Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft's Paul Allen Funds ET Search
Chris Gondek writes "Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, one of the richest men on Earth, today pledged to donate $US13.5 million ($17.99 million) for research into extra-terrestrial life. With the contribution, Allen will have given $US25 million ($33.32 million) for construction of the Allen Telescope Array (ATA), a network of 350 radio telescopes being built to find signs of life in space, said Thomas Pierson, director of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute."
he's from Microsoft, that's bad. but it's aliens and stuff and that's good. what am I to think /.ers?
Well, the commies are gone. We have to have some excuse to invade whatever country we want. I think fighting terrorism is a great idea. I just think we should stop funding it while we're at it.
7 0
The US government has carried out operations in Central America that fit every definition of terrorism that the US has put forward
http://www.soaw.org/new/article.php?id=2
i.e. Deliberate attacks on 'soft' (i.e civilian) targets in Nicaragua. You had a church full of civilians slaughtered at El Mozote, El Salvador which was just the worst of a prolonged campaign by the US that fits the definition of terrorism. That included women and Children, who were raped and killed by the Atlacatel(sp), Salvadoran soldiers trained in US counterinsurgency tactics and responsible for some of the worst atrocities of the Salvadoran civil war.
Heck, The US was the one who encouraged Saddam Hussein to use poison gas during the Iran-Iraq war, and gave him many of his 'WMDs.'
The CIA sees the world in terms of straight power relations. "Pre Emptive war" has always been their doctrine. I have no doubt the 'War on Terror' will help America maintain it's position in the world. It might even protect American children by destroying someone who might oneday threaten American interests. But if you think its preventing children from being killed, you've been watching news reports with a direct feed from the government for too long. The 'War on Terror' is not a 'war on terror'. It's a war to attack whomsoever the US pleases for whatever reason that they please.
The CIA is still completly free to use terrorist tactics if they want.
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
First, the human animal is a pack animal that has as a primary motivation the attainment of higher social status, and to reproduce. By attaining such higher social status, individual human animals increase their reproductive opportunities, thus passing on their genes to another generation. Those with the highest social status are best able to reproduce and pass on their genes. Most (if not ALL) of our behavior is based on this motivation, although we almost always ascribe other motivations to our behaviors.
The important thing for you, dear reader, to understand is that ANY differentiation between one human animal and another human animal may serve to increase social status.
In order to illustrate this principle, let us consider a hypothetical society: all work is taxed 99.9999%, andfurthermore, there is only one consumer good: a blue ribbon. This society is capitalistic, and indeed, it is a social democracy: people work for a living, and the very high tax rate enables the state to provide food, housing, medical care, infrastructure, etc.
The only thing that the state does not provide is the blue ribbon. And that is what everyone works for. It can only be purchased at a great price. Once you have the blue ribbon, you have high social status, and thus you have greater reproductive opportunities.
The point is that human animals will work hard as long as there is an opportunity to gain social status, even if the differentiation between themselves and others is small, as long as there IS a differentiation, and as long as that differentiation can only be obtained through working in a capitalist system.
That hypothetical society is what the social democracies of NW Europe are, to a lesser extent.
eat shiat and bark at the moon