Pidesco

My hobby is stalking. :ph34r:

While I agree more or less wholeheartedly with the first part of your post, I have to say that, from my point of view, the role of human morality in practical affairs is mostly bugger all. In my opinion, it's all about shifts in power. In the case of slavery in the US, for example, the increasing industrialization in the north shifted power and influence towards those states at the expense of the southern states. This change, associated with a traditional rivalry between the north and south, urged people in power to support the abolition of slavery. Another example of such change would be the fight for women's rights all over the world. The suffragists and the feminists would never have gotten anywhere if it wasn't for the two World Wars. In fact I'd say amorality has been the biggest driving force of human prosperity, at least since the reformation, and probably even before it. What seems to me interesting about this is that industrial and economic progress seems to invariably lead to moral progress, as well. So, in my view, morality isn't necessary to progress, but the inverse is true. P.S.: 3rd world countries are mostly not industrialized. And working in sweatshops isn't slavery. It's pretty close to it, but not quite.

I wrote racism but was thinking slavery. Sorry. :">

Miami Vice. It was good fun. As usual Michael Mann directs some kick ass action scenes, and Gong Li is all kinds of awesome even underused in an action flick.

Racism wasn't outlawed because people suddenly started to hate it. It was outlawed because industrialization made it obsolete.

When I saw it, it didn't seem particularly hilarious, I just felt the ending was somewhat lacking. Of course, the last time I saw the original version I must've been at most, 15 years old so I'm not sure what I would think of it if I saw it today.

Yes, I have. It's happier. I'd say the Director's Cut is better, although, apparently Ridley Scott wasn't completely happy with it, either. There will be another Director's cut released sometime in the future.

We agree, then.

I thought you weren't a big Blade Runner fan, though.

Ah. That was silly. :">

Rutger Hauer's one magnificent actor, the sets are mind-blowing, I believe PKD really liked it, last great Ridley Scott movie? PKD?

Are you talking about the Mozart effect?

No it's not. It's reacting to the mother's physiology. You could have a mother that doesn't give a crap about a potentially stressful situation, and one that becomes a basketcase. In both cases the "surroundings" are exactly the same, but the effect on the fetus is very different. The "brain" isn't reacting to anything. It's just being fed whatever the mother feeds it. The mother is part of the surroundings, even if she affects the fetus in a more direct way than usual. And it's not just a question of the immediate reaction of the fetus. It's about how it affects the baby's growth in the long run.

Don't forget that blacks in Africa also suffer from repression, slavery and tribal bigotry. The difference is that in Africa everything is done by their fellow blacks. All in all, it's a nice world we live in, filled with nice people.

Because the embryo is a living being right from the start, regardless of the development of the nervous system. As such, if you were to draw a line regarding abortion, it should be at the moment of conception. I'm in favour of abortion, by the way.

you presuppose that everyone that votes is an idiot. the contrary is probably true. tak Everyone is in some way or another, an idiot. Everyone.

Ironically, if it wasn't for slavery, most African-Americans would be in Africa today dying by the bucketload.

You either put it at the moment of conception or not at all. I think.

Lost Vikings was quite awesome too.

If it's just being affected by the mother's physiology, the brain of the fetus is still reacting in some way to the surroundings.

I believe it's all indirect evidence so far, but I could be wrong. One example, would be a grown man who was afraid of his father who had, apparently, always been a good and understanding parent. Turns out that the father was under a lot stress and constantly throwing tantrums around the time the mother was pregnant.

They would be able to understand emotions, like for example if someone was angry next to the womb, the fetus would understand that person was angry and be affected by it.

anything new about your engine since you last posted here?

The fetus is obviously not an individual but it does have the potential to be an individual. The potential of life is fully realized at the moment of conception, thus though the body has yet to develop, abortion is at least guilty of destroying the potential existence of a human being and personally I value that potential no less than my own potential existence in the future. Of couse, abortion is a more complicated issue since there are cases when the mother's life is also at stake or when it involves a rape. As for whether the embryo has a soul, I don't have an opinion since I don't even have enough understanding of the soul to say that I believe in its existence. I would like to point out that fetuses listen, feel and even partially understand most everything around them, including things that happen outside the womb, so in that sense they are as much individuals as you and I.

Ju-On: The Grudge Quite scary. Not much else, really, but the director did what he set out to do.