Message 85/124
Date: 04-Oct-02 @ 12:21 AM -
RE: 60 Minutes does it again...
geez... didn't mean to sound like a "knowitall"... i just meant martyring the entirety of NA wouldn't _necessarily_ be a bad thing. like... perhaps an exaggeration to illustrate how bad i expect things will get?
things just seem like they're past the point of no return. i thought the whole foundation of your society (constitution) was change... like, it could be changed whenever needed. really progressive/dynamic. but then why is there so much conservative/backward shit going on?
what's up with that? what's up with people pattenting algorithms instead of sharing them? to me that's kind of symbolic of the sickness of NA... we'd rather keep our knowledge to ourselves in the hopes of making some cash instead of sharing it with the world in the hopes of progressing as a species. that's ing pathetic, and if the urge to progress isn't overpowering the (sick) urge to horde and not evolve, SOMETHING drastic had better happen to kick us back onto a less growth-inhibiting path or we're just going to sit and fester... and watch superbowl XXVIMMMMCCIXXXX and the 3006 MTV awards.
i'm not forgetting where i live, and i'm SURE that "We're not all stupid, we're not all gluttonous,"etc. but... so what? are MOST of us not gluttinous? what's the ratio? how could we even measure stuff like that?
how about a very simple-minded thought experiment:
let's say we travel back in time (pre-WWII) with a bomb that will blow up a single building. inside the building are hitler/etc, and X totally innocent people. how large does X have to be before it's no lonnger justifiable to destroy the building? greater than zero? greater than the number of WWII-related deaths?
or is it ultimately pointless cause even if we killed some of the main persons responsible, social situations/etc. would cause similar outcomes?
i don't know... seems confusing to me. seems like you can't really defend EITHER position.
capitalism was great; look at how much it drove us technologically. woo. BUT now that we're starting to hit a wall... what are we going to do? cling to the past or try to find a new and better way to live? seems like the US _should_ be in a prime position as vanguard (since the ability to totally reconfigure their society is built into it's kernel) but instead they struggle to keep things as they were.
to be honest, i guess i just don't understand ANYTHING.
raigan
p.s - wtf is wrong with ayn rand?! i know that around here she's the figurehead for some really stupid people ("the empiricists" or something) but... to me her message is simple: a group of people is always less than the sum of their parts. which is clearly demonstrated anytime a lot of "patriotism" crops up; intelligence vanishes.