There are actually two articles that I'm about to post that provides a great deal for thought for the upcoming/impending/threatened clash of civilizations between East and West.

The first is from:[url]http://www.nationalreview.com/derbyshire/derbyshire110801.shtml[/url]

[size=4]Dreaming for the Whole World[/size=4]
[b]The orgins of creativity.[/b]

by Johm Derbyshire, November 8, 2001 9:15 a.m.

On my shelf I have a copy of Ch'u Chai's The Story of Chinese Philosophy. It's an excellent little handbook: a concise and informative survey of the field, with cute line drawings of the most important sages. From the point of view of a Western reader, however, it's a very peculiar book indeed.

Dr. Chai* takes us through all the main schools: Confucius, Mencius, Taoists, Legalists. The last philosopher he discusses in detail is Han Feizi, who flourished in the middle of the third century B.C. This chapter finishes on page 223. Turning that page, we find ourselves looking at a chapter titled "Conclusions." This final chapter covers, in ten pages, all the significant developments since Han Feizi.

The reader coming to Chinese culture for the first time might think there is some mistake. Perhaps he misread the title: perhaps it is The Story of [i][u]Ancient[/u][/i] Chinese Philosophy? No, the title is as I gave it. Is Dr. Chai playing some subtle oriental joke on us? Did he just get fed up after Han Feizi and stop writing? Or did he perhaps present a 1,200-page manuscript to his publisher, whose marketing department insisted on dropping the last 967 pages? (Don't laugh: This is exactly the kind of thing publishers do.) None of the above. Dr. Chai is an honest man, and [b]the story of Chinese philosophy is just as he has presented it: a starburst of intellectual activity in the fifth, fourth and third centuries B.C., [u]followed by 2,200 years of nothing much at all[/u].[/b]

This came to mind while I was reading Peter Watson's piece in the London weekly New Statesman. Watson is an English writer who is about to publish a book titled A Terrible Beauty, advertised as "a history of the people and ideas that shaped the modern mind." New Statesman is the descendant of the great British left-wing opinion-and-literary magazine of that name that was so influential in the 1930s and 1940s. (It had its last flourishing under the editorship of the historian Paul Johnson in 1964-70. Johnson was at that point still a socialist. Until 1957 the paper's official title was The New Statesman and Nation, and it was known around Fleet Street as the "Staggers and Naggers.")

Watson's piece comes with a paper trail that you can follow back if you feel inclined. It was written in response to an article by Edward Said titled "The Clash of Ignorance" in the October 22nd issue of America's own The Nation (which I have never heard anyone refer to as the "Naggers," though it's not a bad nickname for that peevish periodical). Said's piece in turn is a rebuttal of Samuel Huntington's famous essay "The Clash of Civilizations?" in the Summer 1993 issue of Foreign Affairs, which itself was inspired in part by Islamic scholar Bernard Lewis's penetrating September 1990 Atlantic Monthly article "The Roots of Muslim Rage," in which the phrase "clash of civilizations" first seems to have shown up.

- continued -

Anyway, Watson, having done enough of a study of modernity to make a book about it, has come to certain conclusions. Here are some of them, lifted from the New Statesman article, which of course you can read in its entirely for yourself to see whether I am quoting out of context. Italics are mine.

· "[M]odernity" is... like a swamp, a treacherous landscape where some civilisations can't get a footing. Modernity... has magnified differences between civilisations...

· There is no Asian equivalent of, say, Darwin, no African Max Planck, no Arab Freud, no Japanese Picasso or Matisse. [b]When it comes to ideas, the modern world is a western world, a secular world of democracies, free markets, science and self-governing universities[/b].

· Islam isn't a special case among the non-western traditions, as Naipaul implies. Neither China nor Japan has produced ideas to match its size or population; nor have the many non-Muslim states of Africa...

· Colonialism cannot shoulder all the blame for this, nor can one particular religion. In the realm of ideas, China and Japan are as much under-achievers as the Arab and African worlds... [T]he evidence is incontrovertible: there is a link between civilisation and intellectual achievement; there is a link between intellectual freedom and political freedom...

The topic here is creativity. Why was China so desperately uncreative for so long? Why is the non-Western world such an intellectual, artistic, and even military failure in modern times? Why are the arguments of our "multi-culturalist" preceptors — that any culture is just as good as any other — so laughably unconvincing? Why is the West so creative? Go anywhere in the world today and you will see people — black, white, brown, and yellow people, speaking a babel of tongues — using gadgets invented in the West, discussing ideas developed in the West, playing sports devised in the West, working in buildings erected on Western architectural principles, wearing styles of clothing designed in the West, reading novels and watching movies and listening to pop songs based on Western models... How did this come about?

- continued -

A hundred years ago the most popular explanations were biological. Human beings come in different racial types, our great-grandparents believed, and the white race — most particularly the European portion of it — was genetically superior to the rest of humanity. You can, of course, get locked up for saying things like that nowadays. My own, only mildly scandalous, opinion is that we don't actually know enough about human genetics to rule out biological factors: but if they are present, it is just as factors, thrown in with a lot of other factors. It seems plain at any rate that being white and speaking an Indo-European language does not guarantee you a creative culture. Ask an Albanian, an Iranian, or an Afghan. In fact there have been quite long spells when white Europeans, although highly civilized by most definitions of the word, were perfectly uncreative: Think of the later Roman empire. Gibbons said this was the case with the entire Byzantine empire, all one thousand years of it, though I don't know enough about the Byzantines myself to pass an opinion on Gibbons's opinion.

A different set of explanations was pressed on us in the last half of the 20th century. The West basically stole its creativity, we were told by people like Martin Bernal and the aforementioned Edward Said. [u]The non-Western peoples were just as creative as us, but we had stolen their creations, then stifled or suppressed information about their true origins, claiming them as our own[/u]. This was all part of the "oppression" white Westerners had visited on the rest of the world. I used to regularly attend at an office of the New York City municipal government to transact some business with a very pleasant young female African-American city employee. On the wall of her office was a poster listing, in quite small print, all the scores of inventions and discoveries that, according to the poster, African or African-descended peoples had made: the alphabet, the magnetic compass, airplanes, X-rays, ... It used to make me think of the joke current among intellectuals in the late-Stalinist U.S.S.R., when the authorities were pushing the idea that Russians had invented or discovered absolutely everything: "Russia — home of the elephant!"

If you read a lot of cultural commentary, as I do for a living, you get the feeling that these late-20th-century "oppression" rationales for the non-creativeness of the non-West, though they will no doubt linger on for a few more years in dark corners (elite universities, schools of journalism, National Public Radio, Hollywood, France) are now, so far as most thoughtful people are concerned, fading away like the Cheshire Cat, leaving behind the following single, simple, and daily ever more obvious truth.

- continued -

We of the West have political liberty. We permit open inquiry into all matters. Before deciding on issues of large national importance, we want to hear different opinions about them from respected members of our communities. We insist that those who govern us must periodically submit themselves to our approval, and, if that approval is not forthcoming, yield their offices peacefully to someone we find more acceptable. We keep clerics and military men at a distance from state decision-making. We let writers and artists create as the spirit moves them, submitting their creations to the general public for freely given opinions. Our societies have many power centers, not just one. When those centers conflict, we resolve the disagreement peacefully, according to settled laws and conventions.

Because of all these things, because of our freedoms, we are creative, more creative than any civilization has ever been before in human history. We — mainly the U.S.A. — are creating for the whole world, dreaming for the whole world. There is indeed, as Peter Watson says, "a link between intellectual freedom and political freedom," and it explains everything. "The evidence is incontrovertible."

That's the good news. The bad news is that if you survey history on the large scale, our freedom and creativity is an aberration, an anomaly. The natural state of humanity is slumber, under the wise governance of an omniscient Caliph, Son of Heaven, Divine Augustus, Little Father of the People or other demigod. And worse news yet: As tens of millions of fundamentalist Moslems bear witness, huge numbers of human beings — perhaps all of us, to some degree, in some inner recess of our hearts — yearn for that slumber, actually prefer it over the stresses and challenges and insecurities of freedom.

Eric The(MoreToContinue)Hun[>]:)]

B-b-b-b-but what about [i]DIVERSITY[/i]? [@:D]

Yeah but when China was on a roll 1500 years ago- IT WAS AWSOME...

Woah, wait a minute, no Japanese Picasso- that is debateable. You can nail the thrid world for its lack of industry and science and technical achevement, but ART no no no.

Yes, but even if there [u]were[/u] a Japanese Picasso, which IMHO there wasn't, he would have lived a very, very long time ago!

Eric The(Pro-Western)Hun[>]:)]

[size=4]Lost in the swamp of modernity[/size=4]
Peter Watson Monday 29th October 2001  

[i]His survey of scholars around the world convinced Peter Watson that, outside the west, there were no new ideas in the 20th century[/i]

Westerners and Muslims, according to Edward Said in these pages two weeks ago, are all swimming in the same seas. Both are stranded " . . . between the deep waters of tradition and modernity". The events of 11 September therefore represent no clash of civilisations, he said. That idea is "a gimmick . . . better for reinforcing defensive self-pride than for critical understanding of the bewildering interdependence of our time".

The sad - if admittedly bewildering - truth is that "modernity" is in fact more like a swamp, a treacherous landscape where some civilisations can't get a footing. Modernity itself has magnified differences between civilisations and, in so doing, has helped bring terrorism to the point where it takes the form it has. This is not a "vast generalisation" (another criticism that Said makes about westerners), or at least not one that I alone make. I do not say my research has been exhaustive, but what follows is not just one westerner speaking.

A year ago I published a narrative history of the main ideas that shaped the 20th century. In my research, I visited roughly 150 scholars, leading specialists in their fields, in Europe, America and the Middle East. I asked each expert what were the three most important ideas in their discipline in the 20th century. I found a great deal of agreement, a strong sense of a great conversation taking place. In economics, for example, three experts (two of them Nobel laureates) overlapped to the point where they suggested just four ideas between them, when they could have given nine.

That was agreeably surprising. What shocked me were my interviews with scholars of non-western cultures. Here, I am referring not only to western specialists in the great non-western traditions, but scholars who were themselves born into those traditions - Arab archaeologists or writers, economists and historians from India and China, poets and dramatists from Japan and Africa. All of them - there were no exceptions - said the same thing. [b]In the 20th century, in the modern world, there were no non-western ideas of note.[/b]

There is no Asian equivalent of, say, Darwin, no African Max Planck, no Arab Freud, no Japanese Picasso or Matisse. When it comes to ideas, the modern world is a western world, a secular world of democracies, free markets, science and self-governing universities.

There are important Chinese writers and painters of the 20th century; and we can all think of significant Japanese film directors, Indian novelists and African dramatists. There is a thriving school of Indian post-colonial historiography, led by Gayatri Spivak. Distinguished non-western scholars and writers are household names, at least in smart households: one thinks of Edward Said himself, Chinua Achebe, Amartya Sen, Anita Desai, Chandra Wickramasinghe. But, it was repeatedly put to me, there is no 20th-century Chinese equivalent of surrealism, say, no Indian philosophy to match logical positivism, no African equivalent of the French Annales school of history. Whatever list you care to make of 20th-century innovations, be it plastic, antibiotics and the atom, or stream-of-consciousness novels, it is overwhelmingly western.

- continued -

Is this an expression of defensive self-pride, as Professor Said also argued? In my survey, the views of non-western scholars matched the views of western ones. And I don't believe that western academics or intellectuals are blind to non-western achievements, where they exist. The whole "project" of postmodernism is designed to promote the "other", the non-western, the unorthodox. Look at the famine economics of Amartya Sen (now head of a Cambridge college), the magical realism of Salman Rushdie. They are warmly welcomed in the west and win all sorts of western-based prizes. But these are late-flowering blooms. Overall, throughout the 20th century, the non-western traditions lagged far behind the west in the realm of new ideas. Postmodernism itself is a western notion.

Or, take Bernard Lewis's history The Middle East, published in paperback only last year. He has a chapter called "New Ideas" where the most recent date is 1896.

Why should this huge disparity exist? Is V S Naipaul right? His general views are well known, and he has been accused of being superficial. But he did visit four Islamic societies - Iran, Pakistan, Malaysia and Indonesia. Naipaul did the work and his conclusions were not all one-way.

Pakistan, he found, was a fragmented country, economically stagnant, "its gifted people close to hysteria". As in Iran, there was an emotional rejection of the west, especially its attitudes to women. He found no industry, no science, the universities stifled by fundamentalism, which "provides an intellectual thermostat, set low". The Malays had an inability to compete with the Chinese, who comprise half the population and dominate Malaysia economically. The Islam of Indonesia Naipaul described as "stupefaction": community life was breaking down, and the faith was the inevitable response. In all four places, Naipaul concluded, Islam drew its strength from a focus on the past that prevented development, and that in itself meant the peoples of the Islamic nations couldn't cope with the west. The "rage and anarchy" induced by this kept them locked into the faith - and so the circle continues.

He found support from the Harvard economist David Landes who, in his Wealth and Poverty of Nations (1998), shows how in an earlier age Islam turned its back on the printing press, fearful of the sacrilege it might bring (which meant that many crucial Arab texts were not printed until the 19th century). According to Landes, intellectual segregation is the chief burden of religious fundamentalism. But Landes did not single out Islam for special treatment. He frankly labels Arabs, Indians, Africans and South Americans all as "losers" in the modern world.

For me, too, Islam isn't a special case among the non-western traditions, as Naipaul implies. Neither China nor Japan has produced ideas to match its size or population; nor have the many non-Muslim states of Africa. India, with its burgeoning software sector, Bollywood and its clutch of literary heavyweights, is beginning to stir, but many of its stars seem to spend all or some of their time in the west. Only in that way, it appears, can their own intellectual fulfilment be complete.

- continued -

An entirely different "take" on this predicament came as early as the 1950s from Frantz Fanon, the black psychiatrist born in Martinique. Fanon's most poignant book, The Wretched of the Earth, drew on his experiences as a psychiatrist in Algeria where, he said, certain psychiatric reactions he had seen were directly related to the war of independence then being waged in that country.

Fanon's books, like those of other black authors before him, were deliberately designed to unnerve whites. His most chilling story concerned two Algerians, aged 13 and 14, who had killed their European playmate. As the 13-year-old put it, "We weren't a bit cross with him . . . One day we decided to kill him, because the Europeans want to kill all the Arabs. We can't kill big people. But we could kill one like him because he was the same age as us."

At that stage, said Fanon, Algerian culture was the struggle to be free; the anti-colonial fight - violence itself - was the shared culture of the Algerians, and it absorbed most of their creative energy. And he used a phrase that Martin Luther King was to make famous. He was, he said, a "creative extremist".

Is it too much to link Fanon and Bin Laden? The actions of the latter - turning two of America's great modern achievements, the airliner and the skyscraper, against each other, with the incendiary element in between, oil, as the Middle East's contribution - would certainly count as "creative extremism" on any definition. But the difference, between Fanon's words and Bin Laden's deeds, shows how far this "culture", this way of thinking, this set of ideas, has come. And how long it has been gestating.

Colonialism cannot shoulder all the blame for this, nor can one particular religion. In the realm of ideas, China and Japan are as much underachievers as the Arab and African worlds. At the same time, the evidence is incontrovertible: there is a link between civilisation and intellectual achievement; there is a link between intellectual freedom and political freedom, between the ability to change, on the one hand, and scientific advance, technology-based prosperity and intellectual satisfaction, on the other.

[b]That evidence shows that the parts of the world Bin Laden says he wants to help will be aided by less fundamentalism, not more.[/b]

Eric The(HadEnough,Yet?)Hun[>]:)]

I cant believe i read all that. dont agree with a "white" race being gentically superior. i still challange someone to prove how that could be so. the genetic code for all races is necessary for survival against diseases. viruses, and advance us further along evolutionary lines.

i agree that political and intellectual freedom promotes creativity. how else would you be free to produce something new. incentive to advance yourself is the key.

the west is not really all that creative today, except as far as technology is concerned. social, spiritual, and academic creativity is dead. we are taught today in the west that individual thinking is wrong. conform. there is security in acting as a whole.

"independance breeds chaos; sumbmit and be strong"

social non-creativity-we accept the practices of eastern countries because they are hip. must do so in order to be hip also. doing something on your own, means you will stand alone. you are not cool.

spiritual non-creativity-the pagan beleif systems of yester centuries are re-dressed and called "new age" big whooping deal.

Academic non-creativity-lets adopt indoctrination over standards of learning so we can produce tax paying puppets who are too stupid to make it on their own. just like in eatern socialist shit-holes.

reading lib

[rolleyes] just cuz so hippy calls it art dose not make it art.
Jap stuff is cool I have 600 years old Jap painting on my living romm wall and a 890(or so they tell me)sword next to it but it's not art.
it cool.

They are as all 3rd world people are(but we own them,so they do better)they have nothing they did not get from somebody eles.

As for China, HA! all they could do is put up walls to keep others from f*ing up there lil. world.
They did not even know what to do with the crap they did have.
We are talking about people that would hack each other up with swords and use gun powder as a party toy[:D]

It's not really so much that the west is better it's just that out of all the civilizations that have ever been we have done more in less time that ANY other.

Hold on, that would make us better[:D]

Post from libertarian -

That might be what is being counted for as 'teaching' in today's schools, but that sort of thought is hopelessly [u]un[/u]-Western. It just seems to be part and parcel of modern liberal America's attack upon its own philosophical underpinnings.

And we're the much poorer for such anti-Western b.s., are we not?

Eric The(ListenToHistory,ItFairlyShouts'AboutFace'ToUs!)Hun[>]:)]

"the genetic code for all races is necessary for survival against diseases. viruses, and advance us further along evolutionary lines"

HA HA HA ! evolution HA HA HA! stop dude your gon'a make me pee on my self[:P]


Anybody can tell you will all the holes in science's take on this it takes more blind faith to belivev in evolution that God or any thing elese[rolleyes]

Whites are not geneticly superior it's just that us (Americans) and any other good and decent people around the world(that all come here anyway) are morally and intellectually superior.

true...true

No, that would be incorrect.

"we are taught today in the west that individual thinking is wrong. conform. there is security in acting as a whole"

Lib! Duuuude! look man that is the left wing crap that has filtered into the west.
The good of the one is not as great as the need of the many,bla bla bla.

The Left is very fond of eastern philosophy due to it's open lack of any real truths.
It's more easy to manipulate and very secular, the mix of the two seem very cool and enlightened to some and thats way it here.
Our culture is fine if you leave it alone,so much so it's better that all others.

are you serious? what makes "American" white folk morally superior to say...Germans in the 1930's or in Stalin's Russia? the only thing keeping us from turning into a police state is that AR15 in your gun cabinet. power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. if given a chance there are a lot of "Americans" who would walk down that same road. remember half the country voted for Socialist-democracy candidate Al Gore.

further more i am not any sort of a strict evolutionist. a debate that could wage a dozen posts over for sure. i beleive that a divine being created this planet and all the life on it. i do not believe that we happened by accident. as for "evolution" in my above statement; there is to a degree (you cannot deny this) a measure of "mutation" amongst not only our, but other species as well. how do you think the human race fight infections over time? the main problem is that viruses mutate faster than we can breeding. science prooves that breeding outside of your bloodline increses your chance of protection from birth defects. this come about from using differnet gene pools too throw infections/illnessess a curve.

if you wish to laugh at me; fine. hell i'll laugh with you. but if your going to refute the above, please do so with logic. [bounce]

Let me restate my views with the words from the last two paragraphs of our blessed and beloved Ronald Reagan's second and last inaugural address of January, 1985:

"Now we hear again the echoes of our past: a general falls to his knees in the hard snow of Valley Forge; a lonely President paces the darkened halls, and ponders his struggle to preserve the Union; the men of the Alamo call out encouragement to each other; a settler pushes west and sings a song, and the song echoes out forever and fills the unknowing air.  
 
"[u]It is the American sound[/u]. It is hopeful, big-hearted, idealistic, daring, decent, and fair. That's our heritage; that is our song. We sing it still. For all our problems, our differences, we are together as of old, as we raise our voices to the God who is the Author of this most tender music. And may He continue to hold us close as we fill the world with our sound—sound in unity, affection, and love—one people under God, dedicated to the dream of freedom that He has placed in the human heart, called upon now to pass that dream on to a waiting and hopeful world."

Eric The(AndThatSongIsAGreat'[u]CountryAndWestern[/u]'Hit,ByTheLordHimself)Hun[>]:)]

Ok, show me.
And tell me what the deal is with the data science can't even start to get in to and why there very best thinkers do 180s all the time.

Yes, that's always amused me as well. Here they have the largest population at the time (still) and they have to build walls for protection.

The Chinese cavalry was considerably larger than that of the invading Mongols, but the Mongols possessed an advantage that won the day for them - their saddles had stirrups, while the Chinese saddles of the time didn't.

This one advancement in saddle design played an extremely important role in the defeat of the Chinese!

Eric The(FoodForThought)Hun[>]:)]

Ericthehistorybuff [:D]

say...this could be a reason why we should have full-auto high-capacity rifles [;P]

LibertoonwhoreadsErictheHunspostsat1:30inthemorning
[:D][:D]

"are you serious? what makes "American" white folk morally superior to say...Germans in the 1930's or in Stalin's Russia? the only thing keeping us from turning into a police state is that AR15 in your gun cabinet. power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. if given a chance there are a lot of "Americans" who would walk down that same road. remember half the country voted for Socialist-democracy candidate Al Gore."

SAY WHAT!?!?!?! Are you nuts? 1/2 the counry did not vote at all so how the hell coul;d they vote for Socialist-democracy.
From you AR in my cabinet statment I can see your a bit of a hater,look America is not that bad of a place to be and guns freed us but are not the ONLY thing that keeps us they way.
To say that if I did not know better I would think your at war with somebody,are you?
and with who?

If thats not what you are saying them what the heck is the point?

Look man you say that so many people here are no good cuz they voted for a Socialist-democracy
These people don't even know what the hell a Socialist-democracy is and if they did they would not know why that bad.(public shcoo[rolleyes])

So lets see,in the east they have been at war with there elsves for gens. at a time and they have communism and are anti just about every think we care about but we can't say we are better them they arecuz people here don't vote the way you want!?!?!?!................f*ck it,I'm gon'a go eat some chips[:D]

The Chinese cavalry was good for one charge and then it took forever for it to be reorganized into another attack formation. With stirrups, the Mongols could turn on a dime and make mincemeat out of the cumbersome Chinese cavalry.

Eric The(ThatIsIf'Mincemeat'IsAnAsianDish!)Hun[>]:)]

good reading

I'm at work, and I don't have enough time to completely explain this idea, but I'll try.

I've often thought about this topic of why it seems that in recent history white-dominated free societies develop the bulk of new ideas.  One of the most notable anomalies to this idea is Bob Marley.  He is often called "the first third world superstar."   The first time I heard that statement (maybe in 1978?), I thought it was no big deal.  Now, over 20 years later, I realize it was a big deal.  Where are the other third world talented musicians?  I thought Marley would open the floodgates for others.  I thought record companies would spend a lot of effort looking for that next money making act.  It hasn't happened.  Why not?  Why was Bob Marley so different?

I asked this question of a UNC history professor that I sat next-to on a long flight.  A few weeks later, he e-mailed me back a quote about Bob Marley, "He had description, analysis and prescription."  I don't know who said that originally, but it makes sense.  The professor was of the opinion that only "westerners" are now taught the three required parts of scientific study.  First is to analyse.  Second is to be able to describe what happens.  Third is to be able to create rules to explain how things work.  That mirrors the previous quote.z

I believe stirrups came about in 1066 (Battle of Hastings).  I could be wrong, perhaps this was just the first time the West had stirrups.
Learn something every day.......

[img]http://www.connectmagazine.com/JULY1998/CoverStorypics/Dalerdeal.jpeg[/img]

Ta-dahhh!!! [:)]

Puh-leeeze! Bob Marley (you don't have to be stoned to enjoy, but it surely helps) is not what I would think of as someone who will be remembered as a great musician/composer fifty years hence.

Much less one hundred years from now. Let me see now, what were the lyrics to that song, hmmmm....I SHOT THE SHERIFF (by Bob Marley)

Eric The(IMeanIt'sNotExactlySchiller's'OdeToJoy'Now,IsIt?)Hun[>]:)]

quite the emotional fellow eh? you are correct. half the country did not vote. but half the people who cared to vote did so. most people i know of that do not vote are leftists.

you say that i am at "war" with something. i am not engaged in any sort of physical combat with anything. but mentally i am at "war" with anti-american beleifs.

i agree that firearms alone are not what keeps us free, but what do you think will follow in their absence?

define hater and describe how you think that applies to me.

are their things that i "hate"; yes, i hate slavery, oppression, a disarmed populace, statist ideals. get the picture. perhaps its through the love of something in its stead[:D]

also take note that my point about half the voters supporting AL Gore was about a people who do not embrace their own american culture. a western culture. a culture that promote personal responsiblity over security. i do not [b]I DO NOT[/b]hate people just because they are democrat. half my family and a lot of my freinds adopt leftist ideals. i am not a commisar. i am not at war with these people on an individual basis. i am war with ideals that repress freedom.

my comment about americans being not morally superior to people in germany and russia is based upon human nature. you prove to me how americans are superior morally to someone in russia. could this point be defeated? it could, why dont you try it using logic instead of emotion like a leftist. if ErictheHun debated me on this he would have an answer.

if you wish to e-mail me conerning such please do so at [url][email protected][/url]

hatefully full of love lib

Thats just silly. You act like we are just SOOO stifled and repressed. Conform? since when? walk down the street downtown and then tell me everyone has conformed. The only thing Americans conform to is the idea that we have a right to be different. Some of you people whine so damn much about nonsense. No creativity? How about "A Brief History of Time" (Stephen Hawkings) recent, brilliant, and turned the scientific community on its ear. Artistic? look at the variety of music we have here! plenty of countries outlaw Rock&Roll! lots of others have like 3 bands, we have thousands. All of them are forms of expression. Go to the book store and look at the magazine section, there are about 150 monthly reminders of our individuality and creativeness. Just how do you mean the west is stagnant? we are advancing in lots of ways faster than we can even appreciate sometimes.

Because they are still trying to find the answer. There is lots of evidence (some concrete) but it isn't all there yet. At least they are trying and learning. To many people have this idea that "All my answers are in the good book! I don't need to learn anything else!" That brings about bumpkins, I'm from Tennessee, I know! Some of the people around here with that idea drive me nuts. No desire to learn. But learning takes time, the answers aren't all written down for us. Sure, the scientist have taken wrong turns, that happens.

No, China got sturrups from the Jurchin (Turks) in the 7th century, bout the same time as Byzantium. The Franks got them in the 8th Century, either from the Byzantines or from the Moslems in Spain. Its generally accepted [i]now[/i] that both sides at the Battle of Tours had them (but that is a flip-flop from 20 years ago).

The Muslims got them from Sassinid Persia.  Contenders for inventing it include the Huns, Avars, and Magyars. But it WAS a steppe people who invented it

You are right that only societies with a large degree of personal freedom can develop a "industrial age" from the Iron Age. (This is the opposite of the Iron Age, which centralization created a economy capable of supporting specialized crafts).

However saying that there has been no great artists in Japan (or China,ect) is just saying you dont like Japanese traditional art- there were a lot of great works in screen painting and wood block printing in the Edo period.

Now when it came to weapons, the Japanese were facing British and American Steamships in the 1850's with matchlocks and bows. Why? They banned private ownership of weapons they went and told gunsmiths not to make flitlock guns even for samurai on penalty of death (though they could and did make flint firestarters with the same technology). Arms control and enforced isolation brought peace but stagnated technology.

In China, similar measures were tried, off and on, by various dynasties. But the biggest thing that stopped China's development was overpopultion. So much of her population was tied up in inefficient growing and distrabution methods it didnt matter if you handed new technology on a silver platter to them, they lacked the capital to reproduce it on a large scale- much less develop it on their own.

Strange is it not, [b]ArmdLbrl[/b], that Chinese drawings of the time show horsemen with [b]no[/b] stirrups, but Mongolian drawings always showed stirrups in theirs - the 13th Century has been called the Age of Stirrups by some historians simply because the Mongols excelled in the use of them.

If China had stirrups as early as you claim, they simply either (1) did not use them on their horses in battles (strange!), or (2) never painted or drew pictures of their horses with stirrups attached to their saddles (even stranger still!).

The Mongolian stirrups were huge, wooden affairs that could be used as well for riding backwards, as fowards, which the Mongols often did! You couldn't miss them, I suppose, if you were drawing a picture of them.

Eric The(I'llLookForSomePaintingsForUs)Hun[>]:)]

You mean they used the big platform type sturrup like the Japanese used? With the solid C shaped toe and open back, not the hoop kind we are familiar with here, right?

Well, while I haven't actually taken the time to fetch some pics for us, IIRC, the Mongolian stirrup was a open affair, not closed-toe, since the Mongols excelled in riding backwards and shooting arrows at following enemy horsemen.

Go to this site: [url]http://drlee.org/mongol/r06.html[/url] for a discussion of Mongolian stirrups and how the Chinese later adopted them in an attempt to fend them off!

Eric The(I'llGetToItSoon,IPromise)Hun[>]:)]

Well there is this:
[url]http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/med/sloan.html[/url]

It is important to note that heavy cavalry dont NEED stirrups, the saddle with high cantle and pommel is all they absolutely need for shock action, and light cavalry dont need them at all.
The Cheyanne and Comanche did not use strrups or saddles in the 19th century! Even though they knew of it well enough.

This guy is out there, he is claiming that the Hsiung-nu had the stirrup in the third century [b]BC[/b]!  I havent heard of any archiology that would support that. It is generally agreed that the Hsiung-nu were the ones who introduced Cavalry to China and convinced them to replace their chariots as their mobile forces. But that they had sturrups...I dont know about that. I would say its a risky position he is taking.

This site here states specificaly that the earliest know find of a riding stirrup is from Nanking, China and is from 322AD. [url]http://www.imh.org/imh/kyhpl1d.html#xtocid2243678[/url]

i did not mean to refer to all american. just our pop culture. do not tell me that a large portion of americans think on their own. i just don see it. maybe the people where you live are just plain cooler, but the people i have suffered react based only upon what they think they are supposed to think in order to fit in and be cool.

having dozens of rock/rap/country/etc bands that all sound the same is not creativity. art imitating art can be cool in its own way, but does not present something new.

advances in technology is one thing. so is advances in entertainment. how about advances in thought? philosophy? true social advancemnet that places personal responsibility over government provided security?

is not philosophy over technology what makes the west truly better?

sooo misunderstood and labeled lib

"are their things that i "hate"; yes, i hate slavery, oppression, a disarmed populace, statist ideals. get the picture. perhaps its through the love of something in its stead"

Are you Janet Reno?[thinking]


"my comment about americans being not morally superior to people in germany and russia is based upon human nature. you prove to me how americans are superior morally to someone in russia. could this point be defeated? it could, why dont you try it using logic instead of emotion like a leftist. if ErictheHun debated me on this he would have an answer."


If you have lived more that 20 or 30 years and you really want me to PROVE to you that Americans are better them dumb ass people that let them selves be run over by jack booted commies,why should I think you would even undetstand what I'm telling you?

Anyway emotion is a good thing,you have to stop and think as well I know but some of each is best.

The funny thing about libertarians is they (some of them) don't even know they are left wing funny boys just like the Dems.

Look, you can't take it I think Americans are better than other people(by the way we live) and you as somebody on the left can't deal with that.
People are your god so to speek,the left loves people and sees man as the sol good in the world.

People are no better that they have the will to be and we show the will to be better every day,how do you think we got to where we are now LUCK!?!

Dude you are a lil. to the left and thats up to you to say if it's good or bad but don't tell me people are the same,there not.

The thing is we have more that King Tut and Rome put togther,and all in just 225 years.

We are better just walk outside and see for your self.

I'll email you something to think about,if you really think it best to be left of the founders then know what you are to others.

Why do you feel the need to call people that feel science brings you right back to God and not evolution bumpkins?

Have ever read the data no this or do you so badly need to tell your self there is no God that you don't want to?

Some of the world best PHDs and thinkers have found God is not so far off from there data.
There is history to back up the new science.
In what why dose the Big Bang difer from Genesis?
Nothing say some that know much more that you and I.

Think about this if God did make every thing just they way he said there would be a way to see if work set by set,can you say that you know this has not been done?

It sounds like you are talking about teenagers. They have always wanted to set their own standards (so to speak) they will do what they will, they just act kooky. But you can't judge a society by that. That has always been true, teens have not learned the way the world works yet.

I personally spent the first 8 years of my life living in China with my grandparents. I think much of what has been said about countries like China focusing on the past is very true. If you were to just take a look at Chinese cinema, you'd find that a disproportionally large fraction to have historical themes or take place in some past dynasty. And the fact that the Chinese invented the compass, gunpowder, paper, and printing is endlessly propagated despite the fact that they were all invented such a long time ago it really doesn't matter who invented it. For a lot of people it seems to provide comfort to look to the glories of the past than the potentials of the future.

A very large component of the triumph of western civilization is western science. Western science had always had a great tradition of discovery and free sharing of knowledge. Another great component has to do with geography. If you were to look at the other Ancient Civlizations, the regions of the far east, meso-america, and sub-sahara Africa are all relatively isolated. Diversity is an important factor in progress. Ancient Greece, to which the origins of Western Civilization can be traced, was situated at a crossroad between three continents and near many other civilizations. Europe learned many things during the Rennaisance from the Muslims, who were at the peak of their power. The Chinese had no such benefit. There were no other significant neighboring civilization from which it can learn from. The country got trapped in one mode of thought for thousands of years as a result. Essentially, much of the country still runs on the principals of Confucius.

What complicates the situation is the association of civilization with race. Caucasians certainly didn't invent western civilization, they merely inherited it. The Greeks started it, the Romans refined it and spread it, the Europeans happened to have inherited it. A lot of people associate western civilization with European imperialism and creates a whole inferiority complex out of it. I personally do not see it that way. I'm Chinese American, so I'm obviously not European. But I've effectively adopted western civilization, just as the Europeans adopted it from the Ancient Greeks and Romans. More specifically, I've adopted the ways of American civilization (the Europeans seem to have gripes against us too. Specifically the French and British who miss their old empires). When you takes the racial association out of it, it's easy to see that culture does not reflect on race. Culture is a system, a way of life, and some cultures are more productive and creative than others. Traditional Chinese society is extremely hierarchial, it's almost like the military. It's a very conservative culture in the sense that change is regarded upon as dangerous and destablizing. What you have to realize is that traditionally, the Chinese are more afraid of anarchy than anything else. People were willing to stifle individuality and creativity for the sake for peace and stability. (if you've ever studies Chinese history, you'd know how many civils war China has had).

I'm a Christian, I just don't understand why so many of us have the need to be ignorant. Give the scientist a chance, if science proves genesis then so be it. I just think (even with all the undiscovered facts) that there is a lot more evidence for evolution than for creation. Who says God couldn't have done it in a scientific manner?

JZo2:

Not that I think there is any causal relationship between phenotype(race)and civlized society, but both the ancient Greeks and Romans would be characterized as caucasian.

As far as western civilization goes, a large debt is owed Mssrs. Locke, Voltaire, Spinoza, Rousseau and Tench Coxe (had to throw him in). Obviously not a comprehensive list.  The Enlightenment laid the foundations for modern democracy, liberty and rationality, the pillars which modern society rest. Think the transistor was important? Listen to state radio in a gulag.

Link below briefly dicusses the ideas of Hamilton's [i]The Clash of Civilisations[/i] which I find convincing.
[url]http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2001320002-2001315243,00.html[/url]

Luck
Alac

The end move in politics is always to pick up a gun.
Buckminster Fuller (evidently a maoist on this point)

The people cannot delegate to government the power to do anything which would be unlawful for them to do themselves.  J. Locke

You're making the mistake here of thinking that it's an "either-or" thing.  It is not. The vast majority of Christians in the world accept that evolution happened and believe that God guided it to bring about the result He desired.

Why is creativity so pervasive in our society? Because it pays! Ideas are by far the most important thing in the world, second only to the wisdom to apply them correctly. We live in a society that “incentivizes” the production of novelty -in science, entertainment, education, politics, communication, - even language. Invention earns you cash, or status, or slot on Oprah. Western society is a machine uniquely geared to churn out effective ideas. Obliviously the idea is nothing new, but in the West a unique set of variables has catalyzed the process. Amazingly, not only do we fail to recognize its importance, we fail to realize it exists at all. Western society is so dominant because it produces good ideas faster than they can be stamped out.

New, New, New is the mantra. New is better, improve it you’re a king! That “New and Improved” on your Tide may be the most powerful aspect of our society. All this rampant inventiveness in itself may not be a great thing, but sieved through our culture, which by its very nature only allows the continued existence of tested, effective product, it results in a constant polishing of the gems found worth keeping. Why is the West different – we come up with more bad ideas more often than anyone else – and discard them with amazing rapidity, only to supplant them with those that work.  This constructed machine of western society is why we are feared by some. They understand its true value, even as they try to subvert its nature and destroy its threat.

But others are adopting the methods, reverse engineering their own machines, after the Western model. Look to the east to see evidence of the process at work. In Japan, it is what the Meiji Restoration set about to inculcate, the Marshall plan tried to equip and Deming may have succeeded in bringing about, in some small way. Harquebus to Orbital Rockets in 100 years - nowhere in the world has such progress been seen. Owed to what? The vigorous adoption of the Western system by Japan, although admittedly incomplete, with attendant results. Taiwan, Korea, Singapore, have glimpsed its importance, and are reaping the relative rewards. China sees the elephant – but cant quite get it in the cage.

The rest? The rest either refuse to accept its importance, or are unaware of It at all. The Middle East and Osama-Bin Ladin seeks to use the tools, but avoid the construction. China wishes to implement a bastardized version, which is better than what they had, but not good enough to compete long term. South America is a wonderful example of how to realize this. Africa is too pre-occupied with the enrichment of despots to be concerned at all. And America? America, the pinnacle of the design, only slightly realizes it preciousness. Therefore it is always at risk.

Luck
Alac


Whatever a man does he must do first in his mind. Gyorgyi
Free Your Mind...And Your Ass Will Follow.  Funkadelic

Libertarians are left wing? you obviously do not know what left wing means. left=more govt, right=less govt. at least according to older text books. today totaltarianism exists at both endes. socialism/facism. these are the same thing to me. wether it is national or internalitonal socialism.

there is a eruopean Libertarian party that is socialist. the eruopean Libertarian party is as different from American Libertarianism as night and day.

Libertarians do not support big government (left) but less government and more personal responsiblility. i should have not referred to you as a leftist sytle debater because now you have responded with only more emotion. i apologize.

people are nowhere near my god. you present absolutley nothing of value to back this up.

i agree that alot of americans would not let commie's walk all over them, but alot of americans adopt socialist viewpoint wich is more dangerous for its success. they would not accept government security otherwise.

i dont mind critism, in fact i openly welcome it. if you present reason and logic to me i will read it and think about.[:D]

debative lib