Re: [Biofuel] Fw: Life span of the republic
Woodhouselee, Alexander Fraser Tytler, and he was a Scottish historian/professor who wrote several books in the late 1700s and early 1800s. However, there is no record of The Fall of the Athenian Republic or The Decline and Fall of the Athenian Republic in the Library of Congress, which has several other titles by Tytler. This quote has also been cited as being from Tytler's Universal History or from his Elements of General History, Ancient and Modern, books that do exist. These books seem the most likely source of the quote, as they contain extensive discussions of the political systems in historic civilizations, including Athens. Universal History was published after, and based upon, Elements of General History, which was a collection of Professor Tytler's lecture notes. Tytler's book, Universal history, from the creation of the world to the beginning of the eighteenth century, is available for viewing and searching on-line. The complete text was searched for each of the following phrases: a.. Athenian Republic b.. democracy c.. generous gifts d.. public treasury e.. loose fiscal f.. fiscal g.. bondage h.. 200 years i.. two hundred years j.. spiritual faith In no case was text identified that was remotely similar in words or intent to the alleged Tytler quote. 4. Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University is not the source of any of the statistics or the text attributed to him. Professor Olson was contacted (by me) via e-mail, and he confirmed that he had no authorship or involvement in this matter. And, as Fayette Citizen editor Dave Hamrick wrote back in January 2001: I really enjoyed one recent message that was circulated extremely widely, at least among conservatives. It gave several interesting facts supposedly compiled by statisticians and political scientists about the counties across the nation that voted for George Bush and the ones that voted for Al Gore in the recent election. Supposedly, the people in the counties for Bush had more education, more income, ad infinitum, than the counties for Gore. I didn't have time to check them all out, but I was curious about one item in particular... the contention that the murder rate in the Gore counties was about a billion times higher than in the Bush counties. This was attributed to a Professor Joseph Olson at the Hamline University School of Law. I never heard of such a university, but went online and found it. And Prof. Olson does exist. Now I'm getting somewhere, I thought. But in response to my e-mail, Olson said the research was attributed to him erroneously. He said it came from a Sheriff Jay Printz in Montana. I e-mailed Sheriff Printz, and guess what? He didn't do the research either, and didn't remember who had e-mailed it to him. In other words, he got the same legend e-mailed to him and passed it on to Olson without checking it out, and when Olson passed it on, someone thought it sounded better if a law professor had done the research, and so it grew. Who knows where it originally came from, but it's just not true. 5. The county-by-county murder-rate comparison presented in this piece is wrong. According to the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ), in the year 2000 the national murder rate was about 5.5 per 100,000 residents. Homicide data by county for 1999 and 2000 can be downloaded from the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NAJCD), and the counties won by Gore and Bush can be identified using the county-by-county election results made available by CNN. (The NACJD provides not only the number of reported murders for each county, but also the population for each.) The average murder rate in the counties won by Gore vs. the rate in the counties won by Bush can be determined from this data. By calculating the murder rate for each county and then taking the averages, we find a murder rate (defined as number of murders per 100,000 residents) of about 5.2 for the average Gore county and 3.3 for the average Bush county. But since people, rather than counties, commit murders, a more appropriate approach is to calculate the total number of murders in the counties won by each candidate and divide that figure by the total number of residents in those counties. This more appropriate method yields the following average murder rates in counties won by each candidate: a.. Gore: 6.5 a.. Bush: 4.1 There is a distinct difference between these two numbers, but it is nowhere near as large as the quoted e-mail message states (i.e., 13.2 for Gore vs. 2.1 for Bush). Note that the average of these two figures is 5.3, which, as expected, is very close to the reported national murder rate of 5.5. Last updated: 28 January 2004 end Snopes Quote - Original Message - From: Keith Addison [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Biofuel@sustainablelists.org Sent: Friday, April 14, 2006 11:06 AM Subject: Re: [Biofuel] Fw: Life span of the republic Kim Did you even look
[Biofuel] Fw: Life span of the republic
Greetings, An interesting piece on democracy, slanted to say the least. Bright Blessings, Kim - Original Message - Sent: Wednesday, April 12, 2006 7:52 PM Subject: Life span of the republic And for you purists out there I included the snopes.com url, they have checked this same email out and confirm a lot of it, however there are some figures used in it that don't necessarily jive the way the email would have you believe but it is interesting at the very least. Rick. // www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/tyler.asp The United States is a Republic - but I think you will get the point! How Long Do We Have? About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years prior: A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the worlds greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence: 1. From bondage to spiritual faith; 2. From spiritual faith to great courage; 3. From courage to liberty; 4. From liberty to abundance; 5. From abundance to complacency; 6. From complacency to apathy; 7. From apathy to dependence; 8. From dependence back into bondage . Professor Joseph Olson of Hamline University School of Law, St. Paul, Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 Presidential election: Population of counties won by: Gore: 127 million; Bush: 143 million; Square miles of land won by: Gore: 580,000; Bush: 2,427,000 States won by: Gore: 19 Bush: 29 Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by: Gore: 13.2 Bush: 2.1 Professor Olson adds: In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land owned by the tax-paying citizens of this great country. Gore's territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off government welfare... Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the complacency and apathy phase of Professor Tyler's definition of democracy, with some 40 percent of the nation's population already having reached the governmental dependency phase. Pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom. ___ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel_sustainablelists.org Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (50,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
Re: [Biofuel] Fw: Life span of the republic
Kim Did you even look at the snopes reference yourself? It's hard to believe you did and still posted this. Snopes doesn't confirm a lot of it as Rick claims. It's not slanted, it's just a pack of lies, and it's about five and a half years past its use-by date. http://www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/tyler.asp Urban Legends Reference Pages: Politics (The Fall of the Athenian Republic) Claim: Law professor demonstrates that the results of the 2000 presidential election correspond to an 18th century historian's prediction of conditions accompanying the downfall of democracy. snip In other words, he got the same legend e-mailed to him and passed it on to [law professor] Olson without checking it out, and when Olson passed it on, someone thought it sounded better if a law professor had done the research, and so it grew. Who knows where it originally came from, but it's just not true. If you did look at it you certainly should have warned about that right on top but you didn't mention it. Even if you swallowed Rick's line about snopes, didn't this set off warning bells? Pass this along to help everyone realize just how much is at stake, knowing that apathy is the greatest danger to our freedom. When you see pass this along to all your friends!, or send this to everyone in your address book! there's probably a better than 50-50 chance that a visit to snopes will not be in vain. I've warned about it before, please don't send messages with footnotes like that to the list. Hm. Previously you were saying colonisation is good for human rights and so on. You told me: I know history quite well, thank you. At times I think better than you. But, I can see hope for humanity, I don't think you can. Now you're quoting a misnamed historian as saying things he didn't say, you didn't check it, but it sure does try to lend some support to some of your views. Would that be including what 18th-century Scottish historian Alexander Fraser Tytler (not Tyler) never did imply right at the top, that humans can't do democracy because they're just too venal at heart? You've also said having lots of guns about the place stops people getting shot better than not having any guns around does, or however it's supposed to go, Charlton Heston's line, and you've said strange things about poverty and welfare too. Do you go along with what not-Tyler didn't actually say? If not then how come you seem to have swallowed this obvious bit of disinfo so easily? Whose agenda does it fit, Kim? History, well. No historian since 1947 writes about the rise and fall of civilisations without reference to Arnold Toynbee. Someone who doesn't question the worlds greatest civilizations being described in the next line as these nations doesn't know much about history, but might enjoy reading Toynbee's A Study of History. It's in 12 volumes, but Somervell abridged it to two volumes and got an admiring foreword from Toynbee, you can get them in paperback at Amazon. From which a rather different view emerges than your imposter would have you believe, hard to find any hopelessness in it. Will that make it hard to swallow? Why don't you dump all the spin stuff and find out what you really think? You're not poisonous but this stuff is. For general disabusement about history Mr Wells's Outline of History is still the first resource. A Short History of the World, the abridged version that followed it, is now available free online in full-text with a search box. The two books work well in combination. http://www.bartleby.com/86/ Wells, H.G. 1922. A Short History of the World Well, they're friendly, but, The shit they believe Has got their minds all shut - Frank Zappa Best Keith Greetings, An interesting piece on democracy, slanted to say the least. Bright Blessings, Kim - Original Message - Sent: Wednesday, April 12, 2006 7:52 PM Subject: Life span of the republic And for you purists out there I included the snopes.com url, they have checked this same email out and confirm a lot of it, however there are some figures used in it that don't necessarily jive the way the email would have you believe but it is interesting at the very least. Rick. // www.snopes.com/politics/quotes/tyler.asp The United States is a Republic - but I think you will get the point! How Long Do We Have? About the time our original 13 states adopted their new constitution, in 1787, Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years prior: A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result
