Real thanksgiving

[granfire]

it has really made a huge step away from the sports arena becoming a sport in its own right...
but you gotta bring your ear plugs....

 

[billc]

I think here in the states it cheerleading just lost out on being declared a sport by whoever governs that sort of thing here. Because of that they lose out on a lot of protections that the other sports get. Penn and Teller, on their show Bulls**t, did an expose on cheerleading and its fight for recognition as an official sport as opposed to, I think you would call it an activity.

 

[granfire]

well, it's a girly activity to support the jocks on the football team.
But it's a sport

 

[WC_lun]

It definitely take physical skills and discipline. I can appreciate that. Though, like Tez, it isn't something I'm really into. If ESPN2 is showing a cheerleader tournament and ESPN is is playing basketball, I'll watch basketball...and I don't really care for basketball

 

[Tez3]

We were talking oin the car on the way back about how the media portrays children today as just sitting in front of computers all day yet thousands and thousands of kids this weekend would have been doing some activity or another, there are many thousands involved in Guidng and Scouting, theres hundreds of sports kids are involved in, football is obviously popular here, theres hundreds of kids teams, even leagues for them, street dance is hugely popular here,as well as other types of dance, there's thousands (boys and girls) involved in cheerleading, I know too there are thousands in the various martial arts, the 'street' sports such as skate boarding and anything to do with bikes are popular, we have gymnastic clubs, athletic clubs etc etc the kids aren't as they are portrayed by the media, the kids are moving! Of course some are sitting all day on computers and games but not all and it certainly isn't an 'epidemic'. there are also thousands of competitions in these sports and activities that kids enjoy which knocks the old chestnut about competition not being good for kids on the head. Kids are still kids!

Now that's something to be thankful for!

 

[granfire]

kids are better than their reputation.

But too many fall into the stereotype...

 

[elder999]

Elder 999, the technology of the sail, ships, navigation were what I tried debating with my history professor, it is good that you caught that little bit of technology. Had the early native americans had their own navy things would have been completely different back then

As I'll show, technologies develop where there's a need for them, usually driven by overused resources, but also by some other necessity-like laziness.

The Polynesians had-or, rather, have-a complex ancient navigational system that allowed them to cross vast distances in the Pacific, with near pinpoint precision. Didn't keep Europeans from conquering them......

. Rush and Stossle are still right, the communal nature of the settlement was killing them. Supply ships took months to make that crossing, when they were able to get there in the first place. The giving each family a parcel of land for their own use saved the settlers.

Rush and Stossle are wrong. They've got the wrong "thanksgiving." There wouldn't ahve been a 1623 and changed rules if the Wampanoag hadn't protected and fed them back in 1621. More people and supplies-what the Pilgrims were "giving thanks" for-arrived in 1623, but could as easily have arrived to an empty settlement, if not for the Wampanoag.

. The natives showed how quickly they could use their bows, vs. the slower weapons of the colonists. However, the colonists placed a metal breast plate on a tree. The natives shot at it only to have their arrows bounce off. The natives were then said to have picked up their gear and left in a huff.

I'd like a citation please. Knowing the nature of armor and primitive bows at the time, as well as the nature of the people involved this anecdote seems specious to me.


The technological advantage of the Europeans eventually won the day, that's all. They brought more people, their tech improved and the early native americans were pushed out because they couldn't compete. It happens.

You might want to check out the book, "War before civillization," because the early peoples were just as savage as the europeans.

Don't have to look in the book; it's in my blood. On occasion, I want to rip someone's heart out and have a piece.....alas, it's more than frowned upon in the society I find myself in....:lfao:

Alrighty, then-technology.

Often, the urge to explore, and enhance technology comes from a real limitation in resources. Where resources are adequate, or more than adequate, as they were for Indians before the arrival of Europeans, there is no impetus for developing technology beyond that which meets their needs.

Sometimes a change comes along that is radical-this was the case for the Commanche and their "discovery" of the horse. Left behind by Spanish explorers, horse herds soon populated the plains, and transformed the Commanche from the "stone-age hunter gatherers" you confused the Eastern Woodlands Indians with earlier to what some would call the greatest light cavalry in history in less than 200 years.

Sometimes, the need arises from laziness. Funny story: there was a professor named Johnson at Northwestern University back at the end of the 19th century. His classroom was on the third floor. Professor Johnson was a rather portly fellow, and was annoyed that he had to go down four flights of stairs to the basement to adjust the boiler in the winter-then go up the stairs. Then go back down when his room got too warm. Then go up the stairs. Then go back down when his room got too cool. Then...well, you get the idea. So, he made the first variable remote thermostat-and could adjust the temperature in his room and control the boiler from that room. This was, of course, also the very first Johnson Control, a company that is still with us today, world wide....Some might call it necessity, but Laziness is the mother of invention :lfao: