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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Sowell is right again.
    #2444016 - 03/17/04 04:13 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

'Why do they hate us?'
Thomas Sowell (archive)


March 17, 2004 | Print | Send


The idea that what goes around comes around applies not only to individuals but to nations and whole civilizations. It was just a few centuries ago -- not long, as history is measured -- that China had the highest standard of living in the world and the Dutch were the world's largest exporters, while North Africans were enslaving a million Europeans.


Nowhere have whole peoples seen their situation reversed more visibly or more painfully than the peoples of the Islamic world. In medieval times, Europe lagged far behind the Islamic world in science, mathematics, scholarship, and military power.

Even such ancient European thinkers as Plato and Aristotle became known to Europeans of the Middle Ages only after their writings, which had been translated into Arabic, were translated back into European languages.

Today that is all reversed. The number of books per person in Europe is more than ten times that in Africa and the Middle East. The number of books translated into Arabic over the past thousand years is about the same as the number translated into Spanish in one year.

There are only 18 computers per thousand persons in the Arab world, compared to 78 per thousand persons worldwide. Fewer than 400 industrial patents were issued to people in the Arab countries during the last two decades of the 20th century, while 15,000 industrial patents were issued to South Koreans alone.

Human beings do not always take reversals of fortune gracefully. Still less can those who were once on top quietly accept seeing others leaving them far behind economically, intellectually, and militarily.

Those in the Islamic world have for centuries been taught to regard themselves as far superior to the "infidels" of the West, while everything they see with their own eyes now tells them otherwise. Worse yet, what the whole world sees with their own eyes tells them that the Middle East has made few contributions to human advancement in our times.

Even Middle Eastern oil was largely discovered and processed by people from the West. After oil, the Middle East's most prominent export has been terrorism.

Those who look at the world in rationalistic terms may say that the Middle East can use some of its vast oil wealth to expand its own educated classes and move back to the forefront of human achievement. They did it once, why not do it again?

All sorts of things can be done in the long run, but you have to live through the short run to get there. Moreover, even the short run, as history is measured, can be pretty long in terms of the human lifespan.

Even if the Islamic world set such goals and committed the material resources and individual efforts required, they could not expect to pull abreast of the West for generations, even if the West stood still. More realistically, it would take centuries, as it took the West centuries to catch up to them.

What will happen in the meantime? Are millions of proud human beings supposed to quietly accept inferiority for themselves and their children, and perhaps their children's children?

Or are they more likely to listen to demagogues, whether political or religious, who tell them that their lowly place in the world is due to the evils of others -- the West, the Americans, the Jews?

If the peoples of the Islamic world disregarded such demagogues, they would be the exceptions, rather than the rule, among people who lag painfully far behind others. Even in the West, there have been powerful political movements based on the notion that the rich have gotten rich by keeping others poor -- and that things need to be set right "by all means necessary."

These means seldom include concentration on self-improvement, with 19th-century Japan being one of the rare exceptions. Lashing out at others is far more immediately satisfying -- and modern communications, transportation, and weaponry make it far easier to lash out destructively across great distances.

Against this background, we may want to consider the question asked by hand-wringers in the West: Why do they hate us? Maybe it is because the alternative to hating us is to hate themselves.
He's a very wise man.


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You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444061 - 03/17/04 04:32 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Way to totally disregard the unconditional American military support for Israel(in spite of its many human rights violations) against the Palestinians, our presence in their holy land of Saudi Arabia(as well as our all-too-friendly relationship to their corrupt government), our recent invasion of two countries in that region, or perhaps the mere fact that so many Americans actually believe that they hate us because we are free.


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: silversoul7]
    #2444067 - 03/17/04 04:33 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Way to disregard the possibility he's right.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444079 - 03/17/04 04:36 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Worst comeback ever. :shake:


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"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: silversoul7]
    #2444094 - 03/17/04 04:40 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Way to continue to disregard the possibility he's right.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisibleafoaf
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444096 - 03/17/04 04:40 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

sounds like a thinly veiled attempt at racist rationalization.


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All I know is The Growery is a place where losers who get banned here go.

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444100 - 03/17/04 04:42 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Quote:

luvdemshrooms said:
Way to continue to disregard the possibility he's right.



I read it. I considered the possibility. He's not right. Or if he is, he's only partially so.


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: afoaf]
    #2444101 - 03/17/04 04:42 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Sounds like a weak response was the best you could do.

Don't like the article? Write the author.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: silversoul7]
    #2444103 - 03/17/04 04:43 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Yes, of course you did. Of course you're much smarter than Sowell.

Good for you.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: afoaf]
    #2444110 - 03/17/04 04:46 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Quote:

afoaf said:
sounds like a thinly veiled attempt at racist rationalization.



Not so much racist as ethnocentric. He seems to imply(even if he doesn't state it outright) that the people in the Middle East are these uneducated, easily manipulated pawns. This may be true of some regions, but certainly less so than we tend to think in this country. The average Palestinian is actually quite well-educated in world events, especially compared to the average American. Palestine is filled with "news junkies" who watch news from around the world, and have a much better idea of what's going on than many people in this forum(probably including myself).


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444111 - 03/17/04 04:46 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Quote:

luvdemshrooms said:
Yes, of course you did. Of course you're much smarter than Sowell.



Maybe not smarter, but definitely more right.


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisibleafoaf
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444113 - 03/17/04 04:47 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

ditto, chief.


--------------------
All I know is The Growery is a place where losers who get banned here go.

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: silversoul7]
    #2444118 - 03/17/04 04:48 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

:lol:


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444123 - 03/17/04 04:50 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

:kiss:


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: afoaf]
    #2444125 - 03/17/04 04:50 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

I don't have a problem with the article.

As such I have nothing to take up.

You want to look silly? Debate Sowell and let him know you think he's racist. I'm sure he'll get a laugh from that.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: silversoul7]
    #2444129 - 03/17/04 04:51 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

:eek:


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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InvisibleLe_Canard
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444148 - 03/17/04 05:02 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Well whether or not you agree with the author, he does raise an interesting question: what did happen to the Arab world to make them so far behind the west in the sciences in maths? I've often wondered that myself.

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: luvdemshrooms]
    #2444152 - 03/17/04 05:04 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Next time someone posts something by Noam Chompsky or someone like that, I'm going to hound you about you not accepting the possibility that he's right, just to show you how ridiculous that sounds.


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisiblesilversoul7
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: Le_Canard]
    #2444153 - 03/17/04 05:05 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)

Quote:

ToiletDuk said:
Well whether or not you agree with the author, he does raise an interesting question: what did happen to the Arab world to make them so far behind the west in the sciences in maths? I've often wondered that myself.



My guess is colonialism might have something to do with it.


--------------------


"It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong."--Voltaire

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Invisibleluvdemshrooms
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Re: Sowell is right again. [Re: silversoul7]
    #2444156 - 03/17/04 05:06 PM (20 years, 15 days ago)


Quote:

My guess is colonialism might have something to do with it.




Yup, blame the other guy.


--------------------
You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for that my dear friend is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it. ~ Adrian Rogers

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