Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Mar 7, 2011 13:48:23 GMT -4
If I hadn't been charged for a year for my website I would be regularly backing it up.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Mar 3, 2011 14:03:21 GMT -4
Can you imagine hat would happen if the US just swapped its defence and aerospace budgets? Even for a month or so... Umm, we would wreck our current military?
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 16, 2011 18:45:33 GMT -4
Add Kennedy to the long, long list of things he doesn't know anything about. The list seems to have no bounds. But then, isn't that true of everyone? I certainly suspect that there is a near-infinite amount of things I don't know. The trick is knowing how ignorant you really are about the things you think you do know about.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 14, 2011 12:27:41 GMT -4
An opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal mentioned a new attempt to see if climate models can be trusted - The Twentieth Century Reanalysis Project. They re-analyzed data since 1871 and: The weather is not in fact getting worse since the Industrial Revolution, which raises the question of just how sensitive the Earth's climate really is to man-made CO2 emissions. As the piece mentions, however, Global Warming can be blamed for at least one of the recent weather-related problems: Heathrow apparently skimped on de-icing supplies, and 5 inches of snow managed to ground flights and strand travelers for two days right beore Christmas. The piece points out that Dallas was much more prepared, and despite a huge winter storm was still able to host the Superbowl, with no deaths reported to have been caused by the storm.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 9, 2011 12:55:45 GMT -4
"Trust us, you were happier when you always suffered from borderline malnutrition, had an average lifespan between 21 and 37 years (depending on location) with almost no chance to survive beyond 55, a violent death rate of around 30%, an infant mortality rate of around 60%, and treated your women like property."
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 9, 2011 12:43:11 GMT -4
And if they do feel that wat, no one is stopping them wandering through the Jungle and locating other tribes that have more civilisation and learning about it. It should be their choice though. We both agree it should be their choice, but do they know what's out there? Yes. Cultural attitudes have changed a great deal since the native peoples you mention were first contacted by Western civilization. I'm not sure they do know where to find it. Well do you?
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 9, 2011 0:58:56 GMT -4
You just listed a bunch of things they'd need full time jobs for... unless they lived in Canada. And? Are you agreeing with me that these things might be worth a little risk to one's current way of life?
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 8, 2011 19:36:31 GMT -4
What are they missing out on exactly? Global wars? Economic collapse? Paris Hilton? Antibiotics. Vaccinations. Sanitation. Corrective lenses. Indoor plumbing and hot water. Dentistry. Pre-natal care. Artificial limbs. Modern textiles. Modern hunting techniques and gear. Pocket lighters. Waterproof tents. Literature. Etc.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 8, 2011 19:11:24 GMT -4
And contacting them could very well lead to condemning then to death from western diseases like it has so many other native peoples. Do you think they would be happier living the lifestyle they know, or dead? I don't know. What do they think of their culture now? Do they feel it's stagnant, and that they are missing opportunity, or are they happy with the way things are? I would note that people decide they would be happier dead than in their current circumstances all the time, and I don't mean suicides, but people who are willing to risk their lives in order to change things in their culture. All of those native cultures were first contacted long ago. Will we make the same mistakes again? But shouldn't they have the opportunity to join the rest of the world if they wish it? If we withold contact then we are witholding the opportunity of that choice. We are chosing for them. Look at it another way. What if there is a galactic civilization that could eliminate hunger and poverty with their advanced technology, spread us to other planets (therefore encouraging the survival of our species), grant us effective immortality, and allow us to join their civilization as peers, yet they are witholding these wonders because they don't want to destroy our native culture - that terrible western civilization that you don't want to force on others. Who's decision should it be whether the advantages they offer outweigh the possibility of cultural destruction, theirs or ours?
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 8, 2011 12:47:36 GMT -4
How about making sure that this is not a trap ? especially with the technology that can see if ther are other people around? It's just you and your gunner on the chopper. The mortar crew doesn't need to have anyone else nearby to be a threat to the two of you if you land and get out of the chopper to try to take them prisoner. Making sure there is no one else around won't allow you to safely capture them if they change their mind once you're on the ground.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 8, 2011 12:43:05 GMT -4
An excellent example. Really, the most responsible thing to do is fire on them. There is no way to capture them and no way to gaurantee that they won't immediately go back to what they were doing (shelling civilians) if you leave. sorry to note this , but a Chrsitian saying that you should fire on surrenderers? this Bushism should have brainwashed you totally.. Loving my neighbor means protecting them too. If I leave the mortar crew alone I let them kill innocent civilians - civilians that it is my duty as a member of the military to protect.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 8, 2011 12:33:54 GMT -4
I'm suspecting they know that there is something out there, since they were watching the plane that took the photos. The thing about first contact is that once you do it, it's too late to ask if they wanted it. You can't ask them if they want contact without making it, and thus defeating the entire point of asking. I perfer the Prime Directive approach, when they are ready and start looking, then we can make contact, until then, leave well alone and let them develop in their own way. We have already destroyed enough cultures and killed enough people by exporting western vices and diseases to them. How about we just leave well enough alone this time. Leaving well enough alone means condemning these people to a pretty hard life, with little opportunity for something else. I think it should be their choice, not ours. They should determine the worth of their culture. If they prefer the things Western civilization can offer them to what they have now, who are we to say they are wrong in giving up the old ways?
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 7, 2011 19:25:01 GMT -4
Well it does seem interesting that since his return this time he has started two threads, both aimed at Jason. Possibly aimed at me. Since there seems to be some interst in the issue: There is no first-hand source for Joseph Smith claiming that the moon had Quakers on it - the source of the claim appears to be a 1881 journal entry (36 years after Joseph's death) by Oliver B. Huntington, who was quoting a man named Philo Dibble (really) who had supposedly heard some remarks by Joseph claiming the moon was inhabited. Even then, the supposed quote is that the inhabitants of the moon dressed "quite uniformly in something near the Quaker style" - not that they were Quakers. Brigham Young said he believed that the Moon and the Sun were inhabited in at least one address, but didn't give any details as to their customs or manner. His point seems to have been that there are many things in the universe that we are completely ignorant of, not that he knew anything about such inhabitants through prophetic insight. So we have one very questionable supposed quote by Joseph Smith and one somewhat oblique reference by Brigham Young. Not much to build a criticism of a religion on, but pretty much par for the course for anti-Mormon claims. (As you might have guessed, I have seen and debunked this claim before)
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 7, 2011 19:00:46 GMT -4
Granted there are advantages and disadvantages to having contact with the rest of humanity, but if we are to treat them as human beings, surely we have to give them the option of whether they want this contact, rather than making the choice for them? Exactly why we should do nothing. If they want to make contact let them make the first move. If we go blundering in there and ask them, then we have taken that choice away in doing so. But do they even know we exist to begin with? They can't ask for what they don't know is available.
|
|
Jason
Pluto
May all your hits be crits
Posts: 5,579
|
Post by Jason on Feb 7, 2011 16:02:38 GMT -4
Granted there are advantages and disadvantages to having contact with the rest of humanity, but if we are to treat them as human beings, surely we have to give them the option of whether they want this contact, rather than making the choice for them?
|
|