OK, now the extra coaching is done, let’s get back to the real issues here
I’m especially interested in Chushin’s response to my four scenarios.
But of course, everyone can chime in:
[quote]lixy wrote:
orion wrote:
Rape, murder and xenophobia do all have evolutionary advantages so yes, they are hardwired in our brains.
Hint: There would be no reason for the instinctive fear of unknown men if they would not rape and kill so much.
I disagree. A toddler couldn’t care less if he’s playing with a member of the same race or not. You seem to confuse our love for what is familiar with something hardwired.
Hint: The “familiar” is aquirred, NOT instinctive.[/quote]
You speaking out of your ass.
Reserch shows cleary that even black toddlers like other white babies more.
Nature’s a nazi…
[quote]Schwarzfahrer wrote:
You speaking out of your ass.
Reserch shows cleary that even black toddlers like other white babies more.
Nature’s a nazi… [/quote]
Let me guess…research from the 1930s?
[quote]lixy wrote:
orion wrote:
Rape, murder and xenophobia do all have evolutionary advantages so yes, they are hardwired in our brains.
Hint: There would be no reason for the instinctive fear of unknown men if they would not rape and kill so much.
I disagree. A toddler couldn’t care less if he’s playing with a member of the same race or not. You seem to confuse our love for what is familiar with something hardwired.
Hint: The “familiar” is aquirred, NOT instinctive.[/quote]
But liking familiar and disliking unfamiliar is hardwired.
Little children instinctively fear unknown men and for good reason.
[quote]Schwarzfahrer wrote:
Reserch shows cleary that even black toddlers like other white babies more.
[/quote]
Reminds me of the Chris Rock routine.
“Who’s more racist, white people or black people? Black people! Know why? 'Cause we hate black people too!”
If you can dig up that a citation for that research Schwarz, I’d be interested in seeing it.
Nature isn’t just any Nazi, it’s Dr. Josef Mengele. Here’s a passage from Paul Colinvaux, demonstrating how genocide can even happen among one-celled paramecia, if the conditions are right.
[i]Competing animals will not coexist. The decisive experiments were done by the Russian biologist, G. F. Gause, at Moscow University in the grimmest days of Stalin’s time. What he did was to set up numerous contests between different species of Paramecium to see if he could fault the predictions of the mathematics. Gause kept his paramecia in the glass tubes of a centrifuge, which let him spin them in the machine each day to force the animals to the bottom while he poured off the exhausted food solution in which they lived without losing any animals. He could then top up the tubes with fresh nutrient broth. Any one of the common species of Paramecium would live alone very well in these tubes. From the eight individuals Gause put in at first, a thriving population of thousands would grow and this final number would remain constant for as long as he cared to spin them out daily in his centrifuge and replace their food supplyIf two of these species were placed together into the same tube and allowed to crowd, they must willy-nilly compete for that daily finite dose of nutrient broth.
No matter how many times Gause tested two chosen kinds of Paramecium against each other the outcome was always the same, complete extermination of one species, and always the same species.
There are two obvious gut reactions to these results: one is amazement that what we expected to be a permanent struggling balance in fact became a pogrom, and the other is wonder at how the losing species can exist at all. This second thought holds the key to the whole affair and leads us to know that Darwinian struggles in the real world mean neither endless fighting nor deadly massacre but muted struggle.
The various kinds of paramecia live together in nature; thus there must be circumstances in which the outcome of one of Gause’s set-piece battles would be reversed. Gause was able to reverse the outcome of one struggle by a minor change of technique. Like other protozoa, paramecia were known to secrete chemicals into the water that were toxic to other animals; they were inclined to live by chemical warfare. But when Gause changed the water each day, he removed any such chemicals. So he tried leaving most of the water in and topping up with nutrient concentrate instead of changing the whole broth daily. In one of his series of experiments this was enough to reverse the outcome; the animal that had before always been the winner was now always the loser.
Then Gause stumbled across an even more revealing history, for when he tried yet another pair of species of Paramecium against each other neither became extinct but went on living indefinitely together in the tubes. One species of Paramecium was living in the top halves while the other species lived in the bottoms. These kinds of Paramecium had found unconflicting ways of life possible in even those simple glass tubes of broth; they avoided competition by dividing the space between them. What obviously had happened was that one kind concentrated toward the bottom, where migrants from the other were overcome, whereas the second kind tended to swim toward the top, where their superior concentrations let them win.
Stragglers into the wrong habitat space did indeed suffer deadly competition and struggle, but those of the majority who stayed where their own special strategy for life usually directed them were safe except from competition with their own kind.
There have been many other experiments like those of Gause, using many different kinds of animal and plant. They all result either in total victorious annihilation or in a sharing of the habitat in ways that prevent competition continued strong competition between species is impossible. The different kinds must be kept separate. This at once leads to a splendid comprehension. Animals and plants in nature are not after all engaged in endless debilitating struggle, as a loose reading of Darwin might suggest.[/i]
[quote]Schwarzfahrer wrote:
OK, now the extra coaching is done, let’s get back to the real issues here
I’m especially interested in Chushin’s response to my four scenarios.
But of course, everyone can chime in:
…
Examples for these :
- Some soldier is sent to a warzone. You know from countless sources, even veteran soldiers returning from this very warzone, that it’s purely a massacre, benefitting dubious corporations. The soldier claims: I shall serve my country there with my life.
- A guy proclaims to be a soldier for the good deeds he can do.
You know the guy and think he’s a complete asshole. Benefit of a doubt for someone armed to the teeth sent to a declared “warzone” in a total foreign country with, as he said, “crazy traditions”? - A looming conflict in the near future will cement bad relations with a lot of now neutral countries, according to your best knowledge. Your relative is a soldier preparing for this operation “cakewalk” , which will undoubtedly win the battle practically without casualities, but not the diplomatic strife. This ensures radicalization in the whole region, which ultimately leads to more suffering and less of that fledgling democracy that was the aim of that operation.
After some years, all these events you foretold were exactly as you predected.
Your relative, worthy of respect?
4)A mercenary from a PMC works in Iraq. He sometimes claims to do this also for spreading the democracy, but doesn’treally insist on this, it’s more a bonus for him. How do you view him when in ten years
scenario a) Iraq is a warlord state, human atrocities and woman abuse a lot higher then under Saddam.
scenario b) Iraq is a ME model democracy, things def. get better.
[/quote]
I suggest that these scenarios are exactly why we always should hold the political level accountable and refuse blather about “supporting our troops”.
If you are a soldier, you have an obligation to advise your superiors to the best of your ability, but then execute the orders your receive. As I said in an earlier post, this does not relieve you from responsibility for your actions. A mercenary is also accountable and in addition should not benefit from any ambiguity regarding orders. It seems that the US justice system has some catching up to do with regards to actions by private guards in Iraq.
As for your scenarios, 4 c) will be the outcome and this has been clear from 2003 onwards: Iraq will become a Shia dominated Islamic republic, with a semi-independent Kurdish north. What we have seen during the last years has been the negotiation, often with weapons, about the role the Sunni minority will play in that republic. The place of women (as women, not as individuals) is likely to become worse than under Saddam.
From a strategic point, the US lost the normative power at an early stage, while retaining the destructive power. This means that its influence on the political process is limited to trying to prevent disruption, but unable to influence the direction of that process. What remains is to define the conditions of a withdrawal.
Sadly, I can’t get my hands on the study.
No big deal, because it wouldn’t really change my attitude and respect for humans, no matter if the study was true, false or the other way around (white toddlers prefer black play pals).
The monotheist has to disbelieve them, because surely his god is a nice man and therfore all people yould come untainted and pure into the word.
And no, the study was made a few years ago.
Good post, TQB
[quote]rainjack wrote:
Schwarzfahrer wrote:
Right, leave the left-right stereotype thinking and get back to the discussion.
I ask the especially the soldiers who are or were in Iraq:
If the tactical and strategical advantges wouldn’t have been that drastically in your favour, would you have still gone?
So, if large parts of the republican army was trained and equipped with, say T-90s, air superiority was 50-50, your satellites would have been occasionally shot down, your tanks and soldiers attacked by Frogfoots etc…
In short, if the enemy would have been a real threat and the danger tenfold, how much would the situation change, you believe?
Have you ever played Risk? How many times did you attack a country containing equal troops?
In the real world - name a country who has ever invaded in a offensive strike knowing they were outnumbered, or even 50/50?
I can think of maybe two in the 20th century: Israel in 1967, and Germany’s move on Russia in WWII.
What does this have to do with anything? [/quote]
Careful. You might ask yourself the same question. #36. Your claim regarding the strategical wisdom of such a military action is irrelevant. It does not address the questions posed to you.
[quote]Gael wrote:
Careful. You might ask yourself the same question. #36. Your claim regarding the strategical wisdom of such a military action is irrelevant. It does not address the questions posed to you.[/quote]
Why does it not surprise me that an appeal to common sense would be a fallacy to you?
Heh. You just did it again. But I will entertain this particular point, since it is interesting.
From common sense we have learned that the earth is flat, that the sun orbits the earth, that large metal objects cannot fly, and that an anvil will fall faster than a quarter.
Do you seriously believe appeals to common sense are any stronger than “It just is, because it is, and everybody knows that, duh!” ?
[quote]Gael wrote:
Heh. You just did it again. But I will entertain this particular point, since it is interesting.
From common sense we have learned that the earth is flat, that the sun orbits the earth, that large metal objects cannot fly, and that an anvil will fall faster than a quarter.
Do you seriously believe appeals to common sense are any stronger than “It just is, because it is, and everybody knows that, duh!” ?[/quote]
For some people, appealing to common sense is an exercise in futility.
But I am making the assumption (however misguided that assumption might be) that most people here are rational individuals.
Why did you bring this up? Did you think I was accusing you of making an appeal to common sense?
[quote]Gael wrote:
Why did you bring this up? Did you think I was accusing you of making an appeal to common sense?
[/quote]
Unfortunately, you wouldn’t know common sense if it drove by and flipped you off.
Which makes your entire post meaningless.
Speaking with you is a string of non sequiturs. Never mind.
[quote]Gael wrote:
Speaking with you is a string of non sequiturs. Never mind.[/quote]
You have yet to say anything worth replying to. How about you make an effort before you start asking others to carry your water for you?
[quote]You don’t seem to have a problem with rape. At least not when it is a teen-aged Iranian girl. In fact, I think you even take the position that the victim deserved because she is a slut.
So is your pedophilia learned, or did it just come naturally?[/quote]
Come now, Rainjack are you saying you’ve never actually suprised-sexed a girl?
[quote]Sikkario wrote:
You don’t seem to have a problem with rape. At least not when it is a teen-aged Iranian girl. In fact, I think you even take the position that the victim deserved because she is a slut.
So is your pedophilia learned, or did it just come naturally?
Come now, Rainjack are you saying you’ve never actually suprised-sexed a girl?[/quote]
Surprised Sexed a girl? I don’t fuck “girls”, sancho. I prefer women.
That’s the difference between boys and men.