KoboldCoterie

Closest thing you'll find is likely to be prediction markets, but "whether it rains tomorrow" isn't something that would be available unless it's in the form of "Will X event be rescheduled due to rain?" or similar more boolean things.

He might have felt pressure to keep up with your dad due to just meeting them / wanting to make a good impression, and not realized how drunk he was getting. Doesn't excuse his actions in the least, but might help contextualize them... given it doesn't sound like this is something he would normally do.

Let me guess... It was carrying drugs? Just packed full of cocaine? Can't wait to hear the justification for this one.

I mean, if he said it completely seriously, and the article was published saying he had, then he later came out and said "It was just a joke guys! Jeez, so uptight!", I'd agree with you, but it was apparently clear from the outset that it was a joke and the headline is likely intentionally written to sensationalize it. The only problem I see here is that someone at rawstory thought this was newsworthy.

Eugenics aren't suddenly okay if they're only accessible to some people. Healthcare on the other hand should be available to everyone but it's still a net positive even if it isn't available to everyone.

You said 'or otherwise regulate', not 'and regulate', so I logically assumed you were making two independent proposals and chose to respond to one of them, omitting the other for clarity.

I don't even think it's a counter-argument, really. As soon as prosperity becomes a factor, it's a "rich people only" feature, regardless of what other guardrails are in place.

but make people pay [...] if they want the additional data to screen for more precise things.

Isn't that just worse than giving the data to everyone, though? The more expensive you make it, the more of an exclusively 'rich people' service it becomes. As if kids with rich parents don't already have enough advantages in life, let's make sure they're physically peak, too?

I know 'slippery slope' is a logical fallacy, but I think it's applicable here.

We scan for disease, easy sell. But since we're doing it anyway, let's also include physical defects. Why not also include autism? I mean we have the data already, and these parents are paying for the service, why shouldn't we give them that information? And if we're doing all of that, why not also give them data on life expectancy and intelligence? Maybe physical traits - after all, they'd really prefer a blond haired, blue eyed child.

Gattaca was a great movie and definitely didn't portray any social issues whatsoever stemming from actions like this!

For instance, the report mentions an employee of the City of Boulder, Colorado, who purchased a 12-pack of Sharpie markers for $8.99, while an employee of the nearby Denver Public Schools was charged $28.63 for the same product on the same day.

$28.63 for a pack of sharpies? Whoever looked at that price and thought that ordering it from Amazon was the way to go needs to go back to school themselves.

If this was a human encouraging him to suicide this wouldn’t be newsworthy…

Like hell it wouldn't, do you live under a rock?