Thursday, February 08, 2007
A virus is sweeping the world!
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The so-called right really does have its share of whackjobs - surprisingly, most of the "gibbering idiots" infected with the 9/11 conspiracy virus I've encountered are from somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun. There are no end of conspiracy theorists, of course. See my entry on Freedom to Fascism.
If you think about it the handwringing over anthropogenic global warming is much the same. The theory is offered and believed because it "offers a coherent closed world" in an ocean of otherwise impersonal - and uncontrollable - forces and answers, "albeit erroneously and maniputively," that we can somehow have control over the climate.
The one fatal flaw of humans is the belief in magic, that if we somehow get the incantation just right and work the spell just so we can manipulate anything.
Good luck with that. Of course, that doesn't mean the Bill Starbucks* of the world won't bilk us out of our last dollars trying and - romantic fantasies notwithstanding - they aren't going to make it rain, no matter how much we believe.
*The Rainmaker (1956) Burt Lancaster and Katherine Hepburn
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Quote of the day (from the film) "There's no such thing as a plain woman. Every real woman is pretty. They're all pretty in a different way, but they're all pretty." - Bill Starbuck
I have found this to be true. And I've NEVER met an ugly child.
There is a virus sweeping the world. It infects opponents of the Bush government, sucks their brains out through their eyes and turns them into gibbering idiots. - George Monbiot
The so-called right really does have its share of whackjobs - surprisingly, most of the "gibbering idiots" infected with the 9/11 conspiracy virus I've encountered are from somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun. There are no end of conspiracy theorists, of course. See my entry on Freedom to Fascism.
(from the comments) I think conspiracy theories about 9/11 are believed because not only they offer a coherent closed world in an ocean of nonsense but they answer, albeit erroneously and manipulatively, questions that have never been answered... - Les Politiques
If you think about it the handwringing over anthropogenic global warming is much the same. The theory is offered and believed because it "offers a coherent closed world" in an ocean of otherwise impersonal - and uncontrollable - forces and answers, "albeit erroneously and maniputively," that we can somehow have control over the climate.
The one fatal flaw of humans is the belief in magic, that if we somehow get the incantation just right and work the spell just so we can manipulate anything.
Good luck with that. Of course, that doesn't mean the Bill Starbucks* of the world won't bilk us out of our last dollars trying and - romantic fantasies notwithstanding - they aren't going to make it rain, no matter how much we believe.
*The Rainmaker (1956) Burt Lancaster and Katherine Hepburn
****
Quote of the day (from the film) "There's no such thing as a plain woman. Every real woman is pretty. They're all pretty in a different way, but they're all pretty." - Bill Starbuck
I have found this to be true. And I've NEVER met an ugly child.
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