OK I'll try again. Obviously any post in the forums with the name "Bin Laden" in it is automatically moved to politics without being read properly - no insult intended to the admins here :p

My topic, "Retribution", was actually asking if anyone had any thoughts regarding the validity of the currently held notion that the act of revenge makes the avenger no better than the original perpetrator.

This idea has been accepted almost by everyone as being "fact"... however my thought is that it not fact at all, merely accepted as being so.

Ideas?

Originally posted by Barney_TRubble

This idea has been accepted almost by everyone as being "fact"... however my thought is that it not fact at all, merely accepted as being so.

Ideas? I don't know anyone (posters here and on slashdot excepted) who subscribe to that particular theory.

Part of the reason for such an opinion being prevalent in the US is, I suspect, the ubiquity of guns. After all, what's the point in owning a semi-automatic if you're not going to get the chance to use it? This desire to shoot living things may manifest itself in an overall assumption that retaliation is not just acceptable, but mandatory.

Back in the good ol' days when bombings and shootings were part of everyday news (I'm in Ireland, BTW), there would frequently be a plea for 'no retaliation' from the murdered person's relatives. These pleas usually went unheeded. More people died.

Yes, exactly.
More people died...

Yes Banshee, in principle, i entirely agree with your point of view. However, a realist also sees that there are people out there who dont. Not only are they quite willing to "avenge", they are also simlilarly willing to take the first shot as well.

Now, if everyone held the view that you do, the world would be a peaceful place. Wonderful. Unfortunately, they dont. If it comes down to "you or them" will you still hold your current opinion and die for it, even if it means that the idea is wiped from the face of the earth?

Well, that is a difficult question, because most of the time you do not know how you react, til you have to react in such case.

I do know, that I will give my life for the man I love and my child...

Will I give my life for my country or so?
I don't know, it is not that important, as the lives of my loved ones.
So the only thing I can say for sure is that I sure, without any doubt, will give my life for the man I love and for my child...
Always, no matter the circumstances.

Whenever I hear things like "If you kill me, you'll be no better than me," I have to smile. Remember the cartoon "Mighty Max"? There was this muscle-bound guy who was an eternal warrior or something. He had been known by many names in the past, including Thor and Hercules. This time around his name was ... Norman.

In one episode, Norman had the episode's bad guy by the collars, dangling him over a cliff. The bad guy made that remark, "If you kill me, you'll be no better than me." Without missing a beat, Norman replied "I can live with that." He then dropped the bad guy to a shattering demise below.

I guess I'm of that ilk. I'll deal with my own conscience later. For now, if I have decided that you have committed something so heinous that I must take your life to settle matters, then I don't mind stooping to the level I have placed you at.

Of course, this is hypothetical. I have so far never been so angry that I wanted to kill someone literally. There are people that I wish were dead, whom I genuinely wouldn't miss, but so far nobody has pissed me off to the point that I would take their lives. What would push me that far? Well, the normal family- and survival-based reasons, but anything past that is a we'll-have-to-see situation.

Would I kill for my country? I'd like to think so, only because it has been directly attacked. I accept that I am part of a larger community on several tiers. I am first and foremost, myself. Then I am part of my family, my neighborhood, my city, my state, my nation, my culture, my world, and the human race, in ascending order. I am a big supporter of community involvment and the responsibility of every citizen to do what he or she can to make the community a better place. You can't just say "Well, I'll clean up my house, but the sidewalk isn't my problem," then sit around complaining about the state of the neighborhood. Likewise you can't stop at your neighborhood and complain about the state of your city without making the effort to do something about it. Don't clean up your city and sit idly by while your state goes to hell. Don't straighten out your state's affairs and then stop, because the state of your state is affected by the state of your nation, and so on and so on. It's all interwoven. No one is an island. It's one giant web, and when that web is threatened, I am threatened. When that web is at peace, I am at peace.

I don't know, maybe I'm just looking at too big of a picture of the relation of things, but once you've seen things that big, it's hard to go back to the smaller view.

This is really a difficult question. People have been discussing and will be discussing for many thousand years without a clear cut solution. This is why.

Suppose God (or a very powerful entity - like level 4 intelligence, we are Level one, Monkeys Level 0) asked me to tell the world that He wants everyone to get along and that to clean up the old dogmas and stupid laws and such. The first thing I will say to God: If I say these things, they will kill me. So God gives me the full power to do as I see fit. Now, a group defy me. Do I, by just a mere thought remove these people from our timeline?

OR does it matter one way or the other when this civilization will come to an end when an asteroid strikes and wipes out all life on earth or Sun goes Supernova?


Did not God said "Thou shalt not Kill" ? May be it is all pre-destination....

No killing, in no way.
Only for my loved ones, I stand by that.
I know I do not kill for just an incident or something that happened now, with the attacks at WTC.
Thousands of people died, terrible...
I saw...I saw them jumping out the windows.
You think that doesn't hurt?
To see people jumping rather then burn?
You think I liked it?
I cried, it didn't help, no...
Nothing helped, then, not any more.

Here I tried to talk to some of the young people fighting.
They only get angry and start calling me names.
And then I am lucky maybe, they don't kick me.
What to do then?
I don't know, really don't know.
It hurts not to know how to stop this madness.
How can we stop it then?
You have any ideas?
Tell it, I will help, more will help I guess.
Then we have to find a way to solve this problem, but how?
Where to begin?
In my own street? I already did that.
Give ideas, come on, lets try...
:)

The only solution is genetic modification so that everyone can think using their "Frontal Lobe". It develops between 6 months to 1 year of age. The frontal lobe matures in spurts and takes years to develop. New functions are continually added throughout childhood and perhaps even beyond. The brain is so active in childhood it consumes 20 percent of the body's oxygen.

Improving the frontal lobe activities may help reduce the killing instinct and solve problems other ways....

May be the turbans reduce Oxygen to that part of the brain....:D

Yeah, you never know...:p

Then, let us test it....:D

May be the turbans reduce Oxygen to that part of the brain....

HEY!;)

Ha, Oxygen.
:)
You are the one we need.
You better be ready when Kmguru is coming to get you...
It can take a little while, we first have to capture a few Turbans.
To do the test on...
You understand the meaning of this I guess.
So Oxygen, be ready and get those Turbans good...
Haha...
;)
Well, I am very non-violent, but I know some nice tortures for them, before we start testing...

I know a good torture for them. Let's stick 'em in a room full of grandparents armed with pictures of their grandkids and a plethora of cutesy-wutesy stories to tell about them. The terorrists will stand no chance.

Terrorist: Allah! Oh Allah save me from this torment! Allah!
Grandma: Now, my little granddaughter Missy has a persian kitty named Allah, here's a picture of them at the park. Aren't they just so cuuuuute?
Terrorist: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Sounds good to me...

Here are the factors to consider: When you have hundreds of wives with hundreds of children, it can put strain on the family life. Can someone figure out why males hate the females and mothers?

Turbans can reduce oxygen to the higher function part of the brain....

Eating just bread and water as 3 meals a day and blaming the US for their condition could have some effects too.

Did you see the schools in Afghanistan where they showed 8 and 9 year old girls are taught Quran 8 hour days and no other education. What if when they are forced to bear child, they want these males to go out and kill themselves....

Just some weird thought....

The males go out and kill themselves...???
:)
Not such a bad thought, lets start with the Taliban, all male...
Send thousands of women to the Taliban, they run, screaming, haha.
Good chance they will give up Bin Laden then.
No, we make all turbans, male turbans (there are no female turbans?) and give them a sex operation, we make them female...
And then, after that, we send them back...
Then you will see what happens.
It is great to fantasize, isn't it?
Nice tortures for nasty turbans, pity we do not have one, to try the tortures on.
;)

Quote by kmguru
OR does it matter one way or the other when this civilization will come to an end when an asteroid strikes and wipes out all life on earth or Sun goes Supernova?

our sun will never go supernova...

hehe.. just breaking the subject matter :)

You wish my Australian friend...
But the sun is just a minor star... and the sun can die, like every other Planet or Star.

By my means, it can happen tomorrow.
You never know.
But if that happens, it goes quickly, so don't panic, haha.
Talk to you later.
Have a good time at Sci forums.
;)

thanks for the reply and warm greeting banshee :)

our sun is a minor star, and as such is too small to go supernova.. to go supernova, a star must be much larger than our sun..

our sun will grow large enough in its red giant phase to kill all life on earth, but after that, it will shrink to a dead star with no spectacular supernova unfortunately.

---
This desire to shoot living things may manifest itself in an overall assumption that retaliation is not just acceptable, but mandatory.
---

Ok, I'll admit, I shoot living vegetables and I enjoy it greatly. I resent the implication that the joy I derive from slaughtering innocent life-forms is the only reason for supporting retaliatory airstrikes.

I hear a lot of people talking about how retaliation isn't the only way to defend ourselves but I hear precious little as to what else we are supposed to do. No, military action isn't and shouldn't be the only method we employ but I certainly see the fruitfulness in proactively removing the ability of those who have sworn to destroy us to keep their promises.

Peace can work but strict pacifism is, for the time being, a pipe dream

Our Sun may not go supernova but can become a Red Giant. Throw in a tinkering of human activities, we could artificially induce supernova activity by chance or by design. Then there are blackholes that are the vaccum claener of the universe. One such Blackhole heading our way....it is the end, my friends...unless we run to another part of our Milky Way galaxy.

kmguru

I'd really like to know how you think we would artificially induce a supernova of our sun...

other than that.. be excellent to eachother :)

When face-to-face with someone who professes to believe that it is never O.K. to strike back because it makes you no better than your attacker, that violence begets violence, yada, yada, yada - follow these simple steps:

Step 1. Punch the person in the face as hard as you can.

Step 2. When they get up off the floor to punch you back, remind them of their principles - that it is never O.K. to strike back - because it would make them no better than you, that violence begets violence, yada, yada, yada - and when they stop and realize what they were about to do and they start saying, "That's right, I'm not going to hit you back because..." stop them in mid-sentence by punching them in the face again, harder than the last time.

Step 3. Repeat step 2 until they understand that sometimes it is necessary to punch back.

Sounds good to me blonde_cupid. An excellent suggestion. Then they will get smart and learn to punch back. Soon we will be punching each other until cows come home. It will not stop until one side is destroyed. Then whatever is left, many years will pass - the winning group will divide into two. The same game will be played again and again...new religions will pop up...

This never ending struggle of who is right will continue until there are no more humans left....to fight on ideology...

So...so is life....

Glad you liked my suggestion, kmguru.

How about this: Encourage them to hold onto extreme pacifism especially when the one who is hitting them is a relentless fanatic who does not listen to reason and believes that they are not worthy of life. Encourage them to allow themselves to be punched again and again until they die. All their wordly problems might be solved in death but the terrorist lives on to complete the ethnic cleansing of the world.

Even cleansed as such, the world might still be faced with the same situation you describe: Many years will pass and the remaining group will divide in two, etc...

Moderation is the key, I believe. If one values life, even if they are passive by nature, there are certain extreme situations where it is necessary to strike back at an aggressor. This is one of them.

Peace.

Who is the agressor in this case? And why are you all so doom thinking about the starving of the Planet.
A good, big Tsunami is enough.
I wish I may see it happen, I love it.
The Earth is nearly at its end. Earth is tired of all the violence at her back. We have to give Earth the rest she needs to recover. If we do not so, Nature will stand up, as happened before, in Ancient Times.
What will happen is the question.
Nothing more. Oh, and when will it happen.
Well, that is a great surprise for us all.
May people live, after that, I guess then it will be people who can make Earth well again. The people who know and live like that already. People who are one with Nature and Earth.
They will live, to take care of the New Clean Earth...

:cool:

It is the age old story. King...Tyrant...Oppression...fight or flight.

King...good king...live in harmony. There are/were very few good kings. A story needs to be looked at in its entirety not just a snippet in the middle.

Doing so does not solve anything. US Admin has the right idea, let us hope it is followed through....

Kmguru, what do you mean by; US Admin. has the right idea?
I do not understand.
Can you explain please?
Thank you.:)

The bottom line in this terrorist saga is this:

The Bush adminstration inherited the problems of the world, the grievances of everyone. Those terrorists and their symphathizers do not understand our government system, so they blame past activities to the present group. Now, had they have legitmate complains, they could have lobbied using thier millions of dollars and got some actions out of our new President. Instead those idiots wasted their money on exporting violence to US soil. All they could have done is hire a good Washington lobby group, and walla...they would have been heros...

The result is a campaign to weed them out. If Bin Laden, would have used the money to lobby congress for his cause to improve Afghanistan or whatever, he would have been a real hero. Now a lot of people are going to die, he will go down as the most evil person next to Hitler. Even idiots can change the world....

We will do what needs to be done....

Spoken ... errr ... written like a true American!We will do what needs to be done.... Have you already had the American flag tattooed on your forehead?

Oh, and by the way ...The Bush adminstration inherited the problems of the world And immediately tried to distance themselves from the world ... Only it didn't work.

Oh well, that that's life ... or rather ... death.

There are a kind of people on this world, who are just not good, they are bad, 'evil' if you want.
Some people have that pretty young. Most of the times it has to do with parenthood, but not always. There are some people who just ARE 'evil'. I do not know why, it seems to be that way. I think this is once in the so many years that such person stands up and lets hear something from him/herself.
Just like some people have the order to make big trouble for the world. Like it is our duty to catch these people in time, before they catch us. I can not explain exactly what I mean, but I can feel it. Maybe some more of you do feel it.
Bin Laden has been waiting for the right time, the right time to get America good, with thousands of dead people. Innocent people. It is terrible, but these things happen, every time a new.
Look at history, why should this be this way? I really don't have a clue.
Kmguru? You have an idea?

Have you already had the American flag tattooed on your forehead?

Not quite, but close. Let us see...

The flag is on my carry-on luggage to ward off evil pilots who think every brown skinned first class passenger is a potential threat.

There is a flag on our tree close to the driveway and the street. A small flag such that no one steals it in the true American spirit. Someone stole 3 flags from this rednecks flagpole (3 of them)close to the state highway.

There is a small lapel flag made in China, I have not dared to use it yet.

I do need an American Flag tattooed on my forehead so that I do not get flack from the airline employees and the airport authority. The morons can not differentiate people from Saudi and Lebanon verses people from India (we lost 250 at WTC).

How has the Bush adminstration tried to distance itself from the world? It seems to me that Junior got dropped into the thick of things. It just so happens that he's got bigger balls than everybody thought. He just doesn't flash them around like the last pres did.

The only thing I've seen that the Bush administration has done to be seen as distancing itself from the world is to try to tend to America's problems first, such as the recession. If looking to his own house before propping up someone else's is a crime against the world, then to hell with the world.

kmguru ...
I well realize that these will be trying times for people of color ... hang in there, the hysteria will hopefully pass.

Oxygen ...
If you want to refer to 'balls' you had better look to the Mayor of New York City rather than Dubya who let his 'handlers' bounce him around half the country before letting him return to D.C. where he should have been as soon as possible instead of hiding out from those 'evil terrorists'.

To defend Junior, as the Commander in Chief and the President, he's a pretty important dude. They couldn't just wisk him back to DC until they made sure it was safe. They had originally wanted to wisk him away to Camp David where he'd really be safe. It was his choice to go to DC, and his advisors still thought he went back too soon. Why was he bounced around the country? The situation was still unclear, and a moving target is harder to hit. It was just good tactics. (Ever play paintball? It's the first lesson you learn, ouch! :))

I'm not knocking NYC's mayor by a long shot. I doubt very many mayors from any city would have shown the guts he has. If any one has the right to the title "Your Honor", it's him.

He is a 'pretty important dude' ... but that's why we have a Vice-President waiting in the wings. Remember, the country didn't fall apart when Kennedy was assasinated or Regan was shot.

The only reason I could figure regarding the madness was that Cheney is in such rough shape that they (the corporate interests) couldn't take a chance on anything happening to Dubya.

I don't know about the logic in your first paragraph. Just because we have a back-up president means we shouldn't look to the safety of the first one?

What I attempted, apparently unsuccessfully, to convey was that although the Presidency is important in our Democracy, the individual is not. It isn't as though he were the 'Son of God' to be protected at all costs (although, come to think of it, HE wasn't protected at all).

Would you care to inform me why Dubya is so important? In your world view, that is.

Originally posted by Chagur

Oxygen ...
If you want to refer to 'balls' you had better look to the Mayor of New York City rather than Dubya who let his 'handlers' bounce him around half the country before letting him return to D.C. where he should have been as soon as possible instead of hiding out from those 'evil terrorists'. [/B]

~~~~~~

Coming in late on this thread but thought I'd toss this into the ring.

My impression of "why" Dubya was bounced around was because they (the administration and the military) were scrambling to check out other possible terrorist's targets--including the choice spots in D.C. Probably didn't want Dubya sitting down to lunch in the White House before checking the underside of the table for plastic explosives. These strikes were major, they happened relatively fast, came from different directions, and I can see the sense of "protecting" both the President and the Vice President until everyone was more confident about what was a secure area and what wasn't.

I didn't feel let down in any way to know that Bush wasn't behind his earthbound desk at the time. We have the technology allowing him to remain "in touch" and "in control" without putting him at risk.

If something had happened to him, imagine the outcry from America about how stupid it was to allow him to be so easily targeted. Imagine what a victory it would have been for the terrorists. I also remember him spending many hours on site where the attacks occured, and soon after they occurred. Perhaps spending more time among the ruins than some of our past presidents would have.

If someone else has already expressed these views, I apologize for the redundancy. Didn't sound like it however.

Just more food for thought....


Counterbalance

Thank you, Counterbalance. You took the words right off of my keyboard. ;)

Chagur- I place importance on the post of the Presidency in general because of the awesome responsibility that comes with it. I assume that the leader of any nation has the same or similar responsibilities. The President is not a mere puppet for darker, shadowy powers. I know he's not the absolute final say in all things American, but he's not the marionette that his detractors would make him out to be. He is a man with a job to do. He's the head of a very large corporation, so to speak, and whether or not the malcontents are right about how Junior got into office (I believe it was legitimate, but that could be another thread altogether), he is the right man for the job. When you've got a tool that's working well, you take care of it.

That's why I see Junior as so important. He's actually working. Why do you not consider him so important?

I would agree that he is the 'right man for the job' only insofar as he seems committed to a black/white universe: We against the evil forces of terrorism. Maybe that sort of commitment is what is need at this time, but I do think it is inappropriate.

As to why I do not consider him important? Because of the ways in which he has, or has failed, to address numerous issues.

I think he's committed to a "black and white universe" only insofar as the war goes. What issues are you referring to that he needs to address? The two big ones that come to mind are the environment and the recession.

Recessions don't just suddenly happen. Their conditions are set up long before we ever see them. I make my living in Silicon Valley, home of the 20-year old (ex)millionaire. When the dot-coms became dot-bombs, an entire industry began to collapse. Most of the foundations of the "silicon rush" consisted of craploads of money being invested with no product to show. No product=no sales=no profit=crash. If this was just one small niche, say the 3D videophone market, it would be no big deal except to those immediately involved. The current situation involves and entire industry. When those collapse, not only are the employees and officers out of luck, but so are the contractors, their support personnel, the property owners, the investors, the host city,the remote offices, the parent companies, all of the satellite companies, and all other associated support personnel. This starts a domino effect as the dot-commers now have to file bankruptcy, default on loans, and give back all those obscenely huge houses they were ordering, which now throws a nasty twist on the real estate market. They want their money's worth out of that house, but who can afford it with so many people in the area out of work? It all snowballs from here, and I'm sure I don't need to illustrate it any further as the job competition gets fierce.

And that's just the view from Silicon Valley. Please. Help us. Go buy a few computers. :)

How do we solve this situation? You can't just throw money at companies and say "Hire people". There's a big vaccuum. Jobs need to be created, but where do we create them? How do you employ all those people? They skilled, for the most part. It would be a shame to have all those PhD's wasted on "You want fries with that?" Plus, there's the potential of no summer jobs for teens, and you know what happens when teenagers get bored...

The environment...ah, I don't know how you feel about it, but I think the radical environmentalists are really blowing things out of proportion. We need to find cleaner, more fuel-efficient ways to conduct business, but do we really need so much unspoiled wilderness? Yes, some should be put aside, but let's stay realistic. Most people don't go out into the wilderness and marvel at the beauty of nature. They just have no desire to do so. It's pretty, yes, but were not all Euel Gibbons. (Wow! THAT'S a name I haven't heard in a long time!)

Endangered animals must be protected, and in their own environment if at all possible. The EPA, however, has this habit of declaring animals endangered with no data to back up their claim. If somebody has a personal agenda, they can halt an economically vital project just by declaring the Hypothetical Mudfly an endangered species, even if they can't tell you how many there are in existence or what their role is in the ecosystem. Junior has asked them to prove, within a certain amount of time (I'm not sure of how much time) that an animal is actually endangered.

I'm not exactly unbiased on the oil issue. I drive 85 miles to get to work. Cheap gas is in my best interests. I can't afford one of the nifty little electric cars (although I would like to own one). I would like to see some of that Alaska Pipeline diverted this way instead of to Japan before I let them drill into my Pacific Coastline, but it wouldn't kill me if they did. Maybe if it wasn't such an uphill battle to drill for oil (usually because of the environmental impact studies on the Hypothetical Mudfly), maybe some of the money they have to use to fight the EPA could be used to maintain and improve the equipment so we don't have to worry so much about oil spills and other environmental disasters. Modern drilling equipment has even become minimally invasive to the environment. Most drills take up less that 100 square feet. In the ocean, the rigs become ecosystems all their own as submarine life builds its own world on and around the supports.

That's all I can coherently put up right now. I've got a splitting headache, but at least it's a weekend, hey? Salud!

Re. The environment.
Not expecting him to do very much, or anything, about it.

Re. The recession.
Doubt there's anything he can do about it. It will just have to go its way.

BTW, good point re.exporting Alaskan oil ... it's bummed me for a while now.

I'm back, sans headache. Nothing like a nice walk downtown after a good night's sleep to wash one of those away.

So, what issues are we talking about that Junior needs to address? (As I sip my iced capuccino while sitting in front of a lovely little sidewalk cafe, the sunlight dancing playfully through the trees...)