voltage is potential energy? I thought it was always active, in other words kinetic.. o.o

Voltage is potential. It's not technically potential energy. It's a subtle difference. Electric potential, or voltage, is a change in electric potential energy per unit of electric charge. It's sort of how much a negative and a positive charge want to go together, if that makes sense. Electric potential energy is the amount of energy an object has due to it's charge and the charge of whatever is around it. More or less.

I love how we're talking about energy in a Politics thread. ;3

So if, let's say a bird, managed to make a nest right on top of a street power cord (a part of the cord where the wire wasnt very well isolated) while the power was out. The power suddenly came back on for a few seconds, went back off and electrocuted the bird as well as the nest. The bird dies. Would the nest's electricity die down over time, and still contain electric potential energy? Like, if you for what ever reason poked the nest a short amount of time after the bird's death, would you electrocute your hand? Also, the nest would probably contain more electric potential energy because it's sitting on a power cord, right?

Birds can rest on power cords without getting electrcuted, you have to be grounded (or earthed) to get a shock.

http://injuryprevention.bmj.com/content/10/2/122.full

In Canada between the years 1991-1996 there have been a grand total of 21 electricity related deaths among children. 5 of these were from lightning strikes, 2 of these were from low voltage sources (<1000 volts) and 14 of those were from high voltage sources (>1000). Considering American outlets have a voltage of 110 volts, I think it is safe to conclude that electric sockets are pretty safe. I think it is also safe to assume that these numbers aren't because all Canadian parents like to beat up their children at every possible occasion.

110? that's it? we have more than twice that =\

and cedric, the bird won't be electrocuted. the voltage, in some way, needs a 'reason' to move through objects. what yuggy said - the word 'ground' - is what we name the places where the potential energy is always zero. things in nature always want to lose their energy(in matter of speaking) and thus if any voltage is connected to earth(ground), it'll all go there, and disappear. this is why you have to touch the ground to be electrocuted - the voltage needs a reason to go through you - and in that, you give him way to get to the ground.

However, that's also why you don't see birds sitting with their feet on different wires, as then the voltage would go from one wire to the other through the bird, killing it instantly.

...or because the wires are quite far away from each other and the bird is very small? you know, I don't think birds know Electrostatics

lol, but in a hypothetical scenario!
Also, some birds are decently sized and can sit on multiple wires if they would so wish. Alas, electrocution isn't that favorable for their species. =p

meh, in israel the largest bird you can find that is actually able to fly is seagull~ we're too tiny for big birds to fly in


anyway, back to politics. newtopic! what's your opinion on death sentences?

Bad.

and inmy country?

I think it's bad in all countries, though Israel is from what I understand a tricky case.

a very tricky case in my opinion. our country does not have any death sentences, except for criminal nazis - which are 99.99% all already dead by now. and the subject isn't even coming up as an option, since judaism forbids killing in nearly 100% of the cases(except for stuff like, if someone kills your family intentionally, then only YOU are allowed to kill him, or something).

In my opinion, Israel definitely should have death punishment. we hold thousands of terrorists who have killed a massive number of civilians in jails for years, wasting millions over millions of dollars on keeping them with good conditions etc. this is bad =\

I am entirely against the death penalty. For starters I believe every human has the right to life. No matter what you did, you are still killing another human being. Second, justice isn't punishment. They don't need to "pay" for anything. They need to be helped, not punished. Even in the most extreme cases, where they have a sever mental disorder, they deserve nothing more than our pity.

The problem I was thinking of was related to liberation of prisoners. I don't know how common that is in Israel/Palestine, but that's what's giving me second thoughts due to how complicated that conflict is.

In all other cases though, I agree without thinking twice with Jellsprout.

oh come on, are you seriously saying you'd take a guy like Bin Laden and give him therapy?

what Jell said.

if you found a well-known terrorist dead in a graveyard, you wouldn't pull the body out of its grave and throw it in jail, would you? =P the most extreme case.

While I'm not going to get involved in the actual argument here (I don't like getting into political arguments), that didn't make any sense at all, Cedric.

Jellsprout said that you shouldn't be allowed to kill another human being no matter what, and that the primary focus of justice should be to rehabilitate people, as opposed to getting revenge. You support it with the argument that you wouldn't throw a dead terrorist in jail. What is the connection here? Am I missing something?

+1, I didn't get the relation as well.

I simply don't get that, cuz you can't 'rehabilitate' most of those here, cuz it's not like they're insane or something. if someone breaks into a house, slaughters two parents, two kids and one baby when they're all asleep, exits and goes back home - rehab? really?

killing these guys is the most humane thing I'm accepting, lol. please don't ask me what I would *want* to do to them.

(in case you don't know what I'm talking about - this happened a few months ago here. it might be far from you, but it's a 30 minutes drive away from me.)

Probably the second sentence is the key to the whole argument. I believe that every human being starts with the right to live, but that they can also forfeit that right through their actions, just like any other right. Obviously, it takes a lot, or something very specific, to forfeit a right, but that's still possible. For example, American soldier voluntarily forfeit most all of their rights when they join the military (except in the case for drafts, which don't really happen anymore).
When people commit crimes, we send them to jail and they lose most of their rights anyways. In most cases, that's temporary, and obviously you don't execute them. But if you lock someone in jail for the rest of their lives, you are killing them; you're just taking your time about it.

I assume your third sentence is meant to say something like "It doesn't matter what they did, you're still killing another human being." This is meant to be a moral appeal, but I disagree with it. Killing another human being isn't wrong; what gives that action moral significance is the reason behind it. Is a soldier killing another soldier in wartime a crime? Of course not. If you slam a door in a thief's face and it breaks his nose and kills him (yes, that's not very likely), did you commit a crime? No. So I've established that there are at least some cases where killing a person isn't immoral. I argue that, after due process is served, executions fall under this category.

You argue that justice isn't punishment. True. However, punishment is justice. It's the whole rectangle vs square argument. You help people when they need it; you punish people when they deserve it. You can't change a person's nature; only they have the power to do that, and most people don't even have that. Terrorism is a good example, but just think of any serial killer.  You can't "fix" them, unless you want to go Dr. Mengele on them, which I'd argue is a fate worse than death.

Lastly, mental disorders. Someone who has a legitimate mental disorder that precludes them from responsibility won't get convicted of a crime. They get sent to mental hospitals. By definition, anyone else is responsible for their own actions and therefore must obey the law or suffer the consequences. If there were no punishment associated with the law, the law would have no meaning. Whether you throw people in jail or fine them, you do it to punish them for misbehaving.

sniper's post reminded me of The Clockwork Orange. have you seen that?

Nope. Is it about an Orange? That would make my day.

Okay, I can't help but comment on this, because it's not a traditional political debate. I'd do this in the chatbox, but this post feels like it would be too long for that.

Thomas believes "all murder or attempted murder, no matter what the weapon was (automobile, gun, knife, etc.) should be automatic life sentence"

Thomas, besides the equal punishment for unequal crimes thing (attempting to murder someone for doing something wrong vs killing innocent people), the reason why I dislike this idea is that it doesn't reward people for not committing murder.

Lets say that some guy wants to kill some other guy, and he right about to shoot this guy in the face, but gets interrupted by the police who are now most certainly going to catch him. They want him to let the man live, but for he's already committed attempted murder, and he knows that attempted murder receives equal punishment to murder in your world, so he'll just kill him instead of letting him live, because he knows that there is nothing to gain from not finishing the job, now that he's already attempted the murder. You need an incentive to get this person to let the guy go.

Also check out the big men with the nullifying karma votes. Two people -1ed this post, but no one has even come forward to respond to his question.

interesting.

about the other part of the post, I think that life sentence is for attempt, death for success/serious injury.

although new thought came to my mind - if we had death sentence for that, then they will stop killing people just like that, and instead they will start suicide bombing again. not quite useful =\
at least it'll work for the other murderers.

@sniper: a clockwork orange is a horrible film. it is genious, but is very difficult to watch, and definitely 18+. kinda like Saw, but with other concepts. read about it; it shows extreme violence and behaviours on both ends and attempts to deal with it. there are 2 rape scenes in the movie, not censored at all, almost visual. since I saw that film - every time I hear the song 'I am singing in the rain' I get the creeps crawl in my spine, seriously; and I saw all Saw series without blinking.
it is a must watch if you can handle it. I recommend download.

FOR ALL YOUNG GUYS/GALS HERE:
do NOT watch that film. Seriously, no matter how strong you think you are.