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<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>John D.,<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>Remarkable response. I said that the old <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place
w:st="on">America</st1:place></st1:country-region> was more “respectable,”
not more “pleasant.” Apparently, you think scientific advance
makes up for moral decline, which is perfect commentary to where we are now at.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>Michael Metzler<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal><font size=3 face="Times New Roman"><span style='font-size:
12.0pt'>Michael <metzler@moscow.com> wrote:<br>
<br>
> Thanks for the note. Idealizing the past is precisely what I <br>
> intended not to communicate in my short response. I think that<br>
> both the north and the south had a more respectable culture <br>
> than the one we live in now. This was merely a weak comparison. <br>
> It was a time a bit more saturated with fidelity, honor, <br>
> morality, discipline, respect, love, chastity, beauty, <br>
> architecture, religion, love of God, etc. The land was not as <br>
> filled with idolatry, hatred, bitterness, disloyalty, adultery, <br>
> infidelity, dishonor, laziness, paganism, immorality, <br>
> relativism, general cultural breakdown, statism, impiety, and <br>
> just about any cultural non-good the western world spent 1500 <br>
> years enumerating. That’s all I was referring to.<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
Since 1850, life expectancy in the ! US has risen from around 40 years to
around 75 years:<br>
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005140.html<br>
<br>
Since 1865, vacines have been developed against anthrax, diphtheria, hepatitis,
measles, mumps, pertussis, polio, rabies, rubella, tetanus, tuberculosis, and
yellow fever.<br>
We now have, among others, antibiotics, the germ theory of disease, the
defibrillator, the artificial heart, in vitro fertilisation, an understanding
of human blood types and vitamins, and the human genome has been mapped.<br>
Since 1865, humanity has invented or discovered the air conditioner, the
automobile, barbed wire, the birth control pill, the cathode ray tube, color
photography, the compact disc, computed tomography, the computer, the
dishwasher, dynamite, the dynamo, the electric motor, e-mail, fiber optics, the
Geiger counter, the Global Positioning System, the gramophone record, the
helicopter, the integrated circuit, the laser, the Internet, the jet engine,
the light-emit! ting diode, the liquid fuel rocket, magnetic resonance imaging,
the magnetic tape recorder, the microprocessor, the microwave oven, molecular
biology, the motor cycle, nuclear energy, the pipeline, the pneumatic hammer,
the pocket calculator, polymers, radar, television, radio communication, the
radio telescope, the remote control, satellites, the seismograph, the
spectrophotometer, stainless steel, the steam turbine, the telephone, the
traffic light, the transistor, ultrasonography, the vacuum cleaner, the washing
machine, and the wind tunnel.<br>
<br>
I think we're better of in 2005 than in 1850.<o:p></o:p></span></font></p>
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12.0pt'><o:p> </o:p></span></font></p>
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