# The Lawrence of Arabia appreciation thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 22, 2010, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079 "2010-08-22T16:55:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Saintly\_Loser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saintly_loser/32/4045_2.png) [@Saintly\_Loser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saintly_Loser)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2010, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079/61 "2010-08-28T01:28:07Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Man, if you lose it at 120 you are hamburger meat. Especially if your protective headgear consists of a tweed cap. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2010, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079/62 "2010-08-28T01:44:12Z")
> [@Saintly\_Loser](#): > > > [@carnivorousplant](#): > > > > Man, if you lose it at 120 you are hamburger meat. > > Especially if your protective headgear consists of a tweed cap. Yes, they repealed the helmet law in Arkansas, and lots of dumb m----r f----rs are riding without one. :rolleyes: When I made a bad lane change and was hit by a truck on a Honda 50, my helmet had gouge marks on it. ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2010, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079/63 "2010-08-28T09:53:39Z")
Besides the already mentioned _Lawrence_, the schedule includes _My Favorite Year_, _Becket_, the crazed _Ruling Class_, and the even more crazed _The Stunt Man_. (O’Toole does crazed so well.) Schedule [here](http://www.tcm.com/2010/suts/index.jsp#/peterotoole/0). Concerning Lawrence’s end, [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._E._Lawrence) says that it took him 6 days to die. > [@](#): > > The circumstances of Lawrence’s death had far-reaching consequences. One of the doctors attending him was the neurosurgeon Hugh Cairns. He was profoundly affected by the incident, and consequently began a long study of what he saw as the unnecessary loss of life by motorcycle dispatch riders through head injuries. His research led to the use of crash helmets by both military and civilian motorcyclists. As a consequence of treating Lawrence, Sir Hugh Cairns would ultimately save the lives of many motorcyclists. ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2010, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079/64 "2010-08-28T19:06:02Z")
> [@salinqmind](#): > > I saw this in the theater when I was 11 years old, back in the days when they dropped the kids off at the local movie house for the day, during the summer. Wow, did we have the same parents? Mine would also drop me off at the local movie theater - little did they know some of the sub-text in many of those films. Saw many odd films that were probably not 100% appropriate for a kid that age, but loved the films nonetheless. I vividly recall seeing Lawrence of Arabia when it first came out - we were on vacation and it was a rainy day (so no beach by the lake that day) so my parents dropped me off at the movie theater. I was glued to the screen, and even remember being so _thirsty_ about the middle of the film, due to the desert landscape and feeling of heat, that I had to go buy another Coke. That film stuck with me a long time. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2010, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079/65 "2010-08-28T19:34:26Z")
> [@](#): > > The circumstances of Lawrence’s death had far-reaching consequences. One of the doctors attending him was the neurosurgeon Hugh Cairns. He was profoundly affected by the incident, and consequently began a long study of what he saw as the unnecessary loss of life by motorcycle dispatch riders through head injuries. His research led to the use of crash helmets by both military and civilian motorcyclists. As a consequence of treating Lawrence, Sir Hugh Cairns would ultimately save the lives of many motorcyclists. This reminds me of the origin of [Murphy’s Law](http://www.improb.com/airchives/paperair/volume9/v9i5/murphy/murphy0.html) and its connection with seat belts in cars. In a nutshell, Dr. [John Stapp](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Stapp), Col., USAF, was conducting deceleration tests by riding a rocket sled. It was during these tests that Murphy’s Law came about. I’ll let you read the article to see what happened and why what was said, was said. But I do want to point this out: > [@](#): > > Which leads us to Murphy’s Law. The reason most people get it wrong, Nichols indicates, is that they don’t know how it was originally stated or what it meant. “It’s supposed to be, ‘If it can happen, it will’,” says Nichols, “Not ‘whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.’” The difference is a subtle one, yet the meaning is clear. One is a positive statement, indicating a belief that if one can predict the bad things that might happen, steps can be taken so that they can be avoided. The other version presents a much more somber, some might say fatalistic, view of reality. Based on his experiences during the deceleration experiments, Col. Stapp became a strong advocate for seat belts in cars, which became compulsory in a law signed in 1966. So the connection is: Seat belts were required in cars in large part because of the efforts of Col. Stapp, whose experiments used the rocket sled, which made a run with faulty strain gauges supplied my Capt. Edward Murphy, who said (of the tecnician who wired the gauges backwards) ‘“If that guy has any way of making a mistake, he will.’, which resulted in Col Stapp’s paraphrasing (apparently as part of a group effort), ‘If it can happen, it will happen’ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-lawrence-of-arabia-appreciation-thread/551079.md?page=3)