Seriously? "The First One to Heaven wins"? Ugh. Ugh, ugh, ugh.
It's the same mentality as a suicide bomber. What happens either to you or others on earth is of no significance compared to the promise of eternal bliss for doing as your god commands. There are lots of positives about having faith, but as with other things you can have too much. If you're at the point where others are no longer real people to you and the word of god is the only thing of importance - you've got too much.
The weird thing behind this is, Christianity doesn't have a "better" or "you get priority" heaven based on your actions.
One cannot place blame on Chau over the natives that actually murdered him. It was their own choice to nock an arrow, aim it at another human being, and fire that arrow knowing that it would kill him. It takes a conscious choice to kill another human being; it doesn't just happen automatically. There was a brain behind that arrow, a brain that chose to fire it.
This is a simple issue of cause and effect. Chau died of arrow wounds. Where did the arrow come from? It came from a bow. Who was responsible for firing that arrow? The person who literally fired that arrow.
Chau didn't choose to raise that bow. Chau didn't choose to nock that arrow. Chau didn't choose to draw that bow. Chau didn't choose to aim that bow. Chau didn't choose to fire that arrow. So who is responsible for every step of that 5-step process?
The person with the bow.
This is what I mean by blaming the victim. To place the blame on Chau is to pretend that he was the only conscious being on that entire island, and that everything else was just a mindless machine with no free will. It takes a choice to kill another person. They knew what would happen if they shot him, and they still did it--they chose to kill him.
When one person draws a gun, aims the gun at another person, and pulls the trigger, the fact that that bullet results in the death of a human being is no accident. The fault lies with the person who fired the bullet, not the person who got murdered.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder someone. Is the concept of not murdering people so difficult to fathom? So difficult to contemplate? So difficult to support?
Chau was responsible for the act of trespassing. That's where his role in this begins and ends. The person responsible for killing him was the one who fired the arrow.
The bullet comes from the gun, not from the target.
Self defence.
I honestly want to know what other outcome you think should have happened with The scenario that has been provided to us.
No country is going to say, "Let's set up a law where we can kill anyone who sets foot on our shores, because this primitive tribe on a small island was allowed to do so."?
That is exactly the point I was making. If the United States cannot shoot people crossing the border illegally then these people cannot do so, either. Yes, you can buy "no trespassing" signs for your property and you can even post a sign suggesting--even saying outright--that trespassers will be shot but if you actually shoot someone on your property you will most likely be charged with murder, "stand your ground" laws notwithstanding. (merely setting foot on your property does not constitute an immediate threat to you or your family)
They also broke every treaty they ever signed with the native Americans. The colonists/settlers would tell Native Americans that they could have this or that section of land as theirs to keep, forever, and then something that somebody wanted or needed would be found on, in or under that land, and the army or whoever would move them on somewhere else, only for it to happen again.
I don't think we have ever touched upon that subject here. Previous Administrations were wrong for breaking those treaties--were the decision mine they would all have been upheld to the letter because they were legally-binding documents signed with leaders from other foreign nations.
Later, however, this effect was better known. When Indians were besieging Fort Pitt (now in upstate New York), two Indians and a chief visited to urge the British to flee. The British refused, but before the Natives left, the Commander of the Fort gave them two blankets and a handkerchief straight out of the smallpox hospital. It seems to have worked (which the commander actually intended it to, based on his own words) when a smallpox epidemic broke out in the Ohio valley. 60 to 80 warriors died.
I was not talking about later, I was talking specifically about Columbus and how people these days trash-talk him for spreading disease. Yes, that is exactly what he did *but* can he truly be guilty of it since no one in the entire world had developed the concept of microbes at that time? (we should probably ask Ulysses what he thinks about people acting like couriers, sometimes delivering messages which they did not intend to deliver)
The relative isolation of the First Nations, from far northern Canada all the way to the southern tip of Chile, ultimately led to their downfall. The civilizations of Europe, Africa, and Asia had been cross-pollinating each other for millennia, resulting in necessary advancements in technology. The Nations did not *need* things like gunpowder or railroads, which is why they never developed them.
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So....anyone have any thoughts about He Jiankui, the scientist who claims to have genetically edited two embryos using CRISPR technology?
First - I reject the notion of a universal moral code.
In light of that, I do not blame the Sentinelese nor would I label them murderers for killing Chau. We have never had legitimate communication with these people. We do not understand them. They do not understand us. They are as close of an approximation of aliens as we are likely to find in our lifetime.
I do not think it is reasonable to hold them to some ever evolving moral code that our society has created( not even human society. I mean the USA) and which has been in development for all time as a result of our shared experiences.
Are they responsible for his death? Absolutely yes. Do I blame them? No.
The best analog i can think of is: If you drive without a seatbelt, and a drunk driver crashes into you. The responsibility lies with the driver, but we cannot and should not omit the context that you MAY have survived if you had buckled your seatbelt. It was your choice not to wear it. Does it change responsibility? Not necessarily - but it shouldn't be discounted.
One cannot place blame on Chau over the natives that actually murdered him. It was their own choice to nock an arrow, aim it at another human being, and fire that arrow knowing that it would kill him. It takes a conscious choice to kill another human being; it doesn't just happen automatically. There was a brain behind that arrow, a brain that chose to fire it.
This is a simple issue of cause and effect. Chau died of arrow wounds. Where did the arrow come from? It came from a bow. Who was responsible for firing that arrow? The person who literally fired that arrow.
Chau didn't choose to raise that bow. Chau didn't choose to nock that arrow. Chau didn't choose to draw that bow. Chau didn't choose to aim that bow. Chau didn't choose to fire that arrow. So who is responsible for every step of that 5-step process?
The person with the bow.
This is what I mean by blaming the victim. To place the blame on Chau is to pretend that he was the only conscious being on that entire island, and that everything else was just a mindless machine with no free will. It takes a choice to kill another person. They knew what would happen if they shot him, and they still did it--they chose to kill him.
When one person draws a gun, aims the gun at another person, and pulls the trigger, the fact that that bullet results in the death of a human being is no accident. The fault lies with the person who fired the bullet, not the person who got murdered.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder someone. Is the concept of not murdering people so difficult to fathom? So difficult to contemplate? So difficult to support?
Chau was responsible for the act of trespassing. That's where his role in this begins and ends. The person responsible for killing him was the one who fired the arrow.
The bullet comes from the gun, not from the target.
Self defence.
I honestly want to know what other outcome you think should have happened with The scenario that has been provided to us.
Chau was unarmed. Chau did not attack anyone. It is literally, factually, objectively, impossible to kill someone in self-defense if that person is not attacking you and does not even possess a weapon. Killing an unarmed man is not self-defense--not legally, not technically, and not morally.
You can object that he might theoretically have been carrying a bacterium that could have made someone sick, but the islanders wouldn't know that--they don't have germ theory; no one did before the late nineteenth century. You can't have a justification based on a theory that no one on the island would know about. The closest thing we have is a documented example of someone getting sick after a previous contact... but people get sick all the time, and we have no actual proof that these people somehow knew, from a single isolated event, that foreigners carried dangerous diseases, and, if I'm not mistaken, that event was not even fatal.
Even if they did somehow anticipate modern germ theory, they still had the option of, you know, walking away from him.
What should the islanders have done? They have two options:
1. Find his boat, grab him, and push him onto the boat. 2. Leave him alone, since he's not hurting anyone and not threatening to hurt anyone.
You do not need the least bit of imagination to think of these alternatives.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder them.
I cannot think of anything more obvious than that.
I didn't say the islanders are blameless. Please don't strawman, it's dishonest.
I'm not referring to your argument specifically (for clarity's sake, my posts on page 133 were made before I saw your posts on page 133); I'm objecting to a pattern of assigning blame exclusively on Chau and assigning zero blame to the islanders. It's something I've seen outside this thread, and it distresses me that the murder of an unarmed man is treated as morally neutral or simply a joke.
Why are we even hearing about this Chau guy? According to the WHO there's a murder every minute on this planet. Why is it that Chau and Mashoggi so worthy of special attention? Because the talking heads tell us they are. One's a journalist, the other's a Fundamentalist Christian. They're special because they're more newsworthy. In the grand scheme of things both of them are pretty insignificant, however. The really scary part is the world goes on without them, just like it will after we're all gone too...
One cannot place blame on Chau over the natives that actually murdered him. It was their own choice to nock an arrow, aim it at another human being, and fire that arrow knowing that it would kill him. It takes a conscious choice to kill another human being; it doesn't just happen automatically. There was a brain behind that arrow, a brain that chose to fire it.
This is a simple issue of cause and effect. Chau died of arrow wounds. Where did the arrow come from? It came from a bow. Who was responsible for firing that arrow? The person who literally fired that arrow.
Chau didn't choose to raise that bow. Chau didn't choose to nock that arrow. Chau didn't choose to draw that bow. Chau didn't choose to aim that bow. Chau didn't choose to fire that arrow. So who is responsible for every step of that 5-step process?
The person with the bow.
This is what I mean by blaming the victim. To place the blame on Chau is to pretend that he was the only conscious being on that entire island, and that everything else was just a mindless machine with no free will. It takes a choice to kill another person. They knew what would happen if they shot him, and they still did it--they chose to kill him.
When one person draws a gun, aims the gun at another person, and pulls the trigger, the fact that that bullet results in the death of a human being is no accident. The fault lies with the person who fired the bullet, not the person who got murdered.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder someone. Is the concept of not murdering people so difficult to fathom? So difficult to contemplate? So difficult to support?
Chau was responsible for the act of trespassing. That's where his role in this begins and ends. The person responsible for killing him was the one who fired the arrow.
The bullet comes from the gun, not from the target.
Self defence.
I honestly want to know what other outcome you think should have happened with The scenario that has been provided to us.
Chau was unarmed. Chau did not attack anyone. It is literally, factually, objectively, impossible to kill someone in self-defense if that person is not attacking you and does not even possess a weapon. Killing an unarmed man is not self-defense--not legally, not technically, and not morally.
You can object that he might theoretically have been carrying a bacterium that could have made someone sick, but the islanders wouldn't know that--they don't have germ theory; no one did before the late nineteenth century. You can't have a justification based on a theory that no one on the island would know about. The closest thing we have is a documented example of someone getting sick after a previous contact... but people get sick all the time, and we have no actual proof that these people somehow knew, from a single isolated event, that foreigners carried dangerous diseases, and, if I'm not mistaken, that event was not even fatal.
Even if they did somehow anticipate modern germ theory, they still had the option of, you know, walking away from him.
What should the islanders have done? They have two options:
1. Find his boat, grab him, and push him onto the boat. 2. Leave him alone, since he's not hurting anyone and not threatening to hurt anyone.
You do not need the least bit of imagination to think of these alternatives.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder them.
I cannot think of anything more obvious than that.
This analysis is not obvious to me at all. It seems certain to me that the Sentinilese consider outsiders dangerous. That could be for various reasons, but fear of disease from outsiders was a human characteristic long before there was any knowledge of the mechanisms for transmitting disease and it actually seems quite likely to me that they feared getting into physical contact with a stranger.
Walking away was not a realistic option - effectively they'd already tried that since this wasn't Chau's first visit to the island.
As for murder, that's defined as an unlawful killing - and there's significant differences between societies in what is deemed lawful. I'm happy to criticize the Sentinilese for the way they apply their laws, just as I've criticized others (like the Israelis) for undertaking killings that most countries would deem as murder. However, I think you need to consider whether the Sentinilese themselves would consider this murder - personally I very much doubt it.
@Balrog99: Actually, I started talking about it because I heard people treating his death like it didn't matter, and I wanted to counteract that. It's not that his death is more tragic than any other; it's that his death has been treated like a joke or a non-issue, where other deaths are treated as a tragedy if they enter the news.
As for Khashoggi, I'm guessing his status as a journalists makes his death more worrisome for journalists, which I think is the primary reason it's shown up in the news as much as it did. On a more objective note, his death indicates something that other deaths have not: Saudi Arabia is not only willing to murder its enemies; it's willing to torture and dismember them alive before doing so. It's an indication that the Saudi government is actively sadistic instead of merely murderous.
"Ordinary" murders don't make the news because they don't show us anything we don't already know (people will kill each other over drugs; lovers will commit crimes of passion; muggings can go wrong; etc.). Unusual murders make the news because they show us something that's not already common knowledge (there's an island where the natives will kill intruders; Saudi Arabia tortures its victims before it kills them; the Kremlin is targeting its political enemies).
I do think it distorts our views of reality. A lot of people are under the impression that violence is getting more common, when statistically it's been gradually decreasing for centuries. It definitely warps our politics. We'd save a lot more lives by pouring billions into cancer research instead of the war on terror.
I very much object to the mindless mantra of "fake news!" and the idea that journalists just make stuff up, but it is important to realize there are sampling biases in the news. By nature, journalists report on the unusual and the surprising, and TV news in particular is designed to be attention-grabbing rather than strictly informative.
As for murder, that's defined as an unlawful killing - and there's significant differences between societies in what is deemed lawful. I'm happy to criticize the Sentinilese for the way they apply their laws, just as I've criticized others (like the Israelis) for undertaking killings that most countries would deem as murder. However, I think you need to consider whether the Sentinilese themselves would consider this murder - personally I very much doubt it.
There we have it--as long as something is lawful and that society doesn't consider it to be "murder" then it isn't murder. Really? Seriously? How about if a society thinks that it is okay, according to their own laws, that a man may marry a 10-year-old girl?
As long as enough of us agree that something is permissible and we make it legal then we can get away with *anything*.
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I guess no one cares about genetically editing embryos. That's probably for the best--that topic leads to a nasty can of worms.
It's been a busy day politically in the UK. One major issue is that the government lost a contempt of Parliament motion. That occurred because Parliament passed a motion last month specifically requiring the government to publish the full legal advice they were relying on in relation to the Brexit deal currently on the table. The government refused to do this and, while it's true that such advice is normally kept private, it's hard to argue that the government should be able to override the clearly expressed will of Parliament.
There's a separate process now been started to consider what the appropriate punishment should be for the contempt. It also seems almost certain that the legal advice will be published before the vote on the Brexit deal next month, so we will find out what the government wished to keep hidden.
There was a second significant matter as well. An advocate general of the European Court of Justice has given an opinion that the UK can unilaterally withdraw its intention to leave the EU. That opinion is not binding on the ECJ, but it's rare for them to disagree. That will reinforce the view of many MPs that it's not necessary to support the current Brexit proposals and I can't see them being passed next week.
What happens then is not clear, but what is becoming clear is that options previously ruled out as impossible (not just holding another referendum, but things like a Norway style free trade deal) will be under consideration again.
A no-deal Brexit is still possible as well, but there's no chance of getting a Parliamentary majority for that, so if supporters of that want to push for it the only way would be to support another referendum. Personally I very much doubt that would support no-deal, but I've heard plenty of ardent Brexiteers saying that they believe more people are in favor of Brexit than at the time of the last referendum - so they might want to gamble on the will of the people.
I'm not sure the Sentinelese even have a system of formal laws. Historically, only larger civilizations have legal systems; tribes handle things more informally, based on traditions rather than codified laws.
One cannot place blame on Chau over the natives that actually murdered him. It was their own choice to nock an arrow, aim it at another human being, and fire that arrow knowing that it would kill him. It takes a conscious choice to kill another human being; it doesn't just happen automatically. There was a brain behind that arrow, a brain that chose to fire it.
This is a simple issue of cause and effect. Chau died of arrow wounds. Where did the arrow come from? It came from a bow. Who was responsible for firing that arrow? The person who literally fired that arrow.
Chau didn't choose to raise that bow. Chau didn't choose to nock that arrow. Chau didn't choose to draw that bow. Chau didn't choose to aim that bow. Chau didn't choose to fire that arrow. So who is responsible for every step of that 5-step process?
The person with the bow.
This is what I mean by blaming the victim. To place the blame on Chau is to pretend that he was the only conscious being on that entire island, and that everything else was just a mindless machine with no free will. It takes a choice to kill another person. They knew what would happen if they shot him, and they still did it--they chose to kill him.
When one person draws a gun, aims the gun at another person, and pulls the trigger, the fact that that bullet results in the death of a human being is no accident. The fault lies with the person who fired the bullet, not the person who got murdered.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder someone. Is the concept of not murdering people so difficult to fathom? So difficult to contemplate? So difficult to support?
Chau was responsible for the act of trespassing. That's where his role in this begins and ends. The person responsible for killing him was the one who fired the arrow.
The bullet comes from the gun, not from the target.
Self defence.
I honestly want to know what other outcome you think should have happened with The scenario that has been provided to us.
Chau was unarmed. Chau did not attack anyone. It is literally, factually, objectively, impossible to kill someone in self-defense if that person is not attacking you and does not even possess a weapon. Killing an unarmed man is not self-defense--not legally, not technically, and not morally.
You can object that he might theoretically have been carrying a bacterium that could have made someone sick, but the islanders wouldn't know that--they don't have germ theory; no one did before the late nineteenth century. You can't have a justification based on a theory that no one on the island would know about. The closest thing we have is a documented example of someone getting sick after a previous contact... but people get sick all the time, and we have no actual proof that these people somehow knew, from a single isolated event, that foreigners carried dangerous diseases, and, if I'm not mistaken, that event was not even fatal.
Even if they did somehow anticipate modern germ theory, they still had the option of, you know, walking away from him.
What should the islanders have done? They have two options:
1. Find his boat, grab him, and push him onto the boat. 2. Leave him alone, since he's not hurting anyone and not threatening to hurt anyone.
You do not need the least bit of imagination to think of these alternatives.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder them.
I cannot think of anything more obvious than that.
How do you know they don’t have germ theory? You are assuming they don’t because they are primitive.
Maybe they do have some form of germ theory. Everytime someone has come onto the island, a bunch of them get sick and die. This has been documented in the past. What isn’t to say they don’t have their own documented system either written or oral?
As I said, these people are not violent unless you go near them. There is a reason behind that behaviour. That reason is unknown, but should be respected as they are living peacefully.
- If Chau was to survive, what is stopping him coming back again, this time with more people praising Jesus and an even higher chance of someone getting sick and dying?
Have him arrested? Then its a rallying cry of religious prosecution.
What should be the punishment for the tribe member that fired the arrow? Who should deliver that punishment?
One cannot place blame on Chau over the natives that actually murdered him. It was their own choice to nock an arrow, aim it at another human being, and fire that arrow knowing that it would kill him. It takes a conscious choice to kill another human being; it doesn't just happen automatically. There was a brain behind that arrow, a brain that chose to fire it.
This is a simple issue of cause and effect. Chau died of arrow wounds. Where did the arrow come from? It came from a bow. Who was responsible for firing that arrow? The person who literally fired that arrow.
Chau didn't choose to raise that bow. Chau didn't choose to nock that arrow. Chau didn't choose to draw that bow. Chau didn't choose to aim that bow. Chau didn't choose to fire that arrow. So who is responsible for every step of that 5-step process?
The person with the bow.
This is what I mean by blaming the victim. To place the blame on Chau is to pretend that he was the only conscious being on that entire island, and that everything else was just a mindless machine with no free will. It takes a choice to kill another person. They knew what would happen if they shot him, and they still did it--they chose to kill him.
When one person draws a gun, aims the gun at another person, and pulls the trigger, the fact that that bullet results in the death of a human being is no accident. The fault lies with the person who fired the bullet, not the person who got murdered.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder someone. Is the concept of not murdering people so difficult to fathom? So difficult to contemplate? So difficult to support?
Chau was responsible for the act of trespassing. That's where his role in this begins and ends. The person responsible for killing him was the one who fired the arrow.
The bullet comes from the gun, not from the target.
Self defence.
I honestly want to know what other outcome you think should have happened with The scenario that has been provided to us.
Chau was unarmed. Chau did not attack anyone. It is literally, factually, objectively, impossible to kill someone in self-defense if that person is not attacking you and does not even possess a weapon. Killing an unarmed man is not self-defense--not legally, not technically, and not morally.
You can object that he might theoretically have been carrying a bacterium that could have made someone sick, but the islanders wouldn't know that--they don't have germ theory; no one did before the late nineteenth century. You can't have a justification based on a theory that no one on the island would know about. The closest thing we have is a documented example of someone getting sick after a previous contact... but people get sick all the time, and we have no actual proof that these people somehow knew, from a single isolated event, that foreigners carried dangerous diseases, and, if I'm not mistaken, that event was not even fatal.
Even if they did somehow anticipate modern germ theory, they still had the option of, you know, walking away from him.
What should the islanders have done? They have two options:
1. Find his boat, grab him, and push him onto the boat. 2. Leave him alone, since he's not hurting anyone and not threatening to hurt anyone.
You do not need the least bit of imagination to think of these alternatives.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder them.
I cannot think of anything more obvious than that.
How do you know they don’t have germ theory? You are assuming they don’t because they are primitive.
Maybe they do have some form of germ theory. Everytime someone has come onto the island, a bunch of them get sick and die. This has been documented in the past. What isn’t to say they don’t have their own documented system either written or oral?
As I said, these people are not violent unless you go near them. There is a reason behind that behaviour. That reason is unknown, but should be respected as they are living peacefully.
- If Chau was to survive, what is stopping him coming back again, this time with more people praising Jesus and an even higher chance of someone getting sick and dying?
Have him arrested? Then its a rallying cry of religious prosecution.
What should be the punishment for the tribe member that fired the arrow? Who should deliver that punishment?
As far as we know it seems to be between 50-150 people on the island. There seems to be no way to punish the person who did it without putting authorities in danger or mowing the entire tribe down with guns. Bringing these people into the modern world doesn't seem possible without wiping them out completely. Which is why everyone begs people to stay the hell away. They've managed to survive for hundreds of years without modern conventions or Jesus. They have made it abundantly they want to be left alone.
This is the voter fraud the GOP has been waiting for. It's right here, a massive effort to steal an election. Only problem is, they are the ones who did it, and now they want the election certified anyway. Frankly, in the overall numbers, the difference between the Dems gaining 40 seats or 41 if this result is overturned matters little. But the utter contempt the modern Republican Party continues to show towards democracy itself is palpable.
I'm not sure the Sentinelese even have a system of formal laws. Historically, only larger civilizations have legal systems; tribes handle things more informally, based on traditions rather than codified laws.
I agree with this, but I see it as only another block in the argument that says we should not treat this situation as being analogous to the Kashoggi one, and that we should consider how we judge a people that we do not understand, and whom do not understand us.
@jjstraka34 I don't think anyone here is calling for the natives to punished. The main trend I've taken from this is two main ideas. 1. Chau is solely responsible for his own death, what happened isn't murder because he knew what he was doing was dangerous. So he deserves no sympathy. 2. All that Chau is responsible for is tresspassing, which does not make him deserve death, and what heppened is indeed murder.
There's a bit of right and wrong on both sides. What Chau did WAS dangerous and illegal, even if he had good intentons. But that does not make him responsible for how someone else reacted to his presence. To just disregard his death, and boil his intentions down to "stupidity" and "blind zealotry" is not only sociopathic, but disgusting. This was a tragic event.
I assume the Sentinelese don't have germ theory because humankind went millenia before discovering it. The theory didn't take hold until the 1890s, and even then, it was only present in a small portion of the world. You may as well suggest that the Sentinelese have figured out wave-particle duality or invented penicillin. There's no reason to assume an uncontacted society of 50-200 people independently came up with the same theory that took the entire rest of the world literally thousands of years to discover. If it was that easy for 200 people to figure out germ theory, why did it take so long for the other 1,000,000,000 people to figure it out in the nineteenth century?
I don't know what the best way to find the guilty party would be, but establishing contact and learning the language would involve a long process of gift exchanges and brief visits. Then you'd have to interview people to identify the individual responsible, who could then be arrested and given a trial. The arrest itself would be perfectly doable without lethal violence; police officers in body armor and shields would be able to survive bows and arrows without having to open fire on the natives.
In any case, I don't consider "it's difficult to prosecute" as a fair argument against prosecution. By taking no action, we're just reinforcing the notion that the Sentinelese are free to murder anyone who sets foot on the island.
Just because you learned something in grade school doesn't mean that it was easy for other people to discover. The Sentinelese would have to be 5 million times smarter than the rest of the world to make the same discovery with only 1/5000000 of the population.
@semiticgod Who would be responsible for the prosecution? Would you consider the Sentinelese to be part of the closest nation? Or would they be soverign unto themselves?
I assume the Sentinelese don't have germ theory because humankind went millenia before discovering it. The theory didn't take hold until the 1890s, and even then, it was only present in a small portion of the world. You may as well suggest that the Sentinelese have figured out wave-particle duality or invented penicillin. There's no reason to assume an uncontacted society of 50-200 people independently came up with the same theory that took the entire rest of the world literally thousands of years to discover. If it was that easy for 200 people to figure out germ theory, why did it take so long for the other 1,000,000,000 people to figure it out in the nineteenth century?
I don't know what the best way to find the guilty party would be, but establishing contact and learning the language would involve a long process of gift exchanges and brief visits. Then you'd have to interview people to identify the individual responsible, who could then be arrested and given a trial. The arrest itself would be perfectly doable without lethal violence; police officers in body armor and shields would be able to survive bows and arrows without having to open fire on the natives.
In any case, I don't consider "it's difficult to prosecute" as a fair argument against prosecution. By taking no action, we're just reinforcing the notion that the Sentinelese are free to murder anyone who sets foot on the island.
You don't need to figure out germ theory. "Interact with outsiders, people get sick and die" is a logical connection to make, and you don't need to know Germ theory to make a connection like that.
As for Chau, he's already been to the island twice. The first time, they raised their bows and arrows towards him- he left. The second time, they shot at him, it pierced his bible, he fled. Did he really think they were going to somehow be less hostile the third time? They'd already made it abundantly clear they didn't want him there- they'd shot at him and hit his bible, one guy had yelled at him. You know the definition of insanity- doing the same thing over and over and thinking the outcome will somehow be different this time.
Yes, it's sad he died. But he died doing something stupid and illegal. The laws not only protect the islanders, they also protect outsiders who might be killed by the islanders who apparently consider ousiders to be trespassers and will kill them. I don't consider the islanders at fault, any more than a tiger who kills a human trespassing into its den is at fault.
We (outsiders) know the islanders kill people who trespass onto their island. So why trespass? Leave it alone, stay away, and you'll be fine.
I assume the Sentinelese don't have germ theory because humankind went millenia before discovering it. The theory didn't take hold until the 1890s, and even then, it was only present in a small portion of the world. You may as well suggest that the Sentinelese have figured out wave-particle duality or invented penicillin. There's no reason to assume an uncontacted society of 50-200 people independently came up with the same theory that took the entire rest of the world literally thousands of years to discover. If it was that easy for 200 people to figure out germ theory, why did it take so long for the other 1,000,000,000 people to figure it out in the nineteenth century?
I don't know what the best way to find the guilty party would be, but establishing contact and learning the language would involve a long process of gift exchanges and brief visits. Then you'd have to interview people to identify the individual responsible, who could then be arrested and given a trial. The arrest itself would be perfectly doable without lethal violence; police officers in body armor and shields would be able to survive bows and arrows without having to open fire on the natives.
In any case, I don't consider "it's difficult to prosecute" as a fair argument against prosecution. By taking no action, we're just reinforcing the notion that the Sentinelese are free to murder anyone who sets foot on the island.
This is a little absurd to me. In the same post as you're castigating the ridiculousness of the idea of the Sentinelese knowing about Germ Theory, you're proposing that we decipher their language, that we endanger not only their way of life with our intrusion, but also their very lives by subjecting them to a plethora of diseases - and finally, we also then hold them to account for their actions based on rules and laws for which they've had no say in creating, and have no formal way of even knowing that they exist. Doing all that in this case seems equally ridiculous as the Sentinelese knowing about the duality of light.
In a word, that sounds very tyrannical.
The social contract, which is the very fabric upon which the concept of a society enforcing a system of laws that should (ideally) be just - requires a contract.
Just because you learned something in grade school doesn't mean that it was easy for other people to discover. The Sentinelese would have to be 5 million times smarter than the rest of the world to make the same discovery with only 1/5000000 of the population.
Or be in a unique position (completely iscolated) to get to some form of conclusion that makes sense to them.
They may not know the why, but they certainly know the effect.
If a snake bites you, you don’t have to understand human anatomy to know you’re going to die from it’s poison if you were told that others have died from a snake bite.
@deltago: Germ theory was the cause-and-effect; not just the technical mechanism. Before germ theory, folks in England still thought it was damp vapors that caused disease. It's not just the process that took so much time to understand; it was the cause that took so much time to understand.
@BallpointMan: They didn't have a role in creating the laws of any other nation, but they did have a role (the role) in killing this man, and yes, we do need to hold whoever shot the arrow to account for the murder. To do any less would be to tolerate an act of murder against an unarmed civilian traveling in peace.
Isolation is not realistic in the long term. As I've mentioned, a population that small can't survive this way indefinitely; inbreeding is going to make them even more vulnerable to diseases as time goes on, and not just foreign ones. Again, isolation is the cause of that vulnerability, not its solution.
All I want to establish is that the Sentinelese not murder people who trespass. "Don't kill people" isn't "tyrannical"; it's basic humanity. The only way you can do that is if you speak their language, and the only way you can learn the language is if you interact with them for a few weeks. A gift giving program could start the process.
Put on a hazmat suit if you have to. Spray the whole boat with disinfectant before you head out to the island to establish contact. It's not like we don't have the technology to sterilize materials.
There are numerous different ways you could establish the basic norm of "don't kill people" as long as you have a single person learn a few words of their language to send a single message. Give them a few pairs of handcuffs, a tin shack with an iron pole in it, and a solar-powered device that sends a message to the nearest authority when a button is pressed, and you have an easy solution for the tribe: if somebody trespasses, they handcuff the intruder in the shack, press the button, and wait for somebody to come pick up the intruder and take them off the island.
No violence. No bloodshed. No contamination. The reality is, you don't have to kill people to keep them off your lawn.
@semiticgod Who would be responsible for the prosecution? Would you consider the Sentinelese to be part of the closest nation? Or would they be soverign unto themselves?
I don't know. Myanmar is closer, but India claims it to be a native reserve, so presumably India would handle the prosecution. Alternatively, the U.S. might do so on Chau's behalf, or the U.N. might do so to serve as a more neutral arbiter. I doubt the Sentinelese have any kind of formal court system, and I'm guessing they wouldn't deem foreigners to possess any rights if it meant one of their own were culpable for the man's death (this is a community where everyone would know each other; they wouldn't convict one of their own).
I don't know what the punishment would be if the individual responsible could be identified (the islanders might refuse to disclose the person's identity, which would mean no conviction), but I'm thinking it should be made more lenient than would be typical for murder, if only for diplomatic purposes. Years of imprisonment in a foreign land would not be a suitable response for various reasons. The important thing to establish is that the natives can't kill intruders, but that they can still contact the local authorities and get them to remove any intruders who show up on the island.
@semiticgod I agree with 99% of this. But its unrealistic to hold the current murder(s) accountable. Maybe even unreasonable, I'm not sure if I'm willing to cross that line or not. The fact stands that these people have been isolated for so long, that there is no way to communicate with them at present. Currently, its impossible for us to understand each other. Yes, they are 100% responsible for murder. But we NEED to be able to communicate with them in some way to change their kill policy.
@ThacoBell: True. Establishing communication is the immediate prerequisite for a more stable international relationship with the island. There's not much you can do before you have a translator on hand.
I think the idea they can't survive in isolation indefinitely is disproven by the fact that they HAVE survived by simply living off what is on the island for centuries. If I was a betting man, I'd say left to their own devices, the Sentenilese would outlast most modern human societies. In many respects, they have already done so.
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I honestly want to know what other outcome you think should have happened with The scenario that has been provided to us.
The relative isolation of the First Nations, from far northern Canada all the way to the southern tip of Chile, ultimately led to their downfall. The civilizations of Europe, Africa, and Asia had been cross-pollinating each other for millennia, resulting in necessary advancements in technology. The Nations did not *need* things like gunpowder or railroads, which is why they never developed them.
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So....anyone have any thoughts about He Jiankui, the scientist who claims to have genetically edited two embryos using CRISPR technology?
In light of that, I do not blame the Sentinelese nor would I label them murderers for killing Chau. We have never had legitimate communication with these people. We do not understand them. They do not understand us. They are as close of an approximation of aliens as we are likely to find in our lifetime.
I do not think it is reasonable to hold them to some ever evolving moral code that our society has created( not even human society. I mean the USA) and which has been in development for all time as a result of our shared experiences.
Are they responsible for his death? Absolutely yes. Do I blame them? No.
The best analog i can think of is: If you drive without a seatbelt, and a drunk driver crashes into you. The responsibility lies with the driver, but we cannot and should not omit the context that you MAY have survived if you had buckled your seatbelt. It was your choice not to wear it. Does it change responsibility? Not necessarily - but it shouldn't be discounted.
You can object that he might theoretically have been carrying a bacterium that could have made someone sick, but the islanders wouldn't know that--they don't have germ theory; no one did before the late nineteenth century. You can't have a justification based on a theory that no one on the island would know about. The closest thing we have is a documented example of someone getting sick after a previous contact... but people get sick all the time, and we have no actual proof that these people somehow knew, from a single isolated event, that foreigners carried dangerous diseases, and, if I'm not mistaken, that event was not even fatal.
Even if they did somehow anticipate modern germ theory, they still had the option of, you know, walking away from him.
What should the islanders have done? They have two options:
1. Find his boat, grab him, and push him onto the boat.
2. Leave him alone, since he's not hurting anyone and not threatening to hurt anyone.
You do not need the least bit of imagination to think of these alternatives.
The alternative to murdering someone is to not murder them.
I cannot think of anything more obvious than that.
Walking away was not a realistic option - effectively they'd already tried that since this wasn't Chau's first visit to the island.
As for murder, that's defined as an unlawful killing - and there's significant differences between societies in what is deemed lawful. I'm happy to criticize the Sentinilese for the way they apply their laws, just as I've criticized others (like the Israelis) for undertaking killings that most countries would deem as murder. However, I think you need to consider whether the Sentinilese themselves would consider this murder - personally I very much doubt it.
As for Khashoggi, I'm guessing his status as a journalists makes his death more worrisome for journalists, which I think is the primary reason it's shown up in the news as much as it did. On a more objective note, his death indicates something that other deaths have not: Saudi Arabia is not only willing to murder its enemies; it's willing to torture and dismember them alive before doing so. It's an indication that the Saudi government is actively sadistic instead of merely murderous.
"Ordinary" murders don't make the news because they don't show us anything we don't already know (people will kill each other over drugs; lovers will commit crimes of passion; muggings can go wrong; etc.). Unusual murders make the news because they show us something that's not already common knowledge (there's an island where the natives will kill intruders; Saudi Arabia tortures its victims before it kills them; the Kremlin is targeting its political enemies).
I do think it distorts our views of reality. A lot of people are under the impression that violence is getting more common, when statistically it's been gradually decreasing for centuries. It definitely warps our politics. We'd save a lot more lives by pouring billions into cancer research instead of the war on terror.
I very much object to the mindless mantra of "fake news!" and the idea that journalists just make stuff up, but it is important to realize there are sampling biases in the news. By nature, journalists report on the unusual and the surprising, and TV news in particular is designed to be attention-grabbing rather than strictly informative.
As long as enough of us agree that something is permissible and we make it legal then we can get away with *anything*.
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I guess no one cares about genetically editing embryos. That's probably for the best--that topic leads to a nasty can of worms.
There's a separate process now been started to consider what the appropriate punishment should be for the contempt. It also seems almost certain that the legal advice will be published before the vote on the Brexit deal next month, so we will find out what the government wished to keep hidden.
There was a second significant matter as well. An advocate general of the European Court of Justice has given an opinion that the UK can unilaterally withdraw its intention to leave the EU. That opinion is not binding on the ECJ, but it's rare for them to disagree. That will reinforce the view of many MPs that it's not necessary to support the current Brexit proposals and I can't see them being passed next week.
What happens then is not clear, but what is becoming clear is that options previously ruled out as impossible (not just holding another referendum, but things like a Norway style free trade deal) will be under consideration again.
A no-deal Brexit is still possible as well, but there's no chance of getting a Parliamentary majority for that, so if supporters of that want to push for it the only way would be to support another referendum. Personally I very much doubt that would support no-deal, but I've heard plenty of ardent Brexiteers saying that they believe more people are in favor of Brexit than at the time of the last referendum - so they might want to gamble on the will of the people.
Maybe they do have some form of germ theory. Everytime someone has come onto the island, a bunch of them get sick and die. This has been documented in the past. What isn’t to say they don’t have their own documented system either written or oral?
As I said, these people are not violent unless you go near them. There is a reason behind that behaviour. That reason is unknown, but should be respected as they are living peacefully.
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If Chau was to survive, what is stopping him coming back again, this time with more people praising Jesus and an even higher chance of someone getting sick and dying?
Have him arrested? Then its a rallying cry of religious prosecution.
What should be the punishment for the tribe member that fired the arrow? Who should deliver that punishment?
This is the voter fraud the GOP has been waiting for. It's right here, a massive effort to steal an election. Only problem is, they are the ones who did it, and now they want the election certified anyway. Frankly, in the overall numbers, the difference between the Dems gaining 40 seats or 41 if this result is overturned matters little. But the utter contempt the modern Republican Party continues to show towards democracy itself is palpable.
1. Chau is solely responsible for his own death, what happened isn't murder because he knew what he was doing was dangerous. So he deserves no sympathy.
2. All that Chau is responsible for is tresspassing, which does not make him deserve death, and what heppened is indeed murder.
There's a bit of right and wrong on both sides. What Chau did WAS dangerous and illegal, even if he had good intentons. But that does not make him responsible for how someone else reacted to his presence. To just disregard his death, and boil his intentions down to "stupidity" and "blind zealotry" is not only sociopathic, but disgusting. This was a tragic event.
I don't know what the best way to find the guilty party would be, but establishing contact and learning the language would involve a long process of gift exchanges and brief visits. Then you'd have to interview people to identify the individual responsible, who could then be arrested and given a trial. The arrest itself would be perfectly doable without lethal violence; police officers in body armor and shields would be able to survive bows and arrows without having to open fire on the natives.
In any case, I don't consider "it's difficult to prosecute" as a fair argument against prosecution. By taking no action, we're just reinforcing the notion that the Sentinelese are free to murder anyone who sets foot on the island.
As for Chau, he's already been to the island twice. The first time, they raised their bows and arrows towards him- he left. The second time, they shot at him, it pierced his bible, he fled. Did he really think they were going to somehow be less hostile the third time? They'd already made it abundantly clear they didn't want him there- they'd shot at him and hit his bible, one guy had yelled at him. You know the definition of insanity- doing the same thing over and over and thinking the outcome will somehow be different this time.
Yes, it's sad he died. But he died doing something stupid and illegal. The laws not only protect the islanders, they also protect outsiders who might be killed by the islanders who apparently consider ousiders to be trespassers and will kill them. I don't consider the islanders at fault, any more than a tiger who kills a human trespassing into its den is at fault.
We (outsiders) know the islanders kill people who trespass onto their island. So why trespass? Leave it alone, stay away, and you'll be fine.
This is a little absurd to me. In the same post as you're castigating the ridiculousness of the idea of the Sentinelese knowing about Germ Theory, you're proposing that we decipher their language, that we endanger not only their way of life with our intrusion, but also their very lives by subjecting them to a plethora of diseases - and finally, we also then hold them to account for their actions based on rules and laws for which they've had no say in creating, and have no formal way of even knowing that they exist. Doing all that in this case seems equally ridiculous as the Sentinelese knowing about the duality of light.
In a word, that sounds very tyrannical.
The social contract, which is the very fabric upon which the concept of a society enforcing a system of laws that should (ideally) be just - requires a contract.
They may not know the why, but they certainly know the effect.
If a snake bites you, you don’t have to understand human anatomy to know you’re going to die from it’s poison if you were told that others have died from a snake bite.
@BallpointMan: They didn't have a role in creating the laws of any other nation, but they did have a role (the role) in killing this man, and yes, we do need to hold whoever shot the arrow to account for the murder. To do any less would be to tolerate an act of murder against an unarmed civilian traveling in peace.
Isolation is not realistic in the long term. As I've mentioned, a population that small can't survive this way indefinitely; inbreeding is going to make them even more vulnerable to diseases as time goes on, and not just foreign ones. Again, isolation is the cause of that vulnerability, not its solution.
All I want to establish is that the Sentinelese not murder people who trespass. "Don't kill people" isn't "tyrannical"; it's basic humanity. The only way you can do that is if you speak their language, and the only way you can learn the language is if you interact with them for a few weeks. A gift giving program could start the process.
Put on a hazmat suit if you have to. Spray the whole boat with disinfectant before you head out to the island to establish contact. It's not like we don't have the technology to sterilize materials.
There are numerous different ways you could establish the basic norm of "don't kill people" as long as you have a single person learn a few words of their language to send a single message. Give them a few pairs of handcuffs, a tin shack with an iron pole in it, and a solar-powered device that sends a message to the nearest authority when a button is pressed, and you have an easy solution for the tribe: if somebody trespasses, they handcuff the intruder in the shack, press the button, and wait for somebody to come pick up the intruder and take them off the island.
No violence. No bloodshed. No contamination. The reality is, you don't have to kill people to keep them off your lawn.
I don't know what the punishment would be if the individual responsible could be identified (the islanders might refuse to disclose the person's identity, which would mean no conviction), but I'm thinking it should be made more lenient than would be typical for murder, if only for diplomatic purposes. Years of imprisonment in a foreign land would not be a suitable response for various reasons. The important thing to establish is that the natives can't kill intruders, but that they can still contact the local authorities and get them to remove any intruders who show up on the island.