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Tsunami Satellite Images
JakeisBland writes "Here is a collection of before/after satellite pictures of the devastation in Asia due to the tsunami/earthquake."
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This is simply amazing. I think that every so often Mother Nature decides she needs to show everyone who's boss, a sort of bitchslap to bring the nations of the world together; if only for a little while.
The people of Galle, one of the hard hit areas on the west coast, might take exception to your comment about escaping major damage.
Current death tolls approaching 130k people.
If you thought 9/11 was big think again, we are talking about FOUR HUNDRED 9/11s here.
Online backup with Mozy, sounds like Ozzie, but more!
I've said it before, I'll say it again.
It's a natural disaster. A large one, to be sure, but the Colombia volcano in 1985 killed around 25,000, Mont Pelee in 1902 killed 25,000, and let's not forget the Tangshan earthquake in 1976, which killed between 250,000 and 650,000 people. There's a qualitative difference between something that happened because Mother Nature got titchy, and something that humans planned and carried out.
Different. You can't compare them on the same scale.
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Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
Actually the US has inserted more corrupt dictatorships than they have inserted democratic governments. The dictators were prefered for many years because they were less likely to turn socialist than a democratic country was.
9/11: Terrorists
Iraq: USA
This one: Nature
Speaking as an Indian, a big heartfelt THANKS for all of you who've empathised with the tragedy and have helped the rescue efforts. It's in trying times like these that one's faith in humanity is restored.
Thankfully, in spite of Indian bureacracy being well Indian bureaucracy, rescue and rehabilitation efforts are going on VERY effectively. An enormous number of people in India, be it the government, armed forces, or even the common woman/man is pitching in. Most companies here have setup collection boxes and at the very least, we're donating medicines, soaps, toothbrushes, disinfectants, clothes, utensils, non-perishable food items etc. There's also an army of volunteers who's landed in the disaster struck areas with truckloads of donated stuff and are distributing it to the needy.
Strangely enough, it seems that too many clothes are being donated! A friend of mine is physically helping out with the rescue efforts and he tells me that there's piles and piles of clothes lying around but of little use to anybody. Well, i guess too much help is always better than too little help.
Another thing that amazes me is the resilience of the common man or woman. Here are people living on the edge of poverty, getting hammered everyday with issues like eking out an existence. Perhaps they've scrounged and saved enough to get their daughters married, hidden a few hundred rupees in a hole in the wall. Perhaps they've just bought a shiny new radio or a bicycle. What do they wake up to? A tsunami that takes away their children, their friends, and everything they own. What do they do? Shrug it off eventually and mark it off as karma, god's will, or god's punishment depending on their religion (no, most poor Indians cannot afford the luxuries of athesim or agnosticism). Then, they take it one day at a time and slowly start rebuilding their lives.
You want to see miracles, mental strength, and the answer to life, the universe, and everything? You don't have to look far in times like these.
Most (all?) of the official New Year celebrations and fireworks have been cancelled. The money will be given to aid helping those who suffered from the tsunami.
At the moment there are more than 200 Finns and over 2000 Swedes missing and most likely all of them are dead. To see things in perspective: Finland has a population of 5.2 million, Sweden around 9 million. Everyone with basic math skills can calculate what that would mean if it had happened for tourists from US.
40,000+ people die in car accidents every year. Thousands are killed in floods every few years. Millions die every year from famine.
Death, and to a lesser extent, death from natural disasters, is pretty common. A lot of death from a natural disaster is less newsworthy than a little death from a terrorist attack.
There's also an information problem - it was a lot easier to get information out of new york on 9/11 than it is to get information out of a devastated remote area in Thailand.
paintball
WWI: 16-18 million.
WWII: 40 million.
On a single day in the American Civil War, approximately 30,000 men were killed.
Feel free to dispute those figures, they vary from source to source. You'll not escape the orders of magnitude.
That's what war is like in the age of modern machinery. 9/11 was murder, not war.
...or make poor tsunami jokes when there were no pictures that showed the magnitude of the tragedy.
Seeing the BBC report that showed the young coupld silently carrying their two dead children and seeing the picture of the beach covered with debris -- and then realizing the "debris" consisted of human bodies -- brings the point home that real humans suffered a real tragedy halfway across the world.
Damn, I'm getting tears in my eyes just remembering those pictures.
Because if God overrules free will, even once, he's made the entire thing meaningless. If he, even once, says "Hey, humans, I'll save you from the consequences of your collective choices", he's just made free will meaningless, because its no longer free - its free 'to a point'. By giving us free will, God inherently relinquishes both his right and his duty to overrule our actions.
Trying to make a valid philosophical argument by comparing police to God is bunk, man. The police aren't omnipotent, omniscient, and they aren't the ones who have the ability to decide whether or not we get free will. Of course, anyone who stands by is partly culpable. However, if God intervenes, he destroys the idea of free will. The only way to maintain free will is to stay out of it; as such, by rigorously asserting free will, God becomes non-culpable - he has, in essence, said "I will not interfere, because the consequence of interfering once is to mean that I must take responsibility for all of your actions that I allow to occur." It is, in an odd sort of way, similar to the search engine DMCA exemption - software that indexes material is legal and non-culpable, even if it indexes illegal material, except if it ever filters out some undesirable material on basis of copyright or legality, at which point it immediately becomes culpable for all such infringing material found on the service.
This is just one more reason why God is a bunch of crap. Study the origin of ethics and look into hard vs. soft command, and you'll begin to come towards my point of view, which is that ethics in and of themselves point to the non-existence of God via contradiction.
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Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
After seeing this I feel physically revolted.
Every one of those people could well be someone's brother or sister, or parent....or child....
It's sad that this type of inward looking nationalistic thinking is the norm these days. When will people realize that we are responsible for all of humanity? Does no one teach social responsability anymore? Let me let you in to a little secret here. The rest of the world *is* under an obligation to help SE Asia. Under a *big* obligation. Why? Because of international treaties? Nope. Because of legislation, or UN decisions? Nope. As humans, we are morally responsable for the welfare and well-being of the rest of the world.
And Saddam took 15-20 years, where we've only had 2 so far. Give it time.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Hard to imagine that too many people living in tin-roofed cardboard shacks, and worrying about where their next meals is going to come from, are going to have property insurance. Now I understand why they are teaching critical thinking in public schools.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Shhh, hush now. You're spoiling it.
When asked "how many died in Vietnam war", nine out of ten Americans give the ballpark of "60,000". The two, perhaps three million Vietnamese deaths don't simply register.
Of course the USA still refuses to accept responsibility for the continuing tragedy caused by the massive Agent Orange contamination that is still killing and causing birth defects among the Vietnamese population.
More recently the US and UK war machines have scattered hundreds of tons of toxic and carcinogenic depleted uranium (used in hardening projectile shells) across Iraq. Does anyone think these two countries will ever take responsibility of the devastating consequenses affecting the current and future generations of Iraqi civilians?
While I can reason the deaths and injuries caused by the Indian Ocean Tsunami to be part of the cost of our existance on a living planet (I say this knowing that close friends of mine lost many friends and relatives, and my own relatives holidaying in Thailand only barely escaped death thanks to help by quick thinking locals), I find no good excuses for sending massive war machines to foreign countries to kill massive numbers of locals and to poison their lands for generations to come.
Should invading one's peaceful neighbours be opposed, or rewarded with trade deals?
I'm not a huge fan of Bush by any stretch of the imagination (I voted against him in November), but I can't fault the US government's behavior so far. They authorized a small amount of money to begin with, to help with the most urgent needs (sending food, clearing bodies, and so forth), and over the next few weeks and months will continue to increase the commitment as the specific needs of the countries who have been hurt are ascertained.
The world rallied around the US after 9/11, irrespective of past tensions and difficulties, and I don't think anyone here has forgotten that. We'll do everything within our power to help rebuild those countries devastated by the tsunami, just give us time to get through the bureaucracy, and to make sure our money is going to the right place (someone earlier posted about how in India, so many donations of clothing have been recieved that there are piles of stuff no one wants to wear just lying around. Imagine if the US sent over $100 MILLION of unnecessary clothing).
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
As a Christian Libertarian... I half agree with you and halfway don't.
My faith says that yes, we should help our brother in time of need, however my political philosophy says the government shouldn't be the ones to do it.
Legally, internationally, politically we are under NO obligation or responsibility to do such - nor should we be. However since we do have an abundence of wealth, I don't see a problem with the government having am emergency aid fund, or even low interest loans for foreign countries in times of crisis. But this should be used rarely and saved for large scale disasters such as this.
I don't think that the US Gov should dispense money to anyone out there who has a papercut however. The country shouldn't be overly philantropic.
As a Christian, yes I feel obligated to help anyone who needs help when they do - it is just the right thing to do. I would rather give my money to a private fund that I know, respect, and trust to properly distribute my donations. The government is usually the LAST place to trust in terms of spreading goodwill.
Libertas in infinitum
Oh please, you're comparing apples and automobiles man, not even in the same class. You losing your posh home (by the standards of these people) and car is nothing compared to dying a miserable death from malaria, dysentery or starvation, or lack of potable water.
Not. Even. Fucking. Comparable.