I remember this from a music documentary in the 80s.

The 3 things Athens, Gerogia is famous for:

1. The double-barrel cannon

2. A tree that somehow owns itself

3. A weird local college rock band made big, named "R.E.M.".

Cognitive dissonance is a scenario where you have some sort of conflict in your views and beliefs. This is usually (a) a disconnect between your supposed beliefs and your actual actions, or (b) two or more conflicting beliefs.

These days it seems to be commonly used in political type debates and arguments: e.g. you passionately support party/candidate X, but then they say or do something you strongly disagree with. You are a strong believer in some sort of policy or idea, but it will disadvantage many people or cause some negative side effect. You condemn 'The Other Side' for doing something but then dismiss/downplay/whitewash 'Your Side' for doing the same thing.

The dissonance occurs because deep down, you know all this is 'wrong' on some level, which may cause you great distress, confusion, disappointment or anger.

In some cases, this may cause you to temper your beliefs and ideals "OK so this isn't as clear cut and perfect as I thought, there's all these conflicting things in there, maybe I need to think about this more". This is mostly a normal healthy response.

But it can sometimes lead people into denialism and extremism. "I believe passionately in something, this challenges my belief in this something, therefore it must all be a lie!". This is often how conspiracies and similar crazy theories can develop; people don't know or don't want to deal with their cognitive dissonance, so dive down increasingly narrow and extreme rabbit holes to keep from having their views challenged.

The main argument against it seems to be that companies should be doing something else with that money, such as paying their employees more, investing in better/safer/more efficient equipment or technology to make their workers' lives easier, etc. Rather than simply putting it in their own pockets as profit.

So the negativity is mostly from people like unions, who want better pay and conditions for their workers, or certain elements of the "people before profits!" strain of the political Left

Thanks for sharing that completely irrelevant and pointless personal information with us.

IIRC it was one of the catalysts for the breakup. Bassist Stu Cook had a business degree or similar qualifications, but John insisted on handling the financial side of the band himself.

The largest sapphire ever found was discovered by some Australian farmer's kid playing around some local diggings.

The family used the 'rock' as a doorstop for several years before the father finally took a closer look at it....

https://internetstones.com/news/the-black-star-of-queensland-famous-black-sapphire-gemstone/

I think this song gets way too much undeserved hate.

The main criticisms I see is that it's "too simplistic" and "doesn't delve into the many conflicting feelings and emotions of a depressed/suicidal person".

It's literally a 3-4 minute pop song, it's not a 200 page psychology thesis.

> Thought it was a day that Canadians sat around and watched Boxing all day on TV and chowed down on Turkey leftovers 🥊🥊

If you're talking Australia, it's pretty much this except with cricket instead of boxing.

Should rename it 'Cricket Day'.

> Drinking used to be worse back then. Americans would get drunk on their lunchtime. Alcohol apparently ruined lives.

I remember reading that alot of progressives, especially feminists, actually strongly supported Prohibition for this reason.

They were sick of men getting blind drunk and then beating the crap out of their wife and kids every night.

An 'option' is the right to buy or sell a given commodity at a fixed price at a fixed future date. There are two types of options, Call Options and Put Options.

Buying a Call Option involves paying a premium for the right (NOT the obligation) to buy a commodity at a fixed price at a fixed future date. People who buy call options believe the price of this commodity will strongly increase in the future.

For example, suppose Company X has shares/stocks worth $50. You believe these will trend upwards strongly, and will be worth $60 in 6 months' time. You then go out and buy a call option, paying a premium for the right to buy 100 Company X shares at $50 at a date 6 months in the future.

If you are correct and the shares do increase to $60 over the next 6 months, you have two choices:

a) Exercise your right to buy the 100 shares at $50, and then sell them at the market value of $60 each. Congratulations, you've made a profit of $1000 minus the cost of buying the call option.

b) As the share price trends upwards, the value of the call option increases. Instead of buying the shares, you could sell your call option to someone else for a much higher price that what you paid for it, and make your profit that way.

If you are incorrect and the shares do not increase, your call option is essentially worthless, and you make a loss corresponding to the cost of the call option.

Buying a Put Option involves paying a premium for the right (NOT the obligation) to SELL a commodity at a fixed price at a fixed future date. This is the opposite of a Call Option, and would be used when you expect the price of something to trend downwards strongly.

In the example above, Company X's shares are at $50 but you expect them to fall to $40. So you'd buy a Put Option instead of a Call Option. If the shares did trend down, you'd buy at the lower market value ($40) and sell at $50, or on-sell the Put Option, to make your profit.

I must admit I'm surprised there's an age cut-off for religious ministry.

I'd have thought a more mature person, who's had more time to reflect on the decision, would be more likely to stay. Whereas a younger person has more risk of "Yeah I thought I wanted this but I really don't" quitting.