Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Asian Catastrophes



What's with the massive loss of life from earthquakes and hurricanes in Asia? 100,000 dead from a typhoon in Burma... 20,000 dead from an earthquake in China.
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Doomsday prophets might give this as evidence that we come closer to the "End of Days".
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I think that's hogwash.
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As the earth has become a global village via the Internet and other communication media, obscure provinces in China become next door neighbors. In 1916, a meteorite hit Siberia with the force of 1000 nuclear explosions. Nobody knew about it for 10 years. That could never happen today.
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At any rate, thousands of people dying in natural catastrophes seems to be more of a 3rd world phenomenon. Katrina in New Orleans left 1800 dead.... a relatively low number compared to the carnage in Asia.
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The only thing I can think of for the exponential Asian loss of life is a difference in building codes between the two cultures.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Tread lightly on the group hug via the internet. Nothing replaces having a person right in front of you. And especially some one else's words (media, bloggers, etc) describing the needs of a group of people made up, naturally, of individuals. Who by natural law should be allowed to speak for themselves.

I believe it was Billy Idol who said, "I want my MTV!"