In Defense of the Rich

Here is a gift courtesy of The Economist:

http://economist.com/finance/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10328935

 

This ought to be sufficient to shoot down those misguided Democrats if they dare question the justice of America's income distribution. Though the argument leaves a few openings for potential adversaries to rent asunder, few of the Democratic persuasion have eyes to see or strength to tear.

 

You have consumption inequality level for decades, ever less inequality in "life satisfaction," and an ever greater gap in working hours (with the rich working ever more, the poor ever less).

 

Of course, money still buys a lower stress level (in theory), longer life expectancy, and various forms of power and freedom.

The Moroccan Way

There is an article today in the NY Times on the Moroccan strategy for handling incarcerated terrorists and radicals.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/31/world/africa/31prison.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

 

After reading it, though disgusted by the brutality of both sides, I considered that these terrorists are really a non-threat to the government of Morocco (and most other Islamic nations). In virtually every respect they are marginal types, lacking centralized, coordinated organization and competent leadership. Their relatively high profile is disproportionate to their limited power and absence of a coherent strategy to actually overthrow the King. Yet, they do exert some influence. The question is to what effect. From the government's perspective they're a chronic, but manageable, disease of the body politic. Further, it may be a disease that justifies more severe control over that body, the rest of which may then be pacified by the justification of "disease-control." Most of the Muslim world is a prison, one whose strictures are all the more defensible as a result of certain elements of resistance. In other words, these incompetent extremists (who appear by their actions, as opposed to their words, to be more like anarchists than theocrats) form a (witless) pillar of support for these dictatorial regimes. Anarchism is indeed a game at which the police can beat you. And if the dictators are happy enough to retain their power in despite of the forms of democracy available, the terrorists do not generally seem to view this as a less attractive state of affairs than a democratic option might offer--democratic government poses the threat that it might muster up such a degree of popular legitimacy as a dictator could not sustain in our time and thereby the more effectually block their theocratic ascendance. Thus, the two mortal enemies and the two most powerful forces in many Muslim nations conspire by disparate actions to thwart political and social liberalization.

---

The IPCC Conspiracy

It's damn difficult to find a climate change skeptic possessed of any intelligence (I know several people who've been trying, all lucklessly, for years now)--and you can toss the idea of integrity altogether. But, at least this fellow has one point of some consequence to make and, as a special bonus, he even manages (but just barely) to avoid contradicting himself. Nevertheless, an article fairly representative of the amateurism and weak-witted populist conspiracy-mongering of the climate change deniers:
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/968#

My response:
The article speaks of scientists with vested interests but fails to indicate what those interests may be. It is a phrase infinitely interpretable and, therefore, when not qualified with further explanation, essentially meaningless. Granted that the talk of 2,500 scientists agreeing with every detail and possessing the expertise in each requisite area to offer genuine professional assent--was always transparently loose talk, a sloppy and, strictly speaking, inaccurate representation of the IPCC process. The science is far too detailed and intricate for any individual to fully grasp the entire beast head to foot. But, the source of the misrepresentation, if I am not mistaken, is primarily the media and certain politicians--not the IPCC itself. Consequently, this fellow oversteps the mark in protesting that the reports of the IPCC should be construed as "dishonest and politically skewed." I see little evidence of the former; and insofar as any evidence of the latter may be apparent it conforms to one's common sensical expectations of the nature of such skewing: remember who it is that finally approves these reports. The politicos overseeing this process, though indirectly, nevertheless do exert a degree of influence upon its interpretations where the data are interpretable. Now, stop to consider--would the ruling classes of the nations of this earth wish to bring down upon themselves such a severe test as climate change appears to be? With perhaps a few fairly perverse exceptions (perhaps a few misguided environmentalists and a few nations that might believe they will derive short-term advantages over trade rivals from GHG reductions made by those rivals), most politicos would prefer to duck this problem--Bush is not the only duck, only the worst of them. If you refer to the successive reports issued by the IPCC over the last 20 years or so, you will find that they have consistently underestimated the speed of the warming trend. Probably this decidedly non-alarmist tack has been partly the result of political influence and partly a result of the inherent difficulty of constructing accurate models of the earth's climate.

Due to the endemic and permanent uncertainty of climate science, room will always remain for a range of interpretations to battle it out and to mold the data in accordance with the personal interests and preconceived notions and preferred interpretive methods underlying them--and the observers and reviewers will then perforce select the most persuasive points and paths, the finest collections of probabilities available until the latest data arrive and the battle recommences. But, at present the assembled forces of the IPCC ought to prevail for superior quality and integrity.

Dr. Watson and the Goodthinkers

Watson, the Nobelist DNA co-discoverer, has been run out of conformist society for mentioning the great gap in IQ scores between black Africans and the people of the developed world. The scientific literature counts a 25-30 point differential. Watson's point, in context, was that this is likely a major obstacle to African development, since IQ tests are designed to measure an individual's capacity to function in a modern economy and society. These scores indicate that only 2-5% of black Africans have IQs of 100 or above, 100 being the average IQ of white Americans and Europeans and Japanese and most developed populations. Who in Africa can lead? Who can run government, create businesses, manage businesses, provide technical and engineering services, enforce the law, provide medical care, engage in banking services, manage money for governments, businesses, individuals? In the developed world, we rely on people with IQs over 100 to do these things, or at least to provide the leadership in these sectors. This is not to speak of the surplus IQ needed for actual innovation.

For mentioning this crucial issue in the development, not just of the economy, but of civilization itself--Watson is ostracized and most hypocritically lambasted. If his cowardly critics actually cared about these African unfortunates, they might seek for solutions to this massive IQ deficit instead of persisting in their quasi-religious posing as holier-than-thou saints of political correctness. For example, there is clear evidence that African IQs are substantially depressed by poor pre-natal, post-natal, and infant nutrition. Also, excessive infectious disease rates among mothers and children reduce cognitive potential. Action, thus, might be taken. But the PC scoundrels prefer to engage in a ritualistic excommunication "action."

The following post is a fairly thorough examination of this shameful episode of the intellectual "establishment" working hard to scramble and suppress the truth and invert decent values:

http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/10/james-watson-tells-inconvenient-truth_296.php

Channelling Kafka

Stupidity and brutality in the drug war, aided and abetted by the coward Jeb Bush, a coward judge, scumbag prosecutors and moron cops:
http://jewishatheist.blogspot.com/2007/11/update-richard-paey-pardoned.html
This puritanical frenzy about psychoactive drugs that "our" government has invented and encouraged and financed for decades--really benefits only bureaucrats and gangsters. And considering that government is definitionally the biggest mafia in the land, I suppose that means bureaucrats and gangsters are rather close relations. At least the various ethnic mafias don't force us to pay protection money to protect us from ourselves...the gangsters are too honest for that, but the mendacity of the mandarins is unbounded.

Confidence is High, I Repeat, Confidence is High

Problem: terror in the air

Solution: GED-equipped government employees 

Result:  Report: Airport Screeners Fail To Catch Bomb Components

Liquid Explosives, Detonators Smuggled Past Security

POSTED: 11:36 pm EST November 14, 2007

WASHINGTON -- Government investigators smuggled liquid explosives and detonators past airport security, exposing a dangerous hole in the nation's ability to keep these forbidden items off of airplanes, according to a report made public Wednesday.

What it Means to Support Our Troops

One well-intended, but misconceived notion:
"The troops only concern is the mission. So if you don't support the mission, you don't support the troops."

This is perhaps one of the most mismade quasi-syllogisms I've ever seen. Premise #1 is probably wrong, but it depends upon how one interprets what the mission actually is (Bush has changed the definition of the mission several times as the situation has devolved). Premise #2 also depends upon what the mission is. And the conclusion, following these two undefined premises, becomes meaningless. The only way for the syllogism to work is to define the terms or to assume they take their most abstract meaning--that the mission is whatever the President happens to have directed them to do most recently (to be honest, though I attend to these matters, I have a sense, but am not entirely clear as to what that is). But, then it follows that, in order to support the troops, one is obliged to support any foreign policy the President determines to adopt. The problem with this awkward caravan of reasoning is that it works just as effectually for those Iranians who defend Ahmadinejad's foreign policy or for supporters of any dictator or war criminal you may wish randomly to select. The American dream of America transcends these nations, must transcend them if it is to have any particular value beyond the "petty ephemeral babble of politics and national self-seeking" in which all other nations so shamelessly and exclusively engage.

Policies incompetent or corrupt in nature deserve criticism and ought to benefit by it; nor will the wise and courageous among men neglect their charge to provide it. If the President has any use, he will distinguish smoke from fire, and he will leave the smoke to disperse itself, but he will transmute this fire, at his own forge, into his own new-hammered sword wherewith to smite his enemies foreign and domestic.

A Lengthier Torture Session

Here are a few common pro-torture arguments I've heard and my responses:

 

1 "Government inflicts torture for good reasons."

Unfortunately, this concession does not distinguish your position from that of Hitler or Stalin: neither tortured for amusement, but only for defined purposes.

 

2 "Torture is justifiable if there is an imminent threat or a high profile detainee."

There are several problems with this position. First, it cedes the moral high ground in an absolute sense (though not relative to our current enemies): it is in clear violation of the Geneva Convention. Second, lines tend to blur in practice--who is to define what these this imminent threat is and when it is at stake in a given case. This is ultimately a subjective judgment which will be made by men who have a much stronger incentive to err on the side of inflicting a little more torture instead of permitting a little higher risk of terrorism or some other calamity. I do not trust unchecked power; it would be positioned to inflict torture at its discretion upon whomever it considers a suitable information source. Unchecked government power is anathema to Anglo-American political culture--indeed it is anathema to any decent political culture: unchecked executive power is the simplest definition of tyranny. Third, it would be wise to consider whether, given the costs of torture outlined above, the benefits we may reasonably expect to derive from it are commensurate. I am not persuaded that they are. Not only would we in theory use torture rarely, according to your standards, but on those occasions when it might be used there is no guarantee that it would be effective. To my sense, the costs of employing torture against suspected terrorists are so high that it would only be justified if we were threatened with much more dangerous organizations--ones that could mount more sophisticated attacks than training 4 suicide pilots on flight simulators and finding 14 more suicide volunteers to hijack some planes and do a suicide run.

 

3 "We have the right to torture when necessary because our history demonstrates that we have the moral high ground."

Relative to the values of our enemies in the last century, we clearly have the high ground. But, we judge ourselves by our own values, and, to a large extent, are so judged by the rest of the world. It is relative to our own values, not our enemies' values, that we have ceded ground since 9/11. This process, the widening of the gap between our values and our policies, has damaged our image abroad; also, it has eroded the rights of our citizens and the power of the media and of all governmental institutions except the Executive branch of the federal government. Moreover, policies that fall short of our moral standards, if sustained, will noxiously erode our moral nature and slowly undermine our "higher ground."

 

4 "We committed torture in the war against Japan and this was done to save lives--a simple value equation."

In diametric contrast to our current struggle, PR considerations were not immediately relevant to the war in the Pacific Theater. The only two audiences that mattered in the short term were the Japs and us. Neither was likely to falter in its convictions (in the context of such a hot and brief war) due to an occasional war crime. But, whether such torture as occurred benefitted us in the war is another question. Few Japs were captured and most of the torture occurred at the tactical level, which was likely to accrue benefits only at the tactical level, if at all. Given the probable insignificance of any benefits derived from torture, I doubt whether your "value equation" worked to our advantage in the long run. 

 

The most effective foreign policy is one which maximizes the leverage of both our hard power (military, economic) and our soft power (image, culture, PR, values) to achieve strategic objectives. It follows that in determining which of these forms of power to implement in face of a given challenge we must learn to make intelligent trade-offs informed by cost-benefit analysis (and torture may be the most dramatic instance, and one of the most important, of this conflict).

The Torture Obsession

On the torture question we have not, as we ought to have, held to the moral high ground in the struggle to prevent terrorism. We can afford still to hold this ground and ought to hold it, even at the inescapable risk of paying a tangible price. Instead, we have begun the descent toward the moral level of the enemy. And the further we proceed on this path the closer we come to aiding and abetting the enemy in our defeat. I define defeat as the destruction of our culture and value system, and, thus, by definition whatever is necessary to sustain their existence. Survival of our government and national borders and military, at the cost of the destruction of this essential core is not an end for which I would fight or sacrifice. The Bush people apparently believe that the Anti-Terror struggle can be won without resort to the public relations campaign that was a major element in our victory in the Cold War. In this they are dunces. P.R. is even more important in this struggle than it was in the Cold War, because information is much more easily disseminated now than it was then. And virtually all the terrorists seem to be ideologically-motivated volunteers--as few Soviet soldiers were. Torture, rendition, detention without trial, heavy-handed encroachments upon the rights of American citizens--all of these tactics function as the most effective P.R. for the terrorists and Islamo-fascists.

A Time-Honored Trade-Off

The heart of the argument in this Economist piece is the analogy between the cold war and the war on terrorism. Of course, though on the whole this is an excellent re-perspectivizing, the enemy in each instance was significantly different in nature--from a common sense view, homeland security was less important in the struggle against the Soviets than it is likely to be in the new war. But, until the terrorists come armed with WMDs I am inclined to The Economist's strategy. The erosion of our liberties ought not to be disproportionate to the actual danger, especially as the example of our liberty may once again help us prevail in the struggle. This article is intelligent and courageous and wise.

http://www.economist.com/node/9833041

Political Priorities

In response to an article by a female Republican that she desired a strong, decisive leader for President, and, in particular, one who conforms to the ideals of manhood presented in paperback romance novels (here’s the link, though it’s not really worth reading: http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/06/responsible_adults.html):





I always found it ironic that right-wing party members pride themselves on being strong and supporters of strong leaders--without ever seeming to recognize the inherent contradiction in assuming that those who support strong, decisive leaders are themselves strong and decisive, and prove and enhance their strength by supporting such leaders. In reality, the strength of the leader and that of his individual followers is inversely proportionate--Hitler's strength presupposed the weakness of his followers. The same held for Stalin. Order and responsibility are achieved through enforced conformity and the curtailment of civil rights. It is the weak in spirit who desire to submit themselves to strong leaders, whose fear whelms their passion for freedom and for its concomitant burden of personal responsibility. This contemptible praise of strong leaders does not consist with the small government, libertarian ethos once espoused by Republicans.




Praise of strength for its own sake has always been an invitation to tyranny and to the correspondent diminishment of the individual. My first premise: The supreme political value is the freedom and integrity of the individual. The less of this value permitted and encouraged under a given political dispensation, the lower the presumed value of that system. Much as I would like to place upon the head of the Bush significant responsibility for erosions of individual rights, his misguided policies are of only marginal consequence in the long term. The major, seemingly inescapable trend that threatens to erode individual rights into museum pieces is ongoing, radical technological advance which simultaneously increases the individual's power for destruction and the state's power (and perhaps its imperative) to impose control. This technological trend is like the relentless tide washing in; the politicians are like individual waves preceding or following the tide that will change all things.




I might also note that the connection this rather shallow little woman draws between strength of leadership and "adult responsibility" is highly dubious. Responsibility means providing intelligent, analytical, defensible reasons for decisions, preferably before they are actioned. In this sense, strong leaders tend to be less responsible because they can get away with it.




Comparing the Marine's motivation (who volunteered for the Marines in 2004 after graduating from an Ivy League school) to that of Romney, Giuliani, or Thompson is rather unfair to the politicos. To stay on such a high-pressure, high-reward track for decades in our corrupt corporate and political arenas strongly suggests that these three are motivated primarily by supreme power lust--just like Hilary and Obama, or for that matter Bill and Bush I, Tricky Dick, Johnson, Kennedy (though maybe not Reagan, Carter, Eisenhower).




I sometimes wonder whether most of those men who succeed in climbing such long, compromising career ladders are not psychopaths. It seems almost a precondition to undertake such all-consuming work-lives in a profession inherently manipulative at every level and in all directions.




My impression of the article: the whimperings of a witless little herd animal, or a demonstration of why the enfranchisement of women has proven a misfortune for the male of the species and probably even for women themselves--women are psychologically predisposed to submit more readily than men--ergo, upon their enfranchisement (with a delay of only a few years) the federal government morphed into the nanny state, and now, at the first sign of a threat to domestic security, all the women join the weak-spirited men in calling for security to take precedence over freedom. What do women know of freedom? Their sensitivity to fear floods their sense of appreciation for freedom. They therefore relinquish it at a lower threshold of cause.




Have I now sufficiently distanced myself from all normative political persuasions? Good.




Politics is the pursuit of power and nothing else. As a private citizen my power potential is largely determined by the latitude granted me by my civil rights and the limitations imposed upon me by all manner of government intrusions and presumptions. I believe the government should be granted and left to exercise so much power as consists with its relative, not absolute duty to prevent its citizens from inflicting harm upon each other and to guard them against foreign powers. I consider all other activities to be, at least presumptively, beyond the scope of the government's sphere of justifiable action. I call this political philosophy liberalism; it is intended to promote individual liberty and the “greatest possible development of the type man.” N.  

 

Chesterton

I have recently been reading one of those rare writers who is almost unfailingly amusing, G. K. Chesterton. He does suffer from certain weaknesses--namely, a native superficiality that he attempts to conceal through speed and color of thought, a determined philosophico-religious dogmatism to which only his extraordinary intellectual energy can lend the illusion of life, a frequent casual dishonesty of thought that follows naturally from his first two faults and which leads him either to mischaracterize the ideas and arguments of his opponents or, when he cannot find a way to make their ideas look ridiculous (for example, refuting an argument that labs are fine hunting dogs by tossing them in a shark tank), to simply ignore them. Yet, few writers had such tremendous energy at their disposal; and, strangely, in spite of his Catholic commitments, he had a very supple mind. Also, his ready wit fashions forth brilliant streams and waterfalls of figuration. A writer might well profit from aping his stronger strains, if apeable they be. T.S. Eliot accorded this man one of the oddest and, in a way, insightful criticisms on record. He claimed Chesterton had "too many ideas" and that they were a crutch used to support and mask an inferior mind. The comparison Eliot was making in this connection was to Henry James, a man who had no ideas according to Eliot, but who was not the less "the most intelligent man of  his generation." I wonder whether Eliot understood what he was saying--he may, in part, have been right, but I wonder if he understood how and why. James was that intelligent (being one of the few writers into whose head I have not been able to clamber), and did have an amazingly unschematic mind, but Chesterton may actually have been more intelligent than his works indicate--his ideas were more in the nature of a moral burden he dragged all over creation and uncreation than crutches to carry him on. It is not that Chesterton is necessarily less intelligent than James, it is that he is less honest. James was more like a religious hermit or an aesthetic mystic, Chesterton like an orthodox preacher or politician--the one seeks only the truth because he need only persuade himself of what he discovers, whilst the latter must dabble in the disingenuous to justify the ways of institutions to men, and may have to lie to persuade other men to believe what he believes is the truth. By the way, Nietzsche, an exact contemporary of James, combined the qualities of genius, an undogmatic, even anti-dogmatic temperament, and a fluency with many ideas. Nietzsche beat Chesterton at his own game--with James the competition is much less direct. James specialized in representing the intelligent, civilized mind and the interactions of several such in course of a narrative. This required a different sort of expertise in psychology from that which Nietzsche evidenced. James also knew much more of the art and history of fiction in general. But philosophy was a realm James left almost untouched, whereas Nietzsche philosophized as a way of life.

 

 

A couple of Chestertonian instances:

 

 

First, on how Marxist materialist interpretations of history are dehumanizing: 

 

THE SUN WORSHIPPER


There is a shrewd warning to be given to all people who are in revolt.
And in the present state of things, I think all men are revolting in that
sense; except a few who are revolting in the other sense.  But the warning
to Socialists and other revolutionaries is this: that as sure as fate, if
they use any argument which is atheist or materialistic, that argument
will always be turned against them at last by the tyrant and the slave.
To-day I saw one too common Socialist argument turned Tory, so to speak,
in a manner quite startling and insane.  I mean that modern doctrine,
taught, I believe, by most followers of Karl Marx, which is called the
materialist theory of history.  The theory is, roughly, this: that all the
important things in history are rooted in an economic motive.  In short,
history is a science; a science of the search for food.

Now I desire, in passing only, to point out that this is not merely untrue,
but actually the reverse of the truth.  It is putting it too feebly to
say that the history of man is not only economic.  Man would not have any
history if he were only economic.  The need for food is certainly
universal, so universal that it is not even human.  Cows have an economic
motive, and apparently (I dare not say what ethereal delicacies may be in
a cow) only an economic motive.  The cow eats grass anywhere and never
eats anything else.  In short, the cow does fulfill the materialist theory
of history: that is why the cow has no history.  "A History of Cows" would
be one of the simplest and briefest of standard works.  But if some cows
thought it wicked to eat long grass and persecuted all who did so; if the
cow with the crumpled horn were worshipped by some cows and gored to death
by others; if cows began to have obvious moral preferences over and above
a desire for grass, then cows would begin to have a history.  They would
also begin to have a highly unpleasant time, which is perhaps the same
thing.

The economic motive is not merely not inside all history; it is actually
outside all history.  It belongs to Biology or the Science of Life; that
is, it concerns things like cows, that are not so very much alive.  Men
are far too much alive to get into the science of anything; for them we
have made the art of history.  To say that human actions have depended on
economic support is like saying that they have depended on having two legs.
It accounts for action, but not for such varied action; it is a
condition, but not a motive; it is too universal to be useful.  Certainly
a soldier wins the Victoria Cross on two legs; he also runs away on two
legs.  But if our object is to discover whether he will become a V.C. or a
coward the most careful inspection of his legs will yield us little or no
information.  In the same way a man will want food if he is a dreamy
romantic tramp, and will want food if he is a toiling and sweating
millionaire.  A man must be supported on food as he must be supported on
legs.  But cows (who have no history) are not only furnished more
generously in the matter of legs, but can see their food on a much grander
and more imaginative scale.  A cow can lift up her eyes to the hills and
see uplands and peaks of pure food.  Yet we never see the horizon broken
by crags of cake or happy hills of cheese.

So far the cow (who has no history) seems to have every other advantage.
But history--the whole point of history--precisely is that some two legged
soldiers ran away while others, of similar anatomical structure, did not.
The whole point of history precisely is: some people (like poets and
tramps) chance getting money by disregarding it, while others (such as
millionaires) will absolutely lose money for the fun of bothering about it.
There would be no history if there were only economic history.  All the
historical events have been due to the twists and turns given to the
economic instinct by forces that were not economic.  For instance, this
theory traces the French war of Edward III to a quarrel about the French
wines.  Any one who has even smelt the Middle Ages must feel fifty answers
spring to his lips; but in this cause one will suffice.  There would have
been no such war, then, if we all drank water like cows.  But when one is
a man one enters the world of historic choice.  The act of drinking wine
is one that requires explanation.  So is the act of not drinking wine.

 

 

 

Second instance, Quixote sets out from La Mancha to find La Mancha:

 

 

 

TOLSTOY AND THE CULT OF SIMPLICITY

The whole world is certainly heading for a great simplicity, not deliberately, but rather inevitably. It is not a mere fashion of false innocence, like that of the French aristocrats before the Revolution, who built an altar to Pan, and who taxed the peasantry for the enormous expenditure which is needed in order to live the simple life of peasants. The simplicity towards which the world is driving is the necessary outcome of all our systems and speculations and of our deep and continuous contemplation of things. For the universe is like everything in it; we have to look at it repeatedly and habitually before we see it. It is only when we have seen it for the hundredth time that we see it for the first time. The more consistently things are contemplated, the more they tend to unify themselves and therefore to simplify themselves. The simplification of anything is always sensational. Thus monotheism is the most sensational of things: it is as if we gazed long at a design full of disconnected objects, and, suddenly, with a stunning thrill, they came together into a huge and staring face.

Few people will dispute that all the typical movements of our time are upon this road towards simplification. Each system seeks to be more fundamental than the other; each seeks, in the literal sense, to undermine the other. In art, for example, the old conception of man, classic as the Apollo Belvedere, has first been attacked by the realist, who asserts that man, as a fact of natural history, is a creature with colourless hair and a freckled face. Then comes the Impressionist, going yet deeper, who asserts that to his physical eye, which alone is certain, man is a creature with purple hair and a grey face. Then comes the Symbolist, and says that to his soul, which alone is certain, man is a creature with green hair and a blue face. And all the great writers of our time represent in one form or another this attempt to reestablish communication with the elemental, or, as it is sometimes more roughly and fallaciously expressed, to return to nature. Some think that the return to nature consists in drinking no wine; some think that it consists in drinking a great deal more than is good for them. Some think that the return to nature is achieved by beating swords into ploughshares; some think it is achieved by turning ploughshares into very ineffectual British War Office bayonets. It is natural, according to the Jingo, for a man to kill other people with gunpowder and himself with gin. It is natural, according to the humanitarian revolutionist, to kill other people with dynamite and himself with vegetarianism. It would be too obviously Philistine a sentiment, perhaps, to suggest that the claim of either of these persons to be obeying the voice of nature is interesting when we consider that they require huge volumes of paradoxical argument to persuade themselves or anyone else of the truth of their conclusions. But the giants of our time are undoubtedly alike in that they approach by very different roads this conception of the return to simplicity. Ibsen returns to nature by the angular exterior of fact, Maeterlinck by the eternal tendencies of fable. Whitman returns to nature by seeing how much he can accept, Tolstoy by seeing how much he can reject.

Now, this heroic desire to return to nature, is, of course, in some respects, rather like the heroic desire of a kitten to return to its own tail. A tail is a simple and beautiful object, rhythmic in curve and soothing in texture; but it is certainly one of the minor but characteristic qualities of a tail that it should hang behind. It is impossible to deny that it would in some degree lose its character if attached to any other part of the anatomy. Now, nature is like a tail in the sense that it is vitally important, if it is to discharge its real duty, that it should be always behind. To imagine that we can see nature, especially our own nature, face to face, is a folly; it is even a blasphemy. It is like the conduct of a cat in some mad fairy-tale, who should set out on his travels with the firm conviction that he would find his tail growing like a tree in the meadows at the end of the world. And the actual effect of the travels of the philosopher in search of nature, when seen from the outside, looks very like the gyrations of the tail-pursuing kitten, exhibiting much enthusiasm but little dignity, much cry and very little tail. The grandeur of nature is that she is omnipotent and unseen, that she is perhaps ruling us most when we think that she is heeding us least. "Thou art a God that hidest Thyself," said the Hebrew poet. It may be said with all reverence that it is behind a man's back that the spirit of nature hides.

Another Elephant in the Room

Effects of carbon dioxide and climate change on ocean acidification and carbonate mineral saturation

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2007/2006GL028605.shtml
Basically, this means high CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere are causing more CO2 to be absorbed by the oceans, which raises their acidity. Since pH is measured on a logarithmic scale, the numbers mean that acidity has already increased by 29% since the Industrial Revolution. No one knows exactly what the effects will be, but marine life has evolved for millions of years at pre-industrial acidity levels and those levels are changing very fast. Large scale extinctions of marine life will occur at some point. The question is how much further we can denature the oceans before this happens. Note, also, that this acidification process occurs independently of ambient temperature, that is, of global warming. I consider this one of the top ten, possibly one of the top five problems globally.
This constitutes another very bad gamble on the part of humankind.

In Defense of Bad Books

Not being a book reviewer, there are a great many good books I've yet to attempt and, consequently, have fallen well behind on the reading of bad ones. I did look into O.J.'s though--and it was truly impressive, covering 2 out of Queenan's 3 categories of badness: both stupid and immoral.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9505E7DC133EF935A35756C0A9619C8B63

A Fine Instance of Idiocy: Affirmative Action for the Stupid

Federal Law Drains Resources for the Gifted

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/07/education/07education.html

I believe that if this is one of the consequences of the new education law, it will do more harm than good. Pulling the illiterate up to the level of the mediocre is far less important for the future of this nation at every level than fully potentializing the gifted among us. In virtually every field it is the gifted who cut the path and lead the way--in the private sector above all, but also in government, intelligence, the military, philanthropy, academia, medicine, science, the arts, education. One must be both intelligent and motivated to think beyond the current state of affairs and imagine innovations, then find creative ways to implement them. The gifted create progress, they solve problems--the rest are inertia, human baggage, just followers and laborers.

Of course, based on numbers in the article there is no reason why the new law should push out the gifted programs--Illinois was only spending $19 million a year in the first place on the gifted ($1.50 per citizen of the state). To cut such a cheap and important program displays incredible stupidity. And how can the feds offer only $10 million a year for this? The practical social ramifications of this trend will be further stratification of opportunity by income level--only those who can afford to attend quality private schools will find the blessing of an education proportionate to their ability.