Sputnik

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AuthorTopic: Sputnik
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We could probably break the cycle if humans would unite under one race/flag/country/something related.

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good goal, now how would such a goal be achieved?

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Horrible goal. Take away distance death and return to Spartan style warfare. Especially the part about leaders actually participating in battle.

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Thralni - "a lot of people are ... too weird to be trusted"
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Anyone who even showed a miniscule amount of liking for 300 is one evolutionary step away froma rat.

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quote:
Originally written by Safey:

Every nation has its time and its time will past. America will one day fall and another will come to power and have its vengeance if it so chooses. Then it if follows the pattern it will piss off a large number of people and its fall will come and the cycle continues. The question is how do we break the cycle? To those who want vengeance I like to point out the story of the Hatfield-McCoy feud. Very few if any people can't say that their people were once a a powerful and ruthless empire.
Mine wasn't.
Australia has never been particularly powerful… or ruthless.

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Posts: 74 | Registered: Friday, March 17 2006 08:00
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*nods to Starman, fellow Seattlite*

A one world government economy, where how much everyone everywhere in every position is paid, how much it costs every company to manufacture a product, and how much they sell it for...would be a good start to eliminating a load of evils. Secrecy is the policy which enables business to proceed as usual, and the rape of the masses for the riches of the few to persist. You wanna start a revolution, baby? Cast off the veil that mercenaries, power fiends, CEOs, and corporations hide beneath. Watch the outrage of how women are systematically underpriced for the same roles in the marketplace. Pricing and salaries would massively readjust within days to weeks.

-S-

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Posts: 2009 | Registered: Monday, September 12 2005 07:00
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quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

*nods to Starman, fellow Seattlite*
Starman is from Seatlle, not Seattle.

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Thralni - "a lot of people are ... too weird to be trusted"
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If you're going to compare apples-to-apples then go with what did happen during the cold war, not what could have happened...unless you're comparing stress levels. I think it's at least as high now - probably higher. I think this world is more uneasy.

quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

A one world government economy, where how much everyone everywhere in every position is paid, how much it costs every company to manufacture a product, and how much they sell it for...would be a good start to eliminating a load of evils.
If you're going extreme, go all the way and just eliminate money. We could just trade or do stuff for others out of love. That's what I'd like to see.
Posts: 701 | Registered: Thursday, November 30 2006 08:00
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quote:
Originally written by Stillness:

If you're going to compare apples-to-apples then go with what did happen during the cold war, not what could have happened...unless you're comparing stress levels. I think it's at least as high now - probably higher. I think this world is more uneasy.
If you want to talk about what actually happened, how about the dozens of proxy wars between nations allied to the US and nations allied to the Soviets, each killing hundreds of thousands of people? Wars on the scale of Iraq erupted once every year or two, and larger ones came every decade or so.

[ Friday, October 05, 2007 21:51: Message edited by: Thuryl ]

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The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure!
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Nuke and Pave
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I find it interesting that the conversation about Sputnik so quickly degenerated into arguments about America's role in today's world. Especially considering that Spitnik started the era of space exploration, and sparked a space race that allowed the hostility of the Cold War to be channeled towards a constructive purpose.

quote:
Originally written by Stillness:

If you're going to compare apples-to-apples then go with what did happen during the cold war, not what could have happened...unless you're comparing stress levels. I think it's at least as high now - probably higher. I think this world is more uneasy.
...

Do today's schools hold frequent drills on what to do in case of nuclear attack? Do people live with the constant knowledge that entire human civilization could end in 5 minutes? (The threat is no longer there, because the nuclear weapons are now targeted into the ocean, instead of at Russian and American cities, so even in case of a misunderstanding it would take at least 15 minutes to retarget them back, which is enough time to make out the difference between a NASA rocket and a nuclear warhead. I am simplifying here a little, but the sentence was already getting too long. :) )

As for the actual level of violence, "Cold War" was "cold" only for the major powers involved. In addition to Vietnam and Korea, there were dozens of civil wars, armed conflicts, and revolutions in which USSR supported one side and USA the other. So even if you look at the number of people killed per year, "war on terror" is probably far less bloody than the "Cold" War.

Finally, getting back to the original question of the thread...
quote:
Originally written by Actaeon:

It's been 50 years. A great deal has changed. The question is, are we better off than we were on October 4, 1957?
Just the fact that you can ask this question to dozens of people from all over the world is an answer in itself.

Internet. Computers. Microwave ovens. Color TV. Refrigerators. ... It's hard to list all of the recent technological advances that make our lives easier and more enjoyable. Even people in most of the "third world" enjoy much higher standard of living now compared to 50 years ago. The people in the poorest regions of the world might not have seen much improvement yet, but the term "poorest regions of the world" now includes far fewer countries than it did 50 years ago.

Our world is obviously far from perfect. However, while we still have a long way to go, it doesn't help to diminish how far we've come in the last 50 years. :)

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quote:
Originally written by Jumpin' Salmon:

quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

*nods to Starman, fellow Seattlite*
Starman is from Seatlle, not Seattle.
Shhh, I didn't want to call attention to his spelling problem. It's good to cultivate friendship with the natives.

quote:
Originally written by Stillness:

quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

A one world government economy, where how much everyone everywhere in every position is paid, how much it costs every company to manufacture a product, and how much they sell it for...would be a good start to eliminating a load of evils.
If you're going extreme, go all the way and just eliminate money. We could just trade or do stuff for others out of love. That's what I'd like to see.
Hmm, I see I didn't quite write that correctly, so I will fix it. I think the idea I mentioned was radical enough that it would take a serious paradigm shift to consider. Ultimately, you are right of course with the suggestion to eliminate money, and I'd invoke the same wish. That's further down the pike. But let's not ruin the surprise just yet.

-S-

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Nuke and Pave
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quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

...
Zeviz, are you saying your idea of an improved world is more toys and material possessions, created by the same technologies which also now threaten our very existence because we aren't mature enough to wield them safely?

-S-

These same technologies also greatly extended our lifespan, allowed us to suffer less from diseases, and yes, also made our lives easier and more enjoyable. For some reason, few people volunteer to go back to plowing land using horses all day. Any tool can be used to help or to hurt. How it is used says more about the wielder than the tool itself.

[ Saturday, October 06, 2007 00:41: Message edited by: Zeviz ]

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Be careful with a word, as you would with a sword,
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However well placed word, unlike a well placed sword,
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Posts: 2649 | Registered: Wednesday, October 3 2001 07:00
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I agree with Zeviz.

Really I find it bewildering that technological progress is treated like something evil (or even something good). We can't decide not to invent, just as single-cellular organisms can't decide not to evolve. Regretting that our ancestors didn't have to worry about global warming isn't just wrong because on the other hand we don't have to worry about smallpox or plague. It's also as futile as wishing our childhood back.

I do not say scientists need not show great responsibility with the impact of their inventions, or that a lot of evil couldn't have been avoided that way (see nuclear warheads). But we can't stop or go backwards; we can only steer.

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I fixed the small spelling error, ya happy now?

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Ecstatic. You? ;)

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Lest I be misunderstood, I don't think technology is inherently either good or evil. I agree it is what we do with it that is all important. I also think that technology has very little to do with what really makes life worth living as a human being, though I can readily see how debatable that point would be to many. I would also argue that the human being truly began losing its soul 1000 years ago with the invention of the clock.

As I stated earlier, the concern now is that our technological evolution is far outpacing our own social and spiritual evolution as humans, and that is a recipe for disaster without a significant shift in our thinking in this century.

-S-

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quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

Lest I be misunderstood, I don't think technology is inherently either good or evil. I agree it is what we do with it that is all important. I also think that technology has very little to do with what really makes life worth living as a human being, though I can readily see how debatable that point would be to many. I would also argue that the human being truly began losing its soul 1000 years ago with the invention of the clock.

As I stated earlier, the concern now is that our technological evolution is far outpacing our own social and spiritual evolution as humans, and that is a recipe for disaster without a significant shift in our thinking in this century.

-S-

Technology won't automatically make you better then who doesn't have technology on that will agree. However technology if used right can help enhance and train certain abilities and characteristics. For example give a surgeon a new piece of technology designed to help him treat patients and you enhance his abilities to heal. The same is not true if you give that same technology to someone off the street. Light bulbs make it easier to study at night and so on.

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quote:
Originally written by Starman1985:

We could probably break the cycle if humans would unite under one race/flag/country/something related.
Au sub unu lingvon? ;)

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Good questions I say we all learn Mandarin.

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quote:
Originally written by Synergy:

As I stated earlier, the concern now is that our technological evolution is far outpacing our own social and spiritual evolution as humans, and that is a recipe for disaster without a significant shift in our thinking in this century.

-S-

So how should we think?

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Posts: 3029 | Registered: Saturday, June 18 2005 07:00
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I'm not sure if this is what Synergy is referring to with these, ah, "new age buzzwords", but in my opinion one of the greatest shifts in thinking would be related to national identity.

Our communication networks and economies are increasingly entwined and codependent. Couple that with the dwindling resources and overpopulation, which forces us to become more efficient and cooperative. This means that eventually we will have to stop being citizens of a nation and start acting as citizens of a planet.

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Um... I know what he is talking about, I know what he is reffering too. I just want him to explain what shift in thinking he wants us to make. Just curious.

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And I submitted a theory for what shift he wanted us to make, which may or may not be accurate. :)

[ Sunday, October 07, 2007 07:07: Message edited by: root ]

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quote:
Originally written by root:

And I submitted a theory for what said shift would be, which Synergy may or may not agree with.
Umhmmm, I know, and you are free to do so.

[ Sunday, October 07, 2007 07:07: Message edited by: Thralni ]

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I'm in agreement with Aran, essentially. Nationalism is a damaging symptom of an illusion we live under...that we are all separate beings threatened with insufficient life (we "die") and a perception of lack in ourselves and in nature. We justify killing and discrimintion based ultimately on the world's various conceptions of a God that kills and judges and lacks and fails. We have long come to reflect the gods we have believed in. It does't even matter how many people do not believe in a God now. The beliefs and attitudes and morality have saturated all cultures for millennia. Huge portions of the world are still fighting and willing to die in the name of their god.

We operate out of fear and self-preservation, doing damage to ourselves when we do damage to others. Nationalism needs to dissolve. We need to see that what we do to others we truly do to ourselves, that all boundaries are contrivances, based on trying to hold on to what we think is "ours." We need to see that there is nothing to fear but fear itself.

-S-

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