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‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

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Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#61

Post by nonbel »

PhasmaFelis wrote: post #57
nonbel wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"The great strides we're making in access to food and clean water and medical care won't stop unchecked global warming from devastating human civilization. It's not just a matter of rising sea levels; if things continue apace, large parts of the equator will be too hot for humans to survive by the end of this century, and hundreds of millions of climate refugees will be seeking sanctuary somewhere, anywhere." Do you…

All right! https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/india-climate-chang... https://qz.com/india/1049730/heatwaves-could-turn-parts-of-i... https://www.cnn.com/2016/12/07/africa/sudan-climate-change/i... I'm curious why you felt that such a hostile response was justified. You could have just said "I'd like to see a source for that" and I would happily have provided. Did you really think I was just making up lies, and…

> "All right!"

It isnt exceptional to ask for a source, no need for sarcasm.

> "I'm curious why you felt that such a hostile response was justified. You could have just said "I'd like to see a source for that" and I would happily have provided."

There was nothing hostile about it, just facts. Making those posts without sources is worse than useless if your goal is really to convince people you are correct.

> "Did you really think I was just making up lies, and would slink away in defeat when challenged?"

No, I wanted to see where you were getting these ideas. Now I know...

I can tell right away that none of those sources are going to contain enough info to really tell how those conclusions were drawn but nevertheless, can you extract the most relevant quotes from each and attach to your claims? I mean if you really want to convince people, don't give them secondary sources and make them dig into the primary sources. Go get the direct quotes from the research literature or researchers involved yourself. BTW, I have never had the experience of journalists being able to accurately describe anything I am an expert about.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#62

Post by Klinky »

platz wrote: post #40
andrepd wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The root cause of all of this: an economic system predicated on the notion of growth . Unrestrained greed, sole focus on maximization of profit, and unlimited growth. It's not enough to sell as many mobile phones as you did last year, no, you must sell 10% more each quarter, or whatever. Doesn't matter if you're mining the earth bare, generating millions of tons of garbage, optimising for inferior products that break…

If you don't produce more than you consume (i.e. grow), how do you sustain yourself?

Sustenance is not the same thing as unrestrained growth.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#63

Post by jdc »

howlin wrote: post #35
andrepd wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The root cause of all of this: an economic system predicated on the notion of growth . Unrestrained greed, sole focus on maximization of profit, and unlimited growth. It's not enough to sell as many mobile phones as you did last year, no, you must sell 10% more each quarter, or whatever. Doesn't matter if you're mining the earth bare, generating millions of tons of garbage, optimising for inferior products that break…

""" It's not enough to sell as many mobile phones as you did last year, no, you must sell 10% more each quarter, or whatever. """ But if the next gen of phones use 30% less resources, it's still possible to grow without increasing the rate of resource consumption. GDP growth has been driven much more by innovation than added resource consumption for years.

However with Jevon's Paradox, we get the opposite consequence and people consume even more. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#64

Post by zdragnar »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #56
ta_egdhs wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

idk why this is downvoted. the 90s is the period between the end of the cold war and the start of the war on terror. its the only time in living memory where there was no enemy. 9/11 absolutely changed the country. it was the start of militarized police, nationalistic displays, and 24/7 fear that have all been normalized today. Perhaps the terrorists didn't win (Bin Laden is dead and the house of Saud still stands) b…

Perhaps this is far too controversial a view for HN, and for many Americans, we'll see. The terrorists absolutely won. Least that's my perception as a non-American. Your first mistake was legitimising them as "the enemy" When the IRA were bombing Docklands, Manchester or Birmingham pubs we'd make a poor taste joke the next morning, walk past the wreckage and forget about it the day after that. When the Baader Meinhof…

In a country of 325 million people, it seemed like there wasn't anyone who didn't know someone either affected or directly harmed by the 9/11 (11/9 as you call it) attacks. It didn't feel like "some poor saps over there got the short end of the stick" it felt like "we're all directly attacked".

This wasn't the first time Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda reached out and touched us. Previously, we'd treated him more or less the same as you'd suggested, thinking back to the attack on the USS Cole we just lobbed some missiles off into the desert and called it a day.

As for the surveillance apparatus that sprang up in response, there was most certainly a backlash against it, with all the dystopian oppressive government warnings. The general public didn't really mind much, though, because they'd felt that the government fundamentally failed at what could theoretically have been a preventable disaster.

So, given that, what were we to do? Say to our neighbors, "sorry, you have to risk death in future attacks because I can't be arsed to wait longer in lines at the airport"?

I don't think the terrorists have won, because their objective wasn't to make our lives a little less pleasant. Their objective (as stated) is the fundamental destruction of our nation. Sure, we've compromised our constitution by allowing our government more power than it ought to have. The consequences of our reaction, our actions (and lack of actions in other places) will be felt for generations. That doesn't mean that the terrorists have won, far from it.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#65

Post by nonbel »

DennisP wrote: post #59
nonbel wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"The great strides we're making in access to food and clean water and medical care won't stop unchecked global warming from devastating human civilization. It's not just a matter of rising sea levels; if things continue apace, large parts of the equator will be too hot for humans to survive by the end of this century, and hundreds of millions of climate refugees will be seeking sanctuary somewhere, anywhere." Do you…

It's not hard to find sources. For example: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/the-countries-tha... http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/07/climate-change-earth-... A great book on the effects of climate change is Six Degrees by Mark Lynas, who read 3000 peer-reviewed papers on the effects of climate change and summarized them, one chapter per degree, with extensive references. One reason we know what to expec…

I mean something like this. It seems like just one person needs to do it, then it could be boilerplate since I see similar posts all over the place:

> "The great strides we're making in access to food and clean water and medical care"

-- What evidence is there for great strides being made?

-- Regarding medical "care", there is an implication that care is a good thing. How well is this "care" translating to health, rather than putting people on more pills and causing an obesity crisis?

> "[Improved access to food, clean water, and medical care] won't stop unchecked global warming from devastating human civilization.

-- Why couldn't it? I have often heard the argument that improved standard of living leads to lower birthrates.

> "It's not just a matter of rising sea levels"

-- What evidence is there for rising sea levels? I have heard they were rising before humans started pumping CO2 into the atmosphere.

> "if things continue apace,

-- Why should we expect climate change to continue apace? Looking at the vostok ice core data it looks like there is some negative feedback that leads to a glacial period once it gets too hot. In fact it looks like we are due for one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_core#/media/File:Vostok_Pe...

-- There is also the grand solar minimum we may be due for as well...

> "large parts of the equator will be too hot for humans to survive"

-- Needs source: If humans can find ways to survive in antarctica, submarines, and outer space I doubt this true.

> "By the end of this century, and hundreds of millions of climate refugees will be seeking sanctuary somewhere, anywhere."

-- Why, exactly? Are they incapable of planning ahead or building air conditioned structures? Does this assume some sort of energy crisis?

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#66

Post by alchemism »

nonbel wrote: post #65
DennisP wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not hard to find sources. For example: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/the-countries-tha... http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2017/07/climate-change-earth-... A great book on the effects of climate change is Six Degrees by Mark Lynas, who read 3000 peer-reviewed papers on the effects of climate change and summarized them, one chapter per degree, with extensive references. One reason we know what to expec…

I mean something like this. It seems like just one person needs to do it, then it could be boilerplate since I see similar posts all over the place: > "The great strides we're making in access to food and clean water and medical care" -- What evidence is there for great strides being made? -- Regarding medical "care", there is an implication that care is a good thing. How well is this "care" translating to health, ra…

I can’t help but notice you ignored the content of the parent post entirely and answered the grandfather post instead.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#67

Post by pixl97 »

ewhanley wrote: post #41
crispyambulance wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well put. The ironic thing about all numbers-oriented folks in extractive enterprises (regardless of whether they're extracting natural resources, capital, or labor), is their blind spot to the fact that ALL resources are finite. There's no "free-refill" when the big-gulp runs out.

I can only speak to the minerals extraction industry (oil & gas, specifically), but they (we) are well aware that hydrocarbons are a finite resource. The industry as a whole is arguably short sighted, but it’s not because they think the supply of oil is endless.

Really a bigger issue is that huge amounts of hydrocarbons still exist to be tapped. Which then get turned into atmospheric CO2.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#68

Post by Cyph0n »

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #43
Cyph0n wrote: post #9

If you’re interested in a more in-depth look at the 12 Monkeys universe, check out the excellent TV series of the same title.

The TV series was truly awful and utterly unrelated to the movie, except the weak linking to try and force it to be related in the first one or two episodes.

Utterly unrelated? How much of the show did you watch?

I don’t want to spoil much, but the focal point throughout the whole show was the relationship between the 12 Monkeys and the plague, just like it was in the movie.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#69

Post by cf498 »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #55

It seems, these days, as though the human race has passed a Rubicon and is now on a straight path toward the end of days, or at least the end of the social order as we know it. Is there some name for the phenomenon that as things get better, our assessment of where things stand seems to get more and more pessimistic? I feel like you see this in issues of racial and gender equality as well. Things are so much better t…

Nuclear holocaust would have been caused and was prevented by just a few people. It would have been an action with a direct result. We could and did also just stop with the nonsense.

We dont have that option for climate change. We have a worsening situation and no realistic option to stop or even reverse things.

Differently put, nuclear holocaust was a threat, climate change an active process.

Re: ‘12 Monkeys’: Why Terry Gilliam’s Movie Is Relevant Today

#70

Post by eternalban »

jlawson wrote: post #49
nabla9 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in the movie. They definitely can't change the past. They live in block universe where there is only one timeline that happens no matter what. They can only travel into the past and observe and bring some stuff back. mc is a hero because he discovers the real villain and sends message to the future. The idea is to get sample of the original non-mutated virus and develop a cure in the future so that they can live…

I think the idea was that the woman scientist "in insurance" in the plane at the end was in fact the next agent working on getting the pre-mutated virus. She knew to go back to that time and get on that seat of that plane because Cole's actions pinpointed the target, time, and place.

Precisely. They have found the source, can take samples at each stop, and "get people back on top" post Cole.
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