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The End of Everything
What I find most interesting about this article isn't the projected end of everything (which is very interesting), but the comments below, mostly of people who really can't or won't deal with the idea that everything eventually ends. Not just the usual religious line of arguments, but claims that the physics is flawed, that human technology would find a way to have humanity survive, basically hanging their hat on any possible explanation, any possible belief that the universe will not end in endless darkness.
Now maybe the theory is right, maybe it isn't -- how the universe ends evolves as a theory, just like most everything else in science. Regardless, watching people fear the darkness, that brings me comfort in the sense that I know other people share my fears. But it also makes me very uneasy because, as I've alluded to in other posts, we have to deal with the world as it is, not the way we want it to be. Getting through life successfully is tough enough as it is; we make it that much tougher when we lie to ourselves.
Edited to add: A commenter pointed out that the main issue with this article may not be the knowledge it presents, but the fact that it's counter-intuitive and not well supported. I can't do much about the counter-intuitiveness (the science involved at this level IS counter-intuitive, as anybody who's dealt with either quantum mechanics or general relativity even at a lay level will know), but I can add some support here from some quick research. I just grabbed some articles from Wikipedia; people can google this stuff if they want the horrific details.
Tags: interesting links
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What most people ignore, especially the "white, blue collar" people involved, is that the concept of the traditional 9-5, 35 year corporate manufacturing job is disappearing from the Western world. It's a harsh reality, especially to the people caught up in the wave of change who all of a sudden find themselves with obsolescent or obsolete skills, but this has been the way things have been going since the 80s, and they will fight that change with all their power, holding the clock back, blaming anything and everything except harsh reality.
It's denial, because you can't fight reality -- you can only accept it. The thing is, the sooner you accept reality, the sooner you can DO something about it, as opposed to making it worse when reality finally kicks your ass. (For example, if the Transmission plant in Windsor had taken the opportunity several years to shut down and re-tool for a year, they might be in a position to produce these new generation transmission that GM needs -- but, if I remember events correctly, the union fought the layoffs that would have required, and so, now the entire plant is gone.)
Economies evolve. Countries evolve. This may be the last hurrah of the manufacturing sector as a power broker in politics, but, it's a hurrah of the 20th Century, not the 21st Century. Much as how the power of the rural vote is only preserved by current districting schemes and agricultural subsidies, the manufacturing sector will (if it hasn't already), become a very loud vocal minority, but a minority nonetheless, their power only preserved by government action.
What worries most about this isn't aid to manufacturing sectors -- I think a core manufacturing sector SHOULD be preserved at all costs, for strategic reasons if nothing else -- but it's what people might do to aid the manufacturing sector at the expense of the rest of us. You can work with a delusion quite a while until it turns around to kick you in the butt, and a lot of damage can happen in that time. George W. Bush's foreign policy stands as a great example of that. Tags: interesting links, politics - general
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