I'm sure most of you have already seen this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9SiRNibD14) discussed by Thunderf00t (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1i80qaETtw8) and the Amazing Atheist (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQTX5duQnc8). But here it is in all its un-glory without need for commentary:
[yt]C9SiRNibD14[/yt]
And here's a Reason Magazine (http://reason.com/blog/2016/10/14/watch-leftist-students-say-science-is-ra) article with more context about the video. These people are as stupid as they sound:
QuoteEssentially, these students believe that modern scientific understanding is too Eurocentric. One explained:
"I have a question for all the science people. There is a place in KZN called Umhlab'uyalingana. They believe that through the magic' you call it black magic' they call it witchcraft' you are able to send lightening to strike someone. Can you explain that scientifically because it's something that happens?"
Many people laughed at this remark because, well, witchcraft is not something that happens. But according to the student, witchcraft is like Isaac Newton's theory of gravity—it's just one way of explaining the world, among many.
"Decolonising the science would mean doing away with it entirely and starting all over again to deal with how we respond to the environment and how we understand it," the student continued.
And just in case you thought to yourself that nobody in their right minds would take these folks seriously, here's a sympathetic op-ed (http://connect.citizen.co.za/81832/probably-misunderstood-sciencemustfall/) defending them. This is not satire, folks! I wish it were:
QuoteEssentially the UCT student in the video was not saying UCT must stop teaching science, but that institutions should also take some of the unexplained, traditionally African phenomena and place them under the same microscope they would any other unexplained phenomena. Traditional African medicine should be a field of scientific study with as much gravitas as the contents of Gray's Anatomy (textbook not that awful TV show).
Discrediting legitimate scientific hypotheses merely because they aren't western European is what the issue is here. Not science itself. You pretty much can't disprove science unless you use science to counter it, much like Newton's Third Law.
I'd say that feminist SJWs are equally as dangerous as YECs, but that would be false equivalency. Nobody in academia takes YECs seriously. However, academia as a whole is sympathetic towards feminist SJWs.
So modern science is too eurocentric for her?
well, how about we go ahead and withdraw all the amenities produced by modern science from her and her people--see how they like running around dying of Malaria and simple tooth-aches..
I was considering exactly them! Thanks for the links!
Nevermind that African tribes long before European colonialism had to use scientific understanding to build huts, harvest and grow crops, and even keep a lid on malaria outbreaks. They're seriously implying that all of Africa has never been able to contribute to, or even benefit from, the rest of humanity's understanding of science and nature. Way to insult yourselves, your own heritage and all of Africa idiots.
Quote from: Dallas Wildman on October 22, 2016, 02:51:24 PM
Nevermind that African tribes long before European colonialism had to use scientific understanding to build huts, harvest and grow crops, and even keep a lid on malaria outbreaks. They're seriously implying that all of Africa has never been able to contribute to, or even benefit from, the rest of humanity's understanding of science and nature. Way to insult yourselves, your own heritage and all of Africa idiots.
That's a given: it's a sort of self-racism of low expectations...
West Africa was even industrious in the Middle Ages, and could produce steel of greater quality than Europe could at the time.
Quote from: MrBogosity on October 23, 2016, 08:52:16 AM
West Africa was even industrious in the Middle Ages, and could produce steel of greater quality than Europe could at the time.
Didn't just about everyone who had the ability to make steel make better steel that medieval Europeans?
Quote from: evensgrey on October 25, 2016, 02:59:03 PM
Didn't just about everyone who had the ability to make steel make better steel that medieval Europeans?
Wouldn't surprise me; I think steel was being made everywhere except the Americas before it was being made in Europe. It's originally a Middle-Eastern invention.
Quote from: MrBogosity on October 26, 2016, 12:22:47 PM
Wouldn't surprise me; I think steel was being made everywhere except the Americas before it was being made in Europe. It's originally a Middle-Eastern invention.
India actually. We got our best swords from there.
Quote from: Ibrahim90 on October 28, 2016, 09:13:12 PM
India actually. We got our best swords from there.
I'm pretty sure steel is a more-or-less inevitable invention once a culture starts making iron of decent quality and quantity. It does take scientific metallurgical chemistry to figure out how to make it cheaply and in large quantity.
India might have had better swords, but it is a historical fact that steel ingots from the Middle-East were a sought after commodity throughout medieval Europe, by all cultures. Only the wealthy could afford imported steel for weapons, but it was so superior to locally produced metals that it was worth the cost (avoiding having your sword break in the middle of battle by having a high-quality steel blade was literally life saving). Those who couldn't afford a sword made entirely of imported steel might be able to afford what was known as a 'bearded' sword, with a body of locally made iron or lower-quality steel with imported, high-quality steel cutting edges forge-welded on. It wasn't as good as the entirely imported steel blades, but it was superior to one made entirely of local metal.
Quote from: evensgrey on October 29, 2016, 10:46:20 AM
I'm pretty sure steel is a more-or-less inevitable invention once a culture starts making iron of decent quality and quantity. It does take scientific metallurgical chemistry to figure out how to make it cheaply and in large quantity.
India might have had better swords, but it is a historical fact that steel ingots from the Middle-East were a sought after commodity throughout medieval Europe, by all cultures. Only the wealthy could afford imported steel for weapons, but it was so superior to locally produced metals that it was worth the cost (avoiding having your sword break in the middle of battle by having a high-quality steel blade was literally life saving). Those who couldn't afford a sword made entirely of imported steel might be able to afford what was known as a 'bearded' sword, with a body of locally made iron or lower-quality steel with imported, high-quality steel cutting edges forge-welded on. It wasn't as good as the entirely imported steel blades, but it was superior to one made entirely of local metal.
All true. I was just saying that the first (deliberate) steel was made in India.