Light pollution in Google Earth

[Attilio]

[attachment=0]NorthvsSouth.jpg[/attachment]

 

Google Earth has a nice light pollution feater by NASA. I guess it is fun to roam around Your known places to check it. What made me think is this picture of North and South Korea. That's a huge difference in development. Well that is what 60 years of Stalinism does to a land...

[His Spogness]

Not much light pollution around where I live, we're fairly rural; but we have two nearby towns which are pretty developed and give off a good bit of light pollution, so the majority of the stars we see at night are still masked by their residue, despite being some twenty to thirty minute drive away. It kinda sucks and some people have been trying to see if they would be able to install new outside lights that reduce light pollution (ones that only focus their light immediately on the ground below them), but then again one of the towns has these super cool ornate lampposts in their downtown area and it'd be kind of a shame to see them replaced. Oh dilemma; nature or ritzy human technology? I like both just fine.

[Blue]

North Korea is a distressing place...

[J.C.]

Oh dilemma; nature or ritzy human technology? I like both just fine.

 

I know exactly what you mean... on one hand, looking up at a starry sky is awesome. On the other, we have a natural desire to bring light into the darkness.

 

The pictures taken from space are oddly beautiful, it's like watching energy coursing through Earth's veins.

[Michael Archer]

Wow, that's awesome: it really is a heatmap of the concentration of capitalism and production.

[Axeldeath]

I like seeing Australia at night, you can see all the populated areas contrasted with the barren deserts which produce no light at all, which as a matter of fact is a HUGE amount of area.

[Kyon]

North Korea is a distressing place...

 

Actually, according to a survey. It is the second happiest place on Earth.

[Doom Shepherd]

North Korea is a distressing place...

 

Actually, according to a survey. It is the second happiest place on Earth.

 

...because if you DON'T put down that you're happy on the survey form, they shoot you.

[ProHypster]

North Korea is a distressing place...

 

Actually, according to a survey. It is the second happiest place on Earth.

 

[idiot] No wonder, with all the hot-army-chicks there [/idiot]

 

I can imagine a few people being happy there though, people don't need too much to be happy.

There is a saying in the russian language: The less you know the better you sleep.

[Blue]

North Korea is a distressing place...

 

Actually, according to a survey. It is the second happiest place on Earth.

 

[idiot] No wonder, with all the hot-army-chicks there [/idiot]

 

I can imagine a few people being happy there though, people don't need too much to be happy.

There is a saying in the russian language: The less you know the better you sleep.

There's a significant difference between "Ignorance is bliss" and "Incarnate Nineteen-Eighty-Four".

[ProHypster]

There's a significant difference between "Ignorance is bliss" and "Incarnate Nineteen-Eighty-Four".

I did write a few...

 

Or could it be true, could the dictator actually brainwash his citizens to be so biased and full of propaganda that they actually do believe in the state and that it is better than other countries?

 

In that case I am pretty afraid what's going to happen after N.K's Jutism dissolves. The people will probably be extremely angry....

[Blue]

Or could it be true, could the dictator actually brainwash his citizens to be so biased and full of propaganda that they actually do believe in the state and that it is better than other countries?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult_of_personality

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublethink

 

Cult of Personality is a propaganda of holding a leader or figurehead as some kind of supreme being. This nigh-worship keeps them in power and keeps people happy to an extent.

Doublethink prevents people from thinking otherwise. In the book 1984, Oceania is at war or allied with two other major world-nations called Eurasia and Eastasia. At a moments notice, the Party could declare that Oceania was at war with Eurasia and allied with Eastasia. Thus the populace would maintain "We've always been at war with Eurasia."

Again, maybe even within hours, the Party could re-declare that they were at war with Eastasia and allied with Eurasia.

"We've always been at war with Eastasia."

And the populace would hold these in absolute truth or absolute lie depending upon whether or not the Party said so.

In this sense, it could be maintained by their Government that all protectorates and associates of United States are horrifically evil and despotic places and that North Korea is the best place in the world, and their status of happiness is higher than anyone else's. Since it is accepted as a society, there's not much that can be done in terms of internal unrest because the society doesn't know any different.

[ProHypster]

Or could it be true, could the dictator actually brainwash his citizens to be so biased and full of propaganda that they actually do believe in the state and that it is better than other countries?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult_of_personality

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doublethink

 

Cult of Personality is a propaganda of holding a leader or figurehead as some kind of supreme being. This nigh-worship keeps them in power and keeps people happy to an extent.

Doublethink prevents people from thinking otherwise. In the book 1984, Oceania is at war or allied with two other major world-nations called Eurasia and Eastasia. At a moments notice, the Party could declare that Oceania was at war with Eurasia and allied with Eastasia. Thus the populace would maintain "We've always been at war with Eurasia."

Again, maybe even within hours, the Party could re-declare that they were at war with Eastasia and allied with Eurasia.

"We've always been at war with Eastasia."

And the populace would hold these in absolute truth or absolute lie depending upon whether or not the Party said so.

In this sense, it could be maintained by their Government that all protectorates and associates of United States are horrifically evil and despotic places and that North Korea is the best place in the world, and their status of happiness is higher than anyone else's. Since it is accepted as a society, there's not much that can be done in terms of internal unrest because the society doesn't know any different.

I'm from Ukraine, I can say something after I analyze my family, during Stalin's times people did know there was something wrong... and that he shouldn't be in power, politicians long waited for him to die so that they can denounce him, communists hated him, capitalists hated him, but the way it worked is that he sent all the smart and political people to Gulag with a famous case how he killed all the good generals right before the war and even sent Zhukov ungratefully to Gulag after the war (What an appreciation ...) and sent Korolyov to the Gulag for some 10 years who later went on to become a great head space-programm designer, anyway what was left of the Soviet Union was people too afraid to rise up or commoners who didn't care, personally my relatives from my Mother's side who lived during Stalin's era died because a neighbour used Stalin's regime to his advantage and said that they were saying something bad about him, so they got shot and left my grandfather an orphan with his sister. (Who turned out very well in the end.)

 

Anyway, but I can tell you that the majority of the population DID not approve with him but lived with the hard times and waited for him to die.

[Song]

It all depends on which side you are on and whichever side that is, it is always

the good one and the other one is always the bad one.

And if it is not like that, propaganda will make it so. Propaganda is the strongest

weapon a country can have. It makes people believe they work for a greater

cause while slaughtering whole countries and convinces others that whatever

the authorities do to them, it is always for the peoples benefit while these are

actually robbed raw, sometimes even literally.

 

Also only the winners story goes down in history, which is, as according to the

above, obviously only the good stuff about them, while the losers only get their

bad stuff written down.

Until of course the winners lose too which they all do one day.

[Blue]

Anyway, but I can tell you that the majority of the population DID not approve with him but lived with the hard times and waited for him to die.

But what if it comes to pass that the regime carries on unchanged for more than one generation? a society might get used to it as the norm if it's isolated enough, and that may be what's occurring to North Korea now for all we know. I mean, seriously, their Eternal President has been dead for 17 years.

[ProHypster]

Philosophical Question that I got stuck on after reviewing this topic.

 

What is more important?

 

Knowledge or Happiness.

[Blue]

Philosophical Question that I got stuck on after reviewing this topic.

 

What is more important?

 

Knowledge or Happiness.

I think a more prevalent question is

 

"Which should be a higher objective in life?

 

Truth or Happiness"

 

To which I answer "Either you will try to find happiness and you'll never find it, or you seek truth and you'll get both."

As Douglas Adams once said "What is fame but an empty bubble, what is gold but a translucent trouble." Fame, prestige, power, money, all are usually sought as means to have happiness but in the end they're still just inanimate things. Then one might pursue love to be their objective to be happiness, or maybe a really kickass career. But what if that loved one dies or the job is lost? Then your source of happiness goes away.

But if you find a truth which gives ultimate meaning and purpose to your life, then, well, then you have that. Happiness is just a bonus.