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Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

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Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#611

Post by illuminate »

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #477
icebraining wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It should be noted that multiple studies indicated that terrorists don't have a bigger share of psychopaths than the general population. Average people can convince themselves and/or be convinced to maim and kill if they believe their cause is just. This does not in any way mean we should excuse them, any more than I would let a rabid dog attack me just because I recognize it can't be expected to follow ethical behav…

I remember reading somewhere that a surprisingly large number of terrorists / bombers / what have you, are guys in their 20s or 30s with an engineering background, otherwise pretty normal and unremarkable.

Certainly among the 9/11 hijackers, but there appears to be a great deal of asymmetry with foreign terrorists. Domestic terrorists don't ~appear~ to find the same level of stability, though I haven't read any specific papers that investigated their family lives, careers, etc.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#612

Post by awj »

flyinRyan wrote: post #598
awj wrote: post #491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also like the practicalness of the advice, but it feels rather crass coming from someone deeply involved in Watsi. Good intentions or not, using a horrible event to promote something else altogether while the event is still happening is in terribly bad taste.

Well, one is more likely to mention an organization they know something about than one they don't, right?

...the obvious conclusion being that it would be appropriate for me to tell people to stop talking about the boston marathon so we could discuss the Mariners game that happened on Sunday.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#613

Post by awj »

csallen wrote: post #513
tbrooks wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't matter whether its a non-profit or for-profit, charity or business, or whether pg personally benefits from Watsi flourishing. He's using the events in Boston as a way to promote a service that has nothing to do with the horror occurring in Boston. I'm not saying Watsi isn't great -- it is. But this isn't the time or place to call attention to Watsi. It's tasteless and rude.

I completely disagree, and I'd be interested in hearing a defense of your beliefs. People are suffering the world over. Some suffering is less shocking and unique than other suffering (and therefore less newsworthy), but suffering is suffering just the same. Widely-covered events such as this one should serve as a reminder to us all of the constant suffering going on the world over that is not covered. For any moral…

> I have no idea how you can say that helping people in one area "has nothing to do with" helping people in another.

That one's easy: what tangible benefit will people suffering from the events of the Boston Marathon get from a donation to Watsi? None? Then it has nothing to do with it.

People are indeed suffering the world over. Objectively it would be better if people who want to do something donated to Watsi instead of wringing their hands, praying/sending thoughts, and reloading cnn.com. But people are not objective and trying to steal this kind of attention for your own cause is highly insensitive.

Also, it comes off as crass and tasteless and generally won't work. Except on people who can keep their objectivity in this situation, which categorically aren't the ones pg is trying to reach. So this is crass, tasteless, highly insensitive, and ineffective.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#614

Post by sammyo »

SODaniel wrote: post #156
recoiledsnake wrote: post #2

Edit: Boston police reporting at least 2 dead, 22 injured and 10 people losing limbs. http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/04/15/explosion-reported-near... Looks like there were two explosions. Picture: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BH6fCgFCQAERWMB.jpg:large More details http://www.wcvb.com/news/local/metro/Explosions-reported-nea... "Witnesses said several victims lost limbs, and the area was being evacuated. Many of the in…

The Boston Globe ‏@BostonGlobe 34s BREAKING NEWS: Police getting multiple reports of unexploded devices around Boston 3.38 pm Central time. Update: The Boston Globe ‏@BostonGlobe 28s RT @billy_baker: "It's not safe to be here." - Boston Police evacuating Commonwealth Avenue mall at Gloucester. 3.45 Central time. Update: The Boston Globe ‏@BostonGlobe 1m Boston Police: If anyone knows of any information call about exp…

Cell service was really bad for an hour after the explosion. My wife has an older clamshell phone that seemed harder to connect I expect due to the absence of newer 3G frequencies. Not getting a signal make one very nervous at a time like that.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#615

Post by pekk »

CleanedStar wrote: post #344
throwaway6EB1E1 wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just want you to know that your remarks are in really bad taste. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warrington_bomb_attacks In my lifetime (I'm 30, from Manchester), I lived through two bomb attacks a few miles away from my home, one in the centre of the City, and another in a nearby town in the main shopping street that killed two children. They didn't 'tend to attack military targets'; they were terrorists. Terrorism…

And what was Drogheda, when the English massacred an entire town? Or shooting up the crowd in Croke Park? Or Bloody Sunday? The English have carried out terrorism against the Irish for centuries. It's an English war of choice. The English stole my family's land, gave it to settlers, and now English troops still march up and down Belfast. If you choose to go to war with a country and try to subjugate their people, exp…

You are literally justifying one attack on civilians in an unrelated place, by referring to earlier attacks on civilians by different people?

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#616

Post by csallen »

awj wrote: post #613
csallen wrote: post #513

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I completely disagree, and I'd be interested in hearing a defense of your beliefs. People are suffering the world over. Some suffering is less shocking and unique than other suffering (and therefore less newsworthy), but suffering is suffering just the same. Widely-covered events such as this one should serve as a reminder to us all of the constant suffering going on the world over that is not covered. For any moral…

> I have no idea how you can say that helping people in one area "has nothing to do with" helping people in another. That one's easy: what tangible benefit will people suffering from the events of the Boston Marathon get from a donation to Watsi? None? Then it has nothing to do with it. People are indeed suffering the world over. Objectively it would be better if people who want to do something donated to Watsi inste…

> That one's easy: what tangible benefit will people suffering from the events of the Boston Marathon get from a donation to Watsi? None? Then it has nothing to do with it.

This is becoming pure wordplay now. Sure, if you take the vague phrase "something to do with" and redefine it more specifically as "provides tangible benefits to", then you'd be right. But who gives you the authority to redefine it so? PG made the relation clear in his tweet: "When terrible things happen to people I can't help, I ... help people I can." In other words, he uses tragedies as a reminder to donate to the less fortunate.

Seems pretty simple to me.

As for the rest of your post, it seems that your argument rests on the belief that PG's tweet didn't cause anyone to donate. If so, your argument fails, because some people did donate as a result of PG's tweet (or at least claimed to).

But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and believe that, instead, your argument rests on the belief that getting a few people to donate is not worth causing offense to others. In that case, I would denounce your argument is immature, selfish, and immoral. I would gladly give offense to 10 or 20 people (and tell them to get over themselves) if it caused 1 person to donate to Watsi.

Lastly, you haven't provided any evidence why people should be offended. I completely disagree that anything PG did was crass, insensitive, or tasteless. Au contraire, I think you are the one mistaken for interpreting it that way. You've misappropriated an arbitrary societal rule for reasons you likely cannot defend.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#617

Post by awj »

csallen wrote: post #616
awj wrote: post #613

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have no idea how you can say that helping people in one area "has nothing to do with" helping people in another. That one's easy: what tangible benefit will people suffering from the events of the Boston Marathon get from a donation to Watsi? None? Then it has nothing to do with it. People are indeed suffering the world over. Objectively it would be better if people who want to do something donated to Watsi inste…

> That one's easy: what tangible benefit will people suffering from the events of the Boston Marathon get from a donation to Watsi? None? Then it has nothing to do with it. This is becoming pure wordplay now. Sure, if you take the vague phrase "something to do with" and redefine it more specifically as "provides tangible benefits to", then you'd be right. But who gives you the authority to redefine it so? PG made the…

My argument rests on the belief that attempting to exploit a tragedy to grab attention for your unrelated interests is socially offensive. I cannot conceive of how you gleaned the interpretation you did, but that you did suggests that actual meaningful conversation here is fundamentally impossible.

This has been pure wordplay for quite a while. My mistake was engaging the hive in defense mode.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#618

Post by ChrisNorstrom »

jchavannes wrote: post #563
ChrisNorstrom wrote: post #549

If this continues I wonder if we're going to start seeing drones with "Persistent Stare" (24 hour recording of a massive area that creates an enormous video of the entire city) employed over American Cities. Had one been used already, they would have been able to take the video, slowly reverse it to see who dropped off the package in the dumpster, and then follow that person back to their home or business. Thus findi…

Not sure if you did it on purpose, but you just perfectly described ARGUS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGxNyaXfJsA

Yes, I forgot it was called ARGUS. Argus would be perfect, as horrifying as the privacy concerns are, I'm not sure there is any expectable of privacy in being outdoors in public. The ability to fight nearly every kind of crime would be astronomical.

From finding who dropped off a dead body and the home they went back to, to busting meth labs, illegal arms dealers, kidnapped children, missing persons. My only worry is, this will be used against people simply smoking pot or other things that aren't morally wrong but legally punishable.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#619

Post by csallen »

awj wrote: post #617
csallen wrote: post #616

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That one's easy: what tangible benefit will people suffering from the events of the Boston Marathon get from a donation to Watsi? None? Then it has nothing to do with it. This is becoming pure wordplay now. Sure, if you take the vague phrase "something to do with" and redefine it more specifically as "provides tangible benefits to", then you'd be right. But who gives you the authority to redefine it so? PG made the…

My argument rests on the belief that attempting to exploit a tragedy to grab attention for your unrelated interests is socially offensive. I cannot conceive of how you gleaned the interpretation you did, but that you did suggests that actual meaningful conversation here is fundamentally impossible. This has been pure wordplay for quite a while. My mistake was engaging the hive in defense mode.

> attempting to exploit a tragedy to grab attention for your unrelated interests

"exploit": False. PG does not benefit from people donating to Watsi. What he's doing is quite literally the opposite of exploitation: persuading people to give money to others.

"unrelated interests": I've already debunked this, as did PG in his tweet. A terrible event occurred. This has caused people to become abnormally empathetic toward their fellow man. PG is encouraging people to channel that empathy into a good cause however they can.

The belief your argument rests on consists entirely of falsehoods.

Re: Explosions near Boston Marathon finish line

#620

Post by awj »

csallen wrote: post #619
awj wrote: post #617

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My argument rests on the belief that attempting to exploit a tragedy to grab attention for your unrelated interests is socially offensive. I cannot conceive of how you gleaned the interpretation you did, but that you did suggests that actual meaningful conversation here is fundamentally impossible. This has been pure wordplay for quite a while. My mistake was engaging the hive in defense mode.

> attempting to exploit a tragedy to grab attention for your unrelated interests "exploit": False. PG does not benefit from people donating to Watsi. What he's doing is quite literally the opposite of exploitation: persuading people to give money to others. "unrelated interests": I've already debunked this, as did PG in his tweet. A terrible event occurred. This has caused people to become abnormally empathetic towar…

See, even more wordplay. You're picking the definitions of my words that make it easiest to argue with them, then knocking down the straw man you've constructed. That in any given response only a fraction of my statements are cited supports this.

Hurray, you've successfully countered an argument I wasn't making! I suppose congratulations are in order, though I'm at a loss as to why.

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