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Anti-Technology Themes in James Cameron's Avatar
ThousandStars writes "'The anti-technological aspect [in James Cameron's Avatar] is strange because the movie is among most technically sophisticated ever: it uses a crazy 2D and 3D camera, harnesses the most advanced computer animation techniques imaginable, and has apparently improved the state-of-the-art when it comes to cinema. But Avatar’s story argues that technology is bad. Humans destroyed their home world through environmental disaster and use military might to annihilate the locals and steal their resources.' The question is two-fold: why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie, and why are we drawn to it? Part of the answer lies in Neal Stephenson's Turn On, Tune In, Veg Out."
I saw it as showing bad uses of technology, and more about retelling the story of the native americans as well.
Essentially that is what it was.
Technology, like beer, is the solution to, and the cause of, all of mankind's problems.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
I always read it as another "white people suck" movie, but this time, "white people suck in space", which is equally weird, because Cameron is about as white as they come.
This is my sig.
That it was a private military force that did the attacking, not a governmental one. Presumably, the government on Earth was not willing to allow any military attack on the Natives, hence their attempts for 5+ years for a diplomatic solution.
Also it should be noted that a statement such as "no greenery left on Earth" is an exaggeration at best, considering life would die on the planet without the Oxygen Cycle. Unless the Humans attempted to develop machines to replace the functions of the plants.
Just because a story criticizes something doesn't mean the teller wants to destroy it. In order to change something for the better, we need to criticize it. And if we just attack the criticism, we'll never get change.
Cameron knows better than most what's wrong with our technology and the way we use it. His dependence on technology makes it quite clear that he doesn't want to eliminate it. He's not "anti-technology", he's anti the things he says are bad, which is not technology itself. Really what he's anti is the ways people use technology to treat each other badly. Which is not about technology, but about people.
--
make install -not war
But Avatar’s story argues that technology is bad. Humans destroyed their home world through environmental disaster and use military might to annihilate the locals and steal their resources.
Humans can do bad things using technology. That doesn't mean technology is bad. Next on Slashdot: classic tale "Hansel and Gretel" has a secret message of "gingerbread is bad".
"harnesses the most advanced computer animation techniques imaginable"
Really? Because all I get from the trailers is that it's an updated version of The Smurfs.
Some of this is standard noble savage stuff.
It's an ideal -- peaceful people living in harmony with nature -- that doesn't hold up to close scrutiny. For instance, what do they do if one of their buddies is born with a genetic disease like Polycystic Kidney Disease or needs some other benefit of modern medicine. Also, in the real world packs of wolves and bears don't just leave you alone.
This stuff sounds great until you start to think about it really hard.
P.S. And at the end of the movie I was rooting for the "indians" just like everyone else.
you've chosen to cast this in a negative light as against something. the alternative view is that is is promoting a more rational approach to resource utilization. the easiest way to demonstrate this is using something you can relate to: our own behavior.
Though not as prevalent as it was just a couple decades ago, "white guilt" is a feeling of responsibility particularly experienced by privileged white people for the suffering of blacks under the slave system. It is a modern phenomenon that such guilt is felt by people that are completely unconnected to slavery. The guilt manifests itself as an embrace of Black culture, a willingness to provide undeserved support to the African American underclass, and a tendency to promote multiculturalism and its anti-judgmental system of evaluating cultures.
So if the technology haves want to slum it with the have-nots, it shouldn't be any big surprise that they embrace an ideology that makes themselves the criminal and thus flagellating themselves thereby redeeming themselves. Of course, they do it in a way that doesn't actually put them in direct contact with the have-nots. This is typical behavior of those embracing cultural/technological guilt as a path to spiritual salvation.
that Luke uses 'The Force' and turns off the computer.
Was Lucas trying to say something with that, I wonder...
This Sig does not Exist.
Dances With Smurfs. That's what it was.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
If humans can travel efficiently through space, make avatars, etc., they have the technology to genetically engineer plant life that could help to quickly rebuild's Earth ecosystems. I would imagine that that would be less involved than creating an avatar...
The fact that they rely on bio-centric technology doesn't make them low-tech. Every major organism on that planet has a universal neural bus that can establish a physical and logical link in about .3 seconds. Does that sound even remotely accidental?
frankly i'm a little tired of all the "deep" discussions about this movie popping up all over the place. it's just entertainment, for crying out loud. why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie? because it makes money! why are we drawn to it? well, because of its aesthetics, romantic content, exciting action, and good old marketing. case closed.
p.s. and even if cameron truly believes in the "messages" of the movie, big freaking deal. he's a director. there are many people in the world whose opinion on such difficult philosophical topics has much higher value for me than that of someone in show business.
weinersmith
Apart from that, you can't really say it's anti-technology. Yes, it has a message about imperialism and how conolial powers - or companies despoil environments for their own gain. However that's been going on for venturies and doesn't have a tech. aspect to it. The tech just increases the speed of the destruction.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Is it truly an anti-technology message, or a warning against the misuse of technology?
I use irony whenever I can, but my shirts are still wrinkled...
I must have been answering the call of nature when the movie claimed that "technology is bad", because I didn't get that impression from it at all. At most, there was a "might makes right" is bad, and "allowing mankind to become subservient to quarterly shareholder reports" is bad, but that's about it.
The scientists in the movie did wondrous things with their avatar technology, and the Na'vi had their own, organic version of the same, but never did I see a message that any of this was bad. What was portrayed in a poor light was forcibly relocating a people so as to be able to mine out a large chunk of resource that they're sitting on top of, and that's just theft.
The submitter's 3D glasses must have been defective if he's getting an anti-tech message from this.
Frankly, I have no plans to see this movie -- I never had even the slightest interest in it. In fact, I just generally don't like any movie like this. Not my thing. I do enjoy making fun of it vis-a-vis the "Dances with Smurfs" thing from South Park, but what I've heard about the movie, that's probably a pretty apt sort of representation.
If you remember "Dances with Wolves" at all, its about an American military officer just after the Civil War who goes out to a frontier post and then ends up making friends with the Indians, and then helping them against a later invasion to attempt to drive them out onto a reservation type situation. Here, the Indians have been replaced by those little blue smurf-y things.
As someone noted above, the military force in this particular situation was private and not governmental, however it was essentially the private armies of the British East and West India Companies that were responsible for most of the horrors of colonization by the British (I've never been too clear on the situation with the Spanish insofar as to whether or not they were regular military or not).
This seems to be more like some sort of post-colonial clap-trap than an "anti-technology" film, of course the two things usually go hand-in-hand when perpetrating the myth of the noble savage. In any case, I have no interest in actually watching it.
Maybe a movie that portrait a future where science and technology have become a tool to satisfy human greed, but I don't really think is about anti-technology.
I rather be free in hell than a slave in heaven.
Despite a huge corporate advertising effort from JC's big corporate budget movies. Typical hypocrisy from someone flying in a private jet to educate the proles on resource over-utilization and lectures on greed from a mansion.
I was astounded by the organic synaptic link technology the Navi had. The Navi were possibly more advanced than we were. Their organic synaptic link tech was more advanced than anything we have. The thing is, they didn't develop weapons. Their entire planet was a linked up hive mind.
What new possibilities could this technology have had? could they start growing Organic ships like the Vorlons from Babylon 5? I'd imagine the Navi probably had better math and science than us.
My wife and I went to the watch it on the 24th. Pretty good movie. At the end, she said "thank you for taking me to a chick flick" and I said, ":drool: I want one of those monitors." :)
[John]
Shit better not happen!
To me, this had a lot of Apocalypse Now and The Last Samurai to it. The racial themes were supposed to run deep, but in my opinion, fell somewhat flat. It ended up being a movie about war and Stockholm syndrome, not about racial prejudice. Sure, there are racist characters, but they're not there to be racist; they're there to make an entrepreneurial living, or to enjoy the smell of napalm in the morning.
The term "gone native" actually shows up in this movie, which I found fascinating. Here, we're given a chance to show Kurtz's side of the story; we can see a little bit of his reasoning as well as an understanding of his insanity and defection. Just like Kurtz, our heroes decided to defect for reasons stronger than might ever have been apparent, but which are never strongly touched upon within the actual movie.
Also keep in mind that a lack of technology was not important or emphasized in the final scenes; in fact, I could point to quite a few spots where human technology was required for the day to be saved. Without spoilers, I can't elaborate, but anybody else who has seen it knows what I'm referring to.
~ C.
I think it has more to do with the fascination about the End of Times. People love seeing movies like Apocalypse Now or 2012. Perhaps it is because we as humans realize that the lives we lead now are superficial and do not allow us to reach the potential that we have within us. Nobody likes being wage-slaves to our feudalistic overlords.
I think, deep inside somewhere, we all yearn for a simpler time when we don't have all the stimulation and complexity technology currently gives us.
In reality, I think this is where technology went wrong: instead of making our lives simpler and easier, it has ended up making them more complex and more stressful for us all! Technology should not be attempting to change our lives for the worse; it should be an aid to help all humanity live better lives. I think we have strayed far from that goal, sadly.
P.S. I have no hatred of technology and love it as much as the next tech geek, but there's a point where you just have to think, "Yes, we may have gone too far..." I think that point comes when you look at the world you live in and see that we are obsessed with death and mayhem on the news, while in the real world, many people suffer and we (as a collective) do nothing to aid their lives.
P.P.S. Throwing money at people does not count.
P.P.P.S. Yes, I do know there are many organizations that go out and help the peoples of the world outside our borders, but the aid I'm talking about is this: Technological discoveries that actually help the people of the rest of the world live better lives, not us. This is where a capitalistic technology system fails. If it's not in our interest to discover better ways to use technology to clear sand dunes and create better irrigation systems in the desert, it just won't happen.
And what about technology is that means you have to invade worlds to steal their resources? Technology is just a means to an end.
At this point I think it's clear that doing more on fewer resources is the end to be pursuing.
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This, in a nutshell, is why I had originally figured I’d either hate Avatar or feel like I was giving money to a wacko if I went to see it:
Avatar’s story argues that technology is bad. Humans destroyed their home world through environmental disaster and use military might to annihilate the locals and steal their resources.
It sounds like a description of the typical drivel you get from the anti-capitalism, anti-technology movement.
However after skimming his Wikipedia article, I’m intrigued to see that he also directed Terminator, T2, and Titanic... all of which deal similarly with technology, its use and misuse, and the sometimes-blind faith that people place in it. While I don’t know how far he went with this theme in his newest movie, I’m also more inclined to look at it as an illustration of technology misused and horribly gone wrong rather than just the broad-ended bashing of all technology that it’s been described as in reviews. I think I’ll definitely plan on seeing Avatar at some point.
Actually it doesn't/ The technologies deployed by the blue guys are just as sophisticated (especially the universal protocol connection), just a different kind of technology, just as technological. And I do still prefer robots rather than dinosaurs))
Same plot as Avatar. Humans destroy their world. Humans are bad. Aliens are good, kind and gentle.
I think they must have caught wind of the plot and made a cheap knock off early. That or James Cameron stole the idea. One or the other.
Avatar is about abuse of power (technological advantage).
...stuff was worse than the anti-tech stuff. Dances With Wolves in space. Bah. Hollywood hates the culture and technology that allow it to exist. Don't waste your money, go see Sherlock Holmes.
The question is two-fold: why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie
There's only one answer to the following, and its an obvious one: For the money. You can make a lot of money with movies that demonize people that value money.
I've seen the movie twice and I'm a software engineer for a living. This movie is not making a statement about technology. It is making a statement that it is wrong to try to impose one peoples' way of living onto another people simply because they have something worth taking. It is sheer human arrogance that has been repeated throughout our history. It is highlighted by the statements in the movie shortly before the attack that stated (paraphrased) "that we tried to give them schools and roads." That is simply saying everything we do is better than anything you do. How many times has that been done on our dear Earth? As everyone knows, the movie itself was made with the most advanced technology to date. The plot involved using the most advanced technology in the future. But it was not the technology causing the problem. It was the greed driven decisions of the administrative and militant groups.
I'm pro-alcohol but also pro-moderation.
Avatar was a fairly amazing movie. I'm comparing and contrasting with the new Star Wars. There was probably even more bluescreen in Avatar than Star Wars but Pandora felt convincing and vibrant, completely alive. You never hear people criticizing the Death Star battle in A New Hope saying it looks like a video game, it was just awesome and exciting. I think part of the video game critique comes from movies that overuse bad CGI and make things look little better than the average page and part of it comes from the audience being unable to connect emotionally with those characters. Compare Pandora with any of the environments from the the new trilogy and it's just a lesson in CGI done wrong and CGI done right.
The false dichotomy most people fall into with environmentalism vs. tech is that it's an either/or proposition. "Look, we're either running around in the boonies with bones through our noses and die of preventable diseases before we're 30 or we have to clearcut the forests and live in sterile concrete and steel towers, there's no middle ground." And that's not really true. What's needed is the judicious application of technology, conforming with the needs of the environment rather than trying to thwart or control it.
I'm interested to see what the conservative backlash against this movie will be. Conservatives have been wanting to chew Al Gore's eyeballs out ever since an Inconvenient Truth. There's a strange kind of glee about destroying environmental sacred cows like the Arctic Wildlife Refuge. It's not like the truck barreling down the road indifferent to whether or not there's an animal in the road, it's the truck deliberately swerving to hit the animal, just for fun. This movie is big, awesome, has s'plosions, is from a director who has made some of the most awesome guy movies ever, and it has a message that could only be seen as environmentalist propaganda. This is a 20th century fox film so that explains why Faux News has been told to keep a lid on it. If this came out from any other studio that network would be frothing. Dunno if Limbaugh had anything to say about it yet. He's not affiliated with Faux and has no financial stake in the project. He'd have to go apeshit over it.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Since the beginning of time:
* Look, fire! Now I can keep my family warm and safe.
* Look, fire! Now I can go burn down the hut of my annoying neighbors.
* Look, trigonometry! Now I can build bridges.
* Look, trigonometry! Now I can launch projectiles at those bridges.
* Look, printing press! Now I can communicate broadly.
* Look, printing press! Now I can subjugate broadly.
* Look, nuclear technology! Now I can radiate cancer and use PET scans.
* Look, nuclear technology! Now I can blow cities up...
etc.
The villian used the phrases "fight terror with terror" and "preemptive attack". He was described as gearing up a "shock and awe" attack.
He was using the military to steal a valuable foreign resource, and funnel it into private/corporate hands, killing civilians along the way.
You're saying the message of the movie isn't supposed to be a parallel for Iraq?
For the record, I don't think it is a fair comparison because we're not stealing oil in Iraq. The Iraqi people own the oil and receive every penny for selling the oil. If anything, going into Iraq was a fiscal nightmare for the US. We're footing the bill for the war, and for reconstruction. We're funneling tons of money into Iraq, and liberated 30 million people from a cruel dictator. But given that Cameron is a vocal Democrat who drives a Prius and has suggested Bush lied about Iraq to steal oil, I'm sure he very much intended that to be the message of the movie.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Nowhere in Avatar does it explicitly state that technology is the cause of an Earth where there's "no green left" (that's as close as I can recall to a quote from the lead character). It could just as easily been our tendency to breed like flies on a dung heap that led to the paving of the planet. It's also pretty clear that the main driving force behind the attempted rape of Pandora isn't Earth's government, but a greedy, conscienceless corporation.
It's typical of apologists for the on-going, real-life ecological devastation we're inflicting on our little blue planet to try to misrepresent Cameron's message as anti-technology. In fact it's clearly a cautionary tale against our current trend toward a global corporate oligarchy. The tech in the film is a tool, neither good nor evil. It's used by the heroes for positive purposes and the villains in the service of corporate greed.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
It's not anti-technology at all. We, as humans, abuse things by nature. We use up resources, only to go find another resource to pilfer, etc. Look at how we consume natural resources for pete's sake. Same goes for technology. A good example of that is cell phones. Instead of using texting or pictures for what it's purpose was, we have teens 'sext'ing' on their phones, taking crazy viral photos/videos and clogging up the internet, updating their status every 5 minutes, ignoring reality and real contact for a digital one and hardly even know how to use the 10 digit keypad on the phone, its REAL intent: To call someone and not be tied to land line communication. Again, a lot of this going to be opinionated to a great extent, but the movie is almost a future, truth concept of technology than it is a contradictory for it, IMHO. Furthermore, you also can't tell me if our current world found an alien world, that we wouldn't rape it for all it's worth?
Why do people insist on reading too much into movies? It's just a story and a fairly realistic one at that at least regarding how humans would behave in a not too distant future where a nearby planet happened to have a bunch of resources we needed. I didn't see anything anti-technology about it, just thought yep, that's how humans would behave in a similar situation...
It wasn't anti-technology in any way. For the Na'vi, the animals and trees around them functioned well as their technology, despite being completely biological.
The movie portrayed paramilitary/mercenary and stockholder-driven corporate interests as the primary antagonists, to both the scientists, the Na'vi, and Pandora itself.
Non sequitur: Your facts are uncoordinated.
i wish i had mod points for you. i applaud your courage for posting something so honest and well said.
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
I agree - the movie was not anti-technology, it was anti-plunder.
Basically it was the story of Native Americans. Alternatively, it was "The Last Samurai".
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
I don't see that it says "technology is bad". It says "destroying nature is bad" and "the military is bad". The Na'vi have developed a very high grade bio techology that in the end makes them more powerful than an earthling colonel who went berserk, so technology is good.
The video and the effects are great, the idea of having humans using remote control bodies - beit robots or bio robots - is very interesting and powerful. But the story is really really bad. It's more sentimental than the Lion King and Pokahontas put together. Of course, the makers didn't take themselfves all to serious: the stuff that it's all about is called "Unobtainium".
no, I don't have a sig
People rage on about how "insanely innovative" the movie is - when the majority of monsters/alien life and general story plots are just the same as countless others retold with different names.
Most people are comparing the general plot to "White Man vs Native American" - honestly I'm not so familiar with that history, so I've likened it to the Vietnam war.
At least a good 3 or so of the alien wild-life are not at all unique to Avatar. The dog-like creature is a Coeurl, and I'm pretty sure the horse creature is a lightning horse from Final Fantasy though I don't remember the name. The flyer I'm sure enough that the flyer is also from Final Fantasy.
>Really? Because all I get from the trailers is that it's an updated version of The Smurfs.
Obviously you have not been paying attention.
If you are honestly comparing the sophistication of the animation and rendering in Avatar to that of The Smurfs then you really just need to be quiet because clearly you have no idea what you are talking about.
3D tech aside, the rendering in Avatar has raised the bar for animation to unprecedented heights. In fact, I find words like "rendering" and "Computer Generated Imagery" to no longer have meaning for a film like this.
What they are doing now very nearly constitutes simulation. The only thing holding it back is the fact that the beings being simulated are, obviously, fictional.
Because of this work, the technology is very close now to being able to convincingly simulate humans.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
im a durr
I think it was outright obvious that Avatar was criticizing bad uses of technology, as well as over exploitation of resources. The movie was not full of vagueness, or the kind of intellectual subtlety that gives people lots of room to dream up rival interpretations. The movie was simple, and it was not anti-technology.
I can also see how people who just aren't very good at critical thinking might come away from this movie with an anti-technology story in their heads. They saw guys in airplanes = bad, guys in trees = good, and didn't pay any closer attention than that.
I guess the world is full of such shallow-thinkers. I have accepted this. But it still annoys me when they post stupid articles like this one.
In the story the (good) scientists lose against the (bad) profit-over-anything-corporate backed "private" military. The indigenous where caught in the middle without a say. That message was so obvious it wasn't much of a political statement as it was an easy good guys vs bad guys setup.
But that is not why I enjoyed this must see movie.
I was thinking "Dances With Wolves."
Or "Little Big Man."
Or even "District 9."
There's a lot of this kind of plot. By some accounts, this is all about white people's inability to honestly discuss race.
Although -- there's similarities to "Dune" as well, which isn't racial.
Liberal? Conservative? Compare perspectives at Left-Right
Avatar's story argues that technology is bad. Humans destroyed their home world through environmental disaster and use military might to annihilate the locals and steal their resources.
Bad? That's how awesome technology is. It allows us to do the impossible.
Luddite Pr0n created by anti-Luddite technology.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
I have heard other people express the sentiment that they don't intend to see this film because of the similarity to the plight of the American Indians.
I wonder, do you have a problem with films in the tragic genre in general or just ones that strike too close to historical reality for comfort?
For example, did you similarly boycott "300"?
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I think the movie message is pretty obvious. Its about human greed. Whenever it suited us the opposing culture was crushed by the massive weight of the technological advanced civilization and all this to take control of a valuable resource. Be it the Spanish literally destroying the Inca civilization over night because of gold. Or the native Americans conflict. We always invented excuses for this. But most of this excuses bow down to one thing. We wanted something that was on their territory. And frankly we haven't changed a bit.
As we still find excuses to wage war one places that are rich with resources or that are in a strategic position. And who ever is in the way is simply destroyed. I don't see the movie as being technology vs nature.
Technology is neither good or bad. But it can be used in a good way or a bad way. I think the movie is more about human greed vs the right and ethical position. In a way what Cameron wants people to understand is that more often than it should we put human greed above the right thing to do.
And in fact we have a pretty recent example. And that is the failure of the last climate change talks. Truth is everyone knew the talks were going to fail even before they started.
And taking this into count. The movie ending is all about "nature" fighting back. To put it in another away. Our greed may take us to our doom. While the world powers "live" on top of the big guns, the big companies and so on, and we keep on dismissing very important signs, we may one day wake up and realize that our planet is taking a much more drastic change than we though. And guess what? It doesn't really care if you're the most powerfull man on earth.
...the blue people ever since they revealed what they were doing with the natives.
The takeover of the Native Americans, and the slavery of Africans, were the two most savage acts the United States every did. There was no way even a futuristic United States would allow such actions to proceed. I wouldn't be surprised after they went home there was some type of investigation and charges filed against the CEO and other people within the company for genocide. This is why we need to remember out past, or we will be doomed to repeat it.
A long time ago when we justified the hostile takeover of Native Americans, we considered them as "savages." Guess who the real savages were?
Like the posters before me have said, this isn't a statement on anti-technology, but how technology needs to be responsibly used.
"Oh dear God, James Cameron is rich. I wish I was rich. I should critically analyze a movie that made more on opening day than I'll ever make in my whole life. That will make people like me on the internet." At least that's what I got from the article. Am I right?
Titanic: Biggest, best, unsinkable new ship sinks, killing many of its passengers.
Alexander Peter Kristopeit bought his basement from his mommy for one dollar.
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In a few weeks, we will have heard every crticism and praise of Avatar.
It's anti-technology.
It glorifies technology.
It is anti-military.
It isn't anti-military, that's not a military force, it's mercenaries.
It's anti-corporation.
No, it's anti-consumption.
No, it's anti-technology.
This is only one small loop. There are others, and they intersect.
I liked the movie a lot (saw the 3D Saturday night). But:
- The 3D has a ways to go to be perfect. Some scenes, especially those of the transport with everyone waking up, and those of the link room, do not seem to take 3D very well. Other scenes took good advantage, and reached out to me. I sat far right 1/3 up in the auditorium. If anyone tells me I should have sat center stage, well, then that 3D has a lot of work to do. You should get the same experience in any seat other than the poor blighters underneath the screen, or it isn't serving all your patrons. Which is cool.
- The story was somewhat predictable but then again I've been reading Sci-Fi for about 40 years, and truly inventive plots are few and far between.
- It was told well, which makes up for the plot.
- The effects were truly wonderful. But let's be honest. At least one other Na'vi should get dirty in everyday life, right? Effects get a 9.0 from me for lifelike rendering. Better than Star Wars, with the sad cels sticking out.
- If this is the future of cinema, we will get a lot of 3D crap soon. Crap is still crap. Effects are still effects.
Overall, I would like to see it again, but may not - my wife will NOT go again.
It certainly LOOKS like $500mil, but is it worth it? Maybe...
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
>You're saying the message of the movie isn't supposed to be a parallel for Iraq?
Except for two clumsily-inserted phrases of "fight terror with terror", and "shock and awe", I saw very little comparison to our situation in Iraq. Even the "unobtanium" played only a 30 second role in the film, but OK, I'll give that one, too.
Mostly, this was a story of a technologically superior force taking a technologically inferior force's resources by force. The parallel I drew most strongly was with Native Americans.
As for Iraq, yes, it is true we are not overtly stealing oil from Iraq, that we know of. Whether this is due to altruism or just because they haven't figured out a way to do it overtly is up for debate. But regardless, the simple fact is that securing energy resources is a #1 priority for the continued American Way of Life. That by itself is worth trillions of dollars, and the people with major financial stakes in our situation know this and no doubt are pressuring our government, directly and indirectly, to make sure that energy lifeline stays intact.
On top of this, there are trillions of dollars worth of energy contracts at stake in obtaining, transporting, and selling Iraqi oil. To insinuate that no one is profiting off of the American intervention in Iraq simply because no one is overtly stealing the oil is naive. To speculate that people in our government are not either directly or indirectly pressured by such monied interests is likewise naive.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Like everything that comes out of Hollywood these days, i have absolutely no desire to see this film.
Maybe someday i'll happen to be in the room when someone is playing the dvd, in which case i might see bits and pieces of it. But other than that i'll probably never see it.
This, and the new ST movie should be right up my alley, but Hollywood has made so much crapola in recent years that even the films that should light me on fire do absolutely nothing to motivate me to go see them.
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Star Wars.
From "Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed", through Luke "finding his way" in a swamp on Degobha, to the final battle of stick wielding Ewoks versus the evil technological Empire.
Utterly anti-technological.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
It's no different than advertisers spending gobs of money to hire celebrities as spokespeople for their products. Do you really think some football player is the "authority figure" for determining that a new Ford truck is the best value for your dollar, or that some ex baseball player is an expert on spray paint, or??
The thing is, it's people like Hollywood movie makers, rock stars and sports figures who have access to the media mouthpiece. When they want to deliver a message, they've got the ability to get it delivered to a large audience easily. Many of the people who *really* have deep knowledge of subject DON'T have access to (or even an interest in) broadcasting their opinions and insights.
I love the idea in the article that Avatar would have been a cool story with no white guy's avatar injected into their story at all.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Technology is viewed as the downfall of man...it's the basis of the ManMadeGlobalWarming(TM) religion. However, technology has been nothing but a friend, as mankind finds his way into the future.
Remember "London Fog"? Not just a line of outerwear in the 60's, it pointed to clueless Americans that time in history where 20,000 coal fires kept Britain warm back in the days of Sherlock Holmes. This 'fog' was actually smog, so thick that people with gardens (most of them, actually) had to sweep off the soot if they planned to get anything out of them. It collected that badly.
But here comes technology; no one loves pollution, so not only can we use one large coal plant and run wires everywhere, we also have piped natural gas and the skys are clear. Coal isn't without it's faults, but as recently as the 70's, things were pretty good.
Now, if we can ever get the liberals to permit us to create nuclear power plants, it could be better! Not because of the CO2, but because they're cleaner in general.
But that's not all:
- The story was set in a way to make us guilty of the removal of the indians. Not just in the story line, but they go to the trouble of using a native American 'war woop'. But I didn't DO that. Same for slavery: not gonna feel guilty.
- And lets not forget how America goes to foreign shores and loots them until they're poor!
Bullshit. You people have jobs. Where do you think that money comes from? Where'd it come from before we had a thriving overseas economy?
For example, in India a lot of people got jobs, thanks to the unions pushing up the cost of American production. Thanks, Nick-da-fish and the boys! Ever see India in Google? Wow...desolation. They REALLY NEED our technology.
We brought air-cleaners, clean rooms, caused them to create infrastructure, and now people who might be begging are aswering phones. That's not evil. I wish we had someone who could do that, here!
--- For a good time mail uce@ftc.gov
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Here is James Cameron's "avatar"...
No, indeed, this is a fairy tale. Like any such movie it requires us to suspend disbelief. However, they made enough of an effort for me to do so. Specifically, the discovery by Weavers character that they entire planet is a neural net, like your brain, and the suggestion that every living thing is tied into this "gaia net". It would seem entirely possible, to me, that within this fiction, the "miracle tree", is merely a communication organ of this sentient being. Further, it clearly has some impressive diagnostic abilities - diagnosing and fixing genetic abnormalities would be entirely within the possible capabilities of this organism.
It's not anti-tech, it's anti-White.
A movie so blatantly full of bad racial stereotypes would start a re-run of the Rodney King riots if it had played on Black stereotypes instead. But since the bad guys are white, we whites discuss that some of it's facets may be true. Whitey, pleeeze.
but Native Americans essentially lost...
I'd say its a love story set in a sci-fi world and written by a tree hugging hippie who's spent a bit too much time in a sweat lodge high on peyote. Then again, I'd say Lewis Carroll did the same, but by all accounts he didn't use any chemicals (though possibly laudanum for headaches, however I think its highly unlikely anything was used for extended periods, given historical records).
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Well, if only the company used undeground mining technology in place of strip mining, everything would be ok :)
First of all, the obvious : Nice graphics, of course, though still not quite out of the "uncanny valley", where I'd want them to be. A nice evolutionary step, but certainly not something that won't be surpassed next month (year). It's a bit like those old Disney movies like fantasia "pushing the boundaries of animation". Great looking, but easily surpassed.
Imho the movie is massively anti-technology and pro-"magic". Magic in a sort of a mythological "natural religion" kind of way, and of course conveniently leaving out anything even remotely resembling an actual natural religion (just one example : all natural religions mandate (yes mandate) intra-religious wars between families, individuals and villages, or various combinations of that. Of course, deadly competition between inhabitants of the same place is a physical necessity in any non-agricultural religion, due to the massive inflexibility, unpredictability and unreliability of food sources, and the (natural) inability of a species to do birth control, resulting in exponentially increasing populations that regularly get "adjusted" by a famine or some such, a subject conveniently skipped over in the movie).
Before you ask, flying dragons, and other magical servile creatures seemlingly bread to replace everything from a helicopter to a toast maker do not count as "technology" in my mind. I do not find this strange at all. Nature has provided us with far less than it has provided these aliens. It seems gaia didn't love us from the start ... my ancestors never rode on flying dragons.
Another thing I find quite funny is the location of that village and that tree. What energy source would they have ? Given the extreme "coincidental" location they have, one would think it ... just might be those very same minerals. This would mean, of course, that all that "native" stuff is just "plundering" exactly the mineral source as the humans want. If that wasn't the case, imagine just how "unlucky" those natives must have been to build exactly there. But, of course, keeping mountains floating in the air is just so much more important than keeping humans alive (after all, the movie dialog makes clear that following any course of action other than acquiring those "unobtanium" minerals would result in massive casualties on earth. Of course you'd think that sort of urgency would make people appoint a military commander who is actually capable of dispatching multiple ships, or realize that a space-faring human race probably has options of using orbital bombardment, or even just sending one of those probes to make a *tiny* course correction on a meteor. Problem solved. The aliens obviously have no hope at all of repulsing any form of long-distance attack, whether that's missiles, ray weapons or even meteors).
Avatar as a suicide fantasy
Given the reaction on other blogs this review will loosen quite a few feelings. Apparently it hits close to home for quite a few people. Great stuff for discussions.
It seems we slashdotted bugmenot for a second there, so here's a Google Cache of Turn On, Tune In, Veg Out.
I have a series of complaints for ThousandStars for using this during the submission...
1) Its a couple of paragraphs. SURELY you could have paraphrased it.
2) Its an unsourced op-ed piece. By Neal Stephenson, whoever-in-the-hell that is.
3) It is over four years old, and centers on Revenge of the Sith.
4) We just had a slashdot piece on the exact same topic that went into a lot more detail. The conclusion drawn by THAT discussion was vastly more conversation-worthy.
This is the entire point he is trying to make:
Modern English has given us two terms we need to explain this phenomenon: ''geeking out'' and ''vegging out.'' To geek out on something means to immerse yourself in its details to an extent that is distinctly abnormal -- and to have a good time doing it. To veg out, by contrast, means to enter a passive state and allow sounds and images to wash over you without troubling yourself too much about what it all means.
Some geek out, some veg out, and content that suits both is popular. Well, gee, ThousandStars, that really is deep. Lets ponder that for about half a second so we can really comprehend it. Lets not stop for a moment to assume that Lucas is just a bad author. No, no, no. There's magic behind the curtain. Right.
How is this part of the answer about the presumed conflict between technology and anti-technology? Is the enlightenment that the people making the movies don't really care, and that only plot-geeks would pick up on this?
Look, I know that a lot of people don't click the links. I get it. Please stop punishing those of us that do. Thank you.
I for one am in favor of using the military to solve all conflicts, and destroying all of nature. Anyone that disagrees is a dirty hippie. There's no middle ground here.
Dirty hippies shall inherit the earth after war hawks like you make themselves extinct.
Hippies say they're green and want to save mother earth yet they increase their carbon footprint by burning copious amounts of marijuana.
ehh ? Pardon me ? where do you think the money for the war in Iraq ends up ? In the hands of Iraq poor villagers or something ?
The money that YOU (if you are a US citizen) are spending is going to the hands of private military concerns (mostly US based, thats true).
You are not funneling billions TO IRAQ, you are funneling the billions to private/corporate hands , BECAUSE of war in Iraq. All the benefit Iraq has from the money is the explosions and dead civilians.
Going into Iraq maybe fiscal nightmare for US, and a humanitarian nightmare for the rest of the world, but its a business of the century for US private/corporate military sector. So far, the analogy sits more than perfectly.
Have a nice day
The private company doing whatever it takes to get what they want was featured in another Cameron feature: Alien. The Corporation was willing to allow all of the humans including Ripley die so they could get the Alien for weapons research and eventual profits. That movie came out a bit before Iraq, don't you think?
Did anybody else at the end of the film feel depressed? --Rather than elation over the blue alien victory, I just felt dread.
I mean, we've seen this pattern before; Corporate invasion power doesn't just go home when it's lost a battle. Not when there remains huge profit to be had. It just sends out another battle ship. The blue guys barely won the 'final' battle as it is. There was a lot of luck involved, and they lost many of their best warriors.
And didn't the human forces have a massive space platform in orbit around the planet? They sent home all the human survivors, with all of their intimate strategic intelligence about the planet. Ugh. --I recall another quote from a James Cameron film. . .
"Nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."
There's no way that story ends happily. The credits just happened to roll on an up-tick.
When glancing back at American history, I seem to recall noting plenty of Indian massacres when the old-West was settled, but in the end, the interlopers with the boom-sticks always win.
I came out of Avatar into a massive parking lot which played home to a dozen box stores and felt two things; "Wow! Cool effects" and "Life sucks!"
-FL
Its not antitechnology. Its not anti "might makes right", since the might of the Pandora sentience wins. Its not anti anything. Its a movie. Any negative associations are in the mind of YOU the viewer.
Personally, I think that if the management of the corporation in the movie had any skill at all, they would have recognized that the Na'vi would fuck them over militarily in a standard engagement and nuked them from orbit. Or they could have drilled under the tree from a mile away Or countless other possibilities. But that's because I tend to believe that management in large corporations is defective - so that's what this movie is about for me.
Perhaps someone from a culture where such things happen, and who personally doesn't like it, would have thought that this movie was anti-arranged-marriage.
Many other +5 insightfuls have said it before me, but the movie isn't anti-technology. There are many quotes to support this, but the most damning evidence comes from the movie itself- in order to down the Valkaryie bomber at the end, Jake Sully uses... marine grenades. In order to board the ship, he uses... a machine gun. In order to coordinate his attack, he uses... radio communicators.
Without any of these things, the ambush would either fail or be significantly harder to pull off. The Na'vi don't hate their technology- at no point is there even a symbolic rejection of their *tools*. It's simply the behaviour of the humans that offends them.
So the movie is not anti-technology. It is anvilicious on other topics, but it's not anti-technology.
Check out my sci-fi book "Lacuna" at http://goo.gl/MVxX8
If your soul is immortal, or you somehow come back into a new and better body, why hold on to a broken vehicle?
You'll find references to this in traditions from all corners of the world. You may choose to believe this was a way to cope with the notion of death, however, many things strongly indicate we have lived many lives and its not just a fantasy or cope-mechanism.
It is we who are living unnatural lives, with unnatural fear of the inevitable. If we somehow managed to extend our body's lifetime infinitely, our fear of dying would likely become infinite - or zero, after some considerable time :-)
The question is two-fold: why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie, and why are we drawn to it?
Because people lap this **** up.
I will be collecting my 100% discount on this movie.
love is just extroverted narcissism
The humans should have known their chances of getting their hands on "unobtanium" were pretty meagre to begin with... :)
is about the fact that people should use their fantasy more and not just sit and swallow whatever is brought to them, like a movie.
It is a story. There are many movies where the bad guys win. That does not mean that the people who made the movies are pro-bad guy. It is because people like the story.
Or was Star Wars realy about bringing down the governement and to make us accept the fact that terrorists are always right?
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
> The question is two-fold: why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie, and why are we drawn to it?
The trivial answer is that anti-tech white-man-guilt pollution-destroying stories are popular right now. They are more likely to garner good reviews and make lots of money so the higher-ups involved can live in huge houses and drive to events in gigantic limos. It's similar to when the abundantly wealthy bemoan that executive salaries are too high. They say it because it's a popular thing to say. And they're pretty confident that the audience won't notice the incongruity.
The question I would ask: Why does such an expensive movie that took so long to make have a shamelessly derivative two-bit plot?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
I don't recall hearing dialogue that was anti-technology. However, I did hear a lot that could be construed as anti-corporate, especially about how the primary purpose of the human mission there was return on investment for the shareholders.
There was also the entire motivation of the human character - a former soldier for a government that could restore function to a wounded soldiers limbs (legs) but wouldn't because it cost too much.
It was anti-:
- empiralism
- greed
- stealing
- bullying
- murder
- destruction of nature
- corporatism
It didn't say anything about anti-technology, just anti- doing bad shit to other beings.
>"Simulation" and "CGI" are not mutually exclusive as you paint them to be. In fact, they're practically synonymous.
Yes, you are correct.
The point I'm trying to make here is that to date, CGI graphics have looked like CGI graphics. In Avatar, they have developed the process to where it is now a very good simulation - far more "realistic" and "life-like" than anything we have seen before.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Guilt have nothing to do with spiritual salvation, although its a useful tool to manipulate people to do what you want them to do!
Am not sure I grasped everything in your post.
Though, I would rather think of it as a pendulum. Often it swings from one extreme to the other:
From open and violent racism, to self-deprecation and anti-racism.
It is quite natural that when the heavy pendulum swings, it swings like this until we slow down.
Our children, or children's children, will after some time not ever bother about "racism". It will be unthinkable that someone with a different "colour" should have lesser rights in society.
However, the uneducated, or sheltered/lagging societies, may still do the same mistakes - discriminating on religion, skin colour and other superficial features.
So although our soceity learns alot from this globalisation, we may still do similar mistakes, ignoring previous learnings or forgetting to apply it universally.
Redemption should strictly be to fix the broken laws so that they are at equilibrum, halting this pendulum, not let it swing too much.
In fact, how much we manage to slow down the pendumul, is a sign of spiritual / humanistic maturity.
Sounds to me like you just don't care for fictional storytelling at all, then.
Are there any movies that you have enjoyed?
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
...the movie wasn't anti-technology. It was anti-greed. Did the guy who wrote this article even watch the movie?
>but Native Americans essentially lost...
And that was my final take of the move, as the colonists left Pandora - the Na'Vi are fucked. Just like the brief glory for the Indians at Little Big Horn, in the end it provoked a tidal wave of retribution against which there was no hope of resistance.
As I watched the human colonists column off to leave Pandora, I was thinking, "In a few years an automated drone will arrive in orbit to bathe the Na'Vi villages in a neutron death-ray and solve the problem forever."
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
The movie was not anti-technology. I saw the movie. It was about corporate ruthlessness, military arrogance, greed and ignorance. Precisely the kind of stuff that keeps happening around the world. Destroying the environment, biodiversity, dismissing the civilizations you don't understand as subhuman. The kind of stuff that leads to self-righteous stands and declaration of meaningless wars. Seriously, I expect slashdot to post blogs/articles better than this.
You mean the same guy who bought us such pro-technology, pro-big government, pro-big business block-busters as Terminator, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Aliens, The Abyss, Titanic, and The Dark Angel Series has now gone over to the dark side?
Say it isn't so!
Avatar is not anti-technology. Technology saved the Na'vi. The movie was making a statement about imperialism and ethnocentrism. Both the Na'vi and the humans possessed advanced technology. The Na'vi have advanced biological tech including a world spanning network that they can tap into at will. They fly, possibly better than humans can with their technology. The Na'vi are not stone age primitive people, they are a highly advanced culture with advanced technology. Their technology is just very different than human technology.
Sorry my bullshit sensor overloaded.
I do enjoy fictional storytelling, though. I guess I just like a different type of fiction. For instance, I actually liked 'Dances with Wolves'. "Waterworld" was a piece of shit, but we all already know that.
I saw Sherlock Holmes with my sister, my brother-in-law, and our friends on Saturday. It was OK, the books are better, but the movie was better than I expected it to be.
On the DVD shelf that I can see right now, I have all of the Underworld movies, LA Confidential, Wind that Shakes the Barley, Land and Freedom, American Gangster, some James Bond stuff, Jurassic Park, Lord of the Rings, etc. Then box sets of Jimmy Stewart, Carry Grant, etc.
Film isn't my preferred method of story-telling, so I don't really watch a lot of movies. The ones that I like I tend to like a whole lot though. 'Avatar' just looks unappealing to me. When they make an 'Avatar: The Last Airbender', I'll go see that though. There was a lot of good character development and deep issues in that story line despite it being a "kid's show"
For some reason I found the show too jerky during scenes with lots of rapid movement.
;).
Maybe it was due to the movie being projected at 24fps or that cinema had some problem with their projection system.
Nowadays, 24fps is "barely playable" by video game standards
I grew up watching star trek. Whatever we may profess as our ideals, e.g. the Prime Directive, when it comes to reality, if we ever find a world like that, I am sure there will be people and corporations which will try to plunder it ruthlessly and wipe out the local life forms (which will resist). It has happened before in history. It is happening now. The movie sends a valid message. That as a race (I mean human race), we need to grow up. Unfortunately, the reaction will often be zomg! the movie is anti-capitalistic, anti-development and so on.
People are drawn to the movie because it's shiny and goes boom and woosh. No deep explanation there.
If you see the movie, you'll know the Na'Vi (why are they called that?) are HUGE. Like 1.5 human size. Quite interesting to portray them as larger than us, because often aliens are portrayed as weaker or smaller than humans, or like unrecognizable monsters. These are "human-like" and beautiful giants, with a physical link with the animals around them. Their physical build is much stronger and more resilient than a human, and so is the human "avatars" (the movie is worth it just to see humans walking around as Na'Vi alone).
It's a great movie. Worth a watch, especially on the screen (don't miss it).
It's mostly action though, and a few sentences of philosophy a few places, but mostly the pictures speaks for themselves.
In many ways it is unique movie, although the story is similar, there are unique aspects which keep it apart from others.
It also has its weaknesses:
1) It should really be 3 movies, like LOTR! The story is heavily watered-down to allow for a 2.5 hour fast-paced watch. Would be interesting with depictions of more Na'Vis than just the main character's girlfriend. To have the main character only have one teacher is unrealistic. Things like this allows for the short format, but the compression takes away depth.
2) Its mostly black and white. The corporate military has zero tolerance for any other solution than violence, and have no regard for a pristine planets ecosystem. We see nothing of earth's dilemma, and why they have to resort to mining out the Na'Vi planet using military force. I suspect the story behind have more dimensions to it, but the characters are very one dimensional.
3) Like with native americans, 90% Na'Vis would probably succumb to death just because of contamination to human viruses and bacteria. Not a realistic depiction of clashing of civilizations (but much more exciting!)
4) Too much action. Would love to have more "story", more depth, more history etc. I think the story could be changed to accomodate a longer series. Really, an entire universe could unfold here, but we're given only 2.5 hours, which is too litte.
Avatar is not and 'anti-technology' film (even in a loose sense).
Technically, this "article" should be deleted.
While the current inhabitants might not be technologically capable, the system as a whole seems like it was designed and built by a culture far more advanced than ours.
They live inside the organic expert system (hive mind) that provides everything they need. The only difference being that they don't seem to lose their individuality. But the other animals there do and can be controlled by them or by the hive mind.
Instead of Neal Stephenson's "veg out" and Star Wars article, I'd link this more to Star Trek (TOS). The difference being that in Avatar, the world/computer/ship isn't malfunctioning (that we can tell) and doesn't need our help to repair it/save the inhabitants.
If the trolls don't get you hippies first.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
It's a "people who try to take things from others by force suck" movie.
Exactly, a "white people suck" movie because the implication is that all white people ever do it take by force, except for one lone hero who "breaks the mold".
You are just echoing the reason why the movie thinks white people suck.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Exactly. If anything was bad it was the "3d" - apparently you need a certain kind of eyes for that to work - it didn't in my case - so I was only left with a fairly mediocre movie.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
My observation was that the natives have freakin fiber optics growing out of their hair. That's about as technological as it gets. The movie celebrates technology that doesn't consume, doesn't destroy, but works in harmony for a greater good. As a side note, the movie also glorifies war used not for greed, but for defense and preservation. The message is not really even anti-war. It's against corporate society and the inherent greed and selfishness within our species.
I believe there was a bit of an anti-MMO angle to the film. Essentially, as the controller of an avatar you're jacking yourself in to posses control of a body that is larger than life. Meanwhile your physical body atrophies. Though the outside world might oppose you, it becomes your the MMO addicts overarching goal to get back into the game. But World of Warcraft will never be as immersive as controlling an avatar, the world will never be as rich or deep as pandora, and there will never be a ceremony to transfer your soul into your new, superior container. So really, why bother living in the machine?
Anybody else see this as a theme in the movie or was it just me?
To blog is sublime
This movie was as simple and transparent as it gets. It was great eye candy, making the retelling a tired story worth the price of admission. Accept it for that, and try not to read too much into it.
...mushrooms!
I find the shift from summer blue penis to winter blue boobies refreshing and inspired.
Really? Perhaps someone could enlighten me because I didn't see anything in common between the two articles.
'The tyrant will always find pretext for his tyranny.' - Aesop's Fables
Who is it that really suffers from this white guilt? I would argue that Cameron is telling one of the most simplistic stories that we have. It's a simple tale of good guys vs bad guys with the lesson that greed is bad. Not a whole lot of depth there, and hardly controversial.
When Jesus railed against money changers and warned of the difficulties of the rich getting into Heaven, was he suffering from hebrew guilt? Or was he simply stating a simple truth?
Don't hurt others.
Don't take their stuff.
Don't let things replace your essential humanity.
I find that the people who see 'White Guilt' in all of these archetypal stories are merely projecting their own emotions. Perhaps they are the ones who feel guilty. They are the ones who cast 'America' as the bad guy.
It seems that if any story today has a big corporate or military bad guy in it, conservatives will get their panties in a bunch because the bad guys are 'obviously' a stand-in for America. Yet, they are the ones making that conclusion. I wonder why that is? It says more about the critic than the artist.
You could easily make the jump from the trailers and the basic but apt summary of "Dances With Space Wolves" to the conclusion that the movie is anti- technology, Western society, white people, or all the other silly things people are saying.
There's no way you could think the movie is anti-tehcnology if you've seen the movie and payed any attention to Sigourney Weaver's character. Grace, despite being a hard-ass, is unreservedly one of the good guys, and it is through her knowledge of science that she does her good. Grace was the one who figured out the biological basis for what Jake still largely thought of as the Navi's hokey spiritual beliefs. It's only because of amazing genetics and other sciences that the Avatar program, and thus the opportunity to interact peacefully with the Navi, even exists.
How can you say it's an anti-technology movie where one of the main protagonists is a scientist who never rejects science nor has a reason to, and whose technology is critical for saving the day?! The movie is named after a type of technology; does the movie portray it as good or bad? It's not a trick question, though it might be hard to answer for those who haven't seen it.
The enemies of Democracy are
You clearly "missed it." The movie never portrayed the technology as bad, but rather, the inclination to over-exploit natural resources (and to push around people who aren't as technologically advanced) was bad. Watch it (and PAY ATTENTION this time) and you will see.
Just because this opinion is yours does not make it more interesting to anyone else.
In fact, I merely found it more verbose.
I am not at all impressed.
Somebody else said it first, but it deserves repeating: The "Peaceful Tribe" has been much more of an exception in history than a rule. This and other movies turn that concept into an ideal, where any other type of civilization is somewhat less worthy.
I haven't seen Avatar yet, but somehow this doesn't surprise me. I had to laugh when someone said:
"I would summarize his article, but frankly I could never do it justice."
Article summary: Hollywood leftists hate America.
How hard was that?
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It was the same movie, minus Robin Williams.
In regards to those individuals that trash the ideas of the native connection between two different species in the movie.
Actually the idea isnt that far fetched when you take natural selection into account
What if the early forms where invasive from the native people. In other words a forceful connection to a spinal cord etc???
Then those individual creatures that where taken over in such a manner would have a evolutionary bump to their survival rate
Over time those that could be controlled easier would have better survival odds. Also by selective breeding the local people could influence this as well
Other divergent methodologies could exist as well
the plants could have started the trend. By being able to communicate with their own kind they could warn their neighbors of impending threat allowing them to react in a more timely fashion. One plant could warn their neighbor that --"hey I'm on fire" his neighbor could respond by shutting down systems or increasing sap production to patch wounds etc.. Plant eaters might learn to tap into the same network to find ready food and the next step is of course the predators.
There are numerous possible explanations for such connections if you are willing to consider divergent evolutionary paths then what took place here on earth.
Are these evolutionary paths probable --not likely but that dose not rule them out
Jesus fucking Christ, people, has anyone considered viewing at it as just a really cool looking movie? A good cigar can just be a good cigar even if it happens to come from Cuba and you don't like Cuba's politics.
I have no respect for someone who titles thier post "my opinions are more interesting."
I can't take the whole Avatar-as-greenie movie since we're being bombarded by Mickey D's "Avatar Happy Meal" commercials! I mean, doesn't this hypocrisy annoy anyone else?
You guys are all wrong, it was not anti-technology, it was anti-capitalism. Did anyone sense the undertones of the current world wide anti-"terrorism" campaign US is waging? The bottom line is that is was a Neo-Marxist movie, with the main point being that it was Capitalism that destroyed the planet back home and what was responsible for the negative events of the movie.
That's what the sequel's for. I hope it's going to be more like Empire Strikes Back than Matrix Reloaded.
"Waste not one watt!" - CZ
I thought the story was simple enough that anyone with a quarter of a brain may understand it, but apparently some people had their quarter of a brain way too preoccupied with processing the 3D visuals to even lend a thought to the story.
Ok, here is it for you guys. I'll use simple sentences.
1. Science is good. Heck, it's to die for, even.
2. Technology is okay, depending on what it's used for.
3. Killing other people and taking their stuff is bad. Even if they have blue skin and live in a tree. It's their tree, so keep your greedy little fingers off it.
There are a few other minor points to the story, but I won't overload your brain for now.
a society (like ours) that encourages people to be unproductive (living on welfare, begging on the streets, living in their parents' basements until they're 35...).
You're saying the same society that values and glorifies wealth above all else, encourages people to be unproductive because...it doesn't mean certain death? "Encourages?" Really? Maybe "Allows."
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Wow. The original poster apparently thinks that having technology is a license to invade and kill and steal from people who have less technology. The entire last 500 years of history was lost on him, just like George Bush and about 40% of the US population. The 2 million Iraqis America killed over the past 20 years were just sacrifices on the altar of technology, the price of having semiconductors. BULLSHIT. Europeans developed sophisticated technology first because they lived in the cushiest geography, with beasts of burden and temperate climates and an east-west axis which enabled easy sharing of agricultural innovations. They were not superior people and had no right to steal from other cultures.
Avatar is clearly anti-American, not anti-tech. Not only do you have parallels with the US war machine killing people in their own homes and stealing their resources, you have the lack of a public health care system forcing one of the characters into war in order to get his spine fixed. In an ethical society, spine-fixing is funded BEFORE warships, and the warships are used for DEFENSE. What level of technology you're at is immaterial, totally irrelevant. Ethics apply whether you're on sailing ships or space ships.
When they make an 'Avatar: The Last Airbender', I'll go see that though. There was a lot of good character development and deep issues in that story line despite it being a "kid's show"
Wish Granted
WALSTIB!
I thought the movie was anti-war, not anti technology. It looked to me like the problem wasn't technology, it was technology built around exploitation and extermination. The Navi had technology. In fact, their whole moon was one big networked communications system and super brain. If they lacked power, they made up for it in sophistication. The goal of their technology wasn't the exploitation and dominance of every other living thing, the goal was life worth living.
To me the message of the movie was very pro-technology. And the message was optimistic. The world can be a technological paradise, or it can be a hell, depending on our understanding of it. After all, biology is still the most complex and powerful technology on earth. Cameron is suggesting that movie technology is a good kind of high technology. He is saying that there is still time on earth to start using technology to improve our biosphere, and our life on earth, not flatten, pave and exploit it.
Pretty sure you'll be slaves of Dogbert at that point.
why have a technically sophisticated, anti-technical movie
Why should the contents of a fictional story pose any limitations on how the story is told? It's like saying we should only watch scifi stories in zero gravity cinemas, or medievil fantasy stories can only be written on magical scrolls :/
I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
It was a Pocahontas story and she got her hontas poked.
Facts take all of the premium out of arm waving - T. Reynolds
http://chud.com/articles/articles/21969/1/PROJECT-880-THE-AVATAR-THAT-ALMOST-WAS/Page1.html
Speaks much about what I am reading about in these threads.
Why cant things just be ENTERTAINMENT anymore? Why does there have to be "hidden subtexts" in every single piece of entertainment around, be it music-tv-movies-art-whatever. Nothing can apparently be made just for the pure entertainment anymore. Unless stated, by the writers, before release and review that it is the case all these hidden message stuff is mostly just bollocks and self-deluding interpretations.
Anti-Tech "themes"? You can pretty much find substance for whatever damn "themes" you please in that movie concidering its lenght if you just look hard enough.
But technology wise as a product it was "check out the cool stuff we can do now! - a three hour tribute to technology". With enough cash and the computing power it buys this is now what we can do. If you want to talk about the story or moral of the movie it was as far as I'm concerned not about anti-tech at all. It wasn't the technology that made the humans "evil". If anything it was a story about power and greed and the bad stuff following in its wake. The possible outcome of coveting and trying to grab other peoples stuff -- be they here on earth or giant blue aliens on a planet far far away.
But what is really asked of us here is that we should belive that the writers that couldn't even come up with a better name then "Unobtainium" for their rare and super expensive ore have the depth for putting hidden anti-tech and pro treehugging messages in their movie? Well atleast they didn't call it greedium, but I guess that would have been to obivous.
If one want to go into things that didn't make sense in the movie tho I think the list can be made long. Such as; Why did the robot/exo-skeleton have a knife? It had the servo and shock absorption to jump from a "helicopter" (that looked more like a flying barn) and could break stuff left and right like it was twigs but had to pull out a knife? How and why did the stone/mountains fly/hover like that? Why was every single piece of vegetation glowing in the dark? What would be the biological benefit of that? Are the plants afraid of the dark? I guess the last two was cause they could and it looked cool. So upon nothing that I think you shouldn't read to much into anything but just enjoy it for the fun movie experience that it was.
That hippy propagandist trash, how dare those terrorist rebels attack a peaceful outpost on a forest planet. Those were our troops who gave their lives for the Empire.
I loved the special effects and the 3D, the first 50% of the movie was excellent. When I see aliens shoot arrows (no matter how large!) through the armored cockpit of a attack helicopter I think stupid which is what the combat scenes in this movie were. Only in the movies would something this silly make sense. What a waste to spend $300M, create fantastic new movie technology, and use this worthless story as the plot. For crying out loud, they could have driven the bulldozer into the center! Oh wait a minute, the bulldozer was disabled when 8 cameras were smashed. Talk about stupid. Nuke them from orbit, it's the only way to be sure!
You are right, they will inherit the earth. Usually at a depth of around 6' time permitting.
Nah, dirty hippies would be the first to go, pacifist are the easiest to kill when they're just high and have no weaponry.
There are 10 types of people in the world: Those that know Binary and those who don't.
Well, all the idiots who blatantly blundered this particular intervention and unnecessarily fled back to Earth will get fired, at least. But eventual corporate victory is assured, since the next mission will have people who are aware of Project Thor and how it can wipe out the Na'Vi with no defense or counterattack possible.
Because they have these small plastic boxes attached to their ears and they have no idea how any of it really works, they just know they can upload stupid pictures of their friends drinking too much to this thing called the interwebs.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
"This movie is anti-technology, because humans would never exploit foreign resources without the right tools for the job."
Did it ever occur to the poster that a creative, intelligent director who worked with the story's subject matter for years in production didn't encounter this "ironic" concept, and reject it out of hand as missing the point? It took me about 5 seconds.
"Technology" doesn't "force" us to strip-mine, deforest, privatize, pollute or pillage natural resources. Asserting so is an attempt to avoid responsibility for the uses we put our innovations to.
Let's try: "It is a poor workman that blames his tools."
Every once in a while, there are slashdot threads that hint at how clueless people who read (and post) news for nerds can be. Claims of "anti-technology" provide fuel for liberal-bashing and ideology-spouting and for some reason brings out the worst in nerds. Maybe they feel [falsely] threatened that their god (technology) is being dethroned.
technology used in the movie != the theme or message of the movie.
2 are irrelevant. the technology is used to create a 'dream' in the movie, which conveys a story and message to you. had this movie been real, and you were in that alternate reality, you would have no problems conciling the message with your reality. you wouldnt stop and think about the mechanics of optics and colors while having your butt kicked. there is no rule that says a movie which utilizes high technology has to give a certain message in regard to technology.
its like dreams. in a dream, you just see something, feel something, or get a message. the environment, looks, visuals, sounds and feelings of each and every dream is different.
the question posed in the summary is beyond stupid. im getting the feeling that the posting was done for slashvertisement.
Read radical news here
This is the man who turned the Titanic's story into one about humping the bad boy in a car in the cargo hold, throwing away a one of a kind gem, and Celine Dion whailing. He's just spent 10 years on visually spectacular Sci-Fi fluff. I intend to watch it, but for me it'll be a popcorn movie with visuals. At least this time he isn't using real life deaths to pawn his film
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
one of the most profound discoveries I made in course of studying philosophy was the concept of Categorical Frameworks. A categorical framework is that which provides a primer for translating subjective experience into objective syntax. In other words, everything that we use to communicate in this world depends on a categorical framework.
The next more profound thing to be realized is that this categorical framework is not shared across the globe (or across various species). As a result, any one culture or civilization's world-view and philosophy will be significantly different from that of another. For eg the Categorical Framework of the Native Americans was vastly different from that of the European Settlers. The fact that the Europeans won doesn't automatically mean that their framework was better or more accurate than that of the Natives'.
This is the basis of the movie Avatar, and if you apply the concept of Categorical Frameworks to the story, you will see that what it's trying to do is emphasize that it is not a good idea to force one's ideas (Categorical Framework) down another's throat. And in intercultural interactions, sensitivity to the fact that there IS NO Universal common ground is very important.
We can learn from this in our interactions with the rest of the world (including the natural world) and then perhaps we will have a more respectful attitude towards those that seem different from us.
I was so dissapointed that I couldnt see it in 3D, that I didnt want to see it at all but got dragged along by friends. I'd already decided that I would basically never go back to the movie theatre. I broke that promise to see This Is It, and thought that would be the last movie I ever saw at a cinema. Funny, the service SUCKED then, the manager was busy on the phone doing some interview about their "fantastic new digital projectors", although "um, no we wont be getting 3D". I wanted to laugh, how screwed are movie theatres without the promise of cutting edge technology unavailable through the likes of bit torrent?
I saw Avatar, and again the theatre was crappy. Sticking just to the movie itself though, I absolutely loved it. But the picture quality? It looked dim, grainy, jerky, blurry...It was awful! My friend has a 46 inch Samsung LED lit LCD screen, and maybe I'd been spoiled by that. We had recently been to a computer store and seen $5K+ USD tvs showing off blu ray. Amazing quality, mind blowing concerts of Elton John, how weird is it that one of the best looking videos I've ever seen is an elderly man playing piano?
The blur hurt my eyes, I swear the focus must have been off, or is it just how the image is projected up? I also noticed the "cigarette burns", they seemed to pop up every minute!
After playing online video games in 1080 on a 46 inch LED lit LCD screen, I dont think that movie theatres, at least the ones I've seen here in New Zealand, can compete, not without 3D.
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The movie implicitly supports a small (I'd say minuscule) population where few individuals know how to do anything except hunt, gather, and sing.
What do you mean by "supports?" Do you mean that the story states that such an arrangement is morally superior to large populations with more diverse skill sets? That having a large population and building spacefaring technologies is, in-and-of-itself, morally wrong?
Do you think that, if we are to interpret the story correctly, the author is telling us that our species should outright reject our own efforts at technological progress, should thin our own numbers dramatically, and should return to a primitive nomadic lifestyle? And that we are somehow evil for not doing so?
Or do you just mean that the movie takes a romanticized view of the benefits that a small and primitive population enjoys?
I submit that it is abundantly clear that the story is better described by the latter. Sure, the humans were evil in their willingness to commit mass murder in order to mine, but that does not in-and-of-itself imply that technological advancement (or mining) is evil. The killing is what was evil, not the mining.
And there was the bit about there being no green on earth, thus explaining that humans over-harvested their resources. That does not, in-and-of-itself, imply that it is impossible for humans to find a sustainable balance between resource consumption and technological advancement. It merely implies that in this case, the humans did. At the end of the movie the humans were sent back home. Not "sent to their doom on a dead planet" or any nonsense like that. Sent back home, and that was it. Their willingness to go, and their lack of "but we have no where else to go" protests suggests that the humans will be forced to find their own sustainable balance (since they just learned the hard way that they couldn't simply take resources from someone else).
None of this implies that all sentient life should always live in small tribes, and that technological advancement is the great evil that must be avoided.
it will be with high tech
meanwhile, this amazing low tech thing called exploding human populations is the real source of our environmental issues
so, whatever. tech v environment is a completely contrived, false dichotomy
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
This movie is not anti-technology, the technology of the native is people is simply more naturalistic. It is a tale of two different technologies, and different biologies. The native people in this movie, further, all living life on the Pandora planet are equipped with network ports, although to the untrained eye it may appear to be bestial rape! Despite some of the technological advantages of the Na'vi and their environment, it seems as if one disadvantage they face over their Earth counterparts is the lack of wireless technology.
If this movie is anti-tech, it is anti-wireless. Need more evidence that the Na'vi despite their tribal appearance were actually addicted to their own brand of internet? Here's what I care to say:
They preserve their memories in organic computers, hence the type of double damage when the humans destroy their environment. When the humans take out their sacred watchamacallit it's like if the genealogy.com servers exploded. Oh my!
Seriously, there are tons of examples of this throughout the movie. Of course, there is no monetary system on the planet. Eywa controls the balance of life. Oh wait, Eywa = Ebay. On Pandora, life provides infrastructure and infrastructure adds value. hey-yo!!!
Hopefully I've reached someone who gets it: this movie is convoluted in its themes. I'm not going to analyze it beyond 3-D effects in any depth. It borrows and clusterfux weird analogies from all over the place and if you try to add it all up (assuming you can pick up on it) and apply its message to the world we live in you need to find a new moral compass.
I haven't seen that movie yet, but I heard it's about the "evil corporations" trying to screw the natives, or in this case a planet of blue-faced aliens, out of their natural resources...
Like most evil in the world, this is an issue of government force, not of technology or capitalism! The public has no wide-spread delusions about the "divine rights" of corporations to initiate aggression against others, they only have this delusion about government! No one would allow a corporation to control a school their children go to, pledge allegiance to a corporate flag, involuntarily pay taxes to a corporation, allow it to inflate their currency, fight a war for it, etc, etc, etc. Capitalism doesn't need government, but it does require a universal recognition of individual rights, including the right to own property - no matter your skin color, and no matter what planet you are from!
If humans used technology to destroy their home planet, that wouldn't make *technology* bad. Technology, unlike its wielders, has no choice in the matter.
Animals, of which humans are a kind, will destroy their environment if allowed to reproduce unchecked. If a grazing species strips the grass in its range bare and tramples all its seedlings, it suffers local extinction. Humans are mobile and adaptable, which means the range of our population is pretty much the entire surface of the planet. It is quite conceivable that we can could drastically reduce the carrying capacity of the planet for humans by our actions, although I doubt we'll literally go extinct until the Sun's evolution destroys our planet.
Those grazing animals are not bad because they can destroy their local environment. We are not bad because we can destroy our global environment. We'd be bad, or at least stupid, if we used our adaptability to destroy the global carrying capacity for humans. We'd *definitely* be stupid to blame it on the tools we used.
The current human population of the planet exceeds what the planet could support if we suddenly decided to go back to medieval technology. There are twenty times as many people on the Earth as there were in AD 1000. If we rolled back technology to that point, the Earth's habitats would be striped bare. If the preservation of the Earth's biological systems is *good*, then technology is instrumental to that good. The only other solution to preserving the Earth's ecology is to deliberately reduce the human population by 95%.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
US-made Metal Hurlant ?
This had a great "Planete Sauvage" flavor to it. Bilal, Moebius, Segrelles, all come to mind. The Humanoïdes gang and their spiritual kindred and general spawn... And a whole unending fountain of diverse but familiar oeuvres since then. Usually characterized by refined, intricate and tasteful artwork. On the manga front, Miyazaki and others : Nausicaa, Totoro, Laputa, Memories, Blue Submarine, etc.
The list increases greatly if perfect artwork can be slightly overlooked. As in Blue Gender, for example.
Of course, being US-made, its about soldiers, war, aggression, etc. But then, even The Good Doctor 'fessed up to something similar - early in his days.
The Iraq invasion wasn't about stealing Iraq's oil. The Iraq invasion was about preventing the Iraqi oil bourse from trading in Euros instead of Dollars.
MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!
Ok, despite seeing a the Metal Hurlant 'fantasy planet' genre familiarity, I couldn't shake that Harry Harrison "Bill The Galactic Hero" feeling. As if he/it were staring at me from somewhere in the aisles. I kept looking for the snake that would swallow the antagonist at the most difficult moment.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/policy_report/cpr-20n1-1.html
Why Do Intellectuals Oppose Capitalism?
by Robert Nozick
I agree with the folks saying it's more "showing the nightmare that misuse of technology could bring".
The misuse of technology, as companies such as Google and Microsoft start seeking out more and more contracts (already going on) with governments, military, and intelligence agencies all over the world are a very real an immediate threat.
The last commenter hit the nail on the head. It is this global corporate oligarchy, with plenty of contracts (among others) with technology conglomerates, that are a threat to the future of this world, and the future of free society in general.
Smart phones that spy on you, drone armies of thoughtless/indiscriminate killing machines, emails txt messages and other such things sent to the intelligence community and military.
I would say, that is far different than say. . . inventing technology that is beneficial to humanity, such as... ohh...the internet, or a new way to perform surgery.
Technology like anything else,isn't just one lump thing. I would equate this logic with claiming that if you opposed the Government style of Nazi Germany, that means you are anti-government in general. Doesn't make sense when you think about it, does it?
As expressed elsewhere, the natives could arguably be called post-technical, having moved on from the obvious use of machines to more organic structures, like the organic world-network and the ability to plug into various wildlife.
The thing is, although we get a few *technical* examples of this in the film, (use of the filaments in the hair to bond with a creature and use it as transportation) the sense of a post-technical people doesn't really come out in the film. It might have, if the writing had been a little deeper.
Which brings us back to the most annoying thing about the plot -- there isn't much of one. It might have been interesting to explore the ancient history of the natives, at least in conversations with the elders, drop hints that they had progressed from machines to organics, compare/contrast against the human tech, and come to the conclusion that the humans were the primitives. This would have been an interesting twist that did not require any changes to what we saw of native culture. But instead we get colorful battles and explosions to little purpose. A technically cutting-edge but ultimately hollow film.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Sure, there's a lot of baked-in angst about evil corporate/military humans vs. pure innocent nature. But even more insidious is how it seeks to reinforce how special and awesome we humans are in the universe. The natives don't kill Sully because of a semi-mystical sign that seems to signify that he is special. Later, after only 3 months of training, he is able do all the things that Navi warriors with many years of training can do. Shortly after that he can exceed their greatest legends, unite the clans, call on the gods for help, and win the day.
This is the most implausible aspect of a very implausible plot! We're shown throughout the movie that the Pandoran biology is interwoven in incredibly complex ways--an interdependent ecosystem that developed over millions of years. And we're asked to believe that a human driving an avatar can rise to the top of it in a matter of months. (Obviously because we are so special.)
A "white people suck" story is one in which the non-whites beat the whites themselves. In "Avatar" it would have meant that the Navi succeed without Jake or in spite of him. Instead what we have is a messiah fantasy driven by guilt, call it "white" guilt or "corporate" guilt. Jake is overcome by his conscience, but he then overcomes his conscience and absolves his guilt by becoming a divine instrument of deliverance.
I was disappointed because the movie had so much potential. There's a scene where Jake is talking to his camera and realizing he is having trouble keeping straight who he is. That's a huge idea that is explored in only the most shallow way. Imagine what Charlie Kaufmann could do with that concept.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
There's nothing mystical about Eywa. That's the whole point of the plot. The thing is a life form like any other, and spectacularly fails at pretty much any test of deityhood that's thrown at it in the movie (can't save the dying, can't raise the dead, isn't immortal, etc). It can do some pretty nifty things, but nothing that would require it to be a god.
Later, after only 3 months of training, he is able do all the things that Navi warriors with many years of training can do.
He's a freakin' Marine. I don't believe his brother would have fared nearly as well. The only thing he really needed to learn was to control that other body. And maybe give it a bit of workout, since I don't believe spending a couple of years in an oversized test tube is conducive to ones physical potential. That is shown in the movie, by the way.
And we're asked to believe that a human driving an avatar can rise to the top of it in a matter of months.
Remember the title, "Avatar"? Here's a hint: It doesn't just refer to the Avatar program. The trees _did_ in fact chose and accept Jake. He can't do it because humans are special, he can do it because the network of trees likes him (- personally. It doesn't like the other humans as much, especially not the ones doing the bulldozing. It kind of accepts the scientists, but doesn't consider them able to truly learn and experience what it is. See the comment about it being hard to fill a container that's already full). Many of the key scenes in the movie probably only turn out the way they do because the trees are pulling the strings in the background (Neytiri not turning Jakes avatar into a pincushion, Jake being able to bond with the Toruk (I believe the don't show a fight here because there isn't one - these things can only be ridden when the trees "program" them to accept a rider, otherwise they turn the foolish would-be rider into a light snack), and some others).
I was disappointed because the movie had so much potential.
I agree. It felt like a three-hour, multi-course meal consisting only of bite-sized appetizers. Sure it's tasty, but you'll still leave hungry. However, it does leave quite a bit of room for the viewers imagination, which is also nice.
Any sufficiently advanced technology looks like biology.
Biology is nano-tech on a massive scale. We have yet to decipher a cell. The movie posits a planet-wide neural net mediated through tree routes with intelligent nodes (their sacred place) and mobile probes (the little jellyfish thingys that surround Jack Sully and convince Natiri not to kill him).
The movie may be sort of against crude, badly managed technology, but that's all.
What was portrayed in a poor light was forcibly relocating a people so as to be able to mine out a large chunk of resource that they're sitting on top of, and that's just theft.
Well, they did try to pay for it.
Ultimately this should have been a political solution and not a corporate/financial solution, but when one society has something that another society needs but is unwilling to engage in reasonable commerce to deliver it, then they better have lots of tanks to back that up.
If the stuff were really that valuable there is no reason a government couldn't have negotiated some kind of reasonable arrangement so that ecologically-friendly mining techniques could be used to harvest the ore from under the settlement.
If the natives have such a hardline policy on things like this that they simply are unwilling to deal, then you will have conflict - just like has ALWAYS been the case historically.
The story of Avatar was meant as a very simple moral message. It was yet another telling of Native Americans vs. European Invaders with the natives winning this time. It's the kind of thing we've seen a million times before. There's really nothing more to the story of Avatar than that. It's an enjoyable story, and better, even simple as it is, than most dreck out of Hollywood. But everything is laid out so black and white, it's clearly not meant to be deep.
i for one welcome our new blue avatar overlords in the mist
Nothing like some hollywood jackass to use some cool sounding word without bothering to find out what it means. The very concept of a "rich deposit" of unobtanium is an oxymoron. It's kind of like saying "that prostitute has the biggest client list because she's a virgin"
Since the humans ultimately failed to obtain that rich deposit of unobtanium, it wasn't an oxymoron, just some subtle (unintended?) irony.
Selective breeding allows us to see the long term results of following a certain path of specialization.
Genetic engineering (not selection, there is no natural selection involved) is too risky since it parachutes species without due care of the consequences in the environment.
Two completely different ways to approach the same problem.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Is is a form of art, communication and even propaganda.
Anybody claiming that films are only entertainment should be classed as ignorant.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
"I don't dislike historical movies. I saw about half of 300, but wasn't particularly impressed with it. "
Of all the movies that could be considered "historical" you chose 300?
Are you serious?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Many of us are no longer burdened by inhumane jobs.
We no longer have to walk for hours in order to trade.
We no longer die due to treatable diseases (we as in "we living in rich countries, aren't we lucky bastards?").
I frankly fail to see how technology has made our live more difficult.
Complex perhaps, but difficult? Nope.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
If that helps you to sleep at night, all the power to you.
The fact is that the US intended to control the flow of oil, and the Bush administration initially allowed only US companies to bid for contracts for Iraqi infrastructure (to the chagrin of the British and other US allies on the Iraq adventure).
Of course all these grandiose plans came falling down like a house of cards when the little pesky problem of Iraqi insurgency replaced the dreams of a population receiving invaders with honey and flowers....
It is astounding that there are people still defending the band of vagrants that allowed Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia to become ever bigger problems while wasting resources and lives in decapitating a regime that was all tied up anyway and that had nothing to do with terrorism and that posed no threat to anybody's security anymore
As for liberating 30 million of Iraqis, well, obviously many of them don't feel liberated, and unfortunately we can't ask the opinions of the hundreds of thousands of dead people and we can't even project statistically their opinions because the invading forces didn't put an effort to count the Iraqi casualties.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It's one thing to cross one kind of corn with another. It's another thing to stick tomato genes into corn. That could be an unfortunate surprise to somebody with tomato allergies who eats some special popcorn. And it's quite a bit scarier to start sticking insect genes into plants.
When two organisms have to breed to produce a hybrid, at least you have some idea what to expect. But even that has unintended negative consequences, like Africanized bees. If you go tossing far flung genes, or even fully synthetic genes, into a food plant and try to keep calling it "corn" then you're just asking for trouble.
If foods are designed and fabricated like pharmaceuticals, then they should be tested like pharmaceuticals before being sold for public consumption.
there was a "might makes right" is bad
Remember why the humans left Pandora eventually? It was because of the "might" of the things defending Pandora against humans. So, the movie re-inforces the doctrine - "might makes right".
Bingo Dictionary - Pragmatist, n. A myopic idealist.
They'd probably say that Star Trek is anti-technology too, huh?
...for the second or third movie when you find out that Eywa is in fact a CPU from some terraforming space ship (containing link equipment) that crashed to the planet and began changing everything about so that all the denizens were able to link, and download/upload with the CPU. Those arches around the soul tree are likely the remains of the ship structure.
Now go read the Cycle of Fire trilogy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janny_Wurts#The_Cycle_of_Fire_Trilogy)