Soldiers and Scientists and Engineers

[War Angel]

In my ideal happy candy world, with rainbows, care bears, ponnies, sun with smiling face and sunglasses, kittens, puppies, Hello Kitty, children playing in the field, chocolate bunnies, jelly mountains and sugar trees

And who would make those candies? Who would take care of all the kitties? Who would prevent the puppies from attacking said kittens?

The world is complex. People are complex. There's strife and evil. A failure to deal with all that will end in death of the incompotent\impotent one. That's as simple as it gets.

We are also cultural and social creatures. We want different things, and we want some of those things real bad, so we fight. Some are more willing to fight, and some do it better. If someone refuses to fight, and he doesn't have someone else to protect him, he will die. Society relies on those that are willing to fight, work, invent, think and care. There's only so much of the opposites of those things that a society can take, before it collapses (i.e - the third world provides a nice example.).

I wish we could live in a perfect, peaceful world. I'd love that, really. But right now, there are quite a few people, slightly different than me, who don't want that. They want to fight for their own reasons and causes, that don't match my own, and if I want to keep on living, and my ideas and thoughts to prevail, I'll have to fight back. I'm lucky, because I have many backing me up.

[theundeadhero]

Does anyone else see this war turning into another Vietnam? Americans are fighting an endless enemy, the media catches a few bad soldiers on film and now all soldiers are bad, a new style of fighting is being improvised in the Army, and most troops see this as a worthless struggle. They say we already won Iraqi freedom so let us go home. Their are a lot of similarities.

[Shadow Nexus]

War Angel: Thats why I said world of candy and kittens. I am not saying it is possible, yet I am not denying it. I know it's just a horizon, yet I believe we should strive to such horizon, and we are not doing this at the moment. You know, "Imagine all the people...".

Does anyone else see this war turning into another Vietnam?

Yup, I do. I don't think it will end until USA retires. I already saw that coming since the war started, Bush is playing with fire, and I hope he gets burned (He, not the poor soldiers he sent to die there).

[War Angel]

know it's just a horizon, yet I believe we should strive to such horizon, and we are not doing this at the moment. You know, "Imagine all the people...".

Sorry mate, I just don't see it happening. You're forgetting that not only we're not the same, some of us are downright evil and destructive. What causes someone to kill innocent people, or rape? And these things have existed since ever. I don't see them changing soon. The only thing that can happen, is society and the social structure developing, so that these things happen less, or that they happen only in certain places, and all the 'good people' can stay away from it. And, yes, it's a beautiful song.

As for the Vietnam thing - maybe. Hopefully, the USA will be wiser this time, and actually bugger off once they've achieved their goal. I mean, what else can you do? They don't want you there, they don't want your culture there, they don't want democracy, and the only thing they WOULD like is your head on a platter. You don't stick around after you've punched someone, unless you are going to keep on mauling him.

[Shadow Nexus]

Oh, but I still believe man is good and corrupted by society, like Rousseau.

Not like I think we will get into terrenal paradise or anything like that. However, it's always nice to think about it, and to do as much as you can. As the graffitti in Paris 1968 said: Be realists, ask for the impossible.

[Mr. Mojo Risin]

I'll have cut in and return to the topic for a moment. It's ok. Engineers are used to not being recognized. The truth is modern society exists because of engineering, not politics or ideologies. Those are generally more destructive than good. Everything from empirically observable technology to the process of making a Subway sandwich has the fingerprints of an engineer. And most recently, envirnomental engineering has been developed to counteract what we do to the envirnoment. So, soon even the natural world will be technology based.

As to ethics and war, well that's a more sensitive issue. The science is easy. The ambitions and the self-indulging tendencies of humanities make it difficult. That's is why I find myself to be libertarian most of the time. Newton wasn't thinking atom bomb when he developed calculus. We're experiencing a tipping point when it comes to war toys. There is enough social awareness that eventually, like the Dalai Lama says, 'bullets will have a conscience.'

And no I dont see vietnam, not in terms of lives lost or stupidity. that is partly due to, ironically, the advancement of war toys and a reluctance to just nuke the poop out of anything.