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Post by Retrograde on May 8, 2008 18:06:57 GMT -4
And I disagree with your disagreement  So who is consistantly more generous than America? Oh, I don't know. I think they are pretty much the same as people everywhere. They say all these nice flowery things about what great people they are, but mostly they look after themselves. With respect to the resource issue, I haven't seen anything that convinces me that they would not consume vast quantities of resources, were it not costly to do so. I see evidence that pretty much everyone does that. Pointing out false predictions is a way of establishing that the current alarmism of people like Ted Turner predicting global warming will make us all be cannibals in 10 years is nothing new or remarkable, and therefore despite the bigger and flashier presentation it's still the pronouncements of a person with an agenda rather than facts. And there is a certain entertainment value to pointing out the ridiculousness. Like the man who believed Nessie had been killed by global warming. Well, if it is just for entertainment value, with no particular relevance towards any current policy debate, that's not a problem by me. You could even make fun of the people who are making goofy statements now. Well, I was getting the impression you were. Are you? |
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Post by Ginnie on May 8, 2008 19:25:18 GMT -4
What we need here is a counter point - a list of predictions that have come true, or even milder than compared to reality.
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Jason
Pluto
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Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on May 31, 2008 13:09:38 GMT -4
This opinion piece is a pretty good match of my own views on Global Warming. I'm not a denier, and I'm not a believer. I'm an agnostic, and I think we should do what is doable to benefit the environment while not getting crazy.
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Jason
Pluto
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Posts: 5,579
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Post by Jason on Jun 9, 2008 17:48:07 GMT -4
WHO now acknowledges that the predicted worldwide heterosexual epidemic of AIDS is now seen as very unlikely, as seen here. Outside of Africa AIDS is mostly confined to high-risk groups such as homosexual men, drug users, and prostitutes. It's still a terrible disease that kills lots of people, especially in Africa, but the images of population-destroying pandemics of AIDS popular in mid '80s and '90s opinion pieces have turned out to be false. The doomsayers were once again wrong. Ten or twenty years from now I expect to be reading the same sorts of stories about Global Warming. |
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Post by Ginnie on Jun 9, 2008 18:40:29 GMT -4
And the Bird flu epidemic as well, I hope.
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Post by LunarOrbit on Jun 9, 2008 21:03:22 GMT -4
Doomsayer environmentalists are new at this game... doomsayer religions have been around a lot longer. I'm still waiting for the Armageddon that should have happened about 8 years ago.
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Post by wdmundt on Jun 9, 2008 21:20:41 GMT -4
Or the one that should have happened about 1900 years ago:
Mark 13:24-31 New Interrnational Bible (boldface italics mine):
24 "But in those days, following that distress, the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light;
25 the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.'
26 "At that time men will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. 27 And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens.
28 "Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. 29 Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door. 30 I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. 31 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.
But I don't think anyone from that generation is alive -- and those things have not come to pass.
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Jason
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Post by Jason on Jun 9, 2008 21:51:18 GMT -4
But I don't think anyone from that generation is alive -- and those things have not come to pass. Depends on what you mean by generation, when the generation Christ was talking about began ("this generation" may mean the generation in which the signs begin to appear instead of the then-current generation), and whether you believe John the beloved was made immortal or not (see the strange passage near the end of the Gospel of John). |
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Post by wdmundt on Jun 9, 2008 21:57:07 GMT -4
Does it never bother you at all when you have to explain away such obvious problems in the Bible? Jesus (or whoever wrote these words) was cleary speaking to that generation. Otherwise, the statement has no meaning or purpose.
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Post by echnaton on Jun 10, 2008 7:43:36 GMT -4
Doomsayer environmentalists are new at this game... doomsayer religions have been around a lot longer. I'm still waiting for the Armageddon that should have happened about 8 years ago. I agree with you. Your quote neatly point out the link between many environmental projections and religious ones. They are linked by a common desire to manipulate people, not educate them about the truth. Both are non scientific. |
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Jason
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Post by Jason on Jun 10, 2008 11:10:26 GMT -4
Does it never bother you at all when you have to explain away such obvious problems in the Bible? No. Real life is not simple, so no one should expect that religion is either. Religion uses concepts and vocabulary that are not common in other contexts and will require explanation to those who aren't particularly familiar with the subject. No he's not clearly speaking to the first-century generation of the apostles. In fact, the Joseph Smith translation of Matthew makes it more clear that Jesus is not speaking of the generation of the apostles: "Verily, I say unto you, this generation, in which these things shall be shown forth, shall not pass away until all I have told you shall be fulfilled." What purpose is there in Jesus speaking to his apostles of things they will never live to see? Well first of all, they asked. They were very curious about the future. Secondly, he knew they would record his words for later generations. And I would also note that there is no reason in Christianity to think that 2000 was the scheduled apocolypse and that we've now missed the date. In fact Jesus says "But of that day, and hour, no one knoweth; no, not the angels of God in heaven, but my Father only." The signs given will let the faithful know that the apocolypse is close, but not the exact date it will occur. |
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Post by wdmundt on Jun 10, 2008 18:18:21 GMT -4
If Jesus' words were meant for some unknown future generation, then the phrase would go something like this:
I tell you the truth, the generation that is alive during the end times will will certainly be alive when all these things have happened. Gibberish. Mark 13:30 is a false prophecy.
Some guy modifying the passage 1800 years later should easily be seen as a change made to correct an obvious problem in the New Testament.
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Post by trevor on Jun 10, 2008 18:41:58 GMT -4
G,day Gentlefolk,
Jason, are you only sceptical about a human cause of environmental problems or do you not believe climate change is occuring at all?
As for explaining what is in the bible, I still maintain that no-one alive today has any knowledge of the meaning within it other than their own interpretation, which can be very very wrong. If indeed there is any meaning to it at all.
No different to Nostradamus' quatrains.
As for Americans being generous, they are no different to the rest of the world you have your good and your bad. The USA as a nation does consume a large portion of the worlds resources, it is not an accusation, just a statement of fact, you have a lot of people there my man and a very large country to maintain, it is economics nothing more.
Trevor
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Post by Ginnie on Jun 10, 2008 18:50:17 GMT -4
I think the U.S. is quite generous. But they also like everything to go their way.
Oh yeah. The U.S. and Canada have to be two of the most hedonistic countries in the world.
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Post by Ginnie on Jun 10, 2008 19:03:12 GMT -4
Maybe it's time to listen to this again: www.broadcasting-history.ca/news/unique/am_text.htmlClick on "listen to the original audio" It was written by Gordon Sinclair, a Canadian journalist, in 1973. And forgive me for quoting it verbatim: "This Canadian thinks it is time to speak up for the Americans as the most generous and possibly the least appreciated people on all the earth.
Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts. None of these countries is today paying even the interest on its remaining debts to the United States.
When France was in danger of collapsing in 1956, it was the Americans who propped it up, and their reward was to be insulted and swindled on the streets of Paris. I was there. I saw it.
When earthquakes hit distant cities, it is the United States that hurries in to help. This spring, 59 American communities were flattened by tornadoes. Nobody helped.
The Marshall Plan and the Truman Policy pumped billions of dollars! into discouraged countries. Now newspapers in those countries are writing about the decadent, warmongering Americans.
I'd like to see just one of those countries that is gloating over the erosion of the United States dollar build its own airplane. Does any other country in the world have a plane to equal the Boeing Jumbo Jet, the Lockheed Tri-Star, or the Douglas DC10? If so, why don't they fly them? Why do all the International lines except Russia fly American Planes?
Why does no other land on earth even consider putting a man or woman on the moon? You talk about Japanese technocracy, and you get radios. You talk about German technocracy, and you get automobiles.
You talk about American technocracy, and you find men on the moon -! not once, but several times - and safely home again.
You talk about scandals, and the Americans put theirs right in the store window for everybody to look at. Even their draft-dodgers are not pursued and hounded. They are here on our streets, and most of them, unless they are breaking Canadian laws, are getting American dollars from ma and pa at home to spend here.
When the railways of France, Germany and India were breaking down through age, it was the Americans who rebuilt them. When the Pennsylvania Railroad and the New York Central went broke, nobody loaned them an old caboose. Both are still broke.
I can name you 5000 times when the Americans raced to the help of other people in trouble. Can you name me even one time when someone else raced to the Americans in trouble? I don't think there was outside help even during the San Francisco earthquake.
Our neighbors have faced it alone, and I'm one Canadian who is damned tired of hearing them get kicked around. They will come out of this thing with their flag high. And when they do, they are entitled to thumb their nose at the lands that are gloating over their present troubles. I hope Canada is not one of those."
Stand proud, America! |
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