Thomas Sowell: Two earthquakes -

Townhall.com ^ | December 30, 2003 | Thomas Sowell

[UnklGene]

Two earthquakes -

Thomas Sowell (archive) December 30, 2003

Within a week of each other, two earthquakes struck on opposite sides of the world -- an earthquake measuring 6.5 on the Richter scale in California and a 6.6 earthquake in Iran. But, however similar the earthquakes, the human costs were enormously different.

The deaths in Iran have been counted in the tens of thousands. In California, the deaths did not reach double digits. Why the difference? In one word, wealth.

Wealth enables homes, buildings and other structures to be built to withstand greater stresses. Wealth permits the creation of modern transportation that can quickly carry people to medical facilities. It enables those facilities to be equipped with more advanced medical apparatus and supplies, and amply staffed with highly trained doctors and support staff.

Those who disdain wealth as crass materialism need to understand that wealth is one of the biggest life-saving factors in the world. As an economist in India has pointed out, "95 percent of deaths from natural hazards occur in poor countries."

You can see the effect of wealth by looking at the same country at different times. The biggest hurricane to hit the United States was hurricane Andrew in 1998 but it took fewer than 50 lives. Yet another hurricane, back in 1900, took at least 6,000 lives in Galveston.

The difference was that the United States was a much richer country in 1998. It had earlier warning from more advanced weather tracking equipment. It had better roads and more cars in which to evacuate before the hurricane struck, as well as more and better equipment for digging victims out of debris, and better medical treatment available for those who needed it.

Those who preen themselves on their "compassion" for the poor, and who disdain wealth, are being inconsistent, if not hypocritical. Wealth is the only thing that can prevent poverty. However, if you are not trying to prevent poverty but to exploit it for political purposes, that is another story.

There is another side to the story of these two earthquakes and their consequences. It gives the lie to the dogma being propagandized incessantly, from the schools to the media, that one culture is just as good as another.

It is just as good to lose tens of thousands of lives as not to? What hogwash! It is just as good to lack modern medicine, modern transportation, and modern industry as it is to have them? Who is kidding whom?

This dogmatism prevails at home as well as internationally. Cultures that lead to most children being born to single mothers are just as good as cultures where children grow up with two parents -- if you believe the dogma.

Facts say the opposite. Whether it is education, crime, or poverty, there are huge differences between single-parent families and two-parent families. Even race doesn't make as much difference in outcomes. The poverty rate among black married couples is in single digits. The infant mortality rate among black married women with only a high school diploma is lower than the infant mortality rate among white unmarried women who have been to college.

None of this makes a dent in those who promote the big lie that one culture is just as good as another. What does it even mean to say that? Does it mean that facts fit the dogma? Or does it just mean that they choose to use words in a certain way? It may not make any difference in their theories, but only in the real world.

None of this means that one culture is better than another for all purposes. The cheap vulgarity and brutal ugliness of so much of our media is a legitimate complaint at home and abroad. The sheer silliness of our fad-ridden public schools is a national disgrace.

By the same token, cultures that are less advanced in some ways often have contributions to make in other ways. We all take different things from different cultures to create our own personal lifestyles. We need to stop pretending that it makes no difference when all the facts show that it makes a huge difference, from poverty to matters of life and death.

[.cnI redruM]

If he doesn't make that suggestion someone should have. Iran has been given a treasure trove of King Midas in natural wealth that they have wasted to the vast detriment of their people. Sowell is pointing out that which is so obvious that no one is willing to see it.

[.cnI redruM]

Danny,

You're dead-on, but like anything else in the middle of the road, you'll get hit by traffic driving in both directions.

[Al Simmons]

Common Sense BUMP!

[OldFriend]

Go to google......type in Bam, Iran

[liberallarry]

Difference between cultures: family dead, or lawnmower dead

One of the greatest observations in modern political discourse!

[U S Army EOD]

There is no question, something scientifically designed and built to high standards will withstand something better than a 1000 year old mud building. But still you have to look at the density of the population.

If you stomp an ant hill you kill thousands of ants, but if you only stomp one ant, you only kill one ant. If we had an earthquake centered under the most densily populated area of Chicago with the same power as one that occurred in the upper Mississippi valley around 1812, it will kill in the tens of thousands of people.

[narby]

This Iranian city was built of mud brick a VERY VERY long time ago........is he suggesting it ought to have been levelled and rebuilt to modern specifications?

It would have already been rebuilt had Iran made the economic progress that the west did in the last few centuries.

You think rich Iranians would stay in mud houses?

[U S Army EOD]

When they compare the Galvaston hurricane to Andrew it is like comparing apples to oranges. Florida didn't go underwater as Galvaston did. The buildings in Galvaston were probably stonger and better constructed than the ones in Florida.

When nature is at it furry, it helps to be in something stronger but sometimes what you are in just isn't strong enough.

[Plutarch]

The infant mortality rate among black married women with only a high school diploma is lower than the infant mortality rate among white unmarried women who have been to college.

I have seen this quoted before, but I haven't seen the actual reference or numbers to back it up.

[Mad Dawgg]

"This Iranian city was built of mud brick a VERY VERY long time ago........is he suggesting it ought to have been levelled and rebuilt to modern specifications?"

Only if you would wish not to die from it collapsing during an Earthquake.

[narby]

The value of one "culture" over another also applies to the sexual culture. The current argument that it should be OK for gays to marry ignores the fact that gays live a very physically damaging lifestyle. A lifestyle that if encuraged, would then discurage normal two parent households, that as Sowell point out, are far more important than almost anything else to raising children in decent homes.

I don't want to hear this crap that gays can be "normal two parent" households as well. Promiscuity alone (dramatically higher in gay culture), no matter whether gay or straight, is damaging. As it breaks up families and leaves singe parent households with emotionally damaged children in its wake.

[U S Army EOD]

Is this still true if you eliminate the number of babies from the data that white unmarried women murder???

[oyez]

De Mullas are too busy worrying about which way they face when they go to the bathroom, how to get the old food particles out of their teeth and how the Jews are ruling the world.

[discostu]

Where the earthquake happened in CA buildings used to be made with similar techniques. They were torn down and rebuilt with more modern techniques because the mud is difficult to build big, uses space inefficiently, and is difficult to climate control. The thesis is right on, places with money build better stuff and survive disasters with fewer deaths.

[mvpel]

One of the buildings that was severely damaged was the hospital, built only a few years ago.

[Publius6961]

The deaths in Iran have been counted in the tens of thousands. In California, the deaths did not reach double digits. Why the difference? In one word, wealth.

I rarely feel compelled to disagree with Dr, Sowell, but I must in this case.

In one word: culture

Islam does not permit the excellence of the individual. In theory the "religion" part of the abortion has no centralized authority but in practice it is stifling. It claims to hate sin but tolerates and even encourages social corruption from the top down. It beats women in public for showing ankle, but allows shoddy construction and resulting endlessly repeating mass deaths. And calls them acts of allah (sbuh).

And worst of all, it allows institutionalized hatred to overcome the human need to save as many of the injured as possible. A death cult which deserves to be left to wallow in its own self-made misery.

[Homer_J_Simpson]

Well, I think the California earthquake struck out in the middle of nowhere, while the one in Iran struck near a major city.

Paso Robles, CA has a population of around 25,000. I think I read that Bam, Iran is around 35,000. Not that significant a difference. Especially considering that if two women had stayed inside instead of running out the door there would have been zero fatalities there.

[Publius6961]

Ignorance is bliss.
I suppose you believe that there have been no structures built in the last 100 years?

[Happy2BMe]

"Iranians should be very wealthy, but their Mullas piss their money away on terrorism. If I were an Iranian I would be pissed.'

Speaking of Mullas in this festive season of gratitude and good will . .

Ideas on what to do with that (125 year-old) FRUITCAKE. (Take it to Jay Leno?)
			Posted by DannyTN to Happy2BMe On News/Activism 12/30/2003 12:49:54 PM PST #7 of 9 Send it to Iran Disaster Relief marked "Product of Israel". Take it on your next flight as an anti-terrorist weapon Send it to Iran as a suggested building material for earthquake proof homes. Use it as an excercise block...It's a freeweight, it's a stepping block, hundereds of excercise only 3 easy payments of $9.99. Drop it on Iranian Mullahs from 50,000 feet.

[Publius6961]

That's what we would do. Tear down history and put in a Walmart Superstore.
Like the Taliban did with the giant Buddhas.

The bleatings of an ignorant ass do not deserve a response.