Silly Americans... - Sphere (1998) Discussion

[–] zampano83 19 years ago

first... I'm american and i feel silly responding to this post as if I really cared much about the movie... but I'm kind of bored.

Second, you're right in that americans are arrogant in assuming everything is theirs (and also arrogant in calling ourselves americans, there are quite a few more countries in our continent and a whole other continent full of americans).

third, I bet the ship was U.S. The british space program was never too strong to begin with and was cut a lot during the thatcher days and hasn't bounced back. Americans don't own the market on arrogance. Besides, the "trash basura" label is commonplace in the U.S.

Fourth, compare technology of today from fifty years ago today. who knows where we'll be 50 years from now. And finally, and probably most importantly, if you want to call out a movie for having an unrealistic "space" timeline point your critical finger towards Kubrick's masterpiece 2001.

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[–] bikebryan 19 years ago

To call the space scenes in 2001 to be following an "unrealistic space timeline" is really out of place. In 1968, people actually thought we could be doing all this by the turn of the century. My own father, and many of his generation, believed we would be on Mars by the mid-70s.

Politics brought us to the moon, nothing more. It wasn't a desire for the science, but the US belief in our destiny to be the best and to be the Russians to the moon. Once we realized that goal, the Apollo program lost funding and space exploration basically died.

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[–] dukeb0y 15 years ago

In 1968, people actually thought we could be doing all this by the turn of the century

Yes, we COULD have gone to Mars, that was the 2nd plan for the Saturn V rocket(after the moon) But we built the shuttle instead.

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[–] sabaka2 19 years ago

jloc_enmexico - "Fourth, compare technology of today from fifty years ago today. who knows where we'll be 50 years from now."

Haha, I love this quote! 50 years ago? 50 years ago NASA was flying men to moon and American astronauts were moonwalking on the moon. Today NASA can't even fly a single ship into orbit (forced to pay other countries to do so) and sending someone to the moon seems like a very distant and impractical technical impossiblity.

I'm not going to say that everything was faked, but you have to admit, this is simply absurd. Aren't we supposed to improve with time? Aren't things supposed to become smaller, more efficient, faster, lighter, etc. Look at computers, cars, planes...

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[–] mattscdl 19 years ago

and by 50 years ago you mean 37? 50 years ago we weren't even thinking about the moon.

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[–] zampano83 19 years ago

note that i didn't say how well our nasa program has improved but how technology has improved (computers, mp3 players, digital cameras, etc).

also, I admit I'm not up to date on every nasa development, but we have little buggies on mars sendind data back to us and we didn't have that when we went to the moon.

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[–] gigabyte-me 18 years ago

NASA is a joke. A farce. A bunch of men and women too smart for their own good with the ideals of a child wanting to fly out into space for all the most childish and idealistic reasons.

I bet NASA engineers sit around watching Star Trek dreaming of meeting Romulans. The scary thing is they think they're actually smart enough to reach that point one day, and are wasting billions of America's dollars for their stupid pipe dream.

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[–] anakin022 15 years ago

how do you think you know all that, hm?

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[–] ansher 14 years ago

You're so ignorant that there isn't even a point to correcting you.

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[–] HumanTheONLyRace 13 years ago

You stupid *beep* idiot. There's only two ways our species will survive and keep in mind our odds are against us(especially with *beep* like you)

Extinction or space exploration.

I'd love to hear the reasons YOU think space exploration studies is childish. You could do research and get some programs that are doing *beep* but i'm sure there are some that understand my argument as well.

I bet you think were the only ones who happen to be floating around in the universe. Maybe you've been to other galaxies?

What do you think all the mars *beep* is about? Yeah because of dumb *beep* we don't get the funding to send teams to mars, but with the all i care about is right now attitude well never get anywhere.

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[–] IndyCelt 9 years ago

"You stupid *beep* idiot. There's only two ways our species will survive...
Extinction or space exploration."

Oh dear, another intellectual with a beeper. News for you: extinction has fallen out of favor as a way of surviving.

"i'm sure there are some that understand my argument as well"

Definitely, there are plenty on your wavelength in this thread.

Anyway, bad news just coming in on the survival thing. Way way way before our sun makes Earth uninhabitable, Humans will have been replaced by whatever we evolve into next--and not a moment too soon. Same as we replaced the Neanderthals and various other contemporaneous human-like species, in the last few tens of thousands of years.

And of course our successors will have been replaced many times too in the intervening ~3 billion years. It's a fair bet these superior iterations will come up with some bright ideas, as understandable to us as space travel is to a chimp.

I wonder would they keep us on as pets? We're so adorable on internet threads.

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[–] ffordegroupie 12 years ago

Spoken like somebody who wasn't smart enough to actualy get into the program, Mr. Sour Grapes.

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[–] MissMellieY 19 years ago

I just had to comment here. I don't think it is arrogant at all the people of the United States call themselves Americans. The full name of the country is the United States of AMERICA. We can hardly call ourselves United Statians. It isn't saying Canadians and Mexicans aren't part of North America but they don't have AMERICA in the country name.

As for the movie, USS DOES equate UNITED STATES.

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[–] diederick76 19 years ago

As for the movie, USS DOES equate UNITED STATES.

Yes, but not necessarily of America.

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[–] 19 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Doc_Holiday_Muses 18 years ago

Ummmm....yeah...it's used to denote a United States Ship.

I'm your huckleberry...

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[–] danthecardude 17 years ago

It never ceases to amaze me that any discussion on the web about anything generally devolves into an anti-American (USA) rant. Can't you guys put your jealousies aside long enough to talk about a movie for the movie's sake? Good grief. Grow up.

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[–] mgitzel 18 years ago

Others call you guys United Statesians(sp?). I know that's what a lot of us (Canadians) and some people from Mexico that I have met call you guys. American's refer to other countries in America, so it gets confusing. Hehe, maybe you guys can lobby for a real name, rather then a description.

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[–] justinlesamiz 18 years ago

i would like you to know, for your sake and the sake of your family, that everything you just said was pure BS. nobody in their right mind calls americans united statesians. bs. no american ever refers to other countries in america. it is commonly accepted that the united states is simply referred to as america. i'm not saying that its right or that it even makes sense, but many years of precedence allows for that name to be considered official. no one refers to people from brasil as straight-up "american". it doesn't happen. that doesn't mean that they aren't technically part of the american continents. it just means that the name "america" has been adopted to mean the united states of america. deal with it. it doesn't mean the US is better than anybody else and it doesn't mean anybody is arrogant. americans are no more arrogant than any other country's citizens. yeah, some americans suck, but think of all the people you know, in whatever country you're in, and consider how many of them suck. i promise the percentage is the same anywhere you go. specific people suck. not countries. generalizations hurt the world and need to be stopped.

- www.therightclique.com -

EAT MORE COPS

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[–] the_la_baker 9 years ago

i would like you to know, for your sake and the sake of your family, that everything you just said was pure BS. nobody in their right mind calls americans united statesians. bs. no american ever refers to other countries in america. it is commonly accepted that the united states is simply referred to as america. i'm not saying that its right or that it even makes sense, but many years of precedence allows for that name to be considered official. no one refers to people from brasil as straight-up "american". it doesn't happen. that doesn't mean that they aren't technically part of the american continents. it just means that the name "america" has been adopted to mean the united states of america. deal with it. it doesn't mean the US is better than anybody else and it doesn't mean anybody is arrogant. americans are no more arrogant than any other country's citizens. yeah, some americans suck, but think of all the people you know, in whatever country you're in, and consider how many of them suck. i promise the percentage is the same anywhere you go. specific people suck. not countries. generalizations hurt the world and need to be stopped.

I approve of this old post. Very well said.

I think the 85-15 rule is fairly accurate. 15% of the people create 85% of the problems.

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[–] IndyCelt 9 years ago

"I approve of this old post. Very well said."

Congrats on having the eyesight and patience to wade thru that wall of text!

Woohoo, I'm finished. Damn, that was more fun than listening to Donald Trump--that's The Donald to all you non-USers. I might do it again next year.

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[–] IndyCelt 9 years ago

"i promise the percentage is the same anywhere you go. specific people suck. not countries. generalizations hurt the world and need to be stopped."

You are correct, but that's not the issue. The reason USA and USers get so much stick from elsewhere is that the US continually projects itself as the greatest country on earth. That would be fine if it was just harmless flag waving, but the problem is that a lot of USers actually believe it, and their companies and government take it an unacceptable step further by seeking to impose the American way elsewhere in the world. That's the problem, and the source of labels like "arrogance" and "ignorant".

A glaring example if you need one is the recent [this century] attempts to spread 'American' democracy. As if USA invented it, or had a healthy and well-functioning version of it. The rest of the world isn't blind, so such ignorance and arrogance is going to meet with resistance and blowback..

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[–] oikoumene 18 years ago

<< I don't think it is arrogant at all the people of the United States call themselves Americans. The full name of the country is the United States of AMERICA. We can hardly call ourselves United Statians. It isn't saying Canadians and Mexicans aren't part of North America but they don't have AMERICA in the country name. >>

Actually, you are right on the money! It is absolutely logical, therefore, right.
Strange, it is not first time such a question was risen. And nobody thought of
such an elementary explanation before. Kudos!

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[–] w1dgeteye 19 years ago

Second, you're right in that americans are arrogant in assuming everything is theirs (and also arrogant in calling ourselves americans, there are quite a few more countries in our continent and a whole other continent full of americans).

Ah the American appologizer. The country's full of them. They think they look so INTERNATIONAL by putting down their own country. They're.. well, just so COOL.

Tell me oh idiot appologizer what the hell should we call ourselves? United Staters?????? Ya' moron.

And as far as assuming that everything is ours?? Well there isn't another country with the technology to build or field such a craft. Where in the hell are all the other Space shuttles of the world? Yeah the Ruskis built one, flew it unmanned one time, then parked it in a museum. They couldn't trust their technology enough to even put a crew on it. It also takes money to explore space and because we are one of the few truly capitalist countries in the world we are the only ones who can afford such an ongoing expense.

You America haters give me a pain in the butt, you sit here in a country that other people dream of coming to one day and you sit and put it down. What an idiot.

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[–] ConalTaezali 19 years ago

Well, he looks a lot more international than you, mate.

Nor was he putting America down.

Nor do I hate America.

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[–] A_Llama_Drama 19 years ago

i don't dream of going to the USA. I want to go to South America, but not the USA. I've met enough silly people to last me a life time.
Not that you are all silly of course, but majority of the ones i have met, from university, tourists, work, are all rather silly and over excited.But they are nice, just dim.
My teenage ansgt has a body count

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] foxy123elm 15 years ago

Ugh... I love how some people group all "idiot, silly, arrogant" Americans together. Every country has their "idiots". Why is it necessary to put another country down? I don't think it makes anyone look "worldly".

Mulder: Nobody likes a math geek, Scully.

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[–] oikoumene 18 years ago

<< And as far as assuming that everything is ours?? Well there isn't another country with the technology to build or field such a craft. Where in the hell are all the other Space shuttles of the world? Yeah the Ruskis built one, flew it unmanned one time, then parked it in a museum. They couldn't trust their technology enough to even put a crew on it. It also takes money to explore space and because we are one of the few truly capitalist countries in the world we are the only ones who can afford such an ongoing expense. >>

First, I noticed that you misspelled the word: sing. Russky, pl. Russkies. And I agree with you on the account of Russian shuttle.

Second, still, neither in 50 years, nor in 100 years, anyone would go alone for a project of such magnificence. It would put such strain on economy of any country. By the way, there were talks about a flight to Mars but only together with Russians. Well, like some other IMDb members said here, unlike in 60s still there are no flights to the Moon (and Russians never even got there). I would add something regarding space stations. Here the situation is otherwise: the last Russian space station Mir was in service over 15 years (a Jay Leno's joke went that it outlived many American cars) and demonstrated striking resilience living even through a couple of fires, and Americans wrapped their space station program in 70s. Now we have only an international project.

Bottom line, other posters actually mean, though implicitly, that the ship cannot be exclusively American. However, it would not come as a surprise that the majority of a crew on any international flight be American (or, at least, constitute a largest fraction).

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[–] 18 years ago

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[–] DangerRanger 18 years ago

--------------------------------------------------------
Where in the hell are all the other Space shuttles of the world? Yeah the Ruskis built one, flew it unmanned one time, then parked it in a museum.
--------------------------------------------------------

Back in the 70's, someone working in the shuttle program told me that Russia had 'secretly' taken photos of the space shuttle in development and had tried to copy it. But only having photos to work from, they didn't know how big the thing was and ended up getting the dimensions wrong (too small) and it wouldn't fly. That was the last I had heard of the Russian effort until now. I would have thought that they would have been too embarrassed by their failure to admit that they had tried to 'develop' their own shuttle, much less put it on display in a museum.
What is it - the museum of stolen technologies gone wrong?

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[–] Dr_House_MD 18 years ago

Just like when the americans think the aliens "are a threat to national security"-of course the aliens would just go to america and leave everyone else alone...

"If you were a women I'd slug you"-Peter Griffin

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[–] 18 years ago

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[–] blakjak_cc 13 years ago

Google: Buran

It completed 2 orbits when launched in 1988. It had no crew, was flown by remote control!
It was transported by the largest aircraft to ever fly, the Anatov An-225.
Sadly the hanger it was housed in collapsed in 2002, & it, & the Buran were destroyed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buran_(spacecraft)

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[–] IndyCelt 9 years ago

Man, talk about sensitive and defensive. Shame that 9 years later your post must be a big embarrassment to you. Lucky the Russian spacecraft are around to take care of people and things 'up yonder', yeah? And that's after their empire imploding 25 years ago.

Oh and fyi, the term for United States citizens is USers, of course. Americans are citizens of South, Central and North America. You don't see the citizens of South Africa calling themselves Africans, do you? So having the continent name in the country name isn't an excuse for arrogance.

"we are the only ones who can afford such an ongoing expense"
Were you seriously ignorant of all the other countries with space programs back in 2006? I hope you've educated yourself a bit since then.

"there isn't another country with the technology to build or field such a craft"
I take it you're ignorant of where from the US 'acquired' most of its expertise in rocketry and space? Just because the US got a lead after much of the rest of the developed world ruined itself in WW2, doesn't mean they won't pass the US again soon--unless US education stops slipping down the international charts.

"America haters"
Just because someone criticizes the US and USers doesn't make them like you. There's no patriotism in being blind and ignorant, and the sooner USers realize that, the sooner the US will have a chance of becoming great again. Not merely rich.

"a country that other people dream of coming to one day"
There are many such countries. Only a small few are arrogant and blind to their own faults. Long may they remain a minority.

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[–] spiderfoxenator 17 years ago

You also have to take into account that the movie was based on a book that was written in 1988, so the time frame was a little different. Also, in the book they never truely discover the date, they see the last two digits and guess.

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[–] Dutch_Schaeffer 19 years ago

The dead pilot had American candy or something in his hand.

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[–] SuperNinja 19 years ago

They were Blue Diamond smoked almonds.

http://www.bluediamond.com/

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[–] darthbogus 19 years ago

Heh, "Oh my God, it's an American spaceship!"

Dude, this was a movie, not a documentary. They never went into a real space ship.

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[–] natron82 19 years ago

I'm not sure about the movie but in the book they never see the year 2043 written out, it's just part of the date: xx/xx/43. They assume throughout that it's from 2043, but it could be from 2143, 2243, etc. Just an interesting detail.

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[–] borislav_mitev 19 years ago

cough cough

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[–] Bernnard_Black 19 years ago

Ummm, no. It was indeed an American spaceship, at least in the book. When they were checking the logs, they saw that the ship was named USS Star Voyager. USS = United States Ship. No one else uses that acronym for ship names.

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[–] jimmyman99 19 years ago

USS can also be interpreted as United Soviet States or Union of Soviet States... just a thought hehe

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[–] PhrenicGermal 19 years ago

No.

What English speakers called the USSR, the soviets called the CCCP.

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[–] diederick76 19 years ago

What English speakers called the USSR, the soviets called the CCCP.

No. Obvious mistake. While the cyrilic letters look like a C and a P, it's actually SSSR.

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[–] jonleven 19 years ago

you also have to realize that when they saw the trash it also said basura, which is spanish, i would think that the most common place to see english and spanish as the 2 main languages would be an american establishment.

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[–] Autlan 19 years ago

That's true, the ship was probably built in Cuba or maybe some other country on the southern continent.

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[–] moondog548 18 years ago

Actually "basura" on the trashcan was meant to be Esperanto the artifical "universal" language. Much in commmon with the romance languages tho, I think.

It's recognized as Esperanto in the book IIRC.

/I bring you Sooth/
http://soothunleashed.blogspot.com/

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[–] Villi2 15 years ago

Then that is a clear sign of it being a multi-national, no? English, the global lingua franca, and esperanto, a language constructed for the same purpose...

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[–] interlingua_usa 19 years ago

Please, Adkit. Be real. Did everyone on the mission say it was an American ship? No. Did the entire American nation say "This is our spaceship!"? No. Just one person on the mission said that. So whence comes the venom "Silly Americans"?

Yet another piece of evidence that it's a US spaceship? Trash receptacles say "Trash/Basura" in the US but not the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia, India, Nigeria, New Zealand, or any other important English-speaking part of the world.

Other members of the team don't automatically equate English language with American nationality. Dustin Hoffman and Sharon Stone simply say "look it's in English" when they see the computer controls.

And Adkit, if we're going to be really picky, why do you think that "Trash" is in fact written in English. As in Jorge Luis Borges' short story "The Library of Babel," it's possible (to an infintesimally small degree) that it's simply by chance that some future script resembles the English letters T-R-A-S-H.

Finally, don't you think if a mission, all of whose members spoke some (non-English) language, encountered a ship from the future with words in their own language, they might, in their excitement, say something like "This is a space ship from [our country]" rathter than "This is a spaceship with words in our language?" I'd wager that a group of Italian, Korean, Arabic, Yoruba or Quechua speakers would, if they saw words in their own language while on a mission like that shown in the movie, blurt out "Look what we're going to do in the future!" or words to that effect.

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[–] ta_naemhni 15 years ago

That's all perfectly true, and to this I would also add, by the way:

As it happens, I took up a hobby about two or three years ago -- collecting paper money from around the world. One of the interesting things I've noticed is that most countries in the world use English on their currency. Even Bhutan, which is a very closed country that allows almost no one in even for tourism, uses English on its money, even though their sole official language is Dzongkha. It's just one more indication of how English is pretty much the global "lingua franca", if I'm using that expression correctly.

That being the case, it's not surprising that the ships controls and so on would be in English; even if the ship were a multinational effort, they'd probably use English as it would be the one language that they'd be reasonably sure that everyone involved in the project would speak.

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[–] theonlymovieking 19 years ago

I distinctly remember in the book it was an American spacecraft...soooooo...i guess in the movie it's American too????

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[–] Christoast 19 years ago

wtf. they looked at the pack of candies or something and that’s how they determined that it was indeed American.

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[–] TheMrFrog 19 years ago

Americans speak English. Brittish people use unnecessary "u"s. Ergo it was an American spaceship.

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[–] Chris100575 19 years ago

The "trash" label on the bin suggests that the ship was American, in Britain they're labelled "litter".

A bit like your unnecessary "T" in "British" Mr Frog? ;)

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[–] ninnoart 19 years ago

Maybe the ship was iraqi.

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[–] nazcapilot 19 years ago

Who give's a flying *beep* it's a movie, a MOVIE!

PLEASE! There's almost always at least one nationality post on every movie page; and it's almost always started by Europeans [mainly British {who really don't have a movie industry}], and I'd just wish they'd just shut up...

...'WHY IS ALWAYS AMERICANS WHO SAVE THE WOR--{blah blah blah} *beep* you!

...and Adkit for your vast knowledge, would it be beyond me to ask that you, in the future, use spell check?...

"Why must you challenge me, Mitchell?"

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] the_innovative_one 19 years ago

Is Bush planning to go to a family reunion or something?

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[–] nazcapilot 19 years ago

We're returning to the Moon in 2020; Mars around 2040

"Why must you challenge me, Mitchell?"

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[–] bikebryan 19 years ago

Let's wait and see IF we return to the moon first.

Remember, the first push to the moon was politically motivated. We HAD to beat the Russians to the moon. Now we don't have anybody to beat anywhere. Most folks don't want to throw money to the moon when we have so many probelms here on this world to deal with.

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[–] enraged_chimp 19 years ago

such as energy... your president had something to say on the matter ... and also on the moon.. i assume this has to do with the aquisition of helium-3 which has a value of about $4 billion a ton and is perfect for clean fusion as it dosent produce neutrons but is not present on earth because of its magnetic field it all seems fantastically convenient so much so im sure the evangellical nutters will have something to say on it but it is true. the next place it can be got from is the atmosphere of uranus which provides another reason to go a bit further itl all be like lando carissian in starwars!

have a look at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/226053.stm it explains in laymans terms

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[–] Boris_Grishenko 19 years ago

The 'u's' and 'g's' aren't unnecessary, in Britain we are taught English as it is supposed to be spoken and written, you lot just went and changed it.
COLOUR!

~'Not my words, the words of Top Gear magazine'~ - Alan Partridge

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[–] sippinice 19 years ago

I'm sorry mr. chain u r incorrect it is apparent that you do not know much about the english language or the history of england. In England English is not in fact taught the way it is to be spoken and to be quite exact english is not taught the way it is to be spoken anywhere in the world and to be really really exact English is not a real language it's more of a composite. It's Germanic, French and infuses many foreign langauges. The only real english words are generally the one uni-syllabic words like house.

As far as the English go the spelling of many words was chosen at random because until about the 17th centuary or so most english people could not read (due to the obvious lack of books) and people who could read generally spelt words differantly like church was spelt c-h-u-r-c-h, c-h-y-r-c-h and somehow
k-i-r-k. So when the language was standardized (or standardised if u please lol), in about the early 18th centuary i think, they did the best they could to unify the languages spelling so as to avoid people being confused and people from differant regions would all be able to understand writing (as more people were reading).

The way in which english is spoken has absolutely nothing to do with the way it is spoken. However, when Webster complied the american dictionary he made an effort to spell the words more in the manner in which the are pronounced. So U's were dropped and Z's added. It was the first attempt made to make English read the way it sounds. So in the end like most other things England invented it but america perfected (Jet planes etc).

one final note having lived in england and america i can say this england is utterly pointless and lives in a haze of meaningless history and tradition with no logical feel for it's current place in the global scheme of things. the verdict is still out on America

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[–] 19 years ago

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[–] Boris_Grishenko 19 years ago

Touché Mr. Sippinice. I am well aware that English is a composite of many languages. However, i had recently been filling in application forms on the web and had gotten rather frustrated by the way that there are seldom options on these forms or in software setup programs for the use of UK English. The point i am trying to make is that proper English is from England and therefore, should be recognised as that. I don't find any of it unnecessary.

'The way in which english is spoken has absolutely nothing to do with the way it is spoken.'

A typo? Or an attempt at a profound statement.

I know that the language has been simplified in order for it to be used more phonetically, but you wouldn't change French (a mixture of latin and germanic) or German for the same reason would you? There is no protocol when it comes to developing a language, it just happens. Languages evolve but they don't need simplifying, i didn't struggle to learn it. Anyway, i'm sorry if i offended you in my previous post but i was in a bad mood after a tedious day of form filling (with American English as the standard) and was just messing around with something that came to mind whilst reading a previous post.

I'm only replying to this due to the fact that you had a pop at England when i was only starting a bit of banterous conversation. I'm not English but i have very little time for Condescending people.

Cymru am byth.

~'Not my words, the words of Top Gear magazine'~ - Alan Partridge

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[–] sippinice 19 years ago

(Hey Wheresmychin) Hmmm well apparently you have enough time for condescending people to reply to them on random posts. What's slightly more ironic is that in referring to me as condescending is in itself such. While not referring to me specifically you have clearly attacked my personal character where are I merely made an albeit provocative yet utterly innoccous remark about a country. And I know people have enough patriatism to kill and die for the hono(u)r of their country ( I mean Dulce est Decorum est... and all that right) But try and keep the safty on that m-16 mate.

What I said about England is true it has out lived its usefulness hundreds of years ago it would have been conquered by now and reformatted. And if you know anything about history espacially English history you know that's true. I mean you don't see Pharoh's riding chariots do you.

Anyway, I find it a shame that you had to resort to personally attacking me when I only have the utmost respect and regard for you. I would like to truely apoligi(s)e for offending your sense of national spirit if i can be forgiven i would count myself lucky.

Also an apology to this board for taking a "scientific" discussion and using it to further my own apparently condescending views about England.

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[–] Boris_Grishenko 19 years ago

No problem, just having a rant. I am also sorry for being so argumentative,
being bored in work brings out the worst in me.

No pharoh's i supppose. A couple of dragons would be nice though.

~'Not my words, the words of Top Gear magazine'~ - Alan Partridge

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[–] rickg-20 19 years ago

'What I said about England is true it has out lived its usefulness hundreds of years ago it would have been conquered by now and reformatted'

I think Hitler tried that about 65 years ago....and I'm not speaking German yet...lol
(And before anyone says it, no, the US didnt save our asses, we did that on our own for nearly 2 yrs...it was just useful that Japan brought you all into the war to help us invade France again.....although this time we weren't fighting the French, which is a shame because nobody likes the French and they need a good war to keep them quiet)

P.S. I'm English and my girlfiend is American, (sorry I'll rephrase that...she comes from the United States of the bottom half of the North American continent lol) and we have this language debate all the time. I tell her she doesn't spell things correctly, she says her way makes more sense.......I usually win by asking what language she speaks and where it got its name from.....well, I think I win....women are like cats, you never know what they are thinking.
The truth is, language evolves daily, all economic and social classes invent new phrases of their own, by the truckload every year, some of them stick with us and get taken into our everyday language, most don't.....frankly I don't care, just as long as I'm understood most of the time............and so long as I don't have to speak French......ever.

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[–] IndyCelt 9 years ago

"England is true it has out lived its usefulness hundreds of years ago it would have been conquered by now and reformatted."

That already happened at least 3 times. By Rome 2,000 years ago, by mainly Germans 1,500 years ago, and by French 1,000 years ago [using nice round numbers]. Worked out well too, England proved to be one of the major powers for a lot of the last millennium, and a major contributor to moving humanity forward in thought and activity.

In more recent times, England has a major role to play in helping to shape and direct the great EU vision and experiment--notwithstanding a possible temporary disengagement this decade, people seem to have lost sight of geography and history over there atm.

Or did you have some other concept of "usefulness" in mind?

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[–] fuzzmeister_7 17 years ago

In all English speaking countries we are taught modern English, which has developed regional differences. If you go to Japan,or Italy, or Spain, or India or anywhere else, people from different areas may have different grammar, sentence structure, spelling and pronunciation. It doesn't mean one way of speaking is right and one is wrong, they're just different. It's the same for British and American English. They are just different.

BTW, I never see British posters attacking Australians or New Zealanders for "incorrect" English. Wonder why that is...

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[–] estcst-3 17 years ago

Evangelical nutters? WTF? If anything it seems to be the liberal left that stands in the way of budgeting for space programs. Their endless cries about how we have to fatten up the poor and help them reproduce so that we can have more fat poor people and than we have to take their ill health on as a burden as well even tho they've never produced anything but more fat lazy slobs.

So let's keep feeding the poor Ho-Hos. That's the solution to our problems. Way to go leftists!

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[–] xcrss_my_heartx 18 years ago

"We're returning to the Moon in 2020; Mars around 2040

"Why must you challenge me, Mitchell?" "

Yes there are plans to go back to the moon in 2020 and it will be our last space SHUTTLE trip.
the mars trip will not be done in a shuttle. The space elevator will be done by then. Why do you think there is no funding for current space exploration? all the money is going towards the elevator.

look it up.

http://science.howstuffworks.com/space-elevator.htm
www.liftport.com

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[–] nicenspicy27 19 years ago

president bush is planning to go to mars by 2010,i think. so it coming from 2043 makes sense

lets hope he goes sooner than that and never comes back :)

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[–] bikebryan 19 years ago

NASA hopes to have the ISS finished, using shuttle support, by 2010. What are the odds they can also put together a Mars Mission in that time frame? NONE.

Let's face it, for all the talk and bluster, nobody wants to go back to the moon, let alone Mars - or at least, nobody wants to pay for it.

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[–] ms7431 19 years ago

I disagree, mars is definetely a key stage in our space flight, if aliens are viewing our progress from afar, then our placing a man on mars, will be a key stage in their observation.

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[–] bikebryan 19 years ago

Don't live such a deluded lie. Yes, many people dream of us going to Mars. No, nobody wants to pay for it.

We didn't go to the moon for the science. It was done for an almost pure political statement - we can beat the Russians at something. That impetus is no longer there.

As for getting there by 2010 - be real. I don't like to use absolutes, but I firmly believe there is NO chance that will happen. We might have the ISS done by then, but I'll hold out judgement on that for a couple of years.

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[–] frog1976 19 years ago

First of all...

The Spacecraft was Mexican. The garbage can read "Basura", or trash in Spanish. It is funny that all of you assume its American. It's definitely Mexican. Hell, there's even a giant Disco Ball, or shiny sphere, in the back of the ship...

Second...

Americans will always assume everything is ours. We call it Manifest Destiny. Ask the natives of North America. We make everything ours. We took the English language and made it better, removing those extra u's. We took Croissants and made it into the better Croissandwich. We even took Arnold Schwarzenegger from Austria and made him the Governor of California, the 5th largest economy in the world. So, if we found a spaceship in the ocean with Greek letters written on the side, we would say it's an American Ship. Then we would try to find out what college fraternity it belonged to...

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[–] Boris_Grishenko 19 years ago

Croissandwich???? ROTFL what's that? A croissant is a croissant, end of story. I'm sure the French would disagree that any American version of their food is an improvement, i mean, you're not exactly experts on eating habits. And don't get me started on anyone involved in your current government (even if it is Arnie). It seems to me that your country frequently acquires things, changes them slightly and proceeds to take credit for it. Karma is seriously gonna bite you on the arse. Don't get me wrong, there are many original and innovative ideas that have come out of America but assuming everything is yours is just plain arrogant (seriously not a good quality).

Good day sir.

P.S. You should get out of America for a while, see the world, it's a beautiful place.(That is if you haven't already)

Cymru am byth.

~'Not my words, the words of Top Gear magazine'~ - Alan Partridge

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[–] dreamtheatre-2 19 years ago

dunno it is an american space ship and who knows folks there might have been british or europeans aboard

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[–] frog1976 19 years ago

Well Comrade,

A croissandwhich is available at Burger King and is usually the closest to French food an American will eat. And yes, I've been to France and have tasted their food. Seriously, frog is not really that great. But I love to smoke indoors, go France!

We don't aquire things, change them slightly, and take credit for it. Thats the Japanese. We just make everything better, and let the consumer give the credit.

I was merely commenting that it is Americas natural tendency figure everything is ours. Most Americans think the Statue of Liberty is American made. I know it's French. Hell, the other day I had to tell my nephew that most legendary rock bands are foreign (Rolling Stones, Beatles, AC/DC, ABBA, Wham!) He called me a liar.

But...Sphere being an American movie directed by an American, based on an American novel written by an American and starring Queen Latifa...yeah, I'd say that the spaceship in the movie was supposed to be an American space craft.

P.S. I have seen many different places in this world, and none of them can beat Sunny San Diego, California with the Terminator as our Governor. Karma can kiss my...arse?

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[–] rica2005 19 years ago

what's the point of going to the moon again? there wasn't much to look at when they went there about 45 years ago. rock, goody. we have rocks down here. if we're really going to go anywhere in space, there needs to be another superpower in the world for competition. democracy is all about competition, yet there's not much to compete with the US. Britain probably could, but we're on the same political side. progress will continue to slow without anyone driving us to advance.

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[–] IndyCelt 9 years ago

"democracy is all about competition"

No, you're thinking of raw Capitalism.

Democracy is about the general population ruling themselves, usually via elected representatives.

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[–] blakjak_cc 13 years ago

Frog1976 said:
Karma can kiss my...arse?

Zomg! You spelt it the Aussie way, good stuff. :P

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[–] Sinisterministertwice 18 years ago

Why is that so few Americans (United Statians, United Staters, whatever) actually takes a trip abroad, and by abroad I mean other countries than Canada and Mexico.

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[–] moondog548 18 years ago

We like it here. ;-}

We really do have a very diverse geography all our own though, especially considering Alaska and Hawaii.

Equal parts contentment and complacency. :P

But actually....

What do you even MEAN by "so few" Americans traveling abroad?

/I bring you Sooth/
http://soothunleashed.blogspot.com/

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[–] bulkprincess 18 years ago

Because not all of us are rich. Surprised?

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[–] kiwibleach 17 years ago

I'm pretty sure they were being sarcastic.

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[–] diederick76 19 years ago

Don't forget pizza.

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[–] carloski2003 18 years ago

["Also, there's NO WAY we'll have that kind of technology in 50 years. It must've been like the 23:rd century."]

little narrow minded would you say?
something tells me 50 years ago noone would have envisioned ,
-Medical Pin sized cameras that can be swallowed for surgery,
-a device the size of my thumb could store the text from an entire Library
-Abundant Commodities such as Oil and tungstan would/could ever run out
-That Christina Aguilera would be a successful singer.

Carlos Powered By mozilla Firefox http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/
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[–] Frostypop 18 years ago

I hav many things to say at the moment so listen up!

1. I like Sphere it is an interesting movie.

2. Re: "Silly Americans"
I no this is a bit of a generalisation, but I am constantly surprised by how "silly" americans are. (BTW I'm from New Zealand) The other day i was chatting to an american hu i randomly met online. It was in June. I sed its cold here cos its winter, and he sed "what year is it for you?"
How dum can u get?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

3. Re: carloski2003, "50 years ago noone wud hav envisioned....Christina Aguilera would be a successful singer"
Dude, Xtina isn't 50! Im sure most "young males" wud agree with me.

4. Im frosty. Dusnt ne1 wana comment on how ab fab i am?

Peace owt.

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[–] carloski2003 18 years ago

["3. Re: carloski2003, "50 years ago noone wud hav envisioned....Christina Aguilera would be a successful singer"
Dude, Xtina isn't 50! Im sure most "young males" wud agree with me. "]

i didnt think that i'd have to explain that noone could imagine that really really really bad singers become succesful

Carlos Powered By mozilla Firefox http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/
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