Worse Case Scenario: War or No War?

[AnyPlace]

More and more these days, I'm starting to feel like a glutton for carnage. Devastating climate change within our lifetime is a glaring certainty, natural resources are disappearing at alarming rates as people continue to multiply exponentially, every ecosystem in the world has met its tipping point, at which the damage done becomes permenant, plant and animal life, once abundant, have met rapid extinction, the third world flattens the globe with massive and costly industrialization efforts, and the list goes on.

Hawking, a man I respect and admire more than words can express, has made the dimming of mankind pitch black when recently he came forth and exclaimed that life for man on the planet Earth is indeed done. The only way, he says, for man to survive is to look toward Centauri. A planet it would take 4.2 years to travel to at light speed, when neither the technology nor understanding of the universe exist to undertake such an exodus.

I see the only fleeting for hope for man, a segmented populus of man, at least, in war. I think we need one more "good" war, a world war. Something to lighten the load and loosen to strain on the planet, so that when the enviroment fouls, the species may still have a chance to, if nothing else, cease "naturally" with the expansion of the sun. Its borowed time, but time nontheless.

What do you all think, war or no war?

(Will necessity invent innovation?)

[Simon of the Playa]

wow, who IS this schmuck?

[AnyPlace]

[quote="Simon of the Playa"][size=24]wow[/size], who IS this [size=24]schmuck?[/size][/quote]

Dude, there is no need for that. It's not pretty, I know, but this is a worst case scenario presented with harshest truths I've come across. If you think that people won't start eating each other once food becomes scarce, then I call you a dreamer.

[ygmir]

seems, a sock alert..........

dang...........

don't harsh us, AnyPlace, here and there, burning questions, casanova, etc............

you're delving into subjects, that, this close to the burn, are just no fun.

wait 'til we get the winter doldrums, and, have more time for proper snark and such.

just a thought.

[Simon of the Playa]

i really dont have time for this retard, anyone want to hop in?

it's just not worth it sometimes, you know?

perhaps someone who suffers fools a little more gladly, because i'm afraid of what might spew forth, and i know its not the citizens of pompeii's fault that this guy is making sonically provocative farts in a seismically active region.

fresh meat, or puppet, who cares, let the bloodlust flow, and give this assturd the war he wants, i am going for some R & R.

[AnyPlace]

[quote="ygmir"]seems, a sock alert..........

dang...........

don't harsh us, AnyPlace, here and there, burning questions, casanova, etc............

you're delving into subjects, that, this close to the burn, are just no fun.

wait 'til we get the winter doldrums, and, have more time for proper snark and such.

just a thought.[/quote]

I'm starting to get that vibe. I personally love talking about this stuff, but then I've always been a bit morbid:-)

Truce. I'm done, I promise.

[AnyPlace]

.

i really dont have time for this retard, anyone want to hop in?

it's just not worth it sometimes, you know?

perhaps someone who suffers fools a little more gladly, because i'm afraid of what might spew forth, and i know its not the citizens of pompeii's fault that this guy is making sonically provocative farts in a seismically active region.

fresh meat, or puppet, who cares, let the bloodlust flow, and give this assturd the war he wants, i am going for some R & R.

I'm just about done trying to be cordial you fucking prick. Like it or not, this is he world you and I live in, so stop your bitching and take some personal fucking responsibility for it twat.

[SilverOrange]

Well this is a do-ocracy. If you want to fight population growth why not start at home?

[AnyPlace]

Well this is a do-ocracy. If you want to fight population growth why not start at home? :twisted:

I personally, have decided not to have children as a result of the state of things. The problem is, I represent too small a minority to make any real leeway.

[Simon of the Playa]

I personally, have decided not to have children as a result of the state of things.

Thank God for Small Miracles.

[AnyPlace]

I personally, have decided not to have children as a result of the state of things.

Thank God for Small Miracles.

You would believe in God. Just because you want to die and float around, or whatever the hell it is you think you'll do, with your imaginary character does not give you the right to feign righteous indignation at the mere mention of the state of the world, which you obviously couldn't give two shits about. Fuck you very much! Goodnight.

[Simon of the Playa]

Fuck you very much

first intelligent thing you said all night and you dont even know why.


kisses to you snookums, have fun in SCA dreamland or Hot topic or wherever your happy place is...

[Packoderm]

People on this thead have things to say, but they haven't answered your question about if a war to thin out the herd would be a good or bad thing. I think such a war would be counterproductive. The first casualty of war, which I'm sure you already know, is the truth. Regimes that wage war often use it as an excuse to postpone forward thinking and discussion. From this, distrust arises which makes any kind of global master-plan, other than that that benefits the corporations regardless of the cost, a very remote possibility. Also, any thinning of the herd is often met with nationwide population drives as we saw with Iran and Iraq during their military adventure thirty years ago. So, I'd say no to war and yes to educating the larger world population in mathematics, physics, and other sciences. Most people who bother to learn the sciences without the goal of military supremacy usually tend not to blind themselves to the workings of the world and humans place in it.

TMSAISTI

[Eric]

Ah, the joy of intellectual discourse in a vacuum.

Much better question to pose on the actual playa in the daytime doldrums when nobody feels like leaving camp. Best case- some interesting conversation. Better case- it drives everybody to go look at "that cool thing over there".

Posting questions on the internets in a forum where nobody knows you yet is guaranteed to just start a shouting match. Unless thats what you want, in which case you would be very boring.

[AnyPlace]

Fuck you very much

first intelligent thing you said all night and you dont even know why.


kisses to you snookums, have fun in SCA dreamland or Hot topic or wherever your happy place is...

Intelligence isn't a design, its an ability. No comments for god squad.

(Or perhaps you're just lazy as all hell. Either way feel free to jump up your own ass and die at any time.)

Insults aside, I will say that it never ceases to amaze me that people can be so cavalier about their own fates, let alone the fates of seven billion(+) of their brothers and sisters. I had the audacity to speak of war as a solution to a problem we all face, but if you paid attention you'd know that war on the scale I spoke of is an inevitability anyway (If the push for leaps in scientific innovation at the expense of the scientific method don't do us in first, that is). It's depressing, its morbid and maybe even a bit gothic but its the truth. I wish I had the luxury of choosing something else but I don't. And neither do you.

[bluesbob]

THUNDERDOME!

[Packoderm]

um.

[Packoderm]

In the not too distant future, war will no longer exist, but there will be Rollerball.

[AnyPlace]

Ah, the joy of intellectual discourse in a vacuum.

Much better question to pose on the actual playa in the daytime doldrums when nobody feels like leaving camp. Best case- some interesting conversation. Better case- it drives everybody to go look at "that cool thing over there".

Posting questions on the internets in a forum where nobody knows you yet is guaranteed to just start a shouting match. Unless thats what you want, in which case you would be very boring.

I never knew I had to be popular to get a person to reflect on the human condition. I always assumed it came naturally.

Anyway, that hope is dashed. This is my first year as a Burner and if this is the demographic I have to look forward to, then Burning Man is nothing like it has dressed itself up to be.

To leave the city, the humdrum, the hustle and bustle of apathetic, self centered, self aggrandisement and go to the desert just to find the same is not only, truly, boring, its entirely disappointing and has nothing on any of the morbidity of this thread.

[Simon of the Playa]

yeah, this year sucked, don't go.

[ygmir]

*to quote (probably paraphrase) a wise eplayan*

"Never, mistake "eplaya" for "the playa".........".........

[Kinetik V]

Ain't worth it. Post pulled.

[bluesbob]

To leave the city, the humdrum, the hustle and bustle of apathetic, self centered, self aggrandisement and go to the desert just to find the same is not only, truly, boring, its entirely disappointing and has nothing on any of the morbidity of this thread.

The point everyone has been trying to make is that we all leave the city to get away from those and many other things....yet you drag it along with you. To this board...and maybe to the playa. Leave it.

[AnyPlace]

People on this thead have things to say, but they haven't answered your question about if a war to thin out the herd would be a good or bad thing. I think such a war would be counterproductive. The first casualty of war, which I'm sure you already know, is the truth. Regimes that wage war often use it as an excuse to postpone forward thinking and discussion. From this, distrust arises which makes any kind of global master-plan, other than that that benefits the corporations regardless of the cost, a very remote possibility. Also, any thinning of the herd is often met with nationwide population drives as we saw with Iran and Iraq during their military adventure thirty years ago. So, I'd say no to war and yes to educating the larger world population in mathematics, physics, and other sciences. Most people who bother to learn the sciences without the goal of military supremacy usually tend not to blind themselves to the workings of the world and humans place in it.

TMSAISTI

Just when I threw in the towell, I see this post. I agree that education is the cornerstone of innovation, but I simply cannot cross the divide between the life of the mind and the state of the world. I see too much outer conflict on the horizon to put myself in a place where I can call the goal of, actually, educating the world, each other and ourselves, anything other than and idealized notion.

(Sidebar: You kinda just restored my faith in humanity a little bit. Thanks for actually taking the question seriously.)

[AnyPlace]

To leave the city, the humdrum, the hustle and bustle of apathetic, self centered, self aggrandisement and go to the desert just to find the same is not only, truly, boring, its entirely disappointing and has nothing on any of the morbidity of this thread.

The point everyone has been trying to make is that we all leave the city to get away from those and many other things....yet you drag it along with you. To this board...and maybe to the playa. Leave it.

This might be the hardest thing anyone has ever asked me to do. And I'm entirely serious.

[Trishntek]

More and more these days, I'm starting to feel like a glutton for carnage. Devastating climate change within our lifetime is a glaring certainty, natural resources are disappearing at alarming rates as people continue to multiply exponentially, every ecosystem in the world has met its tipping point, at which the damage done becomes permenant, plant and animal life, once abundant, have met rapid extinction, the third world flattens the globe with massive and costly industrialization efforts, and the list goes on.

Hawking, a man I respect and admire more than words can express, has made the dimming of mankind pitch black when recently he came forth and exclaimed that life for man on the planet Earth is indeed done. The only way, he says, for man to survive is to look toward Centauri. A planet it would take 4.2 years to travel to at light speed, when neither the technology nor understanding of the universe exist to undertake such an exodus.

I see the only fleeting for hope for man, a segmented populus of man, at least, in war. I think we need one more "good" war, a world war. Something to lighten the load and loosen to strain on the planet, so that when the enviroment fouls, the species may still have a chance to, if nothing else, cease "naturally" with the expansion of the sun. Its borowed time, but time nontheless.

What do you all think, war or no war?

(Will necessity invent innovation?)

A few questions:

1. What ecosystem specifically has been devastated by global warming?

2. What are the current known natural resources with certainty?

3. Name 5 animals that have gone extinct in the last,,,, oh I'll be generous,,,,, 100 years?

4. How do we know Centauri still exists if it would take 4.2 years for its appearance to change?

[Packoderm]

A few questions:

1. What ecosystem specifically has been devastated by global warming?

2. What are the current known natural resources with certainty?

3. Name 5 animals that have gone extinct in the last,,,, oh I'll be generous,,,,, 100 years?

4. How do we know Centauri still exists if it would take 4.2 years for its appearance to change?

I'll try to come up with some kind of answer on the fly without my usual research, so please don't jump on me if the answers aren't completely sound.

"1. What ecosystem specifically has been devastated by global warming?"
The moderating effects of our oceans.

"2. What are the current known natural resources with certainty?"
Solar and wind.

"3. Name 5 animals that have gone extinct in the last,,,, oh I'll be generous,,,,, 100 years?"

OK, I cheated:
Arabian Ostrich
Atitlan Grebe
Bali Tiger
Barbary Lion
Bubal Hartebeest
Bushwren
Canarian Black Oystercatcher
Cape Verde Giant Skink
Caribbean Monk Seal
Carolina Parakeet
Caspian Tiger
Caucasian Wisent
Colombian Grebe
Crescent Nail-tail Wallaby
Golden Toad
Grand Cayman Thrush
Guam Flying Fox
Hawai'i 'O'o
Heath Hen
Japanese Sea Lion
Javan Tiger
Kaua'i 'O'o
Laughing Owl
Laysan Rail
Little Swan Island Hutia
Palestinian Painted Frog
Paradise Parrot
Passenger Pigeon
Pyrenean Ibex
Roque Chico de Salmor Giant Lizard
Round Island Burrowing Boa
Ryukyu Wood-pigeon
Santo Stefano Lizard
Schomburgk's Deer
South Island Piopio
Tasmanian Wolf
Thicktail Chub
Toolache Wallaby
Western Black Rhinoceros
Wake Island Rail
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/extinct- ... years.html

"4. How do we know Centauri still exists if it would take 4.2 years for its appearance to change?"

I'm not aware of this star, but there is lots of interesting stuff on this wiki page on the subject:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Cent ... his_system

[Packoderm]

At the risk of further hijacking of this thread, I'll offer this:
The passenger pigeon in that list I posted caught my eye. I googled it and found some interesting reading about it on wiki.

Here's a quote:
"In 1857, a bill was brought forth to the Ohio State Legislature seeking protection for the passenger pigeon. A Select Committee of the Senate filed a report stating "The passenger pigeon needs no protection. Wonderfully prolific, having the vast forests of the North as its breeding grounds, traveling hundreds of miles in search of food, it is here today and elsewhere tomorrow, and no ordinary destruction can lessen them, or be missed from the myriads that are yearly produced."

Fifty-seven years later, on September 1, 1914, Martha, the last known passenger pigeon, died in the Cincinnati Zoo, Cincinnati, Ohio. Her body was frozen into a block of ice and sent to the Smithsonian Institution, where it was skinned and mounted. Currently, Martha (named after Martha Washington) is in the museum's archived collection, and not on display. A memorial statue of Martha stands on the grounds of the Cincinnati Zoo.

[Eric]

To leave the city, the humdrum, the hustle and bustle of apathetic, self centered, self aggrandisement and go to the desert just to find the same is not only, truly, boring, its entirely disappointing and has nothing on any of the morbidity of this thread.

The point everyone has been trying to make is that we all leave the city to get away from those and many other things....yet you drag it along with you. To this board...and maybe to the playa. Leave it.

This might be the hardest thing anyone has ever asked me to do. And I'm entirely serious.

If you are unable to leave behind the expectations for what you will find at a place you've never been, you will not enjoy your visit to the playa.

I'm not kidding- it is not what you expect, and you have no way of knowing what you'll experience. For some people its a spiritual retreat, for others an amazing arts festival; a dance party; a sex party; or just a great fucking camping trip to the desert- but there's no way for you to know how it will hit you until you get there.

However, you are almost guaranteed that if you go expecting it to be one certain way you will be disappointed.

Sometimes the challenge to let yourself go is the greatest challenge you can take.

I'll be interested to see what you have to say once you get back.

[Fire_Moose]

seems, a sock alert..........

dang...........

don't harsh us, AnyPlace, here and there, burning questions, casanova, etc............

you're delving into subjects, that, this close to the burn, are just no fun.

wait 'til we get the winter doldrums, and, have more time for proper snark and such.

just a thought.

Yggy said it perfect. Plonked.