You don't just assume your car is going to run out of oil because you haven't checked the oil since the last time you started it -- you know that as long as you check it every 7,000 miles, or whatever the manual says, you do not have to worry about that. Why would a gun be different?

My van's transmission just died, the whole thing. It had barely 34,,000 miles on it. Just at the 30K mark, I had 30k service on it barely 6 months ago. Because the power train has 5 year/100k warranty, I was safe. They went in and discovered there was barely any transmission fluid left. I saw no leaks on the driveway either so I guess it somehow burned up. Every part except the housing had to be replace. Transmission fluid doesn't regularly do this and doesn't have be checked as much like oil.

Now, why would a gun be different?

Citation please.

Killing animals because some sick fuck thinks it's fun –not fine.

You're not helping your argument. It is fun. That's why people do it. We are primates and have it in our blood.

Treating it like it's unusual feeling or that the people who engage in it are outliers and freaks leads to misunderstanding the nature of it and away from the truth.

If you're not barefoot and hunting with hand-lapped flint point on a spear, you're cheating.

A spear?! Now you're cheating. You need to go back to the plains of Africa and run down your prey until they collapse from exhaustion. No fancy pointing sticks, sir!

Useful on the plains, but not in the forest.

So basically like a GPU or math co-processor.

Is it bribery or do companies donate more money to politicians that agree with their policies?

Why should companies and especially corporations be allowed to donate money? Only private citizens should have that right, and I dare say, those in or running for public office should be allowed to take from those they represent.

Run for Senate in Pennsylvania, the law should be that they accept only from PA citizens. Running to represent district 5 in NY? Please only accept from distric 5 residents. Otherwise we have Senators from Delaware representing Hollywood's interests and not his own constituents. Joe Biden, I'm looking at you.

TBH, I don't think we even play the best games out there routinely - at least for board games. Monopoly, for instance, is a really shitty game with everything in favor of the guy who lands on good properties and then drags on forever. But it's one of those board games nearly every family has in their closet.

Some extended warranties are money down the drain and some not.

Had one on my father's iPad which turned out to be useless. The front screen just fell apart one day (I was there) and made a huge abyss not from any impact (it has a protective casing) but just some type of internal stress. Apple absolutely refused to cover it, even though it's apparent it's not from an impact. Some people are aware that tempered glass products can just absolutely implode one day but manufacturing defects or just stresses - I had a glass sink once explode in my bathroom in the night sounding like a grenade exploded in the distance - except Apple employees. They offered a fix 4x the cost on ifixit. So for iPads/iPhones, Applecare never again, total ripoff. OTOH, I know certain models of Apple notebooks where the logic boards (motherboards) fail quite frequently and it costs half the computer new to replace, at least. (Though I just use a PC notebook, but less worrisome).

I also laughed at people who got extended warranties on early flatscreen thin LCDs (they were still square) since it turned out replacing them with something better years down the road was only marginally more expensive than the extended warranty.

What does it cost society?

Humans are inherently unsafe behind the wheel and I look forward to computers either aiding us or taking full control soon.

If I argued along those lines somewhere, let me know.

“Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value – zero.” (Voltaire, 1694-1778)

I agree completely. Tablets are a fad. The form factor is terrible and the functionality is lacking. I think that most people are going to continue using phones and laptops.

Baby Boomers who never really learned to use the computer. My Dad's eyes are too bad to see an iPhone and he learned computing on an iPad, it's perfect for him. He still can't use a laptop, but that's okay, he's not a power user. Browsing/email/skype, and a few apps.

I thought I would dislike a tablet, but I find them perfect for casual browsing and using on a treadmill to run netflix as an adhoc TV. In fact, I haven't watched TV on a television in months, would probably only buy 1 big one in the living room for the family in the future for movies (maybe, might even cut that down), and just have an tablet for viewing where convenient.

Really, I feel your comment is pre-iPad naysaying all over again.

Isn't there a way to promote them without mandating them?

My school had a lot of mandatory Shakespeare in 8-12th grades, 2+ plays a year and guess what? I always loved reading and yet absolutely detest and despise anything by him or any of the authors that was mandated as I associate it with a tedious chore and avoided anything by them ever since.

Idk if it's the case for everyone, but I always sought out what was interesting to me, it didn't have to be mandated. The trick isn't to ram it down the throat so the student has no choice but swallow but to provide a taste of it. You're never going to make students uninterested in science interested through brute force.

Science class should show some Carl Sagan's videos (and Brian Cox I find interesting too) to light up the imagination but another idea I think could be interesting is that science books, in between chapters, could print some short stories by these luminaries. Don't make it mandatory reading, but just have it there. A lot of people read to read, and having it right there in the text book could reach a lot of kids. If they like it, they will seek the author out on their own and branch out on their own.