Hans Rosling

[Korona 0]

I posted this funky video a while ago:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/hans_ro...on_poverty.html

 

It turns out he has a website too called gapminder.org

It's pretty sweet to check out. It busts a lot of myths, f.e. the laughable idea that the British have bad teeth:

Bad Teeth,,

Or the significant wealth and health disparities inside the US (east coast ftw)

Wealth/Health,,

[BlckWyerve 0]

Oh gee, another GLORIOUS BRITONS BEAT PIG AMERICANS thread.

[Count von Phoib 0]

Feel free to start a "Why the Brits suck, an American perspective" :P

[Logan Hartke 0]

July 4th is coming. Enough said.

 

Logan Hartke

Edited June 2, 2009 by Logan Hartke

[killakanz 0]

Horay! The celebration of our dumping of America!

[Korona 0]

Ish why so sensitive? Debunking a US prejudice equates to "US sucks"? If you look at the graph you can see that both countries are way low down on the chart. Compare it to a sugar producing country like the Dominican Republic and you can see how bad things get without good oral hygiene. It is funny that the UK is a little bit lower given the American stereotype but it doesn't really mean that much. I was just trying to show how this ostensivly dry statistics site is laid out so well that it makes the content fun and interesting, there is no need to take it as an outright attack.

 

 

 

Harharharhar anyway, how about this video:

 

 

All his videos are wicked:

http://www.gapminder.org/videos/

[Logan Hartke 0]

Horay! The celebration of our dumping of America!

Yeah, the Battle of Saratoga was just your guys dying to get away from this insufferable land.

 

In fact, if you Brits knew your history, you'd know that a lot of your army that lost that war didn't even want to go back to Jolly Old England!

 

The Brits have been sore ever since the whole Suez thing. That's where the US held Britain by the balls politically while holding their economy hostage. The US could have brought the British economy to a standstill, and that's not US propaganda, that's according to the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time!

 

But don't worry, I'm sure you're still superior.

 

Logan Hartke

[killakanz 0]

All this time Logan, and you still don't know me do you? ;)

[Goose 0]

It doesn't matter how well it's written, or how many links you post to support your argument, you're still making a childish point Logan. No-one in this thread is trying to say Britain is better than America, it might not have translated across writing but Korona and Killa aren't being serious, enough with the defensiveness.

[Logan Hartke 0]

It doesn't matter how well it's written, or how many links you post to support your argument, you're still making a childish point Logan. No-one in this thread is trying to say Britain is better than America, it might not have translated across writing but Korona and Killa aren't being serious, enough with the defensiveness.

It wasn't me that said it originally, and it was clear what Korona was trying to get across from the content of the links and the selected graphs he chose. It was BlckWyerve that mentioned it originally and something that just about every American that posts regularly on this forum has echoed in the past. Korona's posts consist 75% of this childish "UK is better than the US" jingoistic nonsense. He's like a constant stream of Jeremy Clarkson but without the wit, humor, and nice cars.

 

Phoib suggested we turn it around. I merely said that July 4th was coming up and that was evidence enough of, as he put it, "Why the Brits suck, an American perspective".

 

You think this stuff is childish? I agree. We've been saying that now for months. But your countryman seems to get kicks from it, so if you can get him to put down his rattle and little Union Jack, then maybe we can move on.

 

Logan Hartke

[Goose 0]

I personally can't make the connection between statistics about teeth, internal US economics, and jingoism. But then I can't say I've ever heard anyone say that British people have bad teeth so maybe it's just gone over my head.

[Rattuskid 0]

British people 'have bad teeth' just like the French stink, the Germans are all into fetish sex and the Japanese are all short.

 

Some truth turned stereotype, not universal, and far from categorical. Still, some fit the bill. On that note though, Miss Boyle has decent teeth, if only the rest of her looked as good...

[IconOfEvi 0]

...but the Germans are into fetish sex...

 

Alls Im happy is that there wasn't a comparison for roads inside the US, otherwise for Korona, it would have been like, a double trigger.

Edited June 2, 2009 by IconOfEvi

[Korona 0]

..And Japs ARE small...

 

If you want to read some kind of jingoism into my posts then be my guest but not being able to laugh at your own nation's foibles is a very poor trait.

 

However in this thread we discuss the videos charts and website in general. If people can't do that from this post downwards then I will just move/delete everything except for my own posts. I really like this guy and I think he has a very interesting website. I don't want to see it derailed by internet heroes who can't take my poor sense of humour with good graces.

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER!:

If you are just pent up with rage at this jingoistic thread (and others exactly like it) then why not make a topic about it? Or send me a PM?

[spyvspy 0]

I checked out the time replay thing. Somebody needs to do something about that continual drop in the infant mortality rate, or were all screwed.

[Monkey 0]

I checked out the time replay thing. Somebody needs to do something about that continual drop in the infant mortality rate, or were all screwed. restaurants will be tolerable

 

[Rattuskid 0]

Although there were a lot of direction flipping modifiers, I like how Monkey can completely misread that and come up with the same conclusion.

 

I'm hoping for a mass outbreak of rabies. It's the only disease that seems like it would be cool to die from aside from just mildly gross.

 

"I'm crrrrrrazy... and I may bit your ass! Watch me thrash."

[Monkey 0]

Yeah, I kinda fucked that up. Whatever, I stand by my assertion. Less babies means less noise and more cigarettes.

Edited June 3, 2009 by Monkey

[Korona 0]

But babies love to smoke!

 

 

 

 

It seems like if you watch over time the fall in infant mortality is pushing down the birth rate too. If anything the fall in infant mortality is actually slower than the decline in births leading to many western countries now experiencing population contraction. Then again check out Kuwait in 1991 (!) Sucks to be them.

 

Switching the birth rate axis to display logarithmicly really accentuates it when a country slips into negative "growth". I wonder if the UK will avoid that.

[Rattuskid 0]

Negative population growth seems like the most humane, least intrusive way to stabilize populations in places which are otherwise overcrowded.

 

Perhaps it's a mechanism we picked up from past, something inbuilt in our social and reproductive dynamics?

[Mehman 0]

Birth rates are falling because in the western world we don't have the need to pump out 300 kids to survive. We can now produce 1 offspring and that's enough for our genes to survive and the population is far from being extinct. There's no need for 5 kids and I don't understand why you'd want 5 kids.

[IconOfEvi 0]

Or perhaps its just what all societies do when they subconsciously or whatever resign themselves to destruction.

 

Columnist Spengler wrote a lot on this...

[Rattuskid 0]

If that were true, shouldn't Japan have... imploded by now?

[IconOfEvi 0]

They're well on their way to that...

 

Japan has the lowest birthrate in the world I think. At least among industrial nations. In Japan, its a catastrophe everyone knows about, yet no one doing anything about it. I think Koizumi, when he was PM, even said, literally "Start fucking more, have more babies". That kinda desperate.

[Mehman 0]

Even the japs don't want more japs.