American entry into WWI was probably the single worst decision of the 20th century. By tipping the balance of power enough that an unconditional surrender could be demanded, it directly led to the Versailles treaty which directly led to Hitler and WWII.

We entered the war on a wave of jingoistic, patriotic war propaganda financed by those who stood to financially benefit from the war (ie, the "war profiteers" making millions and billions selling military supplies and commodities).

This is what this is. It is with blood money that this was organized. On the one hand it's cool, on the other despicable.

Glad to see that nonsense war propaganda and fear mongering hasn't changed through the decades.

Sorry to see that the American public is just as stupid and gullible as it ever was.

Interesting article about them from the 1907 NYT:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=950CEFDF1F30E233A25753C3A9609C946697D6CF

@Suzy: Critical thinking is not boring, "skeptics" who post the exact same canned response to anything that doesn't fit into their idea of reality are boring.

Here's how to tell if someone is a follower of the religion of scientism:

On any mention of any phenomena that is not currently accepted by scientific orthodoxy, they say that the whole thing is ridiculous and demand that further research or discussion on the topic be stopped because it's an insult to science.

Not that anyone did, but posting a derogatory term and a generic link is hardly in the spirit of scientific debate.

Sure, this article doesn't prove anything. The police chief might be a quack. But going from a rate of an accident every week or two to none is six months is significant, if it is true.

Is because of the pyramids? Is it because of something else? Who knows? Seeing how the cost of installing additional pyramids is..uh...zero, I can't see any harm in trying this, as a means of isolating this variable.

@Emmers: Sure, it's horrible..and should be discouraged by all and rejected by anyone in a relationship.

What does that have to do with a third party stepping in, stealing 50,000 euros from you, and throwing you in a cage?

A fine illustration of the basic fact that we have two pro-state (also incidentally pro-war and pro-corporate) parties in this country, that quibble over the details.

I'm awestruck by the ingenuity of that approach to scanning a curved page. Bravo Japan!

How is it that Japanese are so bad ass? This is amazing.

FTW! FTMFW!!!!!!!

Best use of ChatRoulette ever, by a factor of 1,000.

I assume the PHP errors were caused by an overloaded server...it's working great now. Nice work guys, nice work :)

Wish I had the foggiest clue how you did it!

A lawsuit? That's ridiculous. Sure, it looks the same. It's a similar style. But unless he's trying to pass these off as genuine Chilhuly's, it's asinine.

So, a glass artist using swirly, protruding glass to make a sculpture. Is that illegal now?

So, whoever made the first Anime movie can sue everyone else for the big eyes and colorful hair? Maybe Lotus 1-2-3 or Wordperfect or whoever can sue anyone else who thought to make a spreadsheet or a word processor?

The whole idea of copyright is an antiquated and backward idea that needs to wither on the vine. Chilhuly can trade on his name just fine, he is not adversly affeted by people aping his work - if anything, his prestige is increased.

Two issues I have with this:

I think it is a reasonable hypothesis that takingviews that are different of those around is a sign of intelligence.

But does this necessarily imply liberalism or atheism?

Sure, America as a whole is largely conservative and religious. But many people live in communities and peer groups that do not have these values. Many people, in short, grow up in peer groups that are liberal and atheistic. Thus, if they adopt these views, it is just a matter of following their conditioning.

Second, I find something offensive about the statement that liberals "have a belief in the welfare of millions of people they have not met."

This is really an unfair sterotype of conservatives. Government is basically a system of taking money from everybody by force, and using it to enact programs that people may or may not have the choice of "benefiting" from. Government sees very legitimate social needs, and answers them with a mandatory monopoly. The first point leads to a fact that money collected in the name of public welfare often goes to war. The second is that many "services" provided by the government end up causing a lot more harm than good - housing projects, farm subsidies, drug wars, foreign aid (id "guns for goons"), etc.

I actively think about the welfare of people in the world as a whole. I am a great believer in charities and NGOs. And I actively promote the abolition of the intellectual framework that has been most dangerous to human progress, livelihoods, and freedom - the idea of "mandatory monopoly government."

In effect, I am so conservative that I am anarchistic.

Does this mean that I have just taken the social values I have been raised with unquestioningly, and am thus of lower intelligence?

I want to thank Neatorama for posting this, mainly for the second to last point.

Here's something everyone should remember: VIRTUALLY EVERY VIOLENT EMPIRE IN WORLD HISTORY HAS CLAIMED THEY WERE ACTING FOR THE GOOD OF THE PEOPLE THEY INVADED.

It's worthwhile reading news stories from the time Napoleon invaded Egypt around 1800 to when America invaded Iraq in 2003 back to back. They are damned similar. "They are a threat to us, they are ruled by cruel tyrants, but we will go in and share our good western culture with them."

America is not uniquely bad. There have been many bad empires in history. Life for people who live inside America is not so bad, at least if you're middle class or above, and don't get caught up in our vast criminal justice system, which cages more people than China does.

But the effects on people around the world who feel America's wrath are miserable. We have our troops in 140 countries, do you assume the people want us there? Birth defect rates are up from 3% to 80% in the Fallujah hospital, due to our "perfectly safe" uranium munitions...how's that freedom taste now, with 4 of 5 babies being born mangled?

Those who are generally remembered as the best presidents were generally the most awful. Lincoln was a wannabe dictator who didn't give a shit about black people except as political pawns, and ended slavery in the most destructive, stupid, cruel, and expensive way imaginable. FDR's economic policies dragged out the depression for more than a decade, and he won the election in 1940 on a platform of keeping us out of the war, while at the same time deliberately provoking the Japanese. Wilson's entering of the fratricidal WWI arguably led to both the Soviets and Hitler, etc- not to mention the income tax, which was proposed as a short term war tax they forgot to ever repeal, or the incredibly damaging federal reserve. Eisenhower and JFK were the last decent presidents.

The most deadly weapon of the state is the profound evil of mandatory public education, shoving fundamental lies about history and how society is run down children's throats before they can learn to think. So, thank you for doing your part to reverse this.

This sort of thing is so much fun. I love jumping off waterfalls (after scouting out the place to dive into first, of course).

There's a similar place called punchbowl falls on an incredible waterfall filled hike in Oregon. I jumped off it last summer...with my friend's brand new digital camera in my pocket. Oops :(