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HAPPY HUMAN ACHIEVEMENT DAY!

Posted by DrEdwardHudgins 5 years, 1 month ago to Culture
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Oct 21 marks the anniversary of Edison’s invention of the first workable lightbulb. If we want more lightbulbs shining above our heads, symbolizing new human-enhancing ideas in our minds ready to be made real, let’s raise consciousness and promote the values of achievement!
SOURCE URL: https://townhall.com/columnists/edwardhudgins/2019/10/21/we-need-to-celebrate-human-achievement-day-now-more-than-ever-n2555089


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  • Posted by DrZarkov99 5 years, 1 month ago
    Actually, humans are pretty amazing animals. We're the only creatures that have reached the level of self awareness to realize our impact on the rest of the world (although I think it's somewhat exaggerated, either out of an inflated collective ego, or a paranoid sense of irrational guilt). Not only have we exploited our understanding of the universe to demonstrate things that can't be done naturally, but we've also helped other species survive and avoid extinction.

    The scariest part of this is that we've reached the point of self evolution. It started with the discovery that we could use artificial means to survive by artificially energizing our immune systems to fight off diseases (vaccination). The biggest step is starting now, with genetic engineering, artificial intelligence, and bionics. We are about to become a superhuman species, and we need to recognize that fact and institute rules that help us achieve that goal responsibly.

    Yea, us!
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  • Posted by LibertyBelle 5 years, 1 month ago
    When I was young and in school, we didn't have a specific "human achievement day", but there seemed to be a sort of general attitude that this was the country which had caused the most achievement, and that that was because of its freedom, which was apparently a widespread attitude. There was a different atmosphere. I think that atmosphere began to change in the '60's.
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  • Posted by exceller 5 years, 1 month ago
    Great idea but it would be subject to nonstop political maneuvering by the left.

    Think of Obama's idea that we should acknowledge the "accomplishments" of Muslim mathematicians and attribute our advances in space research to them.
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    • Posted by 5 years, 1 month ago
      That's why we should start at the grass roots level, esp with home schoolers, local chambers of commerce, Junior Achievement and the like. We would make a point of defining achievement and it's prerequisites, my second point about the need for reason and freedom. There are lots of ways to fight for our values, and I hope this way can contribute to the fight!
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      • Posted by exceller 5 years, 1 month ago
        Yes, agree.

        I am not advocating doing nothing which is the worst attitude.

        Especially, since we know the left would invade every and any venue they can think of.

        The task is enormous, considering education. It is a major area for indoctrination, starting with impressionable minds.
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        • Posted by 5 years, 1 month ago
          Education is the key. For decades universities have turned out indoctrinated graduates who are now leaders in media, entertainment, corporate management, politics, the judiciary, religion and, of course, education. This is the left's successful long march through the institutions. We need to make educational institutional change Job One, otherwise all our logical and fact-based, pro-individual arguments will fall on deaf minds.
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          • Posted by exceller 5 years, 1 month ago
            We are all aware of that.

            How do you propose to do it?

            Electing the right people to run institutions is the only way that works. The majority of them has been taken over or infiltrated by the left, knowing full well what is at stake.

            Obama was pushing for starting at kindergarten. Never too early for brainwashing.
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            • Posted by 5 years, 1 month ago
              Apart from a Human Achievement Day, facilitate alternatives to four year colleges where students are subjected to leftist dogma. "Learn and earn" apprenticeships not only offer training in profitable professions but also help instill an ethos or work, achievement and personal responsibility, See "Trump Administration Proposes More Flexible Apprenticeship Rules." https://www.heartland.org/news-opinio...
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              • Posted by LibertyBelle 5 years, 1 month ago
                A good thing would be to boycott the colleges. If they saw they were losing money and students, maybe they would start to come off their high horse. (And also, maybe they would demand more money from the government, but with enough popular opposition, they might not get it.)
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    • Posted by $ jlc 5 years, 1 month ago
      I do not have any problems with the first part of that statement. Muslim mathematicians - Hurrah! Muslim terrorists - blam! blam! blam!

      On the other hand, our advances in space are to our credit, not theirs, obviously: dozens of countries benefited from the intellectual achievements of Muslim mathematicians and scholars...but only Russia and the US went into space.

      Jan
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      • Posted by mccannon01 5 years, 1 month ago
        I object to the whole concept of "Muslim mathematicians" or "Muslim mathematics". That's like saying calculus is "Christian mathematics", trigonometry and geometry is "Polytheistic mathematics", etc. Even algebra, which is falsely attributed to a Muslim actually came out of the Indus, which would indicate it's "Hindu mathematics" or "Buddhist mathematics". Even some of the aforementioned may have originated in the far East, so it would be "Confucian or Taoist mathematics". I say BAH HUMBUG to "Muslim mathematics"!
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      • Posted by exceller 5 years, 1 month ago
        True.

        But in Obama's head it works like this: a business owner "Did not build" his business himself through 24/7 days/ months and years. It was "others" who did it for him.

        By the same logic, it did not matter that we put in hard money and effort to go into space. It was the Muslim mathematicians who enabled it.

        Ergo, they have the credit.

        We can't really expect anything else from a guy who did not put in a decent day of work in his life. He thinks that "organizing" people is the only work on the planet worth mentioning.
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        • Posted by $ jlc 5 years, 1 month ago
          I am only on a few lists, but I do note that those few tend to a 'throw out the baby with the bathwater' approach. If someone who has 'cooties' (political, social, religious, whatever) makes a good suggestion, they lambast it because of the source.

          So, while I understand and agree with what you said, in trying to avoid doing that, I state that it is fine to praise medieval Muslim scholarship. At that time, they (and the Song dynasty in China) were the socially progressive and scientific luminaries of the planet, and they should justly get credit for it. (Now they are not; and should not.)

          Jan
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  • Posted by Owlsrayne 5 years, 1 month ago
    unfortunately, there are many garage/home inventors and engineers that are trying to advance their inventions on Youtube. Carbon Graphine batteries, experimentation with solid rocket fuels, extend battery packs for Nissan Leafs, home-built electric vehicles, and much more on YouTube should be recognized.
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  • Posted by LibertyBelle 5 years, 1 month ago
    Well, I am glad to use lightbulbs when I can find the right ones (i.e., those that are not made in a totalitarian state.) I just hope that that does not become impossible. It would be inconvenient to have to rely solely on flashlights with batteries. I once cut off the electric company because I thought they charged too much, and left it off for over four years, and used kerosene, and used a battery-operated radio and a battery-operated record player (apparently left over from some experiment in the 60's). After I got more prosperous, I had the electricity turned back on. But where I live now, the utilities are included. (And in several places where they weren't, the leases forbade cutting off the electricity.)
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  • Posted by shaifferg 5 years, 1 month ago
    educators/legislatures/school boards should be encouraged/required? to spend at least 50% of the amount spent each year on sports on the academic/stem part of the budget. Sports seems to have all amounts of money for equipment,fields, transportation while science labs have 20 to 40 year old equipment and forget about getting any funding for after school science, robotics or rocket teams. They have to raise their own funds and many do!
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