On Tue, Dec 29, 2015 at 2:06 AM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > On 12/28/2015 5:30 PM, Telmo Menezes wrote: > > > > On Mon, Dec 28, 2015 at 6:39 PM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> > wrote: > >> >> >> On 12/28/2015 2:53 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: >> >> >> >> On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 7:01 PM, Brent Meeker < <[email protected]> >> [email protected]> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On 12/27/2015 3:56 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote: >>> >>> >>> >>> On Sun, Dec 27, 2015 at 7:04 AM, Brent Meeker < <[email protected]> >>> [email protected]> wrote: >>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On 12/23/2015 1:12 PM, Telmo Menezes wrote: >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> On Wed, Dec 23, 2015 at 6:31 PM, John Clark < <[email protected]> >>>> [email protected]> wrote: >>>> >>>>> On Wed, Dec 23, 2015 Telmo Menezes < <[email protected]> >>>>> [email protected]> wrote: >>>>> >>>>> > >>>>>>>> >> >>>>>>>> >>>>>>>> and their land is not your land. >>>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >> >>>>>>> I do not have the same faith in the divine right of inherited wealth >>>>>>> as you do. >>>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> > >>>>>> Nice dodge. Yes, let's put all in the same bag, Wall Street trust >>>>>> fund kids and remote tribes wanting to keep living their way in *the >>>>>> place >>>>>> they were born in*. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> I'm not a big fan of >>>>> >>>>> Wall Street trust fund kids >>>>> >>>>> either, and if one of them owned one of the 3 places on the planet >>>>> where a thirty meter telescope could be built and refused to let it be >>>>> used >>>>> for that purpose I would be in favor of using the law of eminent domain to >>>>> force the brat to sell it. And by the way, no native Hawaiian or anybody >>>>> else was ever born atop Mauna Kea, there is nothing living up there except >>>>> for a few astronomers, and if native Hawaiians >>>>> >>>>> get there way soon there won't even be that, they want to remove all >>>>> telescopes from the mountain including the world class ones that have been >>>>> there for decades. Why do you defend these people? >>>>> >>>> >>>> I don't defend them. I think they should not interfere with the >>>> construction of the telescope. All I am saying is that ramming things down >>>> people's throats isn't working out so well. I am suggesting that something >>>> like the "prime directive" is probably a good idea. It would be nice to put >>>> a telescope in a certain mountain, but it's not our mountain, so tough >>>> shit. >>>> >>>> >>>> ?? Why isn't it our mountain? The Hawaiians didn't create it. The >>>> ownership of land is a concept invented and enforced by the U.S. and >>>> Hawaiian state government. There's no ownership of land apart from the >>>> society that enforces it. In this case the state of Hawaii owns the land >>>> and they approved the use of the land for astronomy. >>>> >>> >>> This is the usual confusion between lawful and ethical. >>> The desire and need to have some control over one's environment already >>> existed in biological species much more ancient than the Homo Sapeins. >>> >>> >>> But among social animals it was joint ownership...which is exactly the >>> kind of ownership the government exercises over. The Hawaiians are like a >>> small fraction of the tribe who wants to have exclusive control of a part >>> of the joint territory because they have supernatural myths they tell about >>> it. >>> >> >> Suppose that centuries from now we are capable of traveling to inhabited >> planets in other star systems. We come across a planet populated by >> humanoids who are roughly in the middle ages. They are terribly afraid of >> us and regard us as the demons of some ancient prophecy of their religion. >> Do we see them as part of our tribe, take over the planet and impose our >> values and technology for the greater good? Or do we try to remain >> benevolently distant until they are ready? And if we chose the first, isn't >> it true that they were right to consider us demons to being with? >> >> >> The ethical choice is number one. And the answer is no. >> > > So you agree with our subjugation if a more advanced civilization > discovers their way to Earth? > > > I agree with our advancement, yes. Nobody said anything about > "subjugation"...you're trying to move the goal posts. > I would say that you assume that our current culture is so correct that any advanced civilization would share our values, but with more advanced tech. It is very hard to see the limitations of a culture from the inside -- and I do not exclude myself from this observation, of course. What if their values were repulsive to you? Would you just trust that they are more advanced, so they know better? What if they are hyper-intelligent social insects, and find our individualism barbaric? What if they don't value empathy at all? > Educating the American indians wasn't subjugation. The only subjugation > they suffer is being kept in traditional roles on reservations by their > "leaders". > If the education is not desired, then it's subjugation. If they didn't want you in the land where they and their ancestors lived, then you took that land by force. I am not saying that this can be avoided: nature is brutal like that. But pretending that our motivations are nobler than that of any other species our group that is just struggling for survival is disingenuous. > > > >> >> >> This is not so different from the situation native Hawaiians found >> themselves in when the Europeans arrived. >> >> >> Or when the Spaniards arrived in Mexico. Do you suggest that the >> Spaniards should have just waited until the Aztecs "were ready" to stop >> sacrificing slaves everyday to make the sun rise? Do you think they >> should have waited until the tribes subjugated by the Aztecs "were ready" >> to stop providing sacrifices? >> > > There is a lot of contradictory information on the history of that time, > and I'm no expert. I believe that, since the time Spain was a fascist > dictatorship under Franco, even Spain agrees that the conquistadores > committed horrible acts against the Aztec empire. > > Wikipedia, for what it's worth: > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_in_the_Great_Temple > > > and > > > http://lasvegassun.com/news/2015/oct/09/mexican-site-yields-new-details-of-sacrifice-of-sp/ > > > > I do know that the Spaniards were not exactly goody-two-shoes. They were > ok with genocide for conquest, with destroying religious temples to extract > gold and with slavery. They were also the fine folks who gave us the > Spanish Inquisition. > > Some descriptions of what the Spaniards did to the Aztecs are > gut-wrenhing. > > > How do they compare to what the Aztecs did to captives from the the tribes > they ruled over? If ever there was nation ruled by a death cult, it was > the Aztecs: > > > > *The top three Gods that they believe in were Huitzilopochtili (or > “hummingbird wizard), Tezcatlipoca (“smoking mirror”) and Quetzalcoatl > (“sovereign plumed serpent”). Aztec sacrifices were an important part of > the Aztec Religion. They have a strong faith that the Gods needed to be > nourished and replenished by human beings. This happened through human > blood. Being as it was a part of their religion, therefore they had to > participate in bloodletting, which means you purposely harm and drawing > blood from the body. Those who were higher in status within the Aztec > religion were expected to give the most blood during these Aztec rituals. > **The > Aztec gods and goddesses also required the living hearts of humans for > nourishment. All hearts were acceptable but the bravest captives were > considered to be particularly nourishing to the Aztec gods. As this kept > going on widespread warring took place as the Aztec people sought to bring > the captives back to the Aztec temples for sacrifice.* > > *Sometimes they only sacrificed one person other times hundreds or even > thousands of people being held captive were sacrificed at a time. Each > Aztec sacrifice followed the same rules and steps.. The captive or captives > were taken to a pyramid or temple and placed on an altar. The Aztec priest > then made an incision in the ribcage of the captive and removed the living > heart. The heart was then burned and the corpse was pushed down the steps > of the Aztec pyramid or temple. If the captive was particularly noble or > brave, however, he was carried down instead.* > > *In the case of an Aztec human sacrifice being performed for the god > Huehueteotl, the ritual was slightly changed. Huehueteotl was the Aztec god > of warmth, death, and cold. He was responsible for light in the darkness > and for food during times of famine. As a part of the Aztec religion, > special sacrifices were held for Huehueteotl. The victim was first thrown > into a fire, and then pulled back out with hooks before being dying. The > living heart was then removed and thrown back to the fire. Aztec human > sacrifices and bloodletting were important aspects of the Aztec religion, > as they believed it brought balance and peace to the world around them.* > > > > > > > > > > > > *Tlaloc was the god of rain. The Aztecs believed that if sacrifices > weren't supplied for Tlaloc, rain wouldn't come and their crops wouldn't > flourish. Leprosy and rheumatism, diseases caused by Tlaloc, would infest > the village. Tlaloc required the tears of the young as part of the > sacrifice. The priests made the children cry during their way to > immolation: a good omen that Tlaloc would wet the earth in the raining > season. Xipe Totec, God of the east and water, he wore human skin and was a > patron for craftsmen. He was a god of maize and was associated with rain. > The table below shows the festivals of the 18-month year of the Aztec > calendar and the deities with which the festivals were associated. In > History of the Things of New Spain Sahagún confesses he was aghast at the > fact that, during the first month of the year, the child sacrifices were > approved by their own parents, who also ate their children. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_sacrifice_in_Aztec_culture > <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_sacrifice_in_Aztec_culture> Some > post-conquest sources report that at the re-consecration of Great Pyramid > of Tenochtitlan in 1487, the Aztecs sacrificed about 80,400 prisoners over > the course of four days. This number is considered an exaggeration. > According to Ross Hassig, author of Aztec Warfare, "between 10,000 and > 80,400 persons" were sacrificed in the ceremony.[39] The higher estimate > would average 14 sacrifices per minute during the four-day consecration. > Four tables were arranged at the top so that the victims could be > jettisoned down the sides of the temple.[40] Nonetheless, according to > Codex Telleriano-Remensis, old Aztecs who talked with the missionaries told > about a much lower figure for the reconsecration of the temple, > approximately 4,000 victims in total. Michael Harner, in his 1977 article > The Enigma of Aztec Sacrifice, estimates the number of persons sacrificed > in central Mexico in the 15th century as high as 250,000 per year. Fernando > de Alva Cortés Ixtlilxochitl, a Mexica descendant and the author of Codex > Ixtlilxochitl, estimated that one in five children of the Mexica subjects > was killed annually. * > > I am not an Historian, so I do not know how to evaluate the credibility of > such sources. But I am very, very skeptical that they were the champions of > human rights that you paint them to be. > > > Now your straw-manning. I never said they were champions of human > rights. Just that they were better than the Aztecs, both technologically > and ethically. > Technologically: sure. Ethically, I don't know. They were also willing to kill and torture for their superstitions. They did it less often, but this was mostly for practical reasons. Telmo. > > Brent > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
