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Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)



 
 
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  #42  
Old February 25th 17, 06:50 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Chris.B[_3_]
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Saturday, 25 February 2017 15:35:31 UTC+1, Chris L Peterson wrote:

Regrettably so. The inclination to patriotism is one of the things
that may lead to our demise.


Patriotism is one of the most absurd notions ever to be invented by man.
Where one is born is a condition over which no person in history has ever had the slightest control.
How can the unborn child choose anything [at all]?
Do they choose their sex, their religion, their class, eye or hair colour?
If the mother wanders across a nation's border for an hour and gives birth is the child then expected to be a patriot of that borrowed land?
Should they support the local tin-pot dictator and the national football team?
The border to many lands is completely invisible on the ground.

Should the second generation immigrant feel patriotism for his host's land or his mother or father's original place of upbringing?
Who does every Irish-American still speak with an Irish accent over a century after their great grandparents left "home?"
To which country do _they_ feel the greatest patriotism?

To which country should the refugee feel patriotism?
They move into a ghetto and dress their family only in their traditional costume.
They speak only their traditional language, watch TV from home on a satellite dish and worship in a "traditional" way.
Are they "unpatriotic" to their host's land and traditions?
Should they become soldiers and fight against their "homeland?"
Or become mercenaries for a terrorist organization?
Fighting in their "homeland" against the soldiers of their family's "host" nation?
Is that patriotic or unpatriotic? And to whom or to what? ;-)
  #43  
Old February 25th 17, 07:29 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Chris L Peterson
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Sat, 25 Feb 2017 09:50:38 -0800 (PST), "Chris.B"
wrote:

On Saturday, 25 February 2017 15:35:31 UTC+1, Chris L Peterson wrote:

Regrettably so. The inclination to patriotism is one of the things
that may lead to our demise.


Patriotism is one of the most absurd notions ever to be invented by man.


I think it is less invented than it is innate. We evolved tribalism,
and patriotism is just tribalism taken to an extreme. Like other
evolved innate traits (racism, xenophobia, various cognitive biases)
we are capable of largely overcoming them intellectually. Far too few
people make that effort or have the necessary education, however.

A weak sort of patriotism, where we support (and criticize) our own
country because it's in our own best interest to do so makes sense.
The sort of rabid patriotism, even nationalism, that spawns crap like
the Pledge of Allegiance, or the attitude that one's own country is
the best in the world, or that we have any obligation to take up arms,
is very dangerous these days. We aren't little tribes competing for
who gets the waterhole anymore.
  #44  
Old February 26th 17, 07:38 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Chris.B[_3_]
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Saturday, 25 February 2017 19:29:56 UTC+1, Chris L Peterson wrote:
We aren't little tribes competing for
who gets the waterhole anymore.


I can never decide whether sports team allegiance is a good or bad thing.
Does it release potential aggression towards the "enemy" tribe?
Or reinforce it? As it does in soccer around the globe.
There are very distinct similarities here to self-harming, Republican voters.
The followers are of average low intelligence and are easily fleeced.
Paying a week's wages to watch millionaires play a children's game, while wearing rip-off merchandise, is certainly highly profitable for the team owners.
Ironically some of the soccer team owners are foreign billionaires.
A nice little extra income when the banks aren't paying any interest on their ill-gotten gains.
  #45  
Old February 26th 17, 02:38 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
[email protected]
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Saturday, February 25, 2017 at 11:38:28 PM UTC-7, Chris.B wrote:

On Saturday, 25 February 2017 19:29:56 UTC+1, Chris L Peterson wrote:

We aren't little tribes competing for
who gets the waterhole anymore.


I can never decide whether sports team allegiance is a good or bad thing.
Does it release potential aggression towards the "enemy" tribe?
Or reinforce it? As it does in soccer around the globe.
There are very distinct similarities here to self-harming, Republican voters.
The followers are of average low intelligence and are easily fleeced.
Paying a week's wages to watch millionaires play a children's game, while
wearing rip-off merchandise, is certainly highly profitable for the team
owners.
Ironically some of the soccer team owners are foreign billionaires.
A nice little extra income when the banks aren't paying any interest on
their ill-gotten gains.


You two rabid fellows are the ones who are menaces to society.
  #46  
Old February 26th 17, 06:08 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Chris.B[_3_]
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Sunday, 26 February 2017 14:38:52 UTC+1, wrote:

You two rabid fellows are the ones who are menaces to society.


Troll alert.
  #47  
Old February 26th 17, 06:46 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Quadibloc
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Saturday, February 25, 2017 at 11:38:28 PM UTC-7, Chris.B wrote:

I can never decide whether sports team allegiance is a good or bad thing.


I would not wish to take away from the common man one of the few amusements he is
capable of enjoying.

John Savard
  #48  
Old February 27th 17, 08:23 AM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Chris.B[_3_]
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Default Planet near Proxima Centauri (Travel time)

On Sunday, 26 February 2017 18:46:23 UTC+1, Quadibloc wrote:
On Saturday, February 25, 2017 at 11:38:28 PM UTC-7, Chris.B wrote:

I can never decide whether sports team allegiance is a good or bad thing.


I would not wish to take away from the common man one of the few amusements he is
capable of enjoying.

John Savard


Damned by faint praise? ;-)
 




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