving away twice as much as their tax burden would be twice as big. (in Musk's case).

 

 

[GammaGlobulin]

6 minutes ago, Phnom Penh Trader said:

You are just trying to impress people with what you have been assured by those still firmly plugged into the Matrix will achieve that,fortunately I unplugged myself 35 years ago so therefore remain suitably unimpressed thankfully?

OK.

But...

Springsteen is from Pennsylvania.

Not from the Bronx.

[ozimoron]

1 minute ago, JensenZ said:

I need to get his tax records to prove to you how much he saves on taxes? I don't care what you believe and it's not important. The important thing is that he gives a truck load of money to charties - more than any other mega rich person. If your theory was correct, then the richer people like Musk would be giving away twice as much as their tax burden would be twice as big. (in Musk's case).

 

 

My point is that whatever amount is given to charities by the mega rich it pales into insignificance compared to the tax they should pay.

Edited December 4, 2022 by ozimoron