Lurker > adjl

NightShift posted...

also while we are at it, lets remove warning labels from everything also.

That's generally an awful idea. Deaths from allergies alone would skyrocket.
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benbeverfaqs posted...

Except cards you print yourself are not tournament legal. They're not valuable, tradable or sellable

Which is really kind of silly. Obviously they don't have any resale value (unless you make such a close facsimile that it can pass for legitimate, but then that is definitely piracy), but for the game-specific purpose of dictating what mechanics should be engaged and how players should respond to them, there's no real reason not to treat them as legitimate, provided they do match the official card's text in all meaningful aspects. Policing that gets hard, but really, saying self-printed cards aren't tournament legal is just a way for the company behind it to keep people buying their stuff.

benbeverfaqs posted...

and it's copyright infringement ;)

I'm not actually entirely sure about that. Images of most cards are officially available publicly for no cost (looking specifically at MtG, not entirely sure about others). Nothing is stopping me from printing one out if I want to, and nothing is stopping me from printing it onto card stock. Going so far as to make counterfeit cards and selling them would definitely be no bueno, because the art is copyrighted, but printing off a copy for personal use seems to be fair game, as far as I can tell.

Furthermore, even if it weren't freely available like that, you don't need the art to have a functional card. Gameplay-wise, all the card has to do is tell you how much damage your opponent takes (or whatever other mechanic happens), and that can be done without infringing copyright. You might have to alter the wording slightly to steer clear of an exact copy, but I don't think they can enforce copyright on the basic concept of what a given card does. Plus, again, if it's just for personal use, it's not likely to become an issue.

benbeverfaqs posted...

Some people open trading cards with the express purpose of making money, or profiting. There's a whole business of selling singles of popular TCG's, complete with shady practices like weighing booster packs.

Oh, I know. There's a huge secondary market. I'm just saying that the only value the cards themselves really have is for collecting purposes, which is defined by the consumer and/or the secondary market and therefore the company can't be held accountable for presenting an opportunity to gamble. In the company's eyes (at least legally), every card is equally valuable, and people are just buying these packs because they feel like it.
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Veedrock- posted...

I disagree that it's gambling. That's all I'm gonna say.

As has been covered, it doesn't actually matter whether or not it's technically gambling. Gambling is regulated not simply because it's gambling, but because of the psychological manipulation involved in it that has a very high chance of resulting in addiction. The regulations exist to protect vulnerable people that are predisposed toward addiction from companies that would love to addict them to giving up their money. Those same principles are at play with loot boxes, meaning the same potential for addiction is there, meaning the same protections should exist for consumers.
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jkdarlow posted...

They're nothing special.

They really aren't. They're alright chocolate by grocery store candy standards, but there really isn't much of it. Most of their value comes from the novelty of the toy, which is pretty mediocre itself.
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darkknight109 posted...

Does giving them bags of money really qualify as engineering their deaths, though?

Probably not, which makes the question much more complicated. If he were to, say, fund organized crime, he could more reliably guarantee that the money would be used for nefarious deeds, but that would also eliminate any sort of moral high ground he might be feeling from it.
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Blightzkrieg posted...

where restrictions on this stuff are stricter (due to it being more mainstream)

That's also because most forms of gambling are outright illegal in Japan. Those restrictions are probably necessary to keep them from qualifying.
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It's called "Black Friday" because it's when many stores end up in the black for the year. I don't know that Black Friday itself would account for half of their sales, but it actually wouldn't surprise me. Black Friday is massive.
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Then maybe they're already above board. I guess we'll see when the dust settles.
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papercup posted...

Lootboxes are no different than trading cards, mystery toy boxes, crane machines, etc. I guess all of that should be banned as well?

You don't typically open trading cards or mystery toy boxes with the express purpose of making money, or profiting. Loot boxes are gambling because you are opening them specifically to get the good stuff, legendary skins in Overwatch, high level star cards in Battlefront, etc.

I'd say people typically open card packs and whatnot in the hopes of getting something good, or at least something they specifically desire. In the case of card games, some contents are given value by their usefulness in the game, though at least there you can hypothetically just print your own card with the same text and use that for the game.
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Yes and no. The thing with using such models in f2p games is that, as obviously predatory as they are, they're the game's only way of making money and staying afloat. The mobile market is a particularly cutthroat one, with a huge amount of crap to wade through if you're going to try and be successful, and that means you're going to get fun games that have to engage in some questionable monetization practices if they want to continue existing. Wanting those games to continue existing isn't a bad thing. Wanting to normalize predatory monetization practices is, but there are certainly ways to keep those practices around as needed without full-on saying "they're okay carry on unrestricted." I wouldn't be at all surprised if FE Heroes would be just fine if they slapped an age restriction on there and listed the odds of getting characters.
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I_Abibde posted...

Battlefront II is at the forefront of this controversy, but it makes me wonder what effect legislation like this might have on, say, gacha-style mobile games (e.g. Fire Emblem Heroes).

It stands to reason that they'll also see regulation, since the problems inherent in having such systems in AAA games are no less relevant on smaller scales, but they may fly under the radar for having fewer users. We'll see.
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Yellow posted...

I don't get the attitude of kids gambling in video games being a bad thing.

They learn early on, gambling is a system designed to exploit you and take your money.

Because kids don't have the maturity and experience needed to recognize how and when they're being exploited, nor the self-control or value judgement skills needed to recognize when they're spending too much. As prevalent as gambling addiction is among adults, you'd see a whole lot more of it among kids if gambling weren't age-restricted.
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Zeus posted...

But Happy Meals aren't really randomized in the slightest. For starters, they roll the items out on a weekly basis or thereabouts.

Some are, some aren't. I've seen the toys be changed on a weekly basis, and I've seen them selected randomly (not truly random, but close enough) from a pool. Requesting a specific toy does alleviate the issue, though, which is why Happy Meals aren't a strong contender. Kinder Surprises fit the model much more strongly, though given the huge pool of toys they pull from, the odds of getting any specific one you want are too slim for even kids to be inclined to try for a specific one.

As I've said, it's not particularly likely to see this backlash extend as far as it possibly could. It's just interesting to consider just how widespread these marketing principles are. This is purely an academic exercise, not me actually suggesting that Happy Meal toys be banned as gambling.

Zeus posted...

Teens and tweens =/= small children

But still minors, and therefore legally defined as not being okay to target with gambling.

Zeus posted...

The identity is guaranteed, but the catch is not. It's like knowing what prize you're trying for.

That is true. In that case, the random element in each attempted catch is absolutely a means of inflating the price of catching them, as well as inflating the apparent value of the purchase (spending, say, $5 for 10 pokeballs with a 20% chance to catch seems like a much better deal than spending $5 for 2 pokeballs with a 100% chance to catch). This sort of thing really is bloody everywhere.

Krazy_Kirby posted...

loot boxes still aren't gambling

Irrelevant. The formal definition doesn't change the fact that loot boxes exploit exactly the same psychological principles that gambling exploits, and which gambling is restricted in their exploitation of to prevent casinos from abusing addictive behaviours. Ergo, it's only logical to restrict them similarly.

Incidentally, this has been covered already. You should perhaps read arguments before attempting to weigh in on them.
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That just sounds like it's trying too hard to reinforce traditional gender roles, going so far as to call being a tomboy a distinct gender.
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Zeus posted...

And, for the most part, small children aren't the primary buyers for most CCGs

They are, however, for Happy Meals. CCG's generally aren't targeted at small children, but plenty of other randomized toys or trinkets are.

Zeus posted...

*maybe* for Pokemon but even during its heyday at sponsored gathering it was more a mix of teens and tweens than it was small children.

Having been 10 when the Pokemon craze first struck, Pokemon cards were definitely big among pretty young children. Less so at actual gatherings, since that demands a degree of competitiveness that younger children couldn't muster, but Pokemon cards were huge in my elementary school.

That, and teens and especially tweens are still minors.

Zeus posted...

So basically you're advocating against all games of chance as well, then? Because they use the same principle.

Yeah, kind of. Typically, those rewards aren't enough to incentivize excessive spending, but the games are still preying on the same reward circuits.

Zeus posted...

Technically, even arcade games -- the actual video games -- play upon those same tendencies, especially when it comes to the countdown for putting in more coins to continue.

They do indeed, though there the reward (continued gameplay) isn't randomized. Even if the arcade game in question consists purely of randomness (a die-rolling simulator as the most absurdly simplified example), playing the game is itself what you're paying for, and that's guaranteed (quarter-eating aside).

Zeus posted...

Also, technically speaking, wouldn't *any* mtx with the potential for a randomized payout count as gambling under that model?

Potentially. That's what makes this all so interesting as a thought experiment: The slope is not at all slippery enough for these to be realistic considerations, but it is much, much larger than it appears at first glance. In terms of regulations, though, it's the flip side that is more relevant: provided there's an element of skill involved, however minute, random payouts alone aren't sufficient to make something qualify as gambling. This is why mail-in sweepstakes have skill-testing questions. They're unambiguously just chance-based draws, but because you have to answer a simple math question, they're not regulated as gambling.

Zeus posted...

Therefore if you buy Pokeballs in Pokemon Go, that's technically gambling because the balls are used to randomly get "loot" in the form of Pokemon.

I wouldn't say that one applies because the random part is separate from the purchase of the pokeballs. When you use a pokeball and successfully catch a pokemon, the identity of that pokemon is guaranteed. It's not guaranteed that you'll ever encounter your desired pokemon, but it's walking to a given spawn location that rolls those dice, not buying the pokeball.
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papercup posted...

quigonzel posted...

Loot boxes aren't gambling.

When you gamble, you stand to lose something. However, when you purchase a loot box, you always get rewarded with something. It may not be what you wanted but it's something. If the loot box was empty, then there's a problem.

If you're going to classify the loot box system as gambling, the you might as well consider those retail "mystery mini figures" boxes as gambling, too. Which would be stupid to do so.

By that logic I could open a casino, and every time somebody "loses" I hand them a Mars bar, and say that my customers aren't gambling because they got something. No government or court in the world would buy that argument.

Or, for that matter, open a casino where all the slot machines use chips that are sold by some clearly unrelated guy out front who may or may not be buying said chips from the casino under the table. Because the casino has not assigned those chips any value, the slot machines are not actually gambling.
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quigonzel posted...

Loot boxes aren't gambling.

When you gamble, you stand to lose something. However, when you purchase a loot box, you always get rewarded with something. It may not be what you wanted but it's something. If the loot box was empty, then there's a problem.

https://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/3-poll-of-the-day/76017136/890857933

The salient point is that you stand to gain something, not lose something. You are paying money for a chance at a reward, which is a system that psychologically manipulates the consumer in exactly the same manner as formal gambling. Ergo, similar regulations are needed to restrict that psychological manipulation.
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shadowsword87 posted...

adjl posted...

Which I guess is a matter of not intentionally providing any reward in exchange for the booster pack cost, since it's up to the consumer to decide whether or not they've been rewarded by assigning their own value to the cards inside. It's flagrantly exploiting a logical loophole to dance around the issue, but I suppose it works.

Yup!
It's dumb, but it technically works.

That said, they do design a game that uses the cards, so claiming total ignorance seems silly, but I guess there's nothing stopping people from printing their own cards with the same text on them and using those in lieu of gambling for or buying the real thing. With that in mind, I suppose the only value the cards have really is the collecting aspect.
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shadowsword87 posted...

adjl posted...

And then there are CCG's, which honestly probably should be treated as gambling for the same reason

Because as long as the company can say they don't know what everyone else is doing with the cards (at least in a legal sense), they can claim that they "have no idea what people do with those cards after we sell them to people".

Which I guess is a matter of not intentionally providing any reward in exchange for the booster pack cost, since it's up to the consumer to decide whether or not they've been rewarded by assigning their own value to the cards inside. It's flagrantly exploiting a logical loophole to dance around the issue, but I suppose it works.

Zeus posted...

However, I should add that the glaring flaw with equating some of those other things with conventional gambling is many of the non-monetary rewards are non-exclusive in nature and people can buy/trade for certain items (not the same as in the case of lootboxes).

Secondary markets do throw a wrench into things, but they don't really change the fundamental nature of it. If anything, being able to sell the random contents brings the concept of sunk cost into the whole matter, since it creates at least the perceived possibility of being able to recoup losses. It's still offering a randomized reward for making a purchase, which is going to incentivize the purchase if the consumers (often small children) decide one of those possible rewards is something they want.

Again, I don't see it ever actually going that far, but it is surprisingly easy to logically equivocate them.

Zeus posted...

Additionally, in the case of CCGs, it's also *semi* randomized -- the vast majority will give you a certain amount of cards of a certain rarity in each pack.

That's still randomized. That randomization just happens within several subsets of cards, rather than being a full pack randomly selected from the full possible range of cards. Improving the odds makes things more likely, not less random.

Zeus posted...

Additionally, I might add, in some senses CCGs are far less a form of gambling than blind-boxed figures as well given that many sets use absurd-rarity ratios where even buying several larger containers doesn't guarantee you a full set. *That* kinda always annoys me, since it's not like the less wanted characters get the rarer slots.

Yep, that's another particularly egregious example.

Zeus posted...

At any rate, sunk cost is a much bigger issue in *monetary* gambling because people can eventually recoup their loss (or, more pragmatically, believe that they can). However, if you're against the notion of sunk cost as a psychological factor, you wouldn't stop at conventional gambling -- money for a chance at something -- but you'd also incorporate all games of chance in there. I know I've occasionally spent far too much failing to win something from some of them.

The concept of sunk cost is relevant, but not necessary for gambling addiction to develop (or at least for addictive tendencies to be exploited). In the classic Skinner Box example of a rat receiving a food pellet after a random number of lever presses, the rat isn't usually trying to recover the energy spent pressing the lever, it just wants the pellet and doesn't care that it could be doing something more interesting than pressing the lever. Sunk cost is used to rationalize and reinforce gambling addiction, but the addictive behaviour itself is based on the thrill of getting any sort of reward, and the desire to experience it again.
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I look down at them, but not on them.
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Zeus posted...

It's certainly gambling in some senses of the term (which generally and should be illegal), but there's no monetary returns involved.

The monetary returns are necessary for defining it as being gambling, but not actually relevant to the core problem. Gambling is regulated not because of the monetary returns, but because a variable ratio reward schedule (reward is given after an unpredictable number of ) is extremely powerful for conditioning a behavioural response. Responses are learned fast and are very resistant to extinction, which is where addiction comes into play. Casinos and many other forms of formalized gambling exploit this, and are summarily subject to restrictions to limit the possibility of addiction, opposing the fact that casinos would love to have full, unregulated freedom to addict as many people to giving them money as possible. Loot boxes also exploit this, but have no restrictions in place, so currently they are free to be as predatory as they want.

To that end, I'm okay with subjecting paid loot boxes to the same sort of restrictions gambling faces. There's no monetary return, but they use exactly the same principles of psychological manipulation to entice customers into spending money, which is what gambling's restrictions are meant to limit.

Now, that does present a bit of a slippery slope, in that randomized toys or prizes aren't exactly anything new in stuff marketed to kids. Happy Meals, Kinder Surprises, and the cereal box toys of old (don't see too many of them these days, but I'll include it anyway) could all be considered exploitative for the same reasons gambling is. In each case, the toy is secondary to the main purchase (the cheeseburger, mediocre chocolate egg, and cereal, respectively), which would probably function as a legal defense, but conceptually, the same marketing strategy is being used. And then there are CCG's, which honestly probably should be treated as gambling for the same reason. I don't necessarily see it being pushed this far, but there are definitely arguments to be made for doing so.
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Around -40 with windchill. Don't think colder than -30C without.

Mead posted...

darcandkharg31 posted...

Mead posted...

Absolute zero

In Fahrenheit or Celsius?

Both, at the same time

Not actually inaccurate. Absolute Zero may not be equal to 0 in either scale, but Absolute Zero is a concept, not a number. It is, at once, 0K, -273.15C, and some other random number that nobody cares about in Fahrenheit because nobody uses Fahrenheit in a sciencey context.

(Yes, I know Rankines are a thing)
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OmegaTomHank posted...

These dude do really will try to kill you if you leave

Smh

You can't have an autocratic regime if people aren't scared to leave.
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Jen0125 posted...

T0ffee posted...

Snuggletoof posted...

Jen0125 posted...

Snuggletoof posted...

So, essentially "no more lootboxes".

i mean does the name "lootbox" only mean it has to be random? it just means you're purchasing a "box" with "loot" in it.

Yes. Otherwise, your just purchasing the item itself.

Yup and that already has a name. Microtransactions.

a lootbox is still a microtransaction regardless of whether it's randomized or not

The randomization is what makes it a lootbox, though. Lootboxes are a subset of microtransaction characterized by having random contents. Without randomness, they aren't lootboxes.
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TheWorstPoster posted...

Democrats just love trying to destroy the gaming industry, for some reason.

Do explain: How does preventing an unambiguously predatory monetization scheme count as destroying the gaming industry?
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GanonsSpirit posted...

The "think of the children!" argument doesn't really work because children don't have credit/debit cards and can't buy lootboxes on thier own. Maybe parents should try being parents and not let their kids buy lootboxes.

They should, but realistically, it's not practical for parents to keep track of the details of the games their kids want to buy microtransactions in. It's a considerable hassle for somebody with no interest in the game to assess the value of a given in-game purchase, such that you definitely will get kids using their parents' cards to make ill-advised purchases. Could parents prevent that by being more involved? Of course. But that takes time and effort, and publishers can, will, and do find ways to inflate that time and effort to such a point that parents don't want to expend it and they only have to convince the kids it's a worthwhile gamble. And that means you've got a company promoting gambling (or at least financial expenditure based on the same psychological manipulation that's responsible for gambling's addictive qualities) among minors, which is no bueno.

AllstarSniper32 posted...

But there's plenty of adults out there with a gambling addiction.

And that's really the biggest issue here, as much as "think of the children!" is probably the best way to get the attention of regulatory bodies. Putting a gambling-based monetization system into the game preys on people who are vulnerable to gambling addiction. That means such systems should be subject to the same regulations as formal gambling to limit the harm that they can do to such people.
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WastelandCowboy posted...

OmegaTomHank posted...

shadowsword87 posted...

People will move away if there are alternatives that exist.
There aren't always alternatives.

And if there isnt, demand for less oppressive internet drives young upstart companies to expand itno these areas and take down the giants.

Its called capitalism.

Except that it's a big gamble with huge bills to start.

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/04/one-big-reason-we-lack-internet-competition-starting-an-isp-is-really-hard/

Comcast and ATT freak out and throw money at motions to ignore new internet providers or sue upstarts.

Pretty much. Breaking the telecom oligopoly is not at all a realistic option for people that are dissatisfied with the service provided by the existing options. There's a reason Google Fiber is the only noteworthy exception to that trend seen in the last decade or two, and that's because it's ****ing Google and they can throw a billion dollars into a high-risk venture if they feel like it and nobody can stop them. De-regulating ISP's is a really, really bad idea.
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Ogurisama posted...

Minty Maniacs got ****ing robbed.
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ImmortalityV posted...

racists that fail and dumb

Um.
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SunWuKung420 posted...

The closest grocery store didn't have pectin.

Weird. Pectin's not exactly a specialty item. *Shrug*
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Trialia posted...

defenestrate

I love this word.
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Well, you didn't use your vote to help any of Trump's real competitors. That's a far cry from directly supporting Trump, and the guy's ridiculously exaggerating the significance of your wasted vote, but technically you did contribute to that outcome.
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Mead posted...

Yeah I play games to have fun, so I get stuck long enough to not be enjoying my time I will look up the solution

You're problem solving either way

Pretty much. So long as using a guide doesn't take the fun out of the game for you, use it to your heart's content.
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Presumably you'll have to buy groceries as well, and I would imagine you're more likely to find pectin in a grocery store than IPA jelly.
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SunWuKung420 posted...

adjl posted...

Or just make some.

I should but I'm lazy. Maybe someday.

All that's really involved is boiling the mixture and sticking it in a jar. It'd be more work to go out and buy a new jar than to make it yourself.
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Or just make some. I've done champagne jelly with just champagne, sugar, and pectin. I imagine IPA jelly would be similar.
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Mead posted...

I like his paintings so yeah

This. No other metric really matters as a personal assessment. He made stuff that looked good, which makes him a good artist in my books.

More significantly than that, though, he put on a good show. It's fun to watch him paint, simply because he keeps up the entertaining patter and encouraging instructions the entire time.
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RebornKusabi posted...

adjl posted...

Rockies posted...

adjl posted...

Probably because you have a sub-60 hz TV.

The TV I played on when docked is 120 Hz. I don't think there are any TVs within the past ten years (at least) that are below 60

I've got nothing, then.

I do.

For PC games, as a former "Does it matter?" console-only gamer, PC games literally play WORSE under 60 frames a second. On consoles, developers use tricks like dynamic resolution, frame limiting and heavy motion blurring to make you not notice it.

And a controller is inherently less accurate than a mouse is, especially one with high DPI and optical tracking. On top of that, developers will also use aiming helpers like aim assist and auto-aim to help controllers match up somewhat with m/kb setups.

So all of that makes 30 fps on a console not a big deal. HOWEVER!!! On PC, when using a mouse, you can physically tell something is off. Not just performance-wise, but actually physically notice how much more sluggish and framey your input is on the game. For PC players out there, put the game on 30 and then on 60 and use a mouse and keyboard. You will feel it. Badly.

So yeah- playing Mario Odyssey on a controller with all of the developer tricks and trades, you won't notice it. But playing Overwatch, Star Wars: Battlefront 2, Destiny 2 or PubG on 30 and then on 60, you WILL notice it.

But that's not what he's referring to. He's referring to Mario Odyssey looking different when played than when watched on Youtube at 60 FPS, which is a phenomenon I've also noticed. I chalked it up to my TV's refresh rate, which I don't actually know off-hand, but if he's ruled that one out, then I lack ideas.
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Sahuagin posted...

the eyes aren't even in your spinal cord anyway

... *headdesk* That didn't even occur to me. Whoops.

Sahuagin posted...

but it's not so distinct that you could literally hook up the arms to the eyes.

You could, but the likelihood of doing so is indeed pretty slim. It also wouldn't be completely swapping an arm with the butt so much as it would be swapping one arm muscle with one butt muscle.

Sahuagin posted...

it's not like, oops, we wired your arms backwards, it's like, oops, you're having massive seizures and convulsions, your heart is not beating, and your lungs are not working.

Yes, it's likely going to be a matter of pretty much everything being mismatched, rather than individual somatic systems being swapped. I don't see it working, even if they do get the spinal cord to fuse.
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Rockies posted...

darcandkharg31 posted...

I blame game developers and publishers for making too many games and having sales, we need less sales and video games so we have don't have as many options to frilly frally between this game and that game.

I know you're being sarcastic, but at what point does it become a waste of money? I'd rather spend $60 on one game than on 12 random games on sale for $5, generally speaking. At least when I buy a full-price game, I know I plan to play it. If I'm buying the 12 games because of a sale there's little chance I'll play all 12. I don't think I'd need to play all 12; there is a certain amount of sunk cost that still makes that a better deal, but whatever that number is for me, I currently am not hitting it with my sale purchases.

In my case, it's usually a matter of getting 2-3 games I know I want and will play as part of a bundle (particularly a Humble one). It saves money over buying them individually, but it's not a matter of buying the whole bundle just because it's a good deal and without actively wanting any of the games.
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Broken_Zeus posted...

PRESIDENT Duterte is an elected leader, not a dictator.

Who said he was a dictator?
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Zeus posted...

MonsterZed posted...

Zeus posted...

Apparently graphics and gameplay don't matter much to a lot of people. Personally, I'm less a fan of the content than I am the style, although I don't like the style.

MonsterZed posted...

Dude it's Saturday night what're you doing posting on PotD instead of partying? lmfao

You clearly don't remember TC's gimmick.

Oh. That does sound familiar, come to think of it.

Or are you just saying that because you know you'll be mocked for being a youngling if you aren't familiar with such a well-known part of PotD lore?
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green dragon posted...

Gaming has only gotten better.

The games themselves? Debatable, but it's certainly not as bleak as many people with rose-tinted nostalgia glasses would have you believe, and there are plenty of awesome games coming out each year. The industry's practices? Oh hell no. That envelope full of **** gets pushed further and further with each new big release, and I long for the days when Horse Armour DLC was considered controversial.
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Zeus posted...

No, a dumb thing to say is claiming that a group that overwhelmingly benefits is being hurt.

If it's claiming that they're being hurt by something that they're overwhelmingly benefiting from? Sure, because that's just demonstrably false. A group that is generally benefiting can still be hurt by individual decisions, though. You don't get to kick a guy on welfare in the balls and then tell him it didn't actually hurt because he's got a free dinner. Similarly, pumping a community's water supply full of carcinogens doesn't became okay simply because they're on welfare.

Zeus posted...

While to some extent, it can be seen as adding straws to a camel -- just like anything else -- you're greatly overstating your case.

So you believe that the local environment is not going to see significant negative effects from oil drilling? No wilderness is going to be bulldozed to make roads? No habitats are going to be lost to clearcutting? No water is going to be polluted because there are no chemicals of any sort involved in extracting oil?

How is it possible to understand so little about such a simple concept?
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Sahuagin posted...

until we can properly heal spinal injuries,

We already can heal some spinal injuries. The problem with injuries is that they're highly variable in the level and type of damage. Presumably, this transplant will involve a clean cut and a constant supply of blood and nutrients to prevent necrosis, which makes a world of difference in terms of how viable the wound is to heal. It's still a long shot, but if he's got it working, more power to him.

What I have doubts about is whether or not the head's nerves will connect to the corresponding ones in the body. There's a very real chance that there will be mismatched nerves, such that the brain trying to move an arm will result in blinking, or things like that. Same with sensory nerves not connecting to the right places at all (which could result in things like a touch on the arm giving the sensation of being kicked in the balls). You can relearn these things to a certain extent, and given that the volunteers generally have debilitating musculoskeletal conditions that means they can't move much anyway, they won't have as much to relearn, but it might not be possible.
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Krazy_Kirby posted...

i was in middle school when i saw it

You think middle school kids can't be obnoxiously noisy in movie theatres? Heck, if anything, they're some of the worst offenders, given that they often don't have parents with them to keep them in line but they aren't mature enough to shut up autonomously.
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Red_Frog posted...

Mead posted...

...adults that saw Incredibles when they were kids should be able to see the new film without being disturbed by noisy children.

Lmao, well bless their little bleedin' hearts. Now they'll have the opportunity and privilege to experience intimate familiarity with what it was like when they were the noisy children disturbing me.

Eeyup. "True fans" or not, being disturbed while watching the movie would pretty much just be karma.
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Taking a freshman philosophy class, are we?
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