Why is the rest of the worlds opinion of the US negative?

[Norman Bates]

One could argue about the time before 1945 , but America is without doubt the leading nation in science afterwards and will probably continue to be for some time.

 

[Mandinka2]

OK, well nice to see what your agenda is.

Automobile
Flight
Numerous vaccines
Nuclear energy
Man on the moon
Spaceship to the edge of the solar system
The computer
The Internet

More has been accomplished in the last 100 years of American existence than in the 4 billion earth years that preceded it.

Hater.

LOL! Matt , do you really think that I care enough to hate anyone or anything for that matter? Not at all , I give you one thing - the flight was probably a good breakthrough but revolutionary? My view is that it wasn't so , in any case the first plane to take off from a level surface was designed by a Brazilian.
Automobile ? That's a laugh - production process yes , but you'll have to give that to Stevenson and the likes of Daimler Benz and co., who makes the best cars in the world - the Italians of all people - Ferrari , Lambo etc.,
Vaccines - Marie Curie etc., (French) also development of antibiotics.
Man on the moon - well Von Braun was spirited outta Germany at the end of the war as I'm sure you well know which is why the stereotypical rocket scientist in America speaks with a German accent.
Nuclear energy - this is really bullshit - I expected more from you - there was not one truly prominent American amongst the Manhattan project , Italians and Germans , since then there has only been one New Zealander - Erwin Schrodinger.
Spaceship - you mean "hubble"? - not in my opinion a major breakthrough
Computer . Once again Britain and Germany
Internet - major work plus conception by British engineer working at BT (patent expired).
Nice try chum but you should pick your opponents more carefully

 

[HansNZ]

OK guys, just in Matt's defense, as far as Americans go on here he's not that arrogant. There are MUCH worse Yankees on this board. His perceptions of the USA tend to be a lot more balanced than those of pOink, ariolanine, jonnyJuice, etc., etc.

There are a few things in his post that I think need to be commented on.

FACT: Nature didn't give man flight. Man gave it to himself. where did man get flight? America.

I will concede that the Wright Brothers are the first people to have properly documented their flight. There are others before them who probably flew first but for whatever reason have not fully documented their attempts. There was even a man here in New Zealand who flew several years before the Wright brothers. His flight was witnessed by many people, but for reasons too complicated to go into here his success wasn't recognised.

FACT: Nuclear fusion does not occur on Earth in Nature, only in the stars. Man has brought nuclear fusion to Earth; that's how a hydrogen bomb works. Same good old fusion you'd find on the Sun. And where did man perfect nuclear fusion on Earth? America. We are struggling with cold fusion, but then again, Nature hasn't produced that either.

The first persdon to split the atom was a Nobel Prize winning New Zealander called Earnest Rutherford. The Manhattan project was a continuation of the work done by the British.

FACT: Nature put Man on earth. Man decided he wanted to visit the moon. so he did. What country did this? All together now....America.

As far as space flight is corncerned the Russians were ahead of the US. The US scored the glamour victory of getting someone on the moon simply because the Russians didn't have the economic resources to do this. Russia basically scored the most "firsts". Both the American and Russian space programmes owed their existence to the work of the Germans in Rocketry prior to and during WW2.

FACT: You and I have never met. We are thousand of miles apart. Yet we can exchange comments at near light speed. How? Using our computers on this wacky thing called the Internet. Where were computers invented? America. And which country invented the Internet? well, holy shit....it's America.

Computers were invented by a British man named Babbage. The internet was developed by Researchers in Switzerland working at CERN on subatomic research. The system was designed to help deal with all the information sharing required. The US military took the prototype for their own purposes which then developed into the internet we know today.
___________

The US is indeed a major leader in Reasearch and Development. There is no doubt about that. But there is a tendency in American culture to be grandstanding and to make false claims for the USA which don't stand up to scrutiny.

Just my 2c.

 

[Mandinka2]

OK guys, just in Matt's defense, as far as Americans go on here he's not that arrogant. There are MUCH worse Yankees on this board. His perceptions of the USA tend to be a lot more balanced than those of pOink, ariolanine, jonnyJuice, etc., etc.

There are a few things in his post that I think need to be commented on.



I will concede that the Wright Brothers are the first people to have properly documented their flight. There are others before them who probably flew first but for whatever reason have not fully documented their attempts. There was even a man here in New Zealand who flew several years before the Wright brothers. His flight was witnessed by many people, but for reasons too complicated to go into here his success wasn't recognised.



The first persdon to split the atom was a Nobel Prize winning New Zealander called Earnest Rutherford. The Manhattan project was a continuation of the work done by the British.




As far as space flight is corncerned the Russians were ahead of the US. The US scored the glamour victory of getting someone on the moon simply because the Russians didn't have the economic resources to do this. Russia basically scored the most "firsts". Both the American and Russian space programmes owed their existence to the work of the Germans in Rocketry prior to and during WW2.



Computers were invented by a British man named Babbage. The internet was developed by Researchers in Switzerland working at CERN on subatomic research. The system was designed to help deal with all the information sharing required. The US military took the prototype for their own purposes which then developed into the internet we know today.
___________

The US is indeed a major leader in Reasearch and Development. There is no doubt about that. But there is a tendency in American culture to be grandstanding and to make false claims for the USA which don't stand up to scrutiny.

Just my 2c.

Actually you're dead right there Hans , it was Rutherford and not Schrodinger as I mentioned in my post to Matt , he is buried in Lanesborough , Ireland outside a power plant that my father passes by every day. He was truly a man of invention and a revolutionary.

I agree with you about Matt which is why I'm surpised that he labels me a "hater" , I took it in jest and hope it was meant as that. But you are incorrect over your assertion that it was the British who laid the foundations for the Mahattan project , the credit must go to Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn who left Germany when they realised what they had discovered. Fermi was also deeply influential there.

 

[Frackal]

We invented multi-camera angle DVD porn. I challenge you to find a greater contribution to the world.

 

[Mandinka2]

We invented multi-camera angle DVD porn. I challenge you to find a greater contribution to the world.

I will always be thankful to you o master for that (bows respectfully)

 

[Frackal]

Also guys remember that we ARE a nation of immigrants so the fact that these things came out of America may be more relevant than the ethnic backgrounds of their authors...

 

[Mandinka2]

Also guys remember that we ARE a nation of immigrants so the fact that these things came out of America may be more relevant than the ethnic backgrounds of their authors...

Well where I can agree with you to an extent Frack , I do think that some of the technology was blatently stolen , if I do pioneering reearch in America is that work therefore American? What if that work was done in a different country but working for an American company (Viagra/Pfizer comes to mind)? But I do agree , the line is somewhat blurred when multinational projects are concerned. That is why I was concetrating upon singular nations/empires efforts in my comparison. I'll tell you what , I think Edison and Henry Ford were pretty good , with the light bulb (or at least it'S mass production) bein a pretty decent achievement.

 

[musclebrains]

Well as a European i can certainly agree to that. It's one of the things that makes it hard to live here and i can definitely see why there are so many poeple on anti-depressants. .

Very true but it's not just the reduction of symptoms that makes them popular. Most current anti-depressants have an amphetamine-like quality and increase productivity. Ritalin and Adderall, which are also broadly over-prescribed, have the same effect, actually being amphetamines, of course.

 

[musclebrains]

Extremists say USA is responsible for half a million people dying due to the sanctions. That is wrong on 5 counts.

1. iraq started the war that led to the sanctions
2. iraq refuses to disarm and end the sanctions
3. iraq refuses to use the humanitarian oil for food program to end starvation
4. iraq refuses to distribute humanitarian aid freely
5. the security council as a whole supported the sanctions, not just the US

people learn to censor themselves and their thoughts after a while. None of these facts probably even crosses the minds of people who view the US as being directly responsible for the deaths in Iraq.

Notice how you speak for "Iraq" in your list of five facts above. You are conflating Hussein with the Iraqi people. "Iraq" didn't start Gulf War I; Hussein and his army did. It's easy to say "Iraq" deserves the sanctions when you equate the people -- almost 50 percent of them under 20 -- with their murderous leader. It's not so easy when you account for the difference and wonder if it's fair to torture an already suffering people on account of their dictator. It's not as easy as you represent it by a convenient linguistic trick.

I don't know a soul on the left who thinks Hussein isn't bottom-line responsible for the misery in Iraq and would like to see him deposed. The question is whether a retrospective humanitarian objection legitimates a military invasion that will further destabilize the country and attempt to install a government like our own.