Can you imagine such an attempt and such a committee. :grin:
Who would you put on such a committee? — universeness
It would have to be international - historians who have no national loyalties, or else have thrashed out their biases among their peers. It is possible for a academics to see past and beneath their own inherited mythology. Indeed, quite a few have published fat, well-documented books on the historical distortions in their own nation's identity-story.
Of course, there is a much larger number of books published with the aim of distorting it farther, to serve one faction or another. It's not easy for a the average reader to evaluate them. And, given the investment people have in - and the sacrifices they are asked to make for their country, belief in that narrative is not easily swayed. — Vera Mont
Didn't Aristotle argue if it doesn't have substance it is not real, or something like that. Gods have no substance and we can not directly experience them. We can think of a god and have a feeling that we think is a god, but how do prove that is a god and not own reaction to what we think? I once used Artmis a Greek goddess to help me get off a forested mountain but I know these gods and goddesses as concepts, not as beings. This is extremely important because only when what we believe is correct will we get good outcomes. Acting on false information results in bad outcomes.
Concerns about public misinformation in the United States—ranging from politics to science—are growing. Here, we provide an overview of how and why citizens become (and sometimes remain) misinformed about science. Our discussion focuses specifically on misinformation among individual citizens. However, it is impossible to understand individual information processing and acceptance without taking into account social networks, information ecologies, and other macro-level variables that provide important social context. Specifically, we show how being misinformed is a function of a person’s ability and motivation to spot falsehoods, but also of other group-level and societal factors that increase the chances of citizens to be exposed to correct(ive) information. We conclude by discussing a number of research areas—some of which echo themes of the 2017 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Communicating Science Effectively report—that will be particularly important for our future understanding of misinformation, specifically a systems approach to the problem of misinformation, the need for more systematic analyses of science communication in new media environments, and a (re)focusing on traditionally underserved audiences. — Dietram A. Scheufele https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9914-5407 scheufeleatwiscdotedu and Nicole M. Krause
Ah yes, the myth of 'discernment by committee' ... — 180 Proof
I am wondering, isn't it possible to determine what is a myth and want is a fact? — Athena
I really like most of your list of 12 proviso's for a better world but I would change 6 to "Universal FREE education, healthcare and a guaranteed welfare level that provides basic needs, from cradle to grave."
I would change 9 to "Freedom of personal religion but no religious authority figure is acceptable."
I would change 10 to 'Respect for the rights of private property unless it was obtained by nefarious means.'
I would also remove 'freedom from search and seizure,' from your number 8, as you would be removing one of the main defences against nefarious individuals and organisations. — universeness
Well, as I've pointed out previously, I prefer 'economic democracy fortified by representative democracy' rather than our status quo laissez-faire, plutonomic, "representative democracy" (i.e. constitutional republicanism) inspired by classical Athens & Rome and established in 1789. The "group think" of "the people" – who have only ever ratified with their "morally-informed" votes the various exploitation agendas of plutocrats – was baked into the US system almost two centuries prior to the "1958 National Defense Education Act ". — 180 Proof
*Myths and facts have only the most tenuous relationship.*
If you mean determine what's true and false in history, the answer is: Not always. Documents and chronicles are as often falsified as destroyed; witnesses and participants lie, or are intimidated into silence. Past facts may be unrecoverable, unverifiable. But a good many historical facts do survive; conflicting and differing records can be compared; time-lines and family lineages traced; supporting documentation found in the form of personal correspondence and journals; business ledgers, cargo manifests, registers of birth, marriage and death survive... Even quite a lot of physical evidence can be detected by scientific methods. It's painstaking, intellectually demanding work, but there are those who love it and are faithful to it.
* The word 'myth' is so frequently used to stand for falsehood or lie that it's now considered an exact synonym. It is not. A myth is a story that has been passed down in a culture through oral tradition; it may have had some basis in fact at one, or it may be a conflation of old legends; either way, they are part of the fabric of a human society; a narrative of identity and continuity; it's purpose is not and has never been to deceive anyone. I would plead for a distinction between 'myth' and 'lie'. * — Vera Mont
As global overpopulation has resulted in a flood of people coming to US borders and overwhelming cities that are pressed to care for them, it is only logical for us to sincerely wish their own nations could meet their needs. — Athena
. We want the best for everyone and sent many of them our Industries believing if their economies grew commerce for everyone would get better. — Athena
Throughout the nineteenth century and up to the 1930s,
as they secured what they wanted in Latin America, cheap labor, plentiful raw materials, and favorable business conditions. After World War II, Latin American nationalism and revolutions forced American-owned enterprises to redefine their business model throughout the region. U.S. businesses integrated themselves into local societies through direct investment in manufacturing and the creation of broad-based consumer societies eager to buy everything from Coca-Cola to ChevroletsAmerican corporations stridently resisted local opposition — https://www.unmpress.com/9780826319968/the-century-of-u-s-capitalism-in-latin-america/
Nothing remotely Star Trekky!Here are eight of the most notorious cases of US interference in Latin America.
...we already grabbed the goodies and we're not gonna share.It is impossible for the whole world to have the standard of living of the US, because... — Athena
And of course, the waste doesn't start or end with food.he United States discards more food than any other country in the world: nearly 40 million tons — 80 billion pounds — every year.
My apologies for the defect in my character whereby my brand of historical nostalgia fails to be myopic and pollyanna enough for your liking. Enjoy your Mother's Day, madam. — 180 Proof
Global overpopulation is cased by factors traceable through history. The proselytizing religions had a fair amount to do with it, as did the requirement of agriculture and war machineries for cheap human raw material. Industry needed fewer workers, but a surplus labour pool kept them in perpetual competition and thus kept wages low. Unfettered reproduction in the lower classes has always served the interes of the upper classes, who kept their own relatively low, by the simple expedient of constraining their women and casting their own surplus seed to the lower classes. — Vera Mont
Now there's a typically American whopper of a historical distortion! American industry colonized the 'developable' world the same way the British had before them - with the aid of military intervention where guile and buying already corrupt officials failed. The industrialists were, at first, strip-mining everywhere for natural resources, and later for cheap, compliant labour. If the process was made easier by replacing inconvenient or unco-operative native governments, they had the means to do so. Those countries didn't become 'shitholes' by accident or the local population's efforts.
Throughout the nineteenth century and up to the 1930s,
American corporations stridently resisted local opposition
— https://www.unmpress.com/9780826319968/the-century-of-u-s-capitalism-in-latin-america/
as they secured what they wanted in Latin America, cheap labor, plentiful raw materials, and favorable business conditions. After World War II, Latin American nationalism and revolutions forced American-owned enterprises to redefine their business model throughout the region. U.S. businesses integrated themselves into local societies through direct investment in manufacturing and the creation of broad-based consumer societies eager to buy everything from Coca-Cola to Chevrolets
Here are eight of the most notorious cases of US interference in Latin America.
Nothing remotely Star Trekky! — Vera Mont
Would you follow the Shadows or the Vorlons in the Babylon 5 universe, or would you reject them both? — universeness
The trouble is that the Star Trek prime directive was NEVER applied in our early history.
Bloody conquest was the main clarion call in the infancy of what we at some point called 'civilisation.'
The global socioeconomic complete imbalance that exists today, is a consequence of those who in the past with tech advantages, did not adhere to a prime directive, that compelled them to leave aboriginal peoples unmolested. — universeness
I know nothing of them. — Athena
Would you follow the Shadows or the Vorlons in the Babylon 5 universe, or would you reject them both? — universeness
Universeness you may appreciate this. The Celts and Greeks got along just fine at first. Unlike the Celts and Romans. As the Celts perceived the Romans they not only made slaves of others, but they also made slaves of themselves. It would take a lot more information gathering for me to maintain a discussion of such matters but I think it is worth knowing more. — Athena
If we think of ourselves as evolved from an ape-like creature we can perhaps be more forgiving of human behavior and maybe a bit more in awe of our desire to do better. Packs of dogs and troops of chimpanzees do not stop to question the rightness of fighting for the recourses and territory they needed. Why do expect so much more from humans? — Athena
Just enjoy the opportunity to learn more and know more Athena, and then rest, in the comfort of knowing that your insatiable desire for more knowledge and to be able to 'understand,' is about the best and most virtuous desire it's possible for a human to demonstrate.My brain tires and it is time for me to rest. I am listening to lectures about Hinduism right now. Their epic myth that made them more resistant to war put them on a different path than the path Rome followed. My goodness there is so much to know, and my poor brain can't keep up with my desire to know. — Athena
As John Sheridan has been known to utter, "absafragginlootly — universeness
I am not surprised he became a little pessimistic. — universeness
I'm too old to enlist in an army. Plus, I've hated uniforms since Grade 1. Besides, what's the core message of B5? Another two thousand years, still money, still religion, still war, still exploitation and oppression, cruelty and deceit - same old crap on a much bigger stage.Draw a line against the darkness! Join the army of light! — universeness
Hopefully the story improves after each great effort to change things for the better — universeness
Wishful fantasy. If the greed-driven corporate economy and the deceitful, infighting, xenophobic government of an interplanetary empire is exactly like the corrupt, deceitful, infighting, xenophobic government of ancient Assyria, where is the "better"? Where is the arc of history? — Vera Mont
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