Slashdot Mirror

http://www.unesco.org/educatio...

so instead of fixing real world issue so to reduce the motivation for war, let's go kill more civilians than enemies....Why? cause if we don't do it someone else will and that would put us at a disadvantage = Military Industrial Complex Mindset.

Second Amendment does not use the word Gun or Guns but Arms as in Armaments and this includes tanks, missiles, and killer drones https://www.youtube.com/watch?... . Do you have your personal personnel killer drone yet? It'd be cheaper than sponsoring some child in another country, i.e. https://www.childfund.org/ and we can test them via the israeli occupation gaza open weapons range. You know for morale, not morals.

That website you are referring to is BS propaganda to draw more adults in grad school. Either that are they confuse the average age of grad students with the age the grad students actually graduate. Here's a link to some real data and particularly look at "Table 1. Median age at graduation of recent doctoral graduates" (my emphasis). For natural sciences, the median age that people _receive_ their Ph.D. is at 30.5 years old. For all fields, when they _receive_ their Ph.D., it's 32.7 years old.

Another echo of the dubious 99.7. It shouldn't take 2 seconds to realize what nonsense that is. Did you also believe the reports of Fidel's popularity?

Why is the statistic dubious? This poster even gave the source for the statistic, UNESCO. I looked up the literacy rate data on UNESCO's site and found this page with literacy statistics. The rates they publish for Cuba seems to match what both posters posted. Do you have data that contradicts this or does it just "feel" wrong to you? You've been around here for a long time, you should know data plays better with this crowd than emotion. Please present your data refuting the statistic or STFU.

the sats are calibrated with ground data... Every year their numbers are adjusted up...

No, they're not. The measurements are going up, not the adjustments. The citations you yourself provided show only tiny adjustments to the trend, every few years, going both up and down - while the measured temperature trend is ever upwards.

The calibration is not re-done from scratch every year. That would be meaningless, as you say. The satellite data obviously must be kept comparable, both to itself and to ground measurements, so that any trends can be determined. Give these people some credit, would you? not to mention the expert reviewers who checked their methods.

I can't cross reference that information with any other source

Similar data is in the HadCRU and NASA datasets, not just NOAA. They're all cross-checked with each other and with related evidence. Perhaps you should look harder.

As to Vermeer, that contradicts what was in the Church paper that you cited yourself.

No, it doesn't. Church's Fig 5 and Vermeer's Fig 3 Lower are the same graph, though Vermeer has a blue trend line drawn over the red measurement line. You can see clearly they have the same values at the same decades. Fig 3 Upper is the derivative of that trend line, showing rate of change.

how long do you think CO2 remains in the atmosphere?

Individual molecules of carbon are being re-absorbed - and re-emitted - all the time, by plants and by the ocean, in large quantities (around 200Gt/year). This is normally in equilibrium, with a slow growth from geologic weathering and occasional volcanism. The rates of natural emission and uptake aren't fixed however, due to numerous feedbacks, so the best we can say is between 30 and 95 years for much of it, with perhaps 20% persisting a lot longer (thousands of years). It depends a lot on the atmospheric concentration, and how much we keep releasing. This page discusses the issue and provides lifetime graphs.

If true this implies the CO2 from our sources is being emitted at a lower rate than the biosphere's absorption ability.

Obviously that's not the case, because atmospheric levels have gone up sharply for 150 years See this ice-core data and more recent Mauna Loa data, showing a definite acceleration even in the last 50 years.
Regarding CO2 spectrum absorption, your questions were already answered by the citations I've given. Broad-spectrum sunlight is not only reflected, but also absorbed and re-radiated in infra-red (look up black-body radiation), which is then partially blocked by various greenhouse gases. This is well-understood science going back to the 1800s. and I'm not going to go over it all yet again. I've already cited papers that quantify the measured radiative forcing of CO2. There's no serious debate about this aspect, only about the feedbacks and resulting temperature rise.

Regarding ocean acidification, Turley et al 2006 is cited by many. Can't find a link to the paper, but here is a related presentation by Turley - see page 4.

Sorry, but I no longer have the time to spend with long explanations. It's taking too much time from my work. If the many peer-reviewed papers I've already provided haven't convinced you of anything, then providing more won't help. Either you're unable to follow the studies I've cited, or you're unwilling to to accept them as valid evidence, despite peer review and cross-correlation with other evidence. You claim that the broad agreement

With a child mortality rate (under five years old) in India of 52 (compare UK: 5, US: 7) and a literacy rate of 90% (or 74%, depending on source; compare UK/US: 99%) I wonder if the money should not rather be spend on healthcare and education (and health education). Even though space travel and lunar landing seems more fun.

Sources: Unicef Unesco Wikipedia

Again, there's a body of books on the historical development of higher education and nowhere in published literature on the subject have I found an opinion that the ancient schools of India, China, or Middle East should be called universities on their own merit (as opposed to how laymen call them). If you can point me to a scholarly source, either monographs or journal papers, that would corroborate your claim, I will be very thankful for that. I've posted one reference below. I'll be glad to look for some more.

That's because you've studied a very euro-centric view of history. :)
Not your fault...that's how things were in the 20th century (and have carried forward into the 21st century as well). When the current crop of "academics" croak, then we might see some realism as far as history is concerned. If one read history per Western academics, nothing happened in asia save the fueling of Western adventurism, materialism (business, science, technology, etc) and a need to educate the heathen in the ways of the Christian god!

Don't know if this counts...I don't have the patience to try and find this out. We studied about it in Indian history (in India)...so it is common knowledge for Indians who studied in India.

http://whc.unesco.org/en/tenta...

Nalanda is one of the most ancient international centers of education and learning equivalent to modern universities, with a very rich library. An inscribed seal written "Sri-Nalandamahavihariy-Arya-Bhikshu-Sanghasya" identifies the site as Nalanda Mahavihara.
Nalanda has a very ancient history and goes back to the days of Mahavira and Buddha in sixth and fifth centuries B.C. Many references in the Pâli Buddhist literature mention about Nâlandâ. It is said that in course of his journeys Buddha often halted at this place. It is also the place of birth and nirvana of Sariputra, one of the famous disciples of Buddha.
The place rose into prominence in 5th Century A.D. as a great monastic-cum-educational institution for oriental art and learning in the whole Buddhist world, attracting students from like Hiuen Tsang and I-Tsing from China and other distant countries. The galaxy of luminaries associated with it includes Nagarjuna, Aryadeva, Vasubandhu, Dharmapala, Suvishnu, Asanga, Silabhadra, Dharmakirti, Shantarakshita. Another important mention in history, is that around second century, Suvishnu built one hundred and eight temples at Nalanda to prevent the decline of the Hînayâna and Mahâyâna schools of Buddhism.
Various subjects like theology, sabda-vidyâ grammar, hetu-vidyâ (logic), astronomy, metaphysics, chikitsâ-vidyâ medicine and philosophy were taught here. The accounts of pilgrim state that Nâlandâ was bustling with literary activities.
Nâlandâ had now acquired a celebrity spread all over the east as a centre of Buddhist theology and educational activities. This is evident from the fact that within a short period of thirty years following Hiuen Tsang's departure, no less than eleven Chinese and Korean travelers are known to have visited Nalanda.
Life lead by Nalanda monks is regarded as the ideal to be followed by the Buddhist all over the world. This celebrity status persisted through ages. It is also attributed that a detailed history of Nalanda would be the history of Mahayanist Buddhism.
The institution was maintained by the revenue collected from the villages bestowed specifically for the purpose by the contemporary rulers as evident from inscriptions. Royal patronage was therefore the key note of the prosperity and efficiency of Nâlandâ.

That person should tell the UN to mind its own business!

The island is owned by the Commissioners of Irish Lights, i.e. the Irish government.

From the UNESCO web page on Sceilg Mhichíl:

When in 1578 Queen Elizabeth I of England dissolved Ballinskelligs following the rebellion of the Earl of Desmond, under whose protection it had been, the island passed from the Augustinian Order to John Butler. However, although the monastery no longer existed, it continued to be a place of pilgrimage. Around 1826 the owner sold the island to the Corporation for Preserving and Improving the Port of Dublin (later to become the Commissioners of Irish Lights), who built two lighthouses on the Atlantic side.

Sorry to burst your little libertarian bubble there, dude. Better luck next time.

We already have advanced, powerful, flexible learning management systems and promising new ones appearing all the time, e.g. Instructure Canvas. The better ones are easily good enough for most online learning and teaching needs and most learners and teachers only use a small percentage of the features on offer (some claim 80% using 20% of features). For all its sins, Moodle has been a pioneer in this respect and one that many are trying to emulate.

Then there's open educational resources (OER): Creative Commons licensed learning and teaching resources that anyone can download, edit, use, and redistribute with no strings attached except respectful attribution. UNESCO are leading a large co-ordinated effort to make this the new standard in education: http://www.unesco.org/new/en/c.... There are dozens of repositories of resources, worksheets, media, learning activities, and whole courses available today and the number is growing. Anyone can set up an installation of Moodle as a courseware "hub" from which other Moodle's can import learning content from. Here's Moodle.org's official hub: http://moodle.net/

So what are Microsoft and Google bringing to the table? What we already have plus PR, marketing, and wholly unethical blanket surveillance? Do they intend to "fudge" important issues and manipulate education systems to generate yet more revenue for themselves, regardless of any detrimental effects on learning outcomes? Remember that the people we're teaching today are the ones who have to take care of us and fix the messes we've created tomorrow. I'd like them to be smart, insightful, intuitive, creative, analytical and critical thinkers rather than the rather uninspiring products of common core standards and bureacractic mediocrity.

Why are you so inflexible on the idea of keeping classic slashdot *forever*. Think of it as a protected historical landmark in the internet space.

I'm writing UNESCO World Heritage Centre to preserve the Classic right now!
http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/

humanity was born in the ice ages of the Pleistocene we've never experienced a planet as warm as the dinosaurs... Humans will survive a warmer earth I have no doubt, but the potential for massive disruption to the food supply is there and if that happens there's going to be some really ugly war that humanity might not survive. The reason to be scared of global warming is because of those changing fertile zones, humanity goes batshit crazy when starvation is eminent.

Humanity has experienced the whole gamut of climates, from hot deserts to frozen Arctic lands. Civilization is very tenuous at those northern fringes (see the Vikings who ended up having to abandon their colonies in Greenland and Newfoundland).

Guess you haven't thought about the fact that there are vast tracts of land in northern Canada, Alaska, and Siberia that will become viable farmland if the growing season gets a little longer. If the predictions of global warming alarmists come to pass (and so far they have not), I'll be concerned about inundation of coastal cities; but given the large net increase in viable farmland, there should be no concerns about starvation. Global warming is much more likely to exacerbate the obesity epidemic.

At the briefing in which they announced their decision, government officials said Brazilian aircraft maker Embraer SA would be Saab's principal partner. The transfer of technology is crucial to help Brazil develop future generations of fighter aircraft. "There isn't necessarily a need to produce all the parts in Brazil," Amorim, the defense minister said. "What's important is that specific aviation technology is transferred to Brazil so we can develop it."

Brazil has a longstanding policy of spending to develop their own technology infrastructure.. The NSA angle makes for good headlines, but I have to believe the partnership/technology transfer has more to do with it.

Malala gets this one hands-down. Both made very important statements we must pay attention to, but a fucking headshot beats hanging out in a Russian airport IMHO.

I disagree, strongly. Have you actually listened to her speeches? Sample:

"If you want to see peace in Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan; if you want to end the war; to fight against the war; then instead of sending guns send books,â

Riiiiiiiiiiight. The only reason she's so popular is because she's a harmless photo-op for politicians who are sitting around doing noting. While everyone is happy to talk about little girls not getting to go to school because the Taliban blew up their school, nobody seems interested in the widespread murders of civilian boys and men, or conscription.

Most people think there's this massive imbalance in literacy rates. It's about 9%, between men and women.

That's unfortunate, but it hardly compares to the mass worldwide surveillance and conspiracies - or the courage required to acquire all those documents, leave your life behind, and kick a world power in the teeth.

High Coast (Sweden) and Kvarken Archipelago (Finland)

"The geomorphology of the region is largely shaped by the combined processes of glaciation, glacial retreat and the emergence of new land from the sea which continues today at a rate of 0.9 m per century."

Source: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/898

TL;DR Quick summary of the pdf

A follow up link (pdf) with much more information and an in depth study into Ecuadorian media by UNESCO - for those that are interested in more than the 20,000ft overview with simplifications/possible inaccuracies that I gave above...

Obviously whoever dreamed this up has never read the Seville Statement on Violence, specifically point 2:

"It is scientifically incorrect to say that war or any other violent behaviour is genetically programmed into our human nature. [...]"

So there, it's been defined to be incorrect. Because we say so. Let that be a lesson to all of you.

I do not approve of such spending.... there are netter thing to spend tax payer money on. i.e. http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/mods/theme_a/interact/www.worldgame.org/wwwproject/index.shtml

This is a republic where all voices are heard and representiotives representing the taxpayers but how are they to know what or how to represent if the taxpayers have no voice in ho to use the taxes each personally pay?

Open sopurce software doesn't work the way the US corrupted politicaly system does. If it did it'd be seriously in debt.

Mod up; That is spot on.

Here's some history to illustrate your point: San Gimignano "della belle Torri". Watch the photo.The rich lived in "beautiful" towers high above the common people. Note that the towers had no windows. That was too dangerous. They hade some slits to be able to shoot arrows at attacking commoners. And first-floor walkways in case you wanted to visit another rich family, without having to risk walking outside amongst the people who hated your guts.
I've been there, and it was very impressive, but I wouldn't want to live like that; would you?

the world tomorrow will be...less educated that the world today.

World literacy has risen from 77% in 1995 to 82% in 2005. More recently in 2010, 87% of female youth had basic literacy skills, compared to 92% of males.

In China almost all youth are now literate. In Kenya, 93% of youth are literate. Only countries like Ethiopia, Niger, Chad, and Mali have youth literacy rates at or below 50%.

People with college degrees increased to 6.7% of the world population in 2010 from 5.9% in 2000. That is around 50 million new college graduates.

For /. readers who don't understand the importance of Ethiopia, it is the country of Coffee and the 2 hour offer ritual.

I am not sure what is meant here. As the previous AC said, your post has got some language problems, too. (My first guess is would be use of a phone with predictive text)

Back to my question, ethiopia is the country of Adowa, the monolithic churches of Lalibela, Haile Gebre Sellasie, and a lot more. So, what exactly was your point?

What basis do you have to state this supposed "fact"? Last year UNESCO strongly warned about Internet filtering, and in the same year the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression has did the same. There is no need for control to be moved to the UN in order to restrict access to content. Countries around the world are doing a fine job of that on their own (and not just the most repressive ones - France, Germany, South Korea and others are amongst them). The only reason to move an issue to the UN is because it has border-crossing implications. National censorship or content regulation policies generally don't.

Hmmm, interesting to puzzle out the references:
Samarkand is a city in Uzbekistan.
Levodopa is a psychiatric drug
Corinth city in Greece.

His previous postings are not quite as good, and this gem sheds some light on his... condition...

I am an instructor at a university in Canada, and I find it frustrating sometimes that I have 3rd- and 4th-year students who have never had any experience with online learning. It makes my job more difficult when I have to teach basic skills instead of the courses I am supposed to be teaching.

I currently run my courses in a hybrid manner, part traditional, and part online. This allows the students to feel comfortable with the traditional part of the course, and makes the online portion less intimidating. Here's a link to a paper I recently wrote about my class, and which describes the approach I take. The same approach with hybrid classes and software has been used in elementary and secondary schools.

The real problem with technology in schools is not the technology itself, but a lack of clear pedagogy on the part of the teacher. Just throwing technology into a class and waiting for a miracle to happen is ineffective. The teacher should decide which technologies support their teaching objectives and use those. The UNESCO Towards Knowledge Societies report (2005) states,

"Teacher training must therefore extend beyond the bounds of competency in a particular discipline and must include, as components in their own right, training in the new technologies and study of the ways and means of stimulating the students’ motivation and personal commitment. What they will need to learn, then, is not so much a technical skill as the ability to choose from among the increasingly abundant array of teaching and other software and educational programmes on offer, those that are most appropriate. Face-to-face tuition to learners, remains nonetheless essential in basic education. " (pp. 82-83)

Reference:

UNESCO. (2005). Towards Knowledge Societies. UNESCO World Report (p. 220). Paris: UNESCO Publishing.

UNESCO says you are wrong

What? Their charter says they're going to promote culture regardless of race, sex, language or religion, and that's what they're doing.

Why exactly is it that people who live west of the Jordan but who aren't Jewish by race, and whose language is Arabic, and religion is either Islam or Christianity shouldn't have an opportunity to participate in cultural preservation activities?

When even Afghanistan is a member (remember the Buddha statue demolitions?), and their government is talking to/inviting the Taliban in, why is there suddenly a problem with Palestine?

Congratulations on your new global-citizen-indoctrination job. I'm sure you'll do well, but you first need to understand that the "eco-project" that you're expected to present is NOT supposed to teach science or critical thinking or anything along those lines - instead, it should emphasize the importance of the students' sacrifices for the common good, reliance on appointed "experts" for the amount of sacrifice required, and their total submission to the global leaders for guidance in every aspect of their lives. Think of it as your contribution to "positive societal transformation".

You can find some really good reference material right here, and be sure to check out this stuff. Good Luck!!

Congratulations on your new global-citizen-indoctrination job. I'm sure you'll do well, but you first need to understand that the "eco-project" that you're expected to present is NOT supposed to teach science or critical thinking or anything along those lines - instead, it should emphasize the importance of the students' sacrifices for the common good, reliance on appointed "experts" for the amount of sacrifice required, and their total submission to the global leaders for guidance in every aspect of their lives. Think of it as your contribution to "positive societal transformation".

You can find some really good reference material right here, and be sure to check out this stuff. Good Luck!!

Its not a World Wonder. It doesn't even fall into the same category. You can't learn about nuclear warheads from the Great Wall of China. World Wonders are typically amazing structures, works of art, cities, or geological formations. They want Wikipedia on the "World Heritage List" probably for items i, and ii on the list you can find here : http://whc.unesco.org/en/criteria .

Sept. 10, 2001 Donal Rumsfeld announced 2.3 trillion dollars of pentagon spending was unaccounted for. A very clear act of taxation without representation.
Representation does not mean having some fool liar claiming they represent you nor does it say you agree with what ever they do once they are in office.
Representation means accountability to those paying for the public service of the elected.

The real scope is not the Tea Party political group joke, but the historical event of the conception of this country. The Boston Tea Party that was throwing off government. And as such we have the Declaration of Independence spelling out our rights and our duty as US Citizens, to put off such rouge government. It even provides real life example.

The Current Government is Rouge, many in it don't even know the contents of the Founding Documents of this Country. Those documents being the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But they do know how to lie, twist and make up laws to fit their desires and manipulate people instead.

The Government was never close to shutting down, it was all a play to try and make the people feel ok about losing even more of the values they pay for and expect from government, while the Government instead proceeds to support increases in the already over 50 percent of tax payer dollars, the funding of the military industrial complex.

Why do we need to be spending 47% of world defense spending, over 60% when adding in allies, against the less than 40% divided among many small and or poor countries defense spending?

We the people, don't need it! This year there will be 7 billion people on this planet of which its some fraction of 1% causing problems and expense for the rest of us.
Its all simple math that shows a psychological deficiency in government regarding ethic and morals while having a delusional sense of destructive military power.
Proof: http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/TLSF/theme_a/mod02/www.worldgame.org/wwwproject/index.shtml with the question, why is this not happening when its clear it will reduce and even remove motives for war.

What may (or not) appear to be a decrease in military budget is actually an increase when taken in full scope of where percentages of tax payer dollars are going
FDR and Kennedy both warned us about this and so have others.

I am an American, but I do not see the US government being any longer a genuine American government consistent with its founding documents. But only drifting further and further away, becoming a rouge government. And now its becoming quite obvious the US government is disconnected from the people it is supposed to represent, but instead leads the people with deception.

What began in north Africa is spreading and it will come around to the US too.

The math is to simple. there will be 7 billion people on this planet this year and its only some fraction of 1% of the population that is causing all the trouble and waring wasteful expense of the mind games of these few rather than correcting real world problems for the rest of us, RE: http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/TLSF/theme_a/mod02/www.worldgame.org/wwwproject/index.shtml which would be much more effective at reducing the motives of others to attack us, as well.
This is the best indicator of a government that can be rightfully diagnosed as being psychologically unfit to command anyone.

Making up the rules as they go along does not work in this country as its supposed to be a democracy but where is our opportunity to vote on this?
Sept 10, 2001, Rumsfield publicly stated that they cannot account for 2.3 trillion dollars of Pentagon spending.... Thats about $8,000 per man, woman and child in the US..... Its also taxation without representation... striking at the very heart of the birth of the US.... the Boston Tea Party... And they continue to spend massive amounts for defense.... 47% of the total world defense spending. Add in the Allies spending and we are over 60% of world spending where teh remaining 40% is divided amount many many poor countries. We don't need to spend anywhere near that much on defense... unless we are going to be attacked by Aliens... Yeah right....

What began in north Africa is spreading and it will come around to the US too, for teh US government continues to show evidence of their failure to understand the founding documents of this country and even teh Declaration of Independence states its not only our right but duty to put of such corrupt government and make the corrections ourselves.
 

Why are they spending tax payers money for what is already known and available through any field of story writing, be it fiction or fact or some combination?

If there is any urgency it only because the near 7 billion people on this planet are starting to wise up to the less than 1% fabricating crap that causes problems for the rest of us. Ultimately we all are not going to need or be able to afford the ongoing BS produced by politicians and control freaks of war game players Instead those wasted resources on destructive technology can be far more effective in fixing real world problems and hence greatly reducing motivations of war and terrorism and... bla bla bla destructive fabrications for the self supported dependencies of the addicted to the mental handicap of having a lack of morals and ethics. And there can be plenty left over to put them into rehab for life.

What the World Wants, but not the mentally handicapped control freaks otherwise it'd already be happening.

What we have instead is even more on defense for 2011 than shown HERE

http://www.militarybudget.info/WorldwideSpending.html
http://www.militarybudget.info/WorldwideMilitaryExpenditures.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States#Budget_Breakdown_for_2011
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2011/01/06/Gates-Shrinking-budget-means-fewer-troops/UPI-42921294353456/?dailybrief
vs.
http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/TLSF/theme_a/mod02/www.worldgame.org/wwwproject/index.shtml

All links are save to look at:
link nr. 1
link nr. 2
link nr. 3
link nr. 4
vs.
link nr. 5

The purpose of the Prize, supported by the Guillermo Cano Foundation, the Nicholas B. Ottaway Foundation and JP/Politiken Newspapers LTD, is to honour a person, organization or institution that has made a notable contribution to the defence and/or promotion of press freedom anywhere in the world, especially if this involved risk.

Well, we know who most fits that description by far.
We'll need Assange's full/proper name, date/place of birth, nationality, address, and suitable brief biography (yes, most of that is known, but for formalities let's make sure proper, not popular, information is used) to fill in this form. I suggest lots of people submit the form, with "Candidate presented by" filled as "populous at large"; should not a large number of individuals all acting as interested-for-the-same-reason parties have their unanimous selection recognized as much as any formal organization, given the nature of the prize?

The purpose of the Prize, supported by the Guillermo Cano Foundation, the Nicholas B. Ottaway Foundation and JP/Politiken Newspapers LTD, is to honour a person, organization or institution that has made a notable contribution to the defence and/or promotion of press freedom anywhere in the world, especially if this involved risk.

Well, we know who most fits that description by far.
We'll need Assange's full/proper name, date/place of birth, nationality, address, and suitable brief biography (yes, most of that is known, but for formalities let's make sure proper, not popular, information is used) to fill in this form. I suggest lots of people submit the form, with "Candidate presented by" filled as "populous at large"; should not a large number of individuals all acting as interested-for-the-same-reason parties have their unanimous selection recognized as much as any formal organization, given the nature of the prize?

Someone should nominate Assange to UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize 2011

Imagine if he would have to get parol from a US prison to attend?

/Hans

It shows a massive lack of intelligence across teh board fro US defense budgets.
Consider what the world wants and this was calculated years ago.

Amazing that the US defense Budget is nearing what the whole world had budgeted for defense not so long ago.

The incredible lack of intelligence these current numbers show is of complete failure to realize this amount of money used on removing real world problems and improving the general social environment the people of this world live in, would result in a massively reduced motive to go to war. and perhaps even eliminate any need for war should all other countries instead spend their defence budgets on such improvements.

The intelligence community is showing their moronic ignorance.

Step Three: Claim "Ownership" of aforementioned stuff.

While for RIAA has clear the legal bases of their claims (copyright law, in various incarnations), it is not quite clear to me on what legal basis English Heritage can claim ownership of the photos one takes. IANAL, but to my mind they can't claim copyright:

• on the photo, because the photo (which is the form of expression of "artistic creation") is not theirs, is the photographer's
• on the Stonehenge itself - because:
  1. it is ... shall I say?... a building, not at "form of expression"
  2. even if a building would be a "form of expression", it is not theirs (being listed as world heritage)
  3. even if it would be theirs and classified as a "form of artistical expression", the creation act trancedes any current temporal limit for "protection under the copyright law" (that is, unless in UK the copyright protection was extended beyond 5000 years!)

  Head explodes!

Did I hurt your feelings? I'm only trying to be objective here, I don't have any feelings for or against Brazil. I believe it will become a fully developed country within a few decades.

Israel is clearly a developed nation in every aspect of the word. A structured society, ruled by law, organized and effective, high income status, high GDP levels, high levels of education and research all speak in favor of this status.

I assume you object because of the nature of the conflict with/over Palestine? That fact does not detract from the fact that Israelis enjoy a higher quality of life [on average] than say Brazilians. Please, remember I'm not referring to the top echelons of either society.

Freedom House's American origins not withstanding it still produces solid reports, I doubt you can find factual faults with that report?

At least I provided sources and arguments for my claims, you just dismissed the source without providing any counterarguments.

You also seem to have skipped criticizing all the other international sources I named from the OECD to the UN? Do you at least approve of them?

I did my homework, you on the other hand have nothing but hot air.

Sources

How about an official UN report from the High Commissioner for Human Rights on your country and crime, corruption and violence?

How about the UNESCO's official page for Brazil:

"Brazil has been historically marked by social, economic and cultural inequalities. Both society and government are increasingly aware of the need for changing that scenario by creating mechanisms of social participation and control, programmes, projects, and actions that represent a movement towards positive changes."

"Although it has a large number of poor people Brazil is not a poor country, but still has to overcome social injustice and inequality. The social injustices are are reflected in a medium rank in the Human Development Index (HDI), which means that difficulties are still to be overcome in education, health, income distribution and employment conditions."

How about a report from Brazil itself (Ministério da Educação)?

I quote:" In spite of these undeniable advances, Brazil still needs to make great improvements in
these indicators. In terms of HDI in the Latin America and Caribbean region, Argentina,
Chile, Uruguay, Costa Rica, Cuba and Mexico all have higher scores than Brazil."

"In spite of Brazil having the eighth largest economy in the world, the extreme inequality in
income which still typifies the country means that problems of social exclusion running
alongside economic growth continue to exist."

"These data show that, in spite of the progress made, the defects in the Brazilian school
system are still producing large numbers of people with insufficient levels of education,"

"The situation of socio-economic exclusion and insufficient provision of basic education are
also reflected in the opportunities for lifelong learning."

Nationmaster further provides details and sources on the crime rates in Brazil:
http://www.nationmaster.com/country/br-brazil/cri-crime

And so on...

Did I hurt your feelings? I'm only trying to be objective here, I don't have any feelings for or against Brazil. I believe it will become a fully developed country within a few decades.

Israel is clearly a developed nation in every aspect of the word. A structured society, ruled by law, organized and effective, high income status, high GDP levels, high levels of education and research all speak in favor of this status.

I assume you object because of the nature of the conflict with/over Palestine? That fact does not detract from the fact that Israelis enjoy a higher quality of life [on average] than say Brazilians. Please, remember I'm not referring to the top echelons of either society.

Freedom House's American origins not withstanding it still produces solid reports, I doubt you can find factual faults with that report?

At least I provided sources and arguments for my claims, you just dismissed the source without providing any counterarguments.

You also seem to have skipped criticizing all the other international sources I named from the OECD to the UN? Do you at least approve of them?

I did my homework, you on the other hand have nothing but hot air.

Sources

How about an official UN report from the High Commissioner for Human Rights on your country and crime, corruption and violence?

How about the UNESCO's official page for Brazil:

"Brazil has been historically marked by social, economic and cultural inequalities. Both society and government are increasingly aware of the need for changing that scenario by creating mechanisms of social participation and control, programmes, projects, and actions that represent a movement towards positive changes."

"Although it has a large number of poor people Brazil is not a poor country, but still has to overcome social injustice and inequality. The social injustices are are reflected in a medium rank in the Human Development Index (HDI), which means that difficulties are still to be overcome in education, health, income distribution and employment conditions."

How about a report from Brazil itself (Ministério da Educação)?

I quote:" In spite of these undeniable advances, Brazil still needs to make great improvements in
these indicators. In terms of HDI in the Latin America and Caribbean region, Argentina,
Chile, Uruguay, Costa Rica, Cuba and Mexico all have higher scores than Brazil."

"In spite of Brazil having the eighth largest economy in the world, the extreme inequality in
income which still typifies the country means that problems of social exclusion running
alongside economic growth continue to exist."

"These data show that, in spite of the progress made, the defects in the Brazilian school
system are still producing large numbers of people with insufficient levels of education,"

"The situation of socio-economic exclusion and insufficient provision of basic education are
also reflected in the opportunities for lifelong learning."

Nationmaster further provides details and sources on the crime rates in Brazil:
http://www.nationmaster.com/country/br-brazil/cri-crime

And so on...

I hope you take back the "barely literate people" part because it is untrue.

Really? And you know that becasue that is what you feel, or you actually did some research?

"Illiteracy is increasing in China, despite a 50-year-old campaign to stamp it out and a declaration by the government in 2000 that it had been nearly eradicated. The reasons are complex, from the cost of a rural education to the growing appeal of migrant work that draws Chinese away from classrooms and toward far-off cities. "
"From 2000 to 2005, the number of illiterate Chinese adults jumped by 33 percent"
"Since 70% of China's population live in the countryside, and rural adult illiteracy rates are high and the gender disparities are also large in the countryside, the priority and the difficult area of literacy work lies in rural areas."

Just becasue the facts get in the way of your feeling of "the way things should be", don't let that stop you from judging others who point the facts out. Talk about feeling superior.

Just remove their reasons for being which will have the side effect of destroying their ability to gain followers.

We can start here with What the World Wants
The trick is to get the waring mindset addicted into rehab. so we can use the resources to do this, to remove terrorist reasons for being.

Amazing how much psychological power Terrorist have over the waring mindset addicted in using their self supported dependencies effectively.
 

... that for all the shit that goes on in the world to be revealed to the world public that the mass majority of the shit is so totally uncalled for and only exist because of other shit being covered up and kept from other cover up efforts...

The shit needs to be coming out and we can start with Haliburtion blowing the deep water horizon oil rig in tneir pathetic little fucking oil war.

We did not need the oil brought up at this time, we have plenty (this is a fact) and the best holding tank is the earth.
It was tapped as a matter of securing right to the oil vein, which is large. It was tapped sooner than it was supposed to be.
The rig was supposed to be blown before it was tapped..... oops!

This fucking the world shit has to stop! Fuck the Pentagon we don't need it, they are one major supporter of cover ups.

Excuse me but I live here too and I'm tired of the fucking smell of covered up shit!

People, you need to start looking at the information that is available and god damn't start thinking it out!!!!

Try this on for starters. What the World Wants and ask your self why in hell is this not being done? Want to stop terrorist then remove their reasons for existing, instead war monger feed it...... What the fuck?

What lead up to 911? A Trillion dollar bet!!! justy follow the god damn money people. You can even see who the loosers were if you do that. Hint One company name starts with a "W" and another starts with an "E" and there were more too... follow the money god damn't and all the way to 9/11.

Maybe I'm wrong? Maybe I'm not but one thing is for certain, you are not going to know the truth if you don't use your brain and your common sense enough to realize there are coverups and far to many but more than enough to know you can figure things out for yourself. And the general media is not going to fucking spell it out for you. They are afraid of anthrax threats, just ask Ted Turner about that or look it up on the internet.

Don't tell me you've never heard about the Untouchables.

Seriously tho, is the underground market the only reason you'd oppose the criminalization of drugs? Why, here are some new targets:

- Pedophilia? Underground market: check.
- Slavery? Underground market: check.
- Killing? Underground market: check.

An alien can survive for a thousand earth years by eating one human alive. And another 5 thousand years if they also consume a humans soul.

There, now that should keep the world military industry in operation for now.
Otherwise what might we spend such resources on?

Is it not obvious the military industry is running out of excuses to exist?

What the Catholic Church officially supports and really supports are two very different things. Officially, they're against pedophilia, molestation, sex outside of marriage, and in favor of priestly celibacy. In reality, they do everything they can to cover for pedophile priests and screw over the victims.

Wrong, the cover-ups were not to promote pedophilia, molestation, or sex outside of marriage, nor were they because the the Roman Catholic Church secretly disfavors priestly celibacy. Instead, it was done because some in the Church leadership incorrectly believed that hiding the criminal and sinful behavior of a few would in the long-term better serve the mission of the Roman Catholic Church then public investigation, condemnation, and (where appropriate) punishment. It was still an absolutely horrible situation that resulted in more personal suffering to innocents and damage to the Roman Catholic Church than the alternative, but the motivation was far different than you imply. Whatever else you can say about the Church leadership, it is human, and even the Pope doesn't claim infallibility in administrative matters (and pay attention to the last sentence of the linked section).

As for property, the Church has vast holdings of private property (real estate). They talk a lot about charity, but you don't see them making any charitable use of all that property they hold (like selling it and using the money for charitable purposes).

A good part of the Church's most valuable real estate holdings are considered historical and cultural treasures (e.g. nearly all of the Vatican City is a UN World Heritage site), very costly to maintain, and have would have little if any profit-making potential as private properties. Only if they were demolished, sold for scrap, and redeveloped would they be of any interest to a private organization wealthy enough to buy any of these properties. You may not mind the last scenario but a significant number people, including many non-Christians, would not want to see this happen.

Additionally, many of the remaining properties are already involved in charitable work. In 2000 (it was the best citation I could find in a few minutes) the Roman Catholic Church had 638,116 institutions. Even discounting the charitable work done by parishes, missions, and educational institutions, in 2000 the Roman Catholic Church operated 5,853 hospitals, 8,695 orphanages, 13,933 homes for the elderly and handicapped, and 74,936 dispensaries, leprosaries, nurseries and other institutions. That yields a total of 103,417 institutions that are primarily charitable in nature, or a little over 16% of the institutions directly operated by the Roman Catholic Church (and many of the remaining 84% are involved in significant charitable activities as well). This also doesn't include Catholic voluntary organizations which are affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church but not directly operated by it, like The St. Vincent DePaul Society.

While not a perfect analogy, would you really consider a person devoting at least 16% of their waking time and effort to charitable works, while encouraging others to be charitable, a hypocrite?

I am curious how and by whom you think actually discovered the flaw in the IPCC's claims. Science requires that scientific work, claims, publications etc. undergo some degree of peer review which is exactly what happened. The IPCC made a claim which was analyzed and corrected by a scientist. Error correction is one of the most remarkable traits of science that is completely absent in its alternatives (pseudoscience, political infighting etc.)

Sorry, but that's naive BS. Removed this week after British media reports? People were talking about this two months ago...

Here's a blog post from 12/1/09:
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/climategate-imminent-demise-of-glaciers-due-to-a-typo/

See the primary sources here:
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0010/001065/106523e.pdf (p 66)
http://www.ipcc-wg2.gov/AR4/website/10.pdf (p 493)

And I'm sure *someone* knew about this before then, but simply didn't go public about it.

Someone want to remind me why I should trust the IPCC (or climate "science") again?

simply start and continue fixing real problems in the world and terrorist won't be able to gather a following of suicidal individuals or other recruits because they won't have a verifiable reason.

What the World Wants is not what the fewer than 1% of the world population wants.

Its really quite amazing when you consider there are near 7 billion people on this planet and what that equates to in less than one percent being war mongering leaders.

Could it be that engineering degrees are a dime-a-dozen in oil-rich countries where middle-eastern terrorists usually originate? How many people in these countries don't have engineering degrees?

Hmm... some googling:

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed got his engineering degree in North Carolina.
Mohammed Atta got an engineering degree in Cairo (and studied English and German there), but his PhD in Hamburg, Germany.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab studied mechanical engineering in London, UK. It's unclear whether he graduated.

Speaking of degrees being a dime a dozen: In the United States, almost 30% of the population has at a Bachelors degree or higher, and again that many have attended university but only have an associates degree or nothing. In other words, unless wikipedia is wrong, two thirds of the population has attended college. According to the Unesco website, the situation is similar in Western Europe. According to that same website, "23% attended college in the Arab States, 11% in South and West Asia and, despite rapid growth, only 6% in Africa"

Google is refusing to specify these statistics to engineering degrees, but the numbers above suggest that degrees are actually a dime a dozen in "the west", and not in the oil rich countries where middle eastern terrorists usually originate.

Over the years it has gotten more and more clear to me that (counter-intuitively perhaps) it is entirelty possible for very intelligent, learned and hard working men to be religious fanatics, homicidal maniacs, perverts, terrorists, psychopaths, all-round assholes or all of the above. Moral outlook and intelligence don't seem to be very strongly related at all.

Those all have holidays already Teacher's day: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teachers'_Day Doctor's Day: http://www.holidayinsights.com/moreholidays/March/doctorsday.htm World Social Worker's day: http://www.ifsw.org/p38001263.html World Science Day: http://www.unesco.org/science/wcs/eng/declaration_e.htm Mathematicians day:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi_Day (I know it's a stretch) Firefighter's day: http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1986/100886d.htm Initernational Artists day:http://www.internationalartistday.com/ For good measure: Sysadmin day:http://www.internationalartistday.com/ Programmer day:http://www.programmerday.info/