Queen Bee Posted July 12, 2012 Author Posted July 12, 2012 On my old computer. And when I say my old computer, I mean ooooooold. So. Looks like I'll be getting that new computer sooner than I thought... Anyway, I'll get to reading and replying to the wall of text on the previous page in a few. Right now I need to lie down, the past couple days have been very stressful.
thesapien Posted July 12, 2012 Posted July 12, 2012 Now' date=' I see both and think it depends on what filters we're using to judge history as well as how selectively we pick and chose what locations and time periods to focus on. Sometimes, I think that there might be some sort of actual progress and not just cycles, however, I also think that all progress brings both greater goods and greater bads. [/quote'] Well, the difficulty in any discussion such as this is to define "good" and "evil". My entire reasoning falls to pieces if read by a person of a radicly different set of values. A person with ascetic beliefs might find the increase in living-conditions abhorrent. A person with the belief that the truely great in humanity is only 'relesed' during times of conflict will dislike the long peace, etc. I was assuming similar values, actually. There have been many rises and falls in living conditions; still rising and falling in places, today. Currently, most of the world's population is not in Western countries where many of us are looking at. Starvation, a big measure, is a huge problem right now with many arguing that it is on the rise. In the US, homelessness is definitely increasing and going to get a lot worse. As to world peace, I think your measure is biased. You're probably just looking at conflicts between nations. I'm not. Also, you're not looking at frequencies of conflicts between nations over time. The last century had a very high FREAKquency! Oh yeah' date=' we abolished that whole slavery-thing too. Mauretania was the last country with legal slavery, I think they abolished it in 1984. [/quote'] I think we ought to be more careful when relying on legal definitions used today. Someone who has no option but to work in horrible conditions is likely worse off than many slaves of the past. In many places in many parts of the world, past and present, small groups of people tend to be more likely forced into bad situations because they have little to no recourse. When their numbers are large, they gain recourse. So when something like slavery accounts for large populations, conditions of their care isn't as bad as we always assume, else they would no longer accept room and board for their labor and rebel. It's not so different than those today that we no longer call slaves. Consider how not so great the job situation is in the US, yet there are many who flee from far worse situations into the US, no matter the legal risks, often dying before they ever reach the border. Consider, too, that there are monarchies still in existence with kings who do not have to recognize individual rights. The US also has one of the largest prison labor forces in history, but that's not slavery, right? So yeah' date=' have some faith in the human species. Maybe we will turn out more Star Trek than Mad Max in the end... [/quote'] I don't have faith in anything. That said, I'm not predicting a world wide Mad Max, but nor am I predicting a Star Trek future. I often find it amusing that the people who hold vegan/vegetarian beliefs are often the same people who say we should "live more naturally" or "closer to nature" or whatever. They must have missed the parts in the documentaries where the lion jumps the gazelle and then slowly strangles it or the wolf cuts the achilles tendon of a moose before ripping it's throat open... Or hell' date=' why not the squirell who sneaks into birds nests to take the eggs... We atleast try to be humane when we slaughter our food... One thing I actually forgot on my list, over the last 50 years or so animals have actually gotten a whole lot of rights. [/quote'] Well, I don't think we're supernatural, so anything we do is natural. I think many who avoid meat are looking at our closest primate relatives and seeing what they eat and probably seeing their diets as geared to be similar. I sometimes think about copying what gorillas eat in order to bulk up! (And they don't eat meat.) As to animal rights, ah, there you go again focusing on legal terms, lol! I actually feel worse for cats and dogs today given what we do to their reproduction organs and how we keep them locked up in our homes. Vaccines fuck them up, too. Gosh, I must be in an argumentative mood, today.
Queen Bee Posted July 13, 2012 Author Posted July 13, 2012 Queen Bee is ashamed. And embarrassed. I hope not many people saw that post. Anyway, it's gone now. Let's pretend it didn't happen. Please.
Kashked Posted July 13, 2012 Posted July 13, 2012 Currently, most of the world's population is not in Western countries where many of us are looking at. Standards of living are increasing overall, with many of the underdeveloped countries being the fastest to rise. As I previously mentioned, look up Hans Rosling, he is a professor of international health who uses a very pedagogic method in applying statistics to show us that our ideas of the "third world" are unduly negative. As to world peace, I think your measure is biased. You're probably just looking at conflicts between nations. I'm not. Also, you're not looking at frequencies of conflicts between nations over time. The last century had a very high FREAKquency! I am just looking at conflicts between nations yes, but also at the relative mortality in a society. WW2 killed more humans than any other war in history, that is withouth a doubt, but it was still only a couple of percent of the total population, relativly speaking, the two world wars had a fairly low mortality compared to wars in earlier history. Neither did the last century stand out as a century of many wars, rather the other way around. I think we ought to be more careful when relying on legal definitions used today. Someone who has no option but to work in horrible conditions is likely worse off than many slaves of the past. In many places in many parts of the world, past and present, small groups of people tend to be more likely forced into bad situations because they have little to no recourse. When their numbers are large, they gain recourse. So when something like slavery accounts for large populations, conditions of their care isn't as bad as we always assume, else they would no longer accept room and board for their labor and rebel. It's not so different than those today that we no longer call slaves. Consider how not so great the job situation is in the US, yet there are many who flee from far worse situations into the US, no matter the legal risks, often dying before they ever reach the border. Consider, too, that there are monarchies still in existence with kings who do not have to recognize individual rights. The US also has one of the largest prison labor forces in history, but that's not slavery, right? Well, no matter how bad poverty or how bad jobs are, there is still a long way off from slavery. Workers can't be sold to start with, and they ARE free to leave, even if the alternative to a horrible job often are worse. Even if there are still horrible working conditions I still think that the abolition of slavery, which just happened over a period of roughly 100 years after atleast 10 000 years (probably more...) of it being an unqestioned part of human existance, is still a huge leap. I think many who avoid meat are looking at our closest primate relatives and seeing what they eat and probably seeing their diets as geared to be similar. Well, then they obviously missed the part where chimps hunt and kill and eat just about anything. They even use tools, crude clubs, to beat small animals hiding in holes to a bloody pulp. I sometimes think about copying what gorillas eat in order to bulk up! (And they don't eat meat.) Gladiators in ancient Rome actually had a pretty much vegetarian diet, but that was in order to get them fat. Contrary to the hollywood image gladiators were actually pretty fat. Why? Fat men bleed more, which makes for better entertainment... If by "bulk" you mean muscles, you need protein, and while there IS vegetable protein, the easiest way to get it is meat. There is a reason bodybuilders eat a lot of chicken. Lived togheter with one for a summer, and after that experience I didn't want to have chicken again for a looooong time... As to animal rights, ah, there you go again focusing on legal terms, lol! I actually feel worse for cats and dogs today given what we do to their reproduction organs and how we keep them locked up in our homes. Vaccines fuck them up, too. You have a point there, no doubt. Gosh, I must be in an argumentative mood, today. That is how I feel every day. Luckiliy for my wife, who equates arguing with not liking eachother, I have the internet as my sefetyvent...
Queen Bee Posted July 13, 2012 Author Posted July 13, 2012 Random thought of the day: What if the mentally handicapped and insane are normal and we only perceive their speech and actions as irregular because we're the damaged ones?
Guest GingerTom Posted July 13, 2012 Posted July 13, 2012 As soon as you think you're normal then you have a problem. For myself, I would never want to be normal--that's a very slow death...
thesapien Posted July 13, 2012 Posted July 13, 2012 Kashked, instead of hijacking QueenBee's thread and repeating what I've said already elsewhere, one of our tangents was a topic here: http://www.loverslab.com/showthread.php?tid=8888 Maybe we can even make Hans Rosling's stats a tangent over there, too. After just now looking him up, I remember him now from TED (I watch like every TED!), and will refresh my memory with some rewatching of his presentations. Random thought of the day: What if the mentally handicapped and insane are normal and we only perceive their speech and actions as irregular because we're the damaged ones? I keep telling myself that! Seriously. For myself' date=' I would never want to be normal--that's a very slow death... [/quote'] That sounds like something I would say! Do you also not believe in normal aging? A fellow "immortal"?
Guest GingerTom Posted July 13, 2012 Posted July 13, 2012 I eat healthy--fresh fruit, exercise etc. Plus 'youngness' runs in my family--we all always look about 20 years younger than we really are. I won't give away my age but if I was 20 again I would be invisible because people would think I wasn't even born yet. I believe your age is what ever you think it to be.
thesapien Posted July 13, 2012 Posted July 13, 2012 Hard to tell if you're saying anything that might be considered truly crazy. I've come to have beliefs about aging that EVERYONE I know of would see as quite crazy, insane.
Guest GingerTom Posted July 13, 2012 Posted July 13, 2012 Answer: I don't believe in normal aging, but, try to talk to people about it and they go...they just go. EDIT: I have tried many times to get people to eat natural peanut butter. I tell them it tastes fantastic. They buy it, they eat it. I come back to their place and ask them what they thought of it. (I already know the answer before I even ask: "It doesn't have any taste." They are so wrong.
Queen Bee Posted July 17, 2012 Author Posted July 17, 2012 Random thought of the day: What if string theory is right, and three dimensional matter is just vibrations of energy?
thesapien Posted July 17, 2012 Posted July 17, 2012 Perhaps, but it also always seem to me that even when we are kind of right, we're also at least half wrong. Just look at the long history of physics with one example of this after another. So I doubt that suddenly, right now, we've got the final solution and that future physicists won't ever look back and laugh. Atoms were called "atoms" because they once thought atoms were the basic building blocks, irreducible. Then we found they could be broken into electrons, protons, and neutrons, which were then thought to be irreducible also. Now, we're dividing these quantum particles into strings.... But, yeah, I do like the idea of quantum physics being the result of musical notes played in extra-dimensional space so that we're less likely to debate whether or not particles are waves or waves are particles (since quantum particles behave like both, (called quantum duality or quantum wierdness)). However, there's still the trap of asking, "Vibrations of what exactly?" because we think of strings as being physical things. If characters in a video game became conscious and started a physical science, imagine how far down a rabbit hole of endless study it would go. The laws of their universe are based on programming that would at first seem physical and real to them. Even if they ever discovered the many secrets about their virtual world they'd probably have a hard time believing in hardware and what it could possibly be. And it would only get crazier from there as they then would eventually also have to rediscover our current physics that we use to make computers work. Then, if they ever caught up to us, oh my, they'd still be as perplexed as ever, just like we are. This rabbit hole used to be really scary to me. Like having no floor to walk on. I'd always wanted to know stuff, really know. I thought really jumping in would mean looking into the abyss and lead to insanity. Now, it's the other way around. Insanity is in faith, in the end to questions. There is death there, too, in having solidified thought without curiosity, without awe and mystery.
Queen Bee Posted July 18, 2012 Author Posted July 18, 2012 Random thought of the day: In Charlotte's Web, why did everyone react to Charlotte writing "Some Pig" in her web by showering Wilbur with affection and praise? A spider that can write in English is clearly the bigger story here. If I saw that, the first thing I'd do is catch the spider and get rich selling it to research labs. Then I'd toast to my luck over a nice pork dinner...
Queen Bee Posted July 20, 2012 Author Posted July 20, 2012 So my computer died and I replaced it with my much older spare computer, which is now dying. ;.; If there is a god of any kind, please let this thing hold itself together until I can afford a new one. Pretty please?
Queen Bee Posted July 21, 2012 Author Posted July 21, 2012 Random thought of the day: Why is it that whenever a tragedy occurs in the world, people immediately try to use it as proof of the validity of their ideology? Can't they just all agree it's a tragedy and move the fuck on?
Queen Bee Posted July 21, 2012 Author Posted July 21, 2012 No computer and no Internet makes Queen Bee something something.
Queen Bee Posted July 23, 2012 Author Posted July 23, 2012 Holy shit. I just realized Little Rock from Zombieland is Bo from Signs. Also, I just looked her up, and she looks like this now. I feel very old.
Guest GingerTom Posted July 23, 2012 Posted July 23, 2012 I know the feeling. You suddenly realize that face belongs to a child from 10 years ago.
thesapien Posted July 23, 2012 Posted July 23, 2012 Sort of random, sort of related... I hate the phrase MILF, especially since they're usually my own age, making me a FILF.
lakawana_shack Posted July 23, 2012 Posted July 23, 2012 Sort of random' date=' sort of related... I hate the phrase MILF, especially since they're usually my own age, making me a FILF. [/quote'] You have a filfy mind.
Guest GingerTom Posted July 23, 2012 Posted July 23, 2012 Sort of random' date=' sort of related... I hate the phrase MILF, especially since they're usually my own age, making me a FILF. [/quote'] You have a filfy mind. That's very good.
Queen Bee Posted July 23, 2012 Author Posted July 23, 2012 Sort of random' date=' sort of related... I hate the phrase MILF, especially since they're usually my own age, making me a FILF. [/quote'] What you did there? Yeah, I saw it. Not a mom yet, though it makes me feel weird when I find myself attracted to girls I'm technically old enough to have given birth to.
thesapien Posted July 24, 2012 Posted July 24, 2012 Not a mom yet' date=' though it makes me feel weird when I find myself attracted to girls I'm technically old enough to have given birth to. [/quote'] Or the reverse like when someone young enough to be my daughter wants to date me! Granted, they really did think I was closer to their ages, but even after telling them... (My last job was on a college campus where my self proclaimed temporary celibacy was put to the test.)
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