Sweden also has one of the world's highest suicide rates.
I think that is wrong -- Sweden has one of the best statistics of suicides! Since we're not religious, there is a lot less stigma with suicide, so the reporting is better (i.e. a lot less are written off as accidents).
On the other hand, with the winter darkness being what it is...
This lack of religion isn't the most extreme difference of Swedes. I always thought that if there, against all taste and reason, should be a god -- then the Swedes are its way of LD-50 test caffeine. Then the senile idiot just forgot to lock the cage door.
Atheism in Sweden shows differences compared to other countries in that few people here are brought up with religion. People just don't care -- at all. To declare faith in anything is a bit strange, like chewing with an open mouth. A bit strange. Most people that turn religious without that kind of upbringing usually have some lesser mental problems.
I was really surprised the first time I went to Ireland and realized that people were religious -- but otherwise normal.
Lewis does address this theory- really, check him out sometime for a sane, non-American fundy view of Christianity. He actually leaves room for genetic and social origins of some morality
Oh yeah, let us trust a literary professor on science and mathematical models of morals which were invented far after he wrote the book!:-)
I was going to read C S Lewis when I was looking for theist arguments, but I lost interest after reading about Mere Assertions:
Lewis goes to great anecdotal length to argue for the existence of a "Natural Law" of morality within each human. Unlike the law of gravity, though, this moral law can be disobeyed.
"This law was called the Law of Nature," he writes, "because people thought that every one knew it by nature and did not need to be taught it. They did not mean, of course, that you might not find an odd individual here and there who did not know it, just as you find a few people who are colourblind or have no ear for a tune. But taking the race as a whole, they thought that the human idea of decent behaviour was obvious to every one. And I believe they were right." [...]
Lewis does not believe that differing civilizations have had differing moralities: " . . . these have never amounted to anything like a total difference." (Oh? What about culturally sanctioned polygamy, infanticide, cannibalism, wife beating, self mutilation, castration, incest and war?) He dismisses the critics who claim that morality is a result of the species' survival instinct by noting that we are free to obey or disobey this "instinct" and make our decision by a higher standard of Right and Wrong. "You might as well say the sheet music which tells you, at a given moment, to play one of the notes on the piano and not another, is itself one of the notes on the keyboard. The Moral Law tells us the tune we have to play: our instincts are merely the keys."
And if you want to e.g. argue that war has always been seen as "necessary evil" and not a standard way of doing "business", then read up on clan societies and the old Asa (Norse, for English speaking) religion with holmgång and heaven only for those dead in battle!
Sorry but you won't get any further responses to your comments unless you respond to mine. You failed to do that at all in your last post.
I have shown you a liar and in the comment before this last one, you showed racism. I guess you have said more than enough...
Hmmm... it is interesting how you you define that I don't respond to your arguments, since you've complained about it twice. Could you answer a couple of specific questions?
Didn't I respond when I pointed out that the countries Israel are in conflict with are factors of ten worse in most any human rights parameter -- so you probably made a world record(!) in size of double standards when you claimed that Israel was worth a thousand times more criticism than e.g. Sudan?
When I showed that you were wrong about your claims about the Jews being mass murderers at the Nakba (the Arabs mass murdered and threw out Jews instead), I didn't respond when I disagreed and showed your antisemite lies to be wrong yet again?
You made wrong claims about Jenin (see first references on the page). I didn't respond because I showed you wrong instead of agreeing with your repeated claim that Israel is a thousand times worse than Sudan? Or didn't I respond when I jeered at you for lying and repeating your wrong claims about Jenin even after I pointed out that you were totally wrong?
In my last post, didn't I respond when I pointed out how extremely bad style it is in the western world to do racist attacks? The worst insult in the west is "racist". Or didn't I respond when I reminded you about how pathetic you were when shown wrong by lying and doing personal attacks? Or didn't I respond when I laughed about your claim that you had a "strong mind" after doing racism attacks and all that fanatical bullshit?
I attacked just a few of your insanities which I had the energy to read. I really, really hope you're a troll and not this pathetic. If not, please read this link.
Here you even do racist attacks, which really is beyond the Pale in western society -- I guess your stinking racist ass are from the
here, or something? I really hope you're a bad troll, but if not -- I wrote this as honest advice to you.
No, you stupid lying little idiot. I merely said that Hezbollah were responding to Israeli atrocities.
And how do you know that? It looked like realpolitik, i.e. Iran needed focus moved from their troubles -- and since they finance and train Hezbollah, they get what they want. Which seems in character, considering Hezbollah's present cynic power politics in Lebanon.
WHAT? You stupid fucking retarded Jew! It was an international incident! How do you like it when people deny the Holocaust? You think you're the only humans, and the only ones who deserve to have your people mourned?
Everyone that disagree with you is a Jew? The Israelis motivated why it probably wasn't a miss from their artillery but a Palestinian mine on the beach -- did the IDF lie or was it wrong? I don't know. You don't know either -- but you are certain who is guilty! It is always the Jews!! Racist antisemite fanatic asshole.
Since you have nothing constructive to say about it, and no proof otherwise, I can only conclude that I've won the argument by default.
You made claims -- I
pointed out repeatedly that you haven't given any support -- and that even your own references contradicted you! (Also, Jenin's proganda that was retracted is well documented). You know all this -- but you claim victory and do racist attacks. You must be a troll, no single person on the planet can have that little integrity.
I will now only respond to further correspondence if you actually make an attempt to address the multitude of issues I've raised, instead of just denying the Palestinian Holocaust ( and I know how much you Jews hate Holocaust deniers )
I gave a reference to Wikipedia and showed that your statements wasn't supported -- in fact, the systematic murders were on Jews by Arabs, as usual. That follows most other sources I've read (there was one documented massacre in one (1) Arab village, which you could have given a reference to).
I have a strong, well educated mind, and I'm not about to be swayed by some snotty little arsewipe who's best arguement is crying "LIAR!". That's no argument, and to prove my point, I will once again call you a liar.
Repeating empty claims when showed to be wrong implies a strong mind?! Another unique position... like that democracies are worth a million times more criticism than dictatorships -- even despite the democracy being false!! You claim to not lie -- but never discuss where I showed you wrong, time and time again (see references I gave above).
I think you'll find that Israel was the cause of this conflict. Hezbollah were responding to Israeli attacks that killed a number of Palestinians from the same family on a beach.
I wrote that Hezbollah committed acts of war -- your claim that Hezbollah's motivation isn't relevant, idiot. And give refs to your claim about Hezbollah's motivation -- I haven't seen they claim that. Also, I don't know how that family died since someone seems to be lying about that --- who? I don't know -- and neither does you.)
Actually I did. I gave an example of Jenin.
There were extreme claims re Jenin at first which were then retracted. You quote old news stories about the first claims (and partisan references to the most propaganda-ized conflict in history!). This is documented in the link to wikipedia which you yourself gave -- and I quoted. So you must know that you lie here. And I already gave a link to HRW to show about total numbers of dead. Your lack of integrity in repeating known bad facts is incredible.
If you want more examples, try googling for Nakba. Fundamentalist Jews murdered hundreds of THOUSANDS of Palestinians in the killing frenzy that was to become the norm for Israel.
You lie as always. The Wipipedia don't support your version, it says:
Large numbers of the Arab population fled the newly-created Jewish State during the Palestinian exodus, which is referred to by many Palestinian groups and individuals as the Nakba [...], meaning "disaster" or "cataclysm". Some Israeli historians suggest that the Palestinians fled because of orders from Arab generals. Many Palestinians left under the belief that the Arab armies would prevail and they would return.[18] Moreover, "Arab inhabitants of the State of Israel" were offered "full and equal citizenship and due representation in all its provisional and permanent institutions" in the
Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel; many, however, refused. In addition, the entire Jewish population of the West Bank and Gaza Strip was either killed, captured, or expelled by Arab armies. Many also fled to Israel.
Estimates of the final refugee count range from 400,000 to 900,000 with the official United Nations count at 711,000.[19] The continuing conflict between Israel and the Arab world resulted in a lasting displacement that persists to this day, due to the fact that no Arab country absorbed the refugees nor did Israel wish to allow back into itself a potentially hostile population.
Immigration of Holocaust survivors and Jewish refugees from Arab lands doubled Israel's population within a year of independence. Over the following years approximately 850,000 Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews fled or were expelled from surrounding Arab countries and Iran. Of these, about 600,000 settled in Israel; the remainder went to Europe and the Americas (see Jewish exodus from Arab lands).
The only mass murder mentioned was done on Jews, as usual. Also, as usual, you are shown to be a lying idiot.
People using critical thinking try to look at facts first -- and then build opinions. Not the other way. We don't start thinking that Israel, muslims, marxists or any other group/country is bad. We are also aware of that most of our opinions are more-or-less wrong and will change over time. I have changed opinions on most subjects and they'll probably change again.
I have found that idealists like you have a model of the world -- and then confuse your world-model with your image of yourself. To point out that your opinion isn't supported by facts was to attack you as a person (like posting doctors records to you being impotent, or something) and since you had no support, you replied with lies and meaningless personal attacks. A sane reaction would be to realize that you have lots of opinions without reality basis since I could literally take anything testable you wrote and show it wrong.
And if you are going to again lie and claim my description of the "discussion" is wrong, see this
overview of the last part.
So why don't you discuss all places where you have been shown talking utter crap without connection to reality? Like when you claimed that Israel killed hundreds at a time -- which you first couldn't support and then started lying when I pointed out that your own damn reference contradicted you. See what you commented, for a list of what a complete fanatical idiot you are -- with references.
Even in bourgeois democracies, they have universal suffrage. But Israel doesn't. Only Jews can vote.
So how did the Arabs get into the knesset? Around 20% of the Israeli population are Arabic -- and they have the rights to vote. Stop lying some damn time!
I don't have the energy to handle the rest of your lies (Israel doesn't generally start wars -- Hezbollah started acts of wars this summer by kidnapping, for instance.)
I took just one of your insane claims (about Israel being worth a thousand times the criticism than the worst dictators on the planet) and asked for support -- which you couldn't give, so you started lying to hide that -- and followed with personal attacks and lying about my position, which I haven't even discussed. The only damn reference you have given supported my position!!
Well, simply claiming that everything that a critic of Israel say is lies, doesn't make it so.
I didn't read carefully -- here you didn't do another baseless attack on my opinions on subjects that hasn't been discussed. Here you claimed to not be a liar. I motivated my description of you as a disgusting liar; if you could have argued against that with more than another baseless claim, you would have.
For the rest, I discussed that in the other message.
FYI, I don't really care about the Mid East -- so your repeated personal attacks are irrelevant, liar. Israel is just another piece of land that changed hands after the both World Wars (hardly the most unfair land change either) and would not have become its own country if Israel hadn't been created. If that has to be changed, then there are lots of other map changes to do. (I follow the Mid East because of what it says about my local media.)
Well, simply claiming that everything that a critic of Israel say is lies, doesn't make it so.
That is a lie in the first sentence again!! I jeered at you for making repeated insane claims on a subject, so you make attacks by lying about my opinions (which I haven't even discussed) and attack that straw man. For a specific list of your stupidities, go back to what you commented on here.
You can't be real -- you must be the most boring troll I've ever seen. At least use something else but lies and personal attacks. A good troll use perverted logic, too. Please learn to think.
maintain that Israel is a thousand times worse than the countries you listed. As a so-called democracy, the Israeli people have to accept responsibility for the terrorist actions of their democratically elected government. People living in countries that don't even claim to be democratic obviously can't have the finger pointed at them for the actions of their rulers.
You claim that Israel is worth a thousand times more criticism than most any country
I list counter examples of antagonistic countries to Israel (not just any countries) which are up to a factors of a thousand worse on most any parameter of human rights, etc.
You judge different sides with a double standards of a factor of 1000 X 1000 == a million! Which should qualify you for a place in Guinness Book of Records.
You claim that Israel is at least as bad as many of those countries (not a thousand) -- and are shown to lie
So you make more claims -- and are shown to flat out lie
Including on what I comment on here, you make personal attacks by lying about my opinions and then attacking your straw men
Finally, you here claim that Israel isn't a real democracy -- but since they (and the west etc) claims that, they are according to you worth a million times more criticism than dictators?! Obvious problems:
You change position when shown to be a lying idiot without integrity, making another unique claim no one else argues in public.
Most every dictator calls his country democratic (Cuba, DDR, Chile etc) -- including most Arab dictators like Gadaffi. So your... unique... "argument" that you can judge a country claiming to be democratic a million times harsher should be relevant to them, too!!
You really are a useful idiots defending the world's worst dictators.
Stable democracies generally don't start war with each others. If the Arab countries were democratic, the Mid East would probably be peaceful.
OK. So you didn't come up with any excuses. Instead, you refused to discuss Israeli atrocities at all. Either way. Head in sand.
Your accusation is just another lie since I quoted criticism of Israel from HRW here (when I showed you wrong on another point). My ability to complain about Israel isn't relevant -- let me recap:
you claimed that Israel was worth a thousand times the criticism of most any other country.
I gave specific counter examples (same link) of countries that were antagonistic to Israel -- Syria, Sudan, Libya and the nazi-like acceptance of antisemitism prevalent in the muslim Mid East (the world today lack any similar case of racism). All those are factors of ten worse in most any parameter than any present democracy like Israel.
I pointed out that since according to HRW, Amnesty, etc you complain a thosand times more about someone at least a thousand times less bad -- so you have double standards of a factor of a million!! Guinness Book of Records!
You tried to give examples of where Israel was as bad (giving up on "a thousand times") as my examples by these lies:
democracy in Israel is bad (worse than one of the worst police states of the planet, Syria?!)
Israel kills hundreds of Palestinians at a time (which, if it hadn't been another of your lies, still would be a thousand times less than the hundreds of thousands of civilian dead in Sudan -- your lies doesn't even support your original lie, idiot!!)
You tried to give the example of Jenin as an example of atrocities with hundreds of dead -- but not even your own reference supported that, idiot liar!
I gave the example of Jenin, which you refuse to accept as this is somehow outside the realm of normal Israeli terrorist activity
Yet Another Lie. First, you made the specific claim that "Israel kills hundreds of Palestinians at a time , NOT in a year" so I quoted HRW (same link) to show you an idiot and/or a liar.
Then you claimed Jenin as a single example ("hundreds.. at a time" implies more than once) of hundreds of dead. I pointed out that even your own reference contradicted that even a hundred died in that battle -- then you lied in what you commented on. Now you back from that and lie and claim that I refuse to discuss Jenin, which is just another lie.
(Since you literally only argue with lies I don't bother with e.g. your complaints about Israeli democracy (according to you -- worth a thousand more times criticism than Syria, one of the worst police states on the planet!!) and your equally insa.. unique claim that all extreme political opinions should have equal amount of media access for a country to be a democracy, which would disqualify all countries. Do you know anything about the size and influence of the peace movement in Israel?)
I *suspect* that the dread Argument of the Qualifier arose because you have PolySci exposure and I don't
It probably bottoms out in what kind of people that were in the student areas when I studied. I am by no means even an amateur of the subject. I can honestly say that I believe(d) that my position was the common one.
(-: And about references... if there, against all taste and reason, exists a god --- I will argue that I'm basically a good guy at any judgment of my sins by noting that I resisted the temptation to send you off on a wild goose chase of some improbable literature!:-)
Yes, not all subjects can use the scientific method (or do formal proofs) -- and that doesn't necessarily mean that the subject is uninteresting and/or unimportant. Your attitude of wanting to learn is an inspiration which I probably needed now, thank you.
I see you haven't commented on the rest of my response, while coming up with excuses for Jenin.
Excuses? I showed that your claims were totally mindbogglingly wrong according to your own reference.
If you really is an uneducated idiot and didn't lie there, you certainly did lie here -- when you claimed that it was "excuses" when I showed your original claim wrong.
I wrote that I saw no reason to read the rest of your lies when you have consistently lied time and again while trying to defend impossible statements. You are a really, really boring troll.
Your first claimed that Israel killed hundreds of Palestinians at a time and when I pointed out that HRW disagreed, you gave one "example" of Jenin, but see further down in the WikiPedia link you gave yourself:
Further investigation by the United Nations and international reporters found that 52 Palestinians were killed in the operation, 22 of whom were civilians. [...]
Ultimately, Human Rights Watch verified the deaths of 52 Palestinians, of whom it concluded that 27 were suspected to be armed combatants, 22 were civilians, and the status of the remaining 3 could not be determined.
You claimed the IDF killed hundreds "at a time" -- Jenin was an uniquely large battle and not even THAT supports your insane claims. You must have been aware of this and just looked for some bad references.
You're a pathetic fanatic -- here I found a lie in your first paragraph(!!), so I didn't read any further since this isn't the first time you are shown a shameless liar. Will you find some more bad references to support your idiocy now?
There are millions of Palestinian refugees who have had their homes bombed or bulldozed. Israel kills hundreds of Palestinians at a time , NOT in a year.
Hundreds dead at a time?! Millions of homes destroyed?! Oh, no references? Strange... not.
Here is what HRW, a known Israel critic, has to say:
As of October, the number of Palestinians killed in 2006 by Israeli security forces had reached 449, at least half of whom were not participating in hostilities at the time of their deaths, raising serious concerns for civilian protection. The Israeli army's continued failure to conduct investigations into most killings of civilians reinforced a culture of impunity in the army and robbed victims of an effective remedy.
That means 449 for most of 2006, which was a very active year. Your claim of hundreds a time is idiocy -- Hell, you give stupid a bad name! You can't be this stupid and handle a keyboard. You must be a troll or have mental problems.
Can you give good references to any of your claims? At all?!
And the millions of houses... is there a million houses in the Palestine areas totally?! What a nitwit you are!
First you claimed that a democracy (Israel) is worth a thousand times more criticism than most any country (not other democracy) on the planet! Then you make idiotic claims re Syria, one of the worst dictatorships in the world!
Now you specifically claim that despite your insane claims about genocide etc done by democracies that you're not a useful idiot for the dictators?
Syria is one of the world's worst breakers of human rights and
police states is worse than any democracy? How about some references, you lying idiot troll?
This is what the well-known Israel-critic, HRW, has to say about Syria.
(I didn't read the rest. You are already shown to be a liar without neither a clue nor a reference.)
And yes, Israel deserves to be complained about thousands of times more than pretty much every other country.
You should be in Guinness book of records for largest double standards to judge different sides with. Consider:
Syria is a neighbor of Israel and part of the conflict. Check HRW.org. It is one of the worst breakers of human rights, breaks war laws, when Syria had an uprising they killed indiscriminately (not even trying to avoid civilians, like Israel), in the list of worst police states on the planet, assassinates politicians in other countries... etc. The point is, it can easily be argued that in most any parameter -- Syria is worse than Israel by multiple factors of ten.
Sudan has organized mass murders, mass rapes and... ah, what the Hell. They kill civilians by the hundreds of thousands. In Palestine, Israel (mostly) tries to target people killing civilians. The dead from Israeli fire are at most hundreds a year. The one case of a guy murdering civilians in a mosque is still in prison, afaik.
Libya's destabilization of West Africa seems to have resulted in even worse numbers than Sudan.
Check memritv.org and e.g. read about Hamas' quotes from the Zion Protocols. We talk about the same sources that inspired Mein Kampf (which, by the way, sell well in muslim countries!) You can find rasists in any country -- but not that kind of content in state controlled and censored media.
Etc, etc.
I call bad troll.
True Believers really do seem to think that a factor of thousand worse are worth a thousand of the criticism -- but most aren't stupid enough to say it where it can be answered in writing.
My honest opinion, not an insult, is that I really hope you're a bad troll and not this stupid.
Let us see what more you write?
Quite [sic] wanking yourself stupid [...] stupid [...] dickhead [...] mindless drivel [...] you haven't evolved emotionally and intellectually [...]
I try not to keep double standards of judging and believing anyone (except Microsoft) are evil. So it made my day when I was called not evolved by you with your double standards in judging of a factor of a million! He he...
Your arguments weren't coherent either. I don't have the energy or the interest, but some fast points:
US complained a lot about China when other countries (which also had business there) kept their mouths shut. And the US aren't a dictatorship (they don't implement it in other countries either, since even they start wars with dictators) -- so that means you support the worst dictators on the planet against democracies. I didn't understand that you believed that your conspiracy theories re natural resources was a relevant answer to my argument -- please give references to economical (non-extremist) literature... Etc, etc.
At least be an entertaining troll -- that was just sad. (And please don't claim that you're not a troll. I prefer to hope you're just a sad boy without a life and not that stupid.)
Now I'll go do stuff in my life. Please try to get one too, troll.
the amount of political and financial effort put into weapons research and US military strategic objectives exceeds the total funding for efforts encouraging positive political change around the world.
Consider the end of the cold war. The US forced Soviet to spend so much on weapons to counter their own spending that Soviet closed shop. That was a good political change -- brought by weapon research!
No, I'm not claiming it will happen again.:-) My point is that the best way to influence for democracy is to make the economy bad for the dictators -- then they will have to change system sooner or later, since (hopefully) only democracy bring wealth. It seems to be the only way that "encouraging positive political change" seems to work. Why would thieves controlling a country step down -- you believe they care about their country? He he...
(a) Afaik, the US would support the land mine ban -- except for the border North/South Korea. And they do adher to quite strict limits re use of cluster munitions.
(b, c) The US doesn't trust the international system and the UN, true. Consider the joke of human rights in the UN -- the Arab nations almost got Sudan into the new working group -- after Libya! Etc, etc. I really can't blame the US, I rather wonder at the pro-UN propaganda in my local media.
(d) Yeah, the industry gets most of the policies it want. Maybe a bit more than in most other countries. Maybe. The US isn't the worst in the farm subsidies clusterfuck (to use an US idiom), it is France -- and those bastards drag the rest of the EU behind them!:-(
(e) In many ways, the US looks like a third world country. On the other hand, they can't implement a welfare state because they have more or less open borders to some of the poorest countries in the world. Hell, I'm not certain that welfare states are stable in EU.:-(
Are you claiming that Japan's investments in consumer tech will result in many-kwatt lasers?:-)
I am not sure I believe you are serious by arguing that consumer research could do the same work as military research. References would be interesting? There are differences in the type of targets military research do.
For instance, consider WW II and the Germans building Goddard's rockets -- how could that have happened in the civilian sector? How many more decades or centuries?
BULLSHIT! You mean like in Vietnam? Or Iraq? Or Afghanistan ( while they were setting up the Taliban, and now )? [Chille in 9/11, 1973]
Uh, I wrote literally "After the cold war". Chile -73, the Vietnam war and the Talibans were before the end of the cold war. (And North Vietnam was a disgusting regime anyway.) I don't believe you can be this stupid. You must be trolling me.
It's true that the economy of a bourgeois democracy under a capitalist system will grow the fastest out of all the organisations structures that we know. That isn't necessarily a good thing
Well, give an example of a working system that is nicer for human rights? For instance, complainers like you aren't thrown into jail or worse? Oh, there are none?
Also, since most experiments fail with tens of millions of dead, it needs be well tested.
And for the record, read my comments re realpolitik in my previous post -- if west countries depend upon some non-democracy, we don't nag them about democracy. USA seemed to handle Tiananmen square and latter democracy issues better than e.g. Sweden, which is even more dependent on China for economic reasons.
My point -- which you never discussed -- was that it is in our (as in "the west's") interest to work for democracy. Afaik, it is quite obviously true. It also makes a conspiracy theory of your hate speech.
You can't bomb a country into democracy.
Let me guess, you have some convoluted reason why Japan, (West) Germany etc aren't democratic or unique examples?:-)
Well, the thing is that there are plenty of US-bashers around at the moment. It goes without saying that the Arab world thinks as I do.
You feel good agreeing with the worst dictators on the planet? Strange that you lefties never complain about them. You even mentioned Israel, too.
There are lots of things to complain about USA and Israel -- or any other country in the world. Libya, for instance, worked to destabilize West Africa to improve their own power base and got I-don't-know how many hundreds of thousands died. Then we have Sudan, etc. The UN (and extremists like you) complain literally thousands of times more about Israel, which can't compare. Hell, the local left wing journalists avoid ever mentioning this. I'm sorry, but I have to stand with my initial position -- you left wingers are just another religion.
Enough of this garbage, I have better things to do than argue with religious nuts.
First, don't complain about weapons research! That is a good thing, because they do projects that civilian research doesn't do. For instance, Google for Laser Launch and realize that variants of these solid state lasers might give us more space telescopes and other good uses of money. (I can agree on that building and using the stuff is often a waste of money.)
CIA, with their military coupes against democratically elected governments
Oh, please. After the cold war the US generally started to influence clients to become democracies where it is not against their direct interests. (*) For instance, South Korea and Taiwan became democracies when the US wasn't so dependent on them anymore. (The weird part is that afaik, this change came with Reagan a president.)
It is in the west's direct interest to support democracy -- and not only because democracies don't make war (not even USA). We earn more money because the economy of a democracy isn't so likely to be sh.t and they become better customers. (China is a worrying counter example. They might do something horrible, like getting a 1984 society with computer control going. The horrible part is that it could be stable for all time.)
You US bashers are as boring as the McCarty communist scare or Mid West brimstone preachers -- you just think another group is responsible for everything bad.
(*) Like Saudi Arabia, which the US needs more than the other way. If not, the US would pressure Saudi Arabia to democratize. There is this concept called realpolitik, which is practiced by all countries. If the US didn't try to stabilize the Mid East, then Western Europe would have to. We need someone to sell us oil, for now.
It would be a neat solution to Fermi's Paradox if some interesting high energy physics experiment (with e.g. really heavy isotopes which aren't in cosmic radiation?) destroyed the planets it were done on?
But sure, there seems to be some appliances coming. Now we just wait for e.g. support from the major book publishers -- and a good code browsing/annotation application.
Slashdot Mirror
I think that is wrong -- Sweden has one of the best statistics of suicides! Since we're not religious, there is a lot less stigma with suicide, so the reporting is better (i.e. a lot less are written off as accidents).
On the other hand, with the winter darkness being what it is...
This lack of religion isn't the most extreme difference of Swedes. I always thought that if there, against all taste and reason, should be a god -- then the Swedes are its way of LD-50 test caffeine. Then the senile idiot just forgot to lock the cage door.
Atheism in Sweden shows differences compared to other countries in that few people here are brought up with religion. People just don't care -- at all. To declare faith in anything is a bit strange, like chewing with an open mouth. A bit strange. Most people that turn religious without that kind of upbringing usually have some lesser mental problems.
I was really surprised the first time I went to Ireland and realized that people were religious -- but otherwise normal.
Oh yeah, let us trust a literary professor on science and mathematical models of morals which were invented far after he wrote the book! :-)
I was going to read C S Lewis when I was looking for theist arguments, but I lost interest after reading about Mere Assertions:
And if you want to e.g. argue that war has always been seen as "necessary evil" and not a standard way of doing "business", then read up on clan societies and the old Asa (Norse, for English speaking) religion with holmgång and heaven only for those dead in battle!
I have shown you a liar and in the comment before this last one, you showed racism. I guess you have said more than enough...
Hmmm... it is interesting how you you define that I don't respond to your arguments, since you've complained about it twice. Could you answer a couple of specific questions?
Didn't I respond when I pointed out that the countries Israel are in conflict with are factors of ten worse in most any human rights parameter -- so you probably made a world record(!) in size of double standards when you claimed that Israel was worth a thousand times more criticism than e.g. Sudan?
When I showed that you were wrong about your claims about the Jews being mass murderers at the Nakba (the Arabs mass murdered and threw out Jews instead), I didn't respond when I disagreed and showed your antisemite lies to be wrong yet again?
You made wrong claims about Jenin (see first references on the page). I didn't respond because I showed you wrong instead of agreeing with your repeated claim that Israel is a thousand times worse than Sudan? Or didn't I respond when I jeered at you for lying and repeating your wrong claims about Jenin even after I pointed out that you were totally wrong?
In my last post, didn't I respond when I pointed out how extremely bad style it is in the western world to do racist attacks? The worst insult in the west is "racist". Or didn't I respond when I reminded you about how pathetic you were when shown wrong by lying and doing personal attacks? Or didn't I respond when I laughed about your claim that you had a "strong mind" after doing racism attacks and all that fanatical bullshit?
I attacked just a few of your insanities which I had the energy to read. I really, really hope you're a troll and not this pathetic. If not, please read this link.
Here you even do racist attacks, which really is beyond the Pale in western society -- I guess your stinking racist ass are from the here, or something? I really hope you're a bad troll, but if not -- I wrote this as honest advice to you.
And how do you know that? It looked like realpolitik, i.e. Iran needed focus moved from their troubles -- and since they finance and train Hezbollah, they get what they want. Which seems in character, considering Hezbollah's present cynic power politics in Lebanon.
Everyone that disagree with you is a Jew? The Israelis motivated why it probably wasn't a miss from their artillery but a Palestinian mine on the beach -- did the IDF lie or was it wrong? I don't know. You don't know either -- but you are certain who is guilty! It is always the Jews!! Racist antisemite fanatic asshole.
You made claims -- I pointed out repeatedly that you haven't given any support -- and that even your own references contradicted you! (Also, Jenin's proganda that was retracted is well documented). You know all this -- but you claim victory and do racist attacks. You must be a troll, no single person on the planet can have that little integrity.
I gave a reference to Wikipedia and showed that your statements wasn't supported -- in fact, the systematic murders were on Jews by Arabs, as usual. That follows most other sources I've read (there was one documented massacre in one (1) Arab village, which you could have given a reference to).
Repeating empty claims when showed to be wrong implies a strong mind?! Another unique position... like that democracies are worth a million times more criticism than dictatorships -- even despite the democracy being false!! You claim to not lie -- but never discuss where I showed you wrong, time and time again (see references I gave above).
I wrote that Hezbollah committed acts of war -- your claim that Hezbollah's motivation isn't relevant, idiot. And give refs to your claim about Hezbollah's motivation -- I haven't seen they claim that. Also, I don't know how that family died since someone seems to be lying about that --- who? I don't know -- and neither does you.)
There were extreme claims re Jenin at first which were then retracted. You quote old news stories about the first claims (and partisan references to the most propaganda-ized conflict in history!). This is documented in the link to wikipedia which you yourself gave -- and I quoted. So you must know that you lie here. And I already gave a link to HRW to show about total numbers of dead. Your lack of integrity in repeating known bad facts is incredible.
You lie as always. The Wipipedia don't support your version, it says:
The only mass murder mentioned was done on Jews, as usual. Also, as usual, you are shown to be a lying idiot.
If you really aren't a troll, I have a message.
People using critical thinking try to look at facts first -- and then build opinions. Not the other way. We don't start thinking that Israel, muslims, marxists or any other group/country is bad. We are also aware of that most of our opinions are more-or-less wrong and will change over time. I have changed opinions on most subjects and they'll probably change again.
I have found that idealists like you have a model of the world -- and then confuse your world-model with your image of yourself. To point out that your opinion isn't supported by facts was to attack you as a person (like posting doctors records to you being impotent, or something) and since you had no support, you replied with lies and meaningless personal attacks. A sane reaction would be to realize that you have lots of opinions without reality basis since I could literally take anything testable you wrote and show it wrong.
And if you are going to again lie and claim my description of the "discussion" is wrong, see this overview of the last part.
So why don't you discuss all places where you have been shown talking utter crap without connection to reality? Like when you claimed that Israel killed hundreds at a time -- which you first couldn't support and then started lying when I pointed out that your own damn reference contradicted you. See what you commented, for a list of what a complete fanatical idiot you are -- with references.
So how did the Arabs get into the knesset? Around 20% of the Israeli population are Arabic -- and they have the rights to vote. Stop lying some damn time!
I don't have the energy to handle the rest of your lies (Israel doesn't generally start wars -- Hezbollah started acts of wars this summer by kidnapping, for instance.)
I took just one of your insane claims (about Israel being worth a thousand times the criticism than the worst dictators on the planet) and asked for support -- which you couldn't give, so you started lying to hide that -- and followed with personal attacks and lying about my position, which I haven't even discussed. The only damn reference you have given supported my position!!
You give fanatical liars a bad name.
I didn't read carefully -- here you didn't do another baseless attack on my opinions on subjects that hasn't been discussed. Here you claimed to not be a liar. I motivated my description of you as a disgusting liar; if you could have argued against that with more than another baseless claim, you would have.
For the rest, I discussed that in the other message.
FYI, I don't really care about the Mid East -- so your repeated personal attacks are irrelevant, liar. Israel is just another piece of land that changed hands after the both World Wars (hardly the most unfair land change either) and would not have become its own country if Israel hadn't been created. If that has to be changed, then there are lots of other map changes to do. (I follow the Mid East because of what it says about my local media.)
That is a lie in the first sentence again!! I jeered at you for making repeated insane claims on a subject, so you make attacks by lying about my opinions (which I haven't even discussed) and attack that straw man. For a specific list of your stupidities, go back to what you commented on here.
You can't be real -- you must be the most boring troll I've ever seen. At least use something else but lies and personal attacks. A good troll use perverted logic, too. Please learn to think.
A recap with references to this idiocy here:Your accusation is just another lie since I quoted criticism of Israel from HRW here (when I showed you wrong on another point). My ability to complain about Israel isn't relevant -- let me recap:
Yet Another Lie. First, you made the specific claim that "Israel kills hundreds of Palestinians at a time , NOT in a year" so I quoted HRW (same link) to show you an idiot and/or a liar.
Then you claimed Jenin as a single example ("hundreds .. at a time" implies more than once) of hundreds of dead. I pointed out that even your own reference contradicted that even a hundred died in that battle -- then you lied in what you commented on. Now you back from that and lie and claim that I refuse to discuss Jenin, which is just another lie.
(Since you literally only argue with lies I don't bother with e.g. your complaints about Israeli democracy (according to you -- worth a thousand more times criticism than Syria, one of the worst police states on the planet!!) and your equally insa.. unique claim that all extreme political opinions should have equal amount of media access for a country to be a democracy, which would disqualify all countries. Do you know anything about the size and influence of the peace movement in Israel?)
It probably bottoms out in what kind of people that were in the student areas when I studied. I am by no means even an amateur of the subject. I can honestly say that I believe(d) that my position was the common one.
(-: And about references... if there, against all taste and reason, exists a god --- I will argue that I'm basically a good guy at any judgment of my sins by noting that I resisted the temptation to send you off on a wild goose chase of some improbable literature! :-)
Yes, not all subjects can use the scientific method (or do formal proofs) -- and that doesn't necessarily mean that the subject is uninteresting and/or unimportant. Your attitude of wanting to learn is an inspiration which I probably needed now, thank you.
Excuses? I showed that your claims were totally mindbogglingly wrong according to your own reference.
If you really is an uneducated idiot and didn't lie there, you certainly did lie here -- when you claimed that it was "excuses" when I showed your original claim wrong.
I wrote that I saw no reason to read the rest of your lies when you have consistently lied time and again while trying to defend impossible statements. You are a really, really boring troll.
Your first claimed that Israel killed hundreds of Palestinians at a time and when I pointed out that HRW disagreed, you gave one "example" of Jenin, but see further down in the WikiPedia link you gave yourself:
You claimed the IDF killed hundreds "at a time" -- Jenin was an uniquely large battle and not even THAT supports your insane claims. You must have been aware of this and just looked for some bad references.
You're a pathetic fanatic -- here I found a lie in your first paragraph(!!), so I didn't read any further since this isn't the first time you are shown a shameless liar. Will you find some more bad references to support your idiocy now?
Hundreds dead at a time?! Millions of homes destroyed?! Oh, no references? Strange... not.
Here is what HRW, a known Israel critic, has to say:
That means 449 for most of 2006, which was a very active year. Your claim of hundreds a time is idiocy -- Hell, you give stupid a bad name! You can't be this stupid and handle a keyboard. You must be a troll or have mental problems.
Can you give good references to any of your claims? At all?!
And the millions of houses... is there a million houses in the Palestine areas totally?! What a nitwit you are!
First you claimed that a democracy (Israel) is worth a thousand times more criticism than most any country (not other democracy) on the planet! Then you make idiotic claims re Syria, one of the worst dictatorships in the world!
Now you specifically claim that despite your insane claims about genocide etc done by democracies that you're not a useful idiot for the dictators?
Syria is one of the world's worst breakers of human rights and police states is worse than any democracy? How about some references, you lying idiot troll? This is what the well-known Israel-critic, HRW, has to say about Syria.
(I didn't read the rest. You are already shown to be a liar without neither a clue nor a reference.)
Was that a spam ad for this book? :-)
For a more formal treatment, see these:o ry#Criticisms_and_counter-criticisms o ry#Academic_relevance_and_derived_studies
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_peace_the
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_peace_the
Google for democracies don't make war. For instance this. It is, afaik, dogma in conflict research.
But you might of course be correct that it is not as well known as I think. :-)
I will state that if it isn't well known, it should be.
Really interesting link, btw. Thanks.
You should be in Guinness book of records for largest double standards to judge different sides with. Consider:
I call bad troll.
True Believers really do seem to think that a factor of thousand worse are worth a thousand of the criticism -- but most aren't stupid enough to say it where it can be answered in writing.
My honest opinion, not an insult, is that I really hope you're a bad troll and not this stupid.
Let us see what more you write?
I try not to keep double standards of judging and believing anyone (except Microsoft) are evil. So it made my day when I was called not evolved by you with your double standards in judging of a factor of a million! He he...
Your arguments weren't coherent either. I don't have the energy or the interest, but some fast points:
US complained a lot about China when other countries (which also had business there) kept their mouths shut. And the US aren't a dictatorship (they don't implement it in other countries either, since even they start wars with dictators) -- so that means you support the worst dictators on the planet against democracies. I didn't understand that you believed that your conspiracy theories re natural resources was a relevant answer to my argument -- please give references to economical (non-extremist) literature... Etc, etc.
At least be an entertaining troll -- that was just sad. (And please don't claim that you're not a troll. I prefer to hope you're just a sad boy without a life and not that stupid.)
Now I'll go do stuff in my life. Please try to get one too, troll.
It is a classic statement that democracies don't make war with each others. Not even USA.
I shouldn't have shortened my statement, but I thought everyone had heard about it by now.
Not bad arguments. Some comments, though.
Consider the end of the cold war. The US forced Soviet to spend so much on weapons to counter their own spending that Soviet closed shop. That was a good political change -- brought by weapon research!
No, I'm not claiming it will happen again. :-) My point is that the best way to influence for democracy is to make the economy bad for the dictators -- then they will have to change system sooner or later, since (hopefully) only democracy bring wealth. It seems to be the only way that "encouraging positive political change" seems to work. Why would thieves controlling a country step down -- you believe they care about their country? He he...
(a) Afaik, the US would support the land mine ban -- except for the border North/South Korea. And they do adher to quite strict limits re use of cluster munitions.
(b, c) The US doesn't trust the international system and the UN, true. Consider the joke of human rights in the UN -- the Arab nations almost got Sudan into the new working group -- after Libya! Etc, etc. I really can't blame the US, I rather wonder at the pro-UN propaganda in my local media.
(d) Yeah, the industry gets most of the policies it want. Maybe a bit more than in most other countries. Maybe. The US isn't the worst in the farm subsidies clusterfuck (to use an US idiom), it is France -- and those bastards drag the rest of the EU behind them! :-(
(e) In many ways, the US looks like a third world country. On the other hand, they can't implement a welfare state because they have more or less open borders to some of the poorest countries in the world. Hell, I'm not certain that welfare states are stable in EU. :-(
Are you claiming that Japan's investments in consumer tech will result in many-kwatt lasers? :-)
I am not sure I believe you are serious by arguing that consumer research could do the same work as military research. References would be interesting? There are differences in the type of targets military research do.
For instance, consider WW II and the Germans building Goddard's rockets -- how could that have happened in the civilian sector? How many more decades or centuries?
Uh, I wrote literally "After the cold war". Chile -73, the Vietnam war and the Talibans were before the end of the cold war. (And North Vietnam was a disgusting regime anyway.) I don't believe you can be this stupid. You must be trolling me.
Well, give an example of a working system that is nicer for human rights? For instance, complainers like you aren't thrown into jail or worse? Oh, there are none?
Also, since most experiments fail with tens of millions of dead, it needs be well tested.
And for the record, read my comments re realpolitik in my previous post -- if west countries depend upon some non-democracy, we don't nag them about democracy. USA seemed to handle Tiananmen square and latter democracy issues better than e.g. Sweden, which is even more dependent on China for economic reasons.
My point -- which you never discussed -- was that it is in our (as in "the west's") interest to work for democracy. Afaik, it is quite obviously true. It also makes a conspiracy theory of your hate speech.
Let me guess, you have some convoluted reason why Japan, (West) Germany etc aren't democratic or unique examples?You feel good agreeing with the worst dictators on the planet? Strange that you lefties never complain about them. You even mentioned Israel, too.
There are lots of things to complain about USA and Israel -- or any other country in the world. Libya, for instance, worked to destabilize West Africa to improve their own power base and got I-don't-know how many hundreds of thousands died. Then we have Sudan, etc. The UN (and extremists like you) complain literally thousands of times more about Israel, which can't compare. Hell, the local left wing journalists avoid ever mentioning this. I'm sorry, but I have to stand with my initial position -- you left wingers are just another religion.
Enough of this garbage, I have better things to do than argue with religious nuts.
First, don't complain about weapons research! That is a good thing, because they do projects that civilian research doesn't do. For instance, Google for Laser Launch and realize that variants of these solid state lasers might give us more space telescopes and other good uses of money. (I can agree on that building and using the stuff is often a waste of money.)
Oh, please. After the cold war the US generally started to influence clients to become democracies where it is not against their direct interests. (*) For instance, South Korea and Taiwan became democracies when the US wasn't so dependent on them anymore. (The weird part is that afaik, this change came with Reagan a president.)
It is in the west's direct interest to support democracy -- and not only because democracies don't make war (not even USA). We earn more money because the economy of a democracy isn't so likely to be sh.t and they become better customers. (China is a worrying counter example. They might do something horrible, like getting a 1984 society with computer control going. The horrible part is that it could be stable for all time.)
You US bashers are as boring as the McCarty communist scare or Mid West brimstone preachers -- you just think another group is responsible for everything bad.
(*) Like Saudi Arabia, which the US needs more than the other way. If not, the US would pressure Saudi Arabia to democratize. There is this concept called realpolitik, which is practiced by all countries. If the US didn't try to stabilize the Mid East, then Western Europe would have to. We need someone to sell us oil, for now.
The problem with that argument is that nothing is as rare as an unused resource around life.
If they had been here the last few hundred millions years, there would probably be lots of obvious signs of industrial work visible in any telescope.
(Of course, there might be "hunter" aliens and wars, so a low profile is important. If so, the relativistic antimatter rockets should soon arrive...)
But you should agree with this?
It would be a neat solution to Fermi's Paradox if some interesting high energy physics experiment (with e.g. really heavy isotopes which aren't in cosmic radiation?) destroyed the planets it were done on?
I have stopped holding my breath re eink.
But sure, there seems to be some appliances coming. Now we just wait for e.g. support from the major book publishers -- and a good code browsing/annotation application.