Now it seems we are having an interesting balanced discussion, which OLO should be all about.

As an oldie without much early education, who now believes he can argue from both sides, also now looks back and wonders how he agreed with possibly typical Aussies, who not only called our Aborigines either no-gooders or not yet out of the trees, but also called Middle East Arabs, other ones who had just lost their f' en way.

Possibly now still caught between two fires, one to stay loyal to the nation, whoever is in power, and a different reasoning these days, so much harder to quell.

Having studied history thoroughly right back to the ancient Greeks, and only remembering the Bible through a thoughtful mother, as about God's gift of a Promised Land, and getting rid of some awful people who did not believe in God.

But our dear mother also told us that Jesus came on the earth not only to save us, but also to tell us that God is not really so cruel as in the Old Testament.

It is interesting that as one studies more in his own age, he is more likely to go back to a Jesus Meek and Mild mixed up a bit with Socratic reasoning than take Christianity through all the politics and spin that most of our denominations seemed to be based on.

With all the study it also leaves one wondering where true justice lies in our world today, the one formerly held through shot and shell, now with missiles and gone nuclear, or one attained simply through thoughts of forgiveness like with Mandela in South Africa, rather than nasty religous reminders about people who in all truth are just mentally and physically blocking our way, and yet in the eyes of a forgiving God as the young Jesus taught, might be justified in calling us intruders.

Kalim I hope you are still folowing this thread.
My apolgies of course 9/11/2001 precedes July 2002. Sorry.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/24/weekinreview/24hakim.html?ex=1316750400&en=f5d4309bed17c084&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss
Anti Bush people obviously are highly correlated with conspiracy nuts. Showing a similar psychology to Iran's leader who denies the holocaust and wants to nuke Israel out of existence.

See how easy it is to do? Such a pathetic and pointless way to discuss things.

Alan, sorry to differ, but there is a scientific study based on Bismarkian Realpoliik. Not that Bismarck wasn't ruthless when need be, but it has been said by world historians that if Bismarck had been in charge of Germany just before 1914, WW1 would never have started.

Further, as WW2 is said to have been caused by the rise of Hitler and Nazi Germany through the harsh treatment of Germany resulting from the Treaty of Versailles, certain looney lefties, as many academics are now termed by a few of our group, are saying that the worst thing that the US let happen, as regards Realpolitik, was to help little Israel go nuclear. In fact, Islamic resentment over an atomic Israel, could have caused the tragedy of 9/11.

Carrying on with the science of Realpolitik, we are now left with the possibility of letting Iran go nuclear in order to balance atomic Israel, which maybe even Putin of Russia thinks about.

Remember these ex-Soviets were involved so much in a matching nuclear power situation with the US during the Cold War.

A few important pointers on critical thinking:

· True critical thinking is higher-order thinking, enabling a person to, for example, responsibly judge between political candidates, serve on a murder trial jury, evaluate society's need for nuclear power plants, and assess the consequences of global warming.

· Critical thinking is not being able to process information well enough to know to stop for red lights or whether you received the correct change at the supermarket.

· Critical thinking is scientific thinking.

· Critical thinking can be described as the scientific method applied by ordinary people to the ordinary world.

· Children are not born with the power to think critically, nor do they develop this ability naturally beyond survival-level thinking.
· Critical thinking is a learned ability that must be taught.

Humans are conditioned from birth to follow authority figures and not to question their pronouncements. Parents and teachers reinforce us through conditioning using a wide variety of postive and negative techniques. Most individuals reach adulthood in this conditioned form. The result of such conditioning is the antithesis of both scientific investigation and critical thinking: individuals often lack both curiosity and the skills to perform independent inquiry to discover reliable knowledge. Most in fact, from post-kindergarten, can be likened to sheep. Someone earlier has mentioned the ‘clever’ goat, nay, statistically at least, there are few who can ascribe themselves this clever rank – the world in fact has only room for very few critical thinkers, the rest just follow.

The implication of Iran going nuclear needs to be pondered critically. The reasons should be obvious

Looks like your critical thinking theory has put Realpolitik or power balance theory out of date, Relda.

Certainly this has been talked about also. And the only way to put power balance theory out of date, is to have one power so arrogant it knows it is safe to break all the rules.

The Roman Empire felt safe to break all the rules, Relda, as colonial Britain broke all the rules and stayed safe - as America believes she is so very very safe being not only respectably unipolar, but with more atomic weaponry than the rest of the world put together.

The tragic side of it, unfortunately, is that it could be said that while you and I can critically discuss power balance theory, the US has become so naive it believes it is so powerful there is no need to discuss such problems, as she did with her attack on Iraq, as well as letting Israel go atomic.

What we are on about here, Relda, is all about causes which our future historians will dwell upon. That is of course, if such historians are not qietened down or locked up, as Mr Costello has intimated just lately