Hmm, I'm not a member of that club. — Agustino

Rotary International does good work, and it's a good networking organization. I would think you would find it beneficial to belong.

Yes, partly so. Everyone from the Balkans tends to get hot under the collar over casual stuff :rofl: — Agustino

There have been several prominent examples of Balkanites getting hot under their collective casual collars and then getting totally out of hand -- like some archduke merely taking a drive through Sarajevo one fine day, or more recently Yugoslavia disintegrating, and then some dissatisfaction with Kosovo, et al...

For a few years I worked in an AIDS-service agency that had attracted quite a few unconventional types who believed in crystals as healing devices, practiced some fairly far-fetched alternative cures, and some were anti-vaxers. Global warming didn't happen to come up often at the time, so... don't know about that one.

This would have been the kind of place where you once would have found HIV deniers also -- "Oh no, AIDS isn't caused by a virus; it is caused by yada yada yada." They would have denounced the first AIDS drugs as poisons -- which, of course, they were -- many chemotherapies are basically poisons.

There were HIV negative people who wanted to get infected because they were attracted to the intense brotherhood and camaraderie of the diseased pariahs (back in the 1980s). All of this stuff is not just anti-science; some of it is anti-rational, as well, and moving on from there, downright harmful, or dangerous for one's personal survival. There were other screwy ideas -- like going to Taos, New Mexico to immerse one's self in an energy vortex (don't ask, I don't know).

There ideas have causes. The anti-vaxination plague wasn't caused by a fraudulent article in a medical journal, but the article pumped gasoline into the fire. The idea that HIV doesn't cause AIDS began at the same time as AIDS did -- before a solid theory was worked out--and the first wrong guesses never went away. People have been spinning out alternative cures for ... decades? Centuries? A long time, anyway. I don't know why people find these far fetched ideas better than what they consider "crazy scientific ideas", but some do.

Lack of intelligence doesn't correlate well with holding these highly unscientific ideas. Some of the idea holders I've known are really quite intelligent. Maybe slightly crazy, but definitely not stupid. Many of them were also quite pleasant people who, for the most part, led more or less normal lives doing productive work.

or a member of an American Indian people in Northern California... — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Oh, there actually is a POMO Indian tribe in California. Amazing. I thought you were joking. They must find incomprehensible white PoMo English majors a very annoying group, considering the misuse of their most honorable name.

No, very likely this wasn't the case, despite Ida Tarbell's account, which was more vilification than truth. Ron Chernow's biography is more accurate. — Agustino

I should probably read Chernow. Chernow's bio gets good reviews, but that doesn't mean that JDR was not a ruthless capitalist. His son, JDR Jr., the one who supervised the Rockefeller fortune after JDR died, and built Rockefeller Center, seemed to feel that his father's history was something of a burden to bear.

But I wouldn't expect you and me to have have the same view of Rockefeller or Carnegie, or various other tycoons. You and I admire different traits -- which only makes sense, given who you are and who I am.

How do we know this? Because a lot of the producers who sold out to Rockefeller remained in the business working for Standard Oil, and many of them became very rich, millionaires. So going from starving oil producer to millionaire is quite an improvement I would think, no? — Agustino

No doubt it is better to become a millionaire on the coat tails of the guy who swindled you out of your business than to be bitter and resentful for eternity. However... that doesn't make the swindler a nice guy in a white hat.

For example, I was at a notary last week, and he started swearing (with everyone there) at his secretary, then threatened to fire her, reminded her she has a child and is responsible for him, etc. That's definitely not decent treatment, and if it was a man instead of a woman he wouldn't have dared to do that. — Agustino

So, what did your fellow Rotarians do about this example of atrocious behavior (on the part of their fellow Rotarian?)

Back when I lived at the countryside, one of the neighbours there cut his wife with the sword because she refused to have sex with him — Agustino

Were your neighbors Slavic? Slavs seem to get hot under the collar (it's an expression, not a diagnosis of localized neck fever) over fairly casual slights. Unlike the rest of humanity who are always extremely thoughtful about what they get angry about.

Two of the major protagonists were TimeLine and Agustino. It turned pretty ugly. I think it gives a good lesson in the disrespect for women felt and expressed by some members of this forum, not to mention society at large. — T Clark

Yes, I remember that particular philosorumble.

When we talk about differences between men and women, gays and straights. smart people and stupid people and a whole batch of other features, it is important to make refined distinctions. By 'refined' I mean carefully drawn and carefully limited, too. When we talk about strength differences between men and women, for instance, one can say that men provide specimens with more strength than any woman will present, but many men and women have about the same amount of strength. Sure, on average men may be stronger than women, but it's still true that a lot of men and women are about equally strong.

Or one can say that gay men and straight men have different object choices, but that gay men and straight men without long term partners might be about equally promiscuous. "Why don't straight men have as much sex as gay men? Because straight women won't let them." Gay men who are in long-term relationships also put a brake on each other's sexual adventures. Sigh.

Smart people sometimes do very stupid things and stupid people have been known to do some very smart things. But, on average, stupid people tend to be more stupid than smart people (an opinion that is supported by extensive research and millennia of human experience).

It means POst MOdern.

A writer in Quillette proposed that the discussion of transgenderism ought to be based on actual biology, rather than the more political foundation we see.

I would say the same thing about gender, in general, but I can not imagine a discussion occurring about male/female similarities and differences (based on biology, for one, social roles, for two, psychological characteristics for three) that didn't end up in the usual shooting match.

I think there is such a thing as "human nature" which is a stable piece of our reality--but it isn't the whole thing. But even claiming that "human nature" exists, native to our species, and isn't socially determined might cause a riot on campus. Stating the idea that men and women have different interests inherent in their gender is just an intolerable act to the social constructionists.

In truth, they are not even societies, but rather conglomerates of different societies. The society of men, the society of women, the society of rich, the society of poor, etc. They are only under the illusion of being a society, because in truth, they aren't a unity but a multiplicity. — Agustino

Some observers think we do live in a parallel society, as you described. That might be an extreme interpretation of reality, but there is certainly some parallel-ness in US society. Many black people almost live in a different state than white people. Poor people have very little in common with rich people (in many, not all, respects). POMO "intellectuals" often seem to inhabit a different universe, let alone a parallel track in this society.

John D. Rockefeller who was one of the richest men historically ran away from competition like from the devil - for him, it was all about cooperation. He became the richest man, and Standard Oil owned 90% of the oil market (until the government broke him up - for no reason really), precisely because he co-opted everyone else who was in the oil business and organised them to work together - prior to Rockefeller, the oil industry was cut-throat competition, and everyone was struggling to make any money in it. Then they all started making money, and because of efficiencies in production due to economies of scale, oil actually became cheaper than ever. — Agustino

Rockefeller's "cooperation" was achieved through a web of deception, devious transactions, and crude power. Of course Standard Oil was profitable -- if you control 90% of the business, you jolly well ought to be profitable. And Standard Oil and its descendants (like Exxon Mobil, et al) have remained profitable. Oil companies were, are, and will be profitable because the world's economy came to be organized on a foundation of plentiful, cheap oil.

to maintain harmony and ensure that everyone is kept happy - that's what makes things the simplest for you and keeps you in power. — Agustino

Do you really think that ensuring everyone is kept happy is the simplest thing to do? From my experience, keeping even several people happy at the same time can be very difficult. Of course, if you control 100% of the world economy... You can just define happiness as drinking Agu Cola; and if you don't like Agu Cola, well, maybe it is time for you to consider another planet.

Before I read your post, I had done a quick GooSearch for the percentage of women in mining, and I looked at the same site you posted. Did you notice that was "MINING REVIEW Africa? Not that Africans don't count.

Here's a quote from a report by the Colorado School of Mines which is applicable to the US:

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 13 percent of the mining industry is now female compared with less than 6 percent at the time of Gibbs’ graduation. At Mines, 17 percent of mining engineering degrees in 2013 were awarded to women compared with 6 percent in 1998. And, interestingly, the new head of the Department of Mining Engineering, Priscilla Nelson, who took over the reins in January, is the first woman ever to head the department.

These are all steps in the right direction, says Jessica Kogel, a senior manager at Imerys with close ties to Mines. But she and others say the industry should do more to take advantage of the attributes women leaders can bring to a company. A new report published by PricewaterhouseCoopers in collaboration with Women in Mining (UK), ‘Mining for Talent 2014,’ states that mining ranks dead last among global industries when it comes to women in leadership positions. Among the world’s top 500 mining companies, only 7.2 percent of directorships are held by women. Among the top 100, women make up just 10.3 percent of boards of directors.

There is still some underground mining in the US, but most of (like in coal, iron ore) is open pit and the hard labor is done by machines operated by people who are dwarfed by the equipment.

I wasn't trying to suggest that once the masses discover that there is no more gas at the pump, they will at once turn to cannibalism. That will happen when they get to McDonalds and discover there are no more Chicken McNuggets and Big Macs. Then, not from hunger but out of blind rage they will fall upon one another.

You might want to avoid fast food joints at that time.

According to the Hubbert Curve, which charts the rise and projected fall of oil, the fall from peak down to minimal extraction will take about as long as it took to reach peak oil -- so the end of oil is not just around the corner. While some opportunities for a better energy policy passed us by in the 1970s, there are still opportunities to prepare for the demise of petroleum energy -- not by finding the miraculous substitute, but rather, learning to live with much less energy consumption.



Both Kunstler and Greer recognize that over a century of time, population will be reduced by the usual Apocalyptic Quartet; but in any given time and place, life will be humming along fairly normally, until another jolting adjustment occurs. The long term adjustment will be step wise, rather than going over a cliff.

In any case, those who have had white hair snowed on them, or those who already have one foot in the grave and the other foot on a banana peel, need not worry. It will be all sic transit gloria mundi before the next oil crisis hits.

Given that hell is sort of other people anyway, those who do live through the depopulating plagues should find life much improved. Just think: if 1/3 of the population are assholes (estimates vary upwards, never downwards) and 6 billion people die between 2050 and 2100, that might be 2 billion fewer assholes to put up with. If God is truly merciful, the dead will be composed entirely of assholes.

Why, it will be like... i don't know, winning the multi-state lottery for $500,000,000.

What is the idyllic society? Should everybody have a say in how the social order is prearranged and run? Or should the ‘best’ or most ‘capable’ individuals run things? Finally, if this is something we can agree with; how do we determine who those individuals are? — Issac Scoggins

I think it is too late for this question. — T Clark

It is always interesting to think about the perfect society, but I agree with T Clark: It is too late for this .

At least, it's too late now; but the time may come when it can again be asked. If people like John Michael Greer and James Howard Kunstler (two writers who have given a great deal of thought to what Post-Peak-Oil means) are right, the time for these questions will arise again. Greer doesn't predict a cultural collapse next year, or next week. Rather, he projects a fairly slow unwinding of the energy crisis in decades time. The environmental crisis may be quicker.

AT any rate, at some point in the not too distant future (maybe 50, maybe 100, maybe 150 years) the major and large institutions will have succumbed to the multiple crisis, and people will find themselves in much smaller communities than the present. Then will be time to deploy a better, more suitable society than we have now. (O f course, don't wait until that happens to start planning,)

Both authors (Greer and Kunstler) recommend preparing now for the inevitable.

Society in the future may be more like society has been in the past Most goods and services will need to be created locally. No more blueberries in New York from Chile. No shirts, no shoes, no services from China, No cars. Bicycles? Maybe. Boats? yes. intense cultivation in the summer, then equally intense food preservation, and finally, food conservation. No insulin. Probably no antibiotics. Scavenging for metal and making the tools that are needed.

Owing to major population decline, many towns will be small enough again to have direct democracy, but the ideal society will be the one that the locals want and are able to operate.

There will probably be elements of existing conditions in future societies: strongmen will probably arise here and there, and that may be good or bad. Some individuals will be more important than others because they have unique and crucial skills. Someone who can make beer (or wine) will be more important than someone who can make computer programs for machines that no longer work. A midwife will be more important than a heart surgeon. A good farmer will be more important than a good auto mechanic.

It will be as difficult as ever for societies to be egalitarian and practice mutual support and protection. Anyone who can help people create and maintain the community they have will be very valuable.

if's, and's, or but's — darthbarracuda

Dick comment, but you don't need the apostrophes here. :razz: — Thorongil

Without the apostrophes one gets ifs, ands, or buts; these spellings may be correct, by typographically they require a second glance.

I understand what you are saying, but gazelles and lions are not human, and we should not judge them as if they were humans.

Darth, I don't know if anyone has told you the facts of life, yet, but let me alert you to how bad they are. Life sucks! Humans can separate themselves a little from nature (and to that extent we become liable to judgement.

"Life isn't a person; life isn't mother nature. It's not a self-conscious process. Until we came along it was all pre-moral--not even a-moral, non-moral, or immoral. Moral didn't exist. "Moral" applies to us only. If you apply morals to "life", nature, the cosmos, etc. you end up with absurdities, like... The moon is gradually moving away from the earth. How immoral of the moon. We need the moon. The Andromeda Galaxy is going to collide with the Milky Way galaxy. Isn't that a crime? Shouldn't the galaxy be diverted? The Milky Way doesn't have to take that from Andromeda, after all.

antelope being hunted for sport — darthbarracuda

When humans engage in horrible acts we can, we should, we must judge it, because judgement is part of our world. Hunting antelope may be natural for wolve, but for your average first world hunter to go shoot animals for trophies can be judged as many bad things.

Because barbarism is a human category of experience. Ripping up plants and chewing them to death is the way animals derive energy. It's not subject to human judgement. One may disapprove of how deer obtain nutrition, but unless one has an alternate method for deer to obtain food... why would one call them barbaric? Deer are not immoral or moral, it's a-moral or non-moral. They are neither barbaric nor civilized; they simply behave.

how barbaric, childish and empty bourgeoisie entertainment seems when the reality of extreme suffering is understood — darthbarracuda

What goes on in the animal kingdom isn't barbaric -- it is life. But filming the zebra being attacked by several lions (or other animals) and then being ripped up -- over, and over, and over -- IS barbaric. Similarly, what is the instructive message in showing uncompetitive chicks being pecked at till they die, or kicked out of the nest by the stronger chick? Apparently producers find this kind of footage really useful.

The selection and inclusion of certain kinds of natural scenes is not, in itself, natural -- it's cultural, and it's done for a pedagogic purpose. No great imagination is needed to derive the message: Killing is natural, the weak die and the strong survive, and the uncompetitive are forced to withdraw and (for all we care) die.

Bad, very bad, and the worst things in life are not necessary for the good to exist, and they are not compensation for good things. Visa versa. There are good, better and best things, there is the same range of bad things, and they exist separately.

A predator (eagle, lion...) captures live prey and begins to eat it before it is dead. The pain the prey experiences before it is dead must be appalling. The pain of severe burns is awful. Cancer, severe injury, and infection can produce pain which rates 10 out of 10. Bullet wounds, blasts, shrapnel, and poisons an produce intolerable pain which until death intervenes, must be endured--not for any good, not in service to anything, not as compensation, not as a balance.

There are ways of relieving pain; short of an induced coma; all pain can't be eliminated short of death. Pain is rated on a scale of 1 (negligible) to to 10 (intolerable). The worst pain I have experienced was, I suppose, 7 and 8 out of 10 -- a badly broken ankle, a very severely bruised thigh muscle, and broken ribs. Each was pretty bad. Fortunately they didn't happen all at the same time. I was endurable because I understood that it wouldn't last a very long time, and it did become less severe fairly quickly (days or weeks, not hours).

IF one could eliminate pain from existence, would one eliminate 1 through 10, or maybe 6 through 10? After all, certain kinds of pain (registering that one has touched something hot enough to burn) are vital. One needs to know if a major bone is broken. One needs to know one is having a heart attack.

Palliative Care specialists are becoming more aggressive in alerting patients to the existence of better pain control (and terminal disease management) than patients might be aware of. But some kinds of pain are still severe and are difficult to quell.

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum, Mr. Scoggins down in Big D. Let me hang this around your neck:

Is there an ultimate standard of morality, something outside physical reality? — Issac Scoggins

First of all, what does the intensifier "ultimate" mean to a standard of morality? A system defines what is right and wrong. What is it that would be more right and wrong?

Where, outside of physical reality, would this ultimate standard be lurking? God? If you think God provides the ultimate standard of right and wrong, say so. (Lots of people think it's God's doing.) If not god, then who? What? Where? Why?

John Michael Greer, a blogger, ecologist, science fiction author, "Arch Druid" and so forth says this about Marxism:

Think of any currently popular political or religious ideology, and you’ll likely find at its center the claim that one and only one story explains everything in the world. For fundamentalist Christians, it’s the story of Fall and Redemption ending with the Second Coming of Christ. For Marxists, it’s the story of dialectical materialism ending with the dictatorship of the proletariat. For believers in any of the flotilla of apocalyptic ideologies cruising the waterways of the modern imagination, it’s another version of the same story, with different falls from grace ending in redemption through different catastrophes. For rationalists, neo-conservatives, most scientists, and many other people in the developed world, the one true story is the story of progress.

***
For fundamentalist Christians, no matter what the problem, the solution is surrendering your will to Jesus (or, more to the point, to the guy who claims to be able to tell you who Jesus wants you to vote for). For Marxists, the one solution for all problems is proletarian revolution. For neoconserva-tives, it’s the free market. For scientists, it’s more scientific research and education. For Democrats, it’s electing Democrats; for Republicans, it’s electing Republicans, and so on.

from The Long Descent: A User's Guide to the End of the Industrial Age[/i] Chapter 2, The Stories We Tell Ourselves

Exactly.

Then cut out the bullshit justifications and call it what it is. Oh, and quit chastising other countries for doing the same as you, i.e pursuing their own interests. — CuddlyHedgehog

British singer Billy Bragg wrote a new version of the Internationale, the worldwide worker's communist anthem: these lines...

In our world poisoned by exploitation
Those who have taken now they must give
And end the vanity of nations
We've but one earth on which to live

express the idea that ordinary working people the world over [are said to] have a common transcending interest over and above the interests of 'nations'. This is true in some respects and not true in other respects.

Small farmers in France and small farmers in Germany or England certainly have a similar problem -- getting a good price for their crops. The EU attempts to work out an equitable solution for small farmers. Between small farmers in France and small farmers in the United States (as if there were any small farmers left in the US) have the common problem of getting enough return on their crops -- without the EU to work out a solution.

Workers in the US auto industry have the same interests as the workers in the EU. Japanese, and South Korean auto plants. The interests of manufacturing companies are represented by trade negotiators; the interests of the workers (in every country) get short shrift.

Agriculture in South America has been penetrated by European and American seed/fertilizer/herbicide/pesticide manufacturers who have gradually shaped their agricultural practices to resemble the industrialized model.

In one hand, we have the stateless, borderless ideals of the old-fashioned communists--workers of the world unite. In another hand we have international capitalism--whatever it takes to maximize return for shareholders. In a third hand you and me are both observing what goes on in the world and trying to describe it.

You and I may not approve of what is going on. In point of fact, I believe you don't, and I don't either. I do not approve of many of the "interests" pursued by the American state, and numerous other states as well. But it seems to me true that states, and international conglomerate corporations, are the contenders in the international arena. They are all pursuing a batch of interests that match the interests of only some of their people. Peasants, industrial workers, foot soldiers, fishermen, municipal workers, nurses, old people--all sorts--just don't register in international affairs.

So, when I say "countries have interests, not friends" only some of reality is described. If you have a better way to capture the complexities of multi-level competing interests around the world, let's hear it.

Because I find there to be this tendency to "be for and against" when looking at countries. So if your critical about the US, that means people aren't going to be critical about those countries opposing the US (or vice versa) — ssu

For the last time, who said this? Who? — René Descartes

Perhaps not in these hallowed halls one does not hear this, but I hear it in conversations quite often. For instance, if one talks about Syria, someone will say "The Americans are bombing women and children (men apparently don't count) again; we are military bullies. We should leave Syria alone. The Syrians don't deserve what we are doing to them... and so on." In their haste to condemn the US for being a military imperialist racist sexist regime, they overlook the horrors of what Syrians various factions are doing, and what the Assad regime is doing to Syrians. At least we are not dumping barrels of chorine gas on neighborhoods.

Of course, the badness of the Assad regime doesn't make the badness of US policy in Syria better.

The same thing is true in Iraq and Afghanistan. Our failures in these two countries do not redeem the failures of these two countries within their own borders. And their failures don't redeem ours either, of course.

Yet another example is the unlawful immigration conflict. People who are advocates for undocumented unlawful immigrants argue for the legitimacy of the immigrants presence here, as if the citizens of this country had no stake in how many immigrants get here, or how much illegality is involved.

Another problem in people's thinking about foreign policy (among other things) is that they 'personalize the behavior of nations'. "The United States is a bully." Syria is crazy." "France is snobbish." "Italians aren't serious." and so on. Diminishing a nation by characterizing it as an annoying person gives one simple objects to think about, but gets in the way of a complex nuanced view of reality.

Let me be the first to admit -- I too have difficulty remembering that nations have interests, not friends. It's just easier to think about world affairs in simplified form.

In the Noam Chomsky - William F. Buckley interview I posted above, Chomsky demonstrates the way we should think. IF only I could think like Chomsky.

You are asking a deeper question than I may be able to answer.

Is it that people can not understand that the US and Iran, for instance, can both pursue reasonable self interest--which happens to be opposed by its opposite? I can think of several reasons why Iran might wish to have nuclear weapons: Israel, Saudi Arabia, and us. And there are several reasons why we might not want Iran to have nuclear bombs: Israel, Saudi Arabia, and us.

Iran has good reason not to trust the USA -- given our interventions in their affairs during the 20th century. We were probably pursuing our self interest in interfering with their affairs but it backfired. Untoward outcomes is a possibility every nation's foreign policy has to contend with. Foreign policy operatives have to ask themselves "Just how much value will this devious piece of maneuvering have for us? Is it worth it? What if it blows up in our faces? Do we have plausible deniability?"

Foreign policy in the middle east seems to be governed by the US Government's stated policy that "Our self interest is staked on controlling middle eastern oil supplies." Marching in and just seizing the oil is bad manners, (and the marching in can back fire badly -- see IRAQ) so let's just install a conveniently pro-American government, and then we can have the oil.

You've gone to bed, but let me expand a bit on why some think that nations can not be judged by personal, individual standards.

A nation may be composed of 10 million, 300 million or a billion. More and less. The government represents the varied interests of its citizens. The government also contains separate interests such as the judicial system, the military, health agencies, economic agencies, and so forth. The citizens carry out all sorts of business, cultural, industrial, agricultural, activities, just to mention a few.

They who represent a nation in the world represent a vast array of interests. Somehow they must act to benefit as many of the particular interest the people have as possible. Every other nation has the same situation.

So, if a powerful nation (like Great Britain--back when it was great, or France, or the Soviet Union, or the United States can advance the good of its people's varied interests, it should and it will. That may mean empire; it may mean military dominance; it may mean financial dominance, and so on.

You and I can personally apply our ethical standards to our own situations and behave accordingly. We are only responsible to ourselves and several others, while the state executive is responsible to millions, or billions.

This sounds somewhat a-moral, and perhaps it is. But large nation states are at the top of the moral food chain, and who above them can judge? Only other large nation states are in a position to judge in a way that will possibly make a difference. Holland could denounce Nazi Germany, but UK, the USSR, and the USA were in a position to punish Germany for invading Poland. (Yes, I realize we didn't join the war just then.)

I'm fine if America invades a country, just don't make up bullshit to justify it. Simply say: "We would like to invade this country because we feel like it. There are lots of materials, human labour and strategic positions, and we want all of it. We also want to press the native people as we are superior to them and we need them to make computers and fridges for us. We also have a more powerful army, so its easy for us to invade this country as they can't do anything about it. That's why we want to invade this country. We have no care for local populations, and collateral damage means nothing to us, it's just a statistic." — René Descartes

This is, of course, an excellent example of "graceless honesty".

We had become an imperialistically minded state well before WWII, but after WWII we discovered we were the replacement of the British and the French empires. We pursued military, economic, and political agendas which we preferred -- just like the Romans, Spanish, Portuguese, Hapsburg, German, Russian, French, and British empires had done before us.

There is no other rational basis for a powerful country to act, really, except in its own best interest. Our best interest lay in organizing the world to suit our economic, military, and political needs. The foreign policy of a nation, or empire, may very well be immoral by individuals standards (there are numerous examples). But nations have interests, and that's what they pursue.

[/quote]My main questions:[/quote]

I'm feeling oppositional and obstructive.

Do Americans have a feeling of superiority over others, or a sense of Manifest Destiny to this day? — René Descartes

Many Americans feel superior to many other people. This is typical of people in general. Manifest Destiny has pretty much been fulfilled, so might as well be for it rather than agin it.

Why do Americans need to be so involved in other nations affairs? — René Descartes

Because we live on a relatively small planet, and the affairs of one nation affect the affairs of other nations. That said, it isn't clearly to me exactly what we are doing in Afghanistan. Presumably we were in Iraq to have some say over how their oil was disposed of. That didn't seem to work out very well. Vietnam didn't work out very well either. On the other hand, WWII seems to have been entirely worth it from our perspective.

Why is America a hypocritical country? — René Descartes

For god's sake, can we please get over our shock when somebody is hypocritical!!! Look, René, everybody on earth is hypocritical: it's a vital tool to get through life, and it just isn't natural for human beings to be gracelessly honest all the time -- or maybe ever.

When will America cease it's Imperial ambitions? — René Descartes

How about never? Does never work for you? I suppose when we are one of the many crushed, pureed, and canned countries that once were strong and dynamic, we'll stop being imperialistic.

Who will take over from America IF they ever collapse? — René Descartes

Whoever it is, you will find them hypocritical. If the dire warnings about peak oil, global warming, and economic collapse come true, there may not be another imperialistic power for quite some time. It may be that people will be praying for a strong country to take control of the chaos.

When will Americans realise what they are doing is wrong? — René Descartes

How about never. Does never work for you?

Imperialism has its good points. The British Empire did screw a lot of the natives out of a good deal. On the other hand, they dragged them out of the shadowy superstitious pagan past into the bright sunshine of 19th century enlightenment and progress. So that was a good thing. The trouble with some of Britain's colonies was that the British didn't impose civilization on them quite long enough.

Somebody has to maintain order in the world. The Romans did it. The Brits did it. The Americans are doing it. Naturally the Romans, Brits and Americans have all maintained order in their own interests. Why the hell would they do otherwise? Little 10th century Rus expanded from a batch pf peasant huts to a great empire reaching from Eastern Europe all the way to the Pacific Ocean. Probably all the petty kingdoms and half-assed sheikdoms of Central Asia were better off as part of the Russian Empire than fending off hordes of invaders themselves.

Had the American Indians been the beneficiaries of guns, germs, and steel the way the Europeans were, history would have been different. Alas for them, fortunately for us, they weren't. Nothing wrong with American Indians -- all of them from the Arctic to Terra Del Fuego. But the fact is, they didn't know we were coming, hadn't exploited the mineral resources below their feet, and weren't able to fend us off. So, the Spanish, Portuguese, British, and Americans (mostly us 4) just rolled over them.

Life is not fair. As a rule, nations do not apply personal religious standards to their own actions. Like, nations don't have friends. They have interests. What is in the interest of the State of France? Liberty, Equality, and Brotherhood for Algerians and SE Asians? In a pigs eye.

Should America pursue it's interests in the world as if it were a Quaker Meeting? No.

Marx also said that class conflict is one of the features of existing societies:

The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.

Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master(3) and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.

In the earlier epochs of history, we find almost everywhere a complicated arrangement of society into various orders, a manifold gradation of social rank. In ancient Rome we have patricians, knights, plebeians, slaves; in the Middle Ages, feudal lords, vassals, guild-masters, journeymen, apprentices, serfs; in almost all of these classes, again, subordinate gradations.

The modern bourgeois society that has sprouted from the ruins of feudal society has not done away with class antagonisms. It has but established new classes, new conditions of oppression, new forms of struggle in place of the old ones.

Marx, the Communist Manifesto

Why was Marx poor? Well for one, he wasn't welcome in his homeland or in Paris. London accommodated all sorts. For two, his trade was philosophy and writing. He made a little money off his journalistic efforts. He spent much of his time in the round, glass domed reading room of the British Museum researching and writing Das Capital.

You can have a self-supporting tradesman or a financially dependent philosopher. With one you get his labor until he dies an early death; with the other you get philosophy that shook the world. Which one is the better deal? (Not everyone will agree the latter was better.)

Your 25,000th voter doesn't know what the total is, of course. For all he knows, the election IS already decided by many votes. And even if the vote was all but a tie, everyone who voted (either way) matters as much as the last one to vote.

At what threshold does a change in individual behavior cause a major unintended social effect? — Abdul

Behavior changed from what?

Let's say 3000 people are watching a broadway play premier. No one has seen the play before. The expected behavior is that everyone will remain seated until the intermission. Everyone knows is expected, because it is well established social convention.

Suppose, during the first act that 25 people get up and exit the theater at various times. Has an unintended social effect occurred? Then, suppose that during the second act (before the intermission) 30 more people scattered throughout the theater get up and exit the theater. 55 people have now walked out.

My guess is that at some point during the first two acts people walking out will have had a social effect (intended or not) on the 2945 remaining audience and the cast. Probably somebody has studied this. Is there a difference between one person walking out about every minute or people walking out at irregular intervals.

If people walk out of a production, does that change the opinions about the play of the people who stayed? I would guess it does (favorably or negatively).

Life, including politics presents a myriad instances where the uncoordinated actions of individuals can have significant social effects. In open voting (show of hands) the act of voting puts pressure (positive or negative) on others in the room. In legislative voting where votes are displayed on an electronic board, it is clear that some legislators are measuring the vote before they cast their own vote. Sometimes votes are changed.

In a public speaking engagement, one or two loud objectors can create significant problems for the speaker; if the speaker cannot dominate the audience, then he may lose his audience, especially if additional objectors pop up.

It is. Sort of, in a totally crooked way. Other people make up their statistics, I make up mine. And if you say it with a straight face and with conviction, a lot of people will believe you.

How do you know? — CuddlyHedgehog

How so I know? I conducted a survey of 3329 practicing psychopaths (they're listed in the phone book) and asked them if they were happy. 22% said they were happy, 73% said they were not happy, and 5% said that providing me with a slow and painful death might make them slightly happier than they were at the time.

It depends on how you define happiness. — CuddlyHedgehog

True, and I suppose I don't know whether psychopaths are happy. However, people who are psychopaths, and not merely slightly to somewhat psychopathic (a much larger group) don't seem to be happy. They don't connect with other people very well, they don't attach. The connections between their fore-brains (frontal cerebral cortexes) and limbic systems may be structurally impaired. Does serial murder makes a classic psychopath happy? I don't think so.

Remember, psychopathy is abnormal; so is sociopathy. The normal routes to normal (and socially acceptable) satisfactions do not seem to be open to them.

It does thus originate, true, Not to get too fussy, but doesn't "παιδο" contain a lower case alpha and a lower case iota? That aside, are you from England or Australia? There are differences between American and British spellings. Like, color and colour, center and centre.

Check out the comments at the end. — Sir2u

He had better hope the jury isn't drawn from Yahoo user lists.

But I sort of agree, up to a point. I don't know about girls, but boys certainly fantasize about having sex with adults. Whether it was a good, bad, or forgettable experience would depend a lot on the personality of the adult. Sex with a lot of adults just wouldn't be that much fun for a lot of other adults, let alone a 13 year old. Where is a hebephile (prefers older children than pedophiles) when you need one? They are supposed to be good at sex with young teenagers.

Some people become happy via murdering, slaughter, abusing, exploitation, raping, kidnapping etcetera — Kitty

You are confusing the a-morality and moral impairment of psychopaths with their alleged happiness. Psychopaths are generally not happy; they are also generally not remorseful. And besides, one doesn't have to be a psychopath to murder, slaughter, abuse, exploit, rape, kidnap, and so on.

And paedophiles per se are not psychopaths either. (Are you English? Australian? You spelled it paedophile; nothing wrong with that, of course, if it makes you happy. Some people spell it pedophile, which is not more correct or less. You also didn't use the Oxford comma, so my geo-grammarian locator tool is confused.)

Pedophiles don't choose to be pedophiles; they just are--not that they should be turned loose on the nearest elementary school, either. But within the limits of the law and what society considers acceptable, yes -- they too may pursue happiness.

Charleton sometimes has interesting things to say. — T Clark

When he's not being a dick and a charlatan.

Americans have a right "to pursue happiness"; the constitution doesn't guarantee that anyone will over-take happiness.

I have been unhappy, and I have been happy. I can't say exactly what caused either state.

Each person is, though, in charge of their own pursuit of happiness. Maybe they do a good job of pursuing happiness, maybe not. Other people contribute to their happiness, and other people detract from their happiness. One should try to avoid people, places, and things that make one unhappy.

If your spouse is making you unhappy, if you hate the city you live in, and your car is a hateful pile of junk, you should try to get free of these problems: divorce, moving somewhere else, and getting a different car. It doesn't make sense to change your attitude while staying in a bad marriage in a city you hate with a car that is more trouble than it is worth.

Maybe you are stuck where you are, for various reasons. Happiness may just not be in the cards. You may have to settle for being cheerful instead of happy.