As Neil Degrasse Tyson notes, the life we do know is primarily made of, in order of proportions - hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, other. Other than helium, the order matches exactly the proportions of "normal" matter in the universe. It's not a stretch to look for life made up of the most common elements in the universe.

Complete bollocks. That's how libertarians like to demonize liberals, but that's not the truth of the matter. Most liberals aren't happy with common core - I certainly found it ridiculous.

The main issue libertarians make a big deal of, as I say before, is having to pay taxes at all, at any level. You can look through all the comments on this article, and you'll find a dozen libertarians saying taxation is theft, with no distinction between federal taxes or state taxes.

Stop trying to claim principles for yourself that are not exclusive to you.

The majority comments from libertarians on all issues is "tax is theft" - indicating they don't want to pay for public education.

So do us "liberals". The difference between libertarians and liberals is libertarians don't want to pay for public schools and want them to compete for survival. We can have competition, but libertarians want to go the extra step of introducing some form of social darwinism - that for whatever reason some kids can't go to a better school, tough luck to them as though their situation is entirely in their control and therefore their own fault.

Liberals also want an improved education with room to experiment with ways of teaching. That libertarians try to claim ownership of that desire is ridiculous.

The main advantage of the origami wheel is five-fold.

What could possibly go "booonnnggggg"?

No, I'm not saying that. Try reading comprehension and maybe realize that my point was that not everything can efficiently be paid for by individual user fees.

Libertarianism IS an extreme ideal.

Here's what libertarians don't get: Just because your ideology has "liberty" in the name, does not make it the exclusive owner of the concept. Guess what? Unlike what the US right wing media try to tell you, people who are liberal ALSO want liberty and as much freedom as is SUSTAINABLE.

The impractical part is precisely that part about paying for society wide things based on individual free will. Sorry, but free will is overrated. Some things, like education and human rights are too important to be left up to free will. Children have no option but to go to school, and the South has no option but to accept integration.

Doesn't make it libertarian. Fact.

Having a choice doesn't make something libertarian. Fact.

Libertarianism having choice does not mean anything else with choice is automatically libertarian. Fact.

Trying to say Sweden's system is libertarian simply because it has choice is like trying to say

http://www.economist.com/news/...

"The system, introduced 20 years ago, allows parents to choose between municipal schools and independent schools, all financed by tax money. The aim was to increase quality by competition, but it has also led to the best students flocking to the same schools."

So here you are, arguing that STATE FUNDED schools, both municipal AND independent, are libertarian because they have choice.

You have a poor grasp of logic, as evidenced by your apparent failure to understand the non-exclusivity of properties of things. Fact.

You tried to argue that the choice of state funded independent schools is a libertarian system. Fact. And you say *I* don't have a clue. Good job buddy. Showing everyone that libertarianism is a pipe dream that can only work with government backing. You don't really want government money to go away. You just don't want to pay for it but are happy to take the benefits of it.

Ironic that is the very thing you do in this sentence.

You mean libertarians have been asking for a socialist education system? Libertarians have been asking for improved government funding for universities?

You haven't even figured out what you're opposed to - the economic model or the education model. The Germans may have moved on from the Prussian education model, but the economic model for providing education is still pretty much state funding for the majority.

I for one will make sure never to call the Scandinavian and German countries' public funded institutions "libertarian", for one. Now THAT is embarassing.

Gotta love libertarian logically fallacious reasoning. Calling something a name constitutes an argument, apparently.

Can you decline to use the service? Can you decline to use the economic benefits from having interstate highways? Can you decline to benefit from having clean water and safe food? Can you decline to benefit economically from a nationally enforced currency and social stability from a commonly applied law?

Actually, yes you can. You decline to use the service by leaving society. Don't like it? Tough. You can actually leave, and you won't pay taxes. So by your very own definition, they are just as much fees as any other fee.

Quality of life is not an entitlement and is only possible through joint investment from every member of society.

Circular reasoning. By whose rules do you say that is the only possible definition of fair? Only if you buy into libertarianism do I accept those rules. I don't, so I don't.

Furthermore, what constitutes a "consensual transaction"? Under contract law, consent does not exist if made under duress. Someone who accepts a job way below minimum living standards because they are pressed to do so is under duress, yet that is what libertarians like you like to take advantage of. Or do you mean to restrict consent to the consent of the employer, and not the employee? Only consent matters for the poor put-upon employer?

A non-sequitur if there ever was one, and also a tautology because, again, you'd need to assume libertarianism to accept your conclusion. Why do Americans continually ignore the examples of Scandinavian and German public education, as though other people have not already figured out how to make schools valuable without introducing social darwinist forces into education?

You know the models of other countries are ALSO competition in principle, and your ilk's ideological and puritanical approach has failed compared to the competition. Like I said, your ilk's systems are self-defeating.

Which is what we call TAXES. That's why the GP is right to call it a fantasy. It is a fantasy to think individual user fees would be an efficient way of paying for widely used necessities.

Libertarians that oppose the notion of a fair minimum wage is using slavery.

And intelligent and rationality requires education on mass, which libertarians also don't want to pay for, making libertarianism a self-defeating system.

I focus on Australia because that's where I live. I don't care what other countries are doing. I care about what MY country is doing. Maybe you like to live according to standards set by other people, but I'd prefer living to the standards we set ourselves.

The Australian standard is the "Aussie battler". Yet one little fight and people like you run away like pansies. If you can't live up to your own standards, you are nothing. Stop pretending you have it tough when you really don't.

Aussies have this imagined persona of the "Aussie battler".

I guess that is until it comes to do any real battling, like reducing carbon emissions and settling refugees.

Then you have data back on computers. They haven't actually solved anything.

With computers, you can store vast amounts of data and run a lot of analysis on it. With paper, not so much. Good for the privacy conscious citizen.