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I tend to relate a great deal of human behavior to basic biology, and I have some Freudian leanings. I believe many of the differences between men and women are based on the simple fact that young men can conceive as many children in a single day, as women can conceive in an entire lifetime. So, men really have no particular need or reason to have a high degree of control over their immediate social environment in order to propagate their gene pool. They don’t need to stick around and control a community in order that a small number of children can survive. The optimal strategy for men to spread their gene pool, is simply to propagate as much as possible, in as many places as possible, over as far a domain as possible. Hence, why talk to people a lot? It’s a waste of time. They could be seeking out more females, in distant frontiers, rather than wasting their time talking. In contrast, women have to nurture and protect their small brood, in order to survive through their genes, for posterity. They have to control and influence everyone around them, and their small brood, in order to keep them alive. They must survive as long as possible, to bear as many children as possible, and to protect their children, by controlling everyone around them with social control strategies — usually, human communication. Women have to talk about everything, because everything and anything could be relevant to the survival of their small brood of children, while men are busy travelling the world simply trying to “conquer” as many women as possible! ------------------------------- Although the term Nazi actually means “national socialism”, it can be quite easily argued that the terms are totally contradictory, since socialism is, by definition, internationalist, in that it advocates that the world community as a whole should control resources and production, for the common good. In other words, the very term that Hitler coined for his “movement” was a lie! Hitler was a fascist, and fascists believe in a high degree of centralized government control to pursue national interests — there is no internationalist element in fascism, even when fascists temporarily choose to ally themselves with other nations. ------------------------------------ I think Saddam Hussein and his generals were never really expecting to have to fight a Gulf War, almost up the point when actual fighting began. President George Bush Sr. had virtually agreed to his invasion of Kuwait, so, President Hussein was genuinely perplexed by the hysterical American reaction following the invasion. Saddam saw the whole thing as a kind of American game, or bluff. What Saddam didn’t understand was that, with the USSR collapsing, President Bush was actually looking for an opportunity, really any opportunity at all, to allow America to flew its muscles, and show that the U.S. was the only real superpower in the world now. Saddam didn’t realize that he was just being used for this purpose, although he posed no particular threat to the U.S. So, Saddam’s actions were not based on his belief that Iraq was actually more powerful than the U.S., but, that there really was no reason for the U.S. to fight Iraq, so, they wouldn’t. Saddam didn’t understand the broader geopolitical implications of the Gulf War, in terms to confirming American world dominance, which, was its real purpose. ----------------------------------------------- I assume you mean the 1950’s. I would say not only would people from the 1950’s understand our current technology almost perfectly, they would be genuinely stunned by how little progress had been made in 70 years! Remember the difference between 1953 and 1883, the previous 70 years. The electric light and the telephone had scarcely been developed, and, it wasn’t clear to what extent they’d even be practical. Electrification of homes was still almost unknown. Only the crudest automobiles existed in experimental form. Human flight was considered an impossibility, except in balloons. Steam powered trains and boats represented the most advanced technology that really existed, and was widespread. The motion picture wasn’t invented until 1890! The very concept of television did not exist. Computers, obviously, did not exist, since electronics did not exist. In contrast, by 1953, virtually every single major technology currently in existence was already present, and being used by people as a whole. The only single area in which we have made apparent progress is computers and related technologies, and, even there, the fundamentals already existed by 1953. The transistor had been invented in 1947, and computers -- including vacuum tube electronic computers -- had been used to win the second world war. A very nice way of summarizing the issue is to look at average American life expectancy in 1953 -- it was 69. What is average American life expectancy today -- it's 76, just an increase of 10%, in 70 years. What was average American life expectancy in 1883 -- just 40 years of age! In other words, life expectancy increased by 75% between 1883 and 1953! Technology, science, medicine have virtually stopped, in terms of real progress in the last 70 years. It wouldn't take a scientist like Albert Einstein a month to catch up with our technology. Even the average person would be up to scratch in 90 days. We have accomplished virtually nothing in the last 70 years, in technology, despite the frantic efforts of our scientists and engineers to promote themselves.