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Now You Know February 1, 2006

Posted by Resident Egoist in : Culture, Sci-Tech , comments closed

Via Live Science:

Democrats and Republicans alike are adept at making decisions without letting the facts get in the way, a new study shows.

And they get quite a rush from ignoring information that’s contrary to their point of view.

Researchers asked staunch party members from both sides to evaluate information that threatened their preferred candidate prior to the 2004 Presidential election. The subjects’ brains were monitored while they pondered.

The results were announced today [Jan 24, 2006].

“We did not see any increased activation of the parts of the brain normally engaged during reasoning,” said Drew Westen, director of clinical psychology at Emory University. “What we saw instead was a network of emotion circuits lighting up, including circuits hypothesized to be involved in regulating emotion, and circuits known to be involved in resolving conflicts.”

[...]

The test subjects on both sides of the political aisle reached totally biased conclusions by ignoring information that could not rationally be discounted, Westen and his colleagues say.

Then, with their minds made up, brain activity ceased in the areas that deal with negative emotions such as disgust. But activity spiked in the circuits involved in reward, a response similar to what addicts experience when they get a fix, Westen explained.

The study points to a total lack of reason in political decision-making.

“None of the circuits involved in conscious reasoning were particularly engaged,” Westen said. “Essentially, it appears as if partisans twirl the cognitive kaleidoscope until they get the conclusions they want, and then they get massively reinforced for it, with the elimination of negative emotional states and activation of positive ones.”

Notably absent were any increases in activation of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain most associated with reasoning.

The tests involved pairs of statements by the candidates, President George W. Bush and Senator John Kerry, that clearly contradicted each other. The test subjects were asked to consider and rate the discrepancy. Then they were presented with another statement that might explain away the contradiction. The scenario was repeated several times for each candidate.

The brain imaging revealed a consistent pattern. Both Republicans and Democrats consistently denied obvious contradictions for their own candidate but detected contradictions in the opposing candidate.

[...]

Ever wondered what is wrong with this country and why? Well now you know — though I for one didn’t expect the answer to be so freakin’ hilarious!

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Don’t Be Evil … Surrender To All Evil January 25, 2006

Posted by Resident Egoist in : Culture , comments closed

Google has explicitly adopted a new motto today: “Surrender To All Evil” — the exact opposite of its previous one: “Don’t Be Evil”. It has agreed to the censorship of its search results in accordance with the wishes of the fascist, Chinese State. How is it going to do this? By launching a new “customized” Google.cn site which will circumvent the Chinese government’s current firewalling of the main Google.com domain.

And just like Microsoft, Yahoo, and Cisco — among others — Google has manufactured its own rationalization of its coupling with the Devil.

Via Breitbart.com:

Google officials characterized the censorship concessions in China as an excruciating decision for a company that adopted “don’t be evil” as a motto. But management believes it’s a worthwhile sacrifice.

“We firmly believe, with our culture of innovation, Google can make meaningful and positive contributions to the already impressive pace of development in China,” said Andrew McLaughlin, Google’s senior policy counsel.

Yep, you heard that right: “a worthwhile sacrifice”! I wonder which word it is people misunderstand the most: “worthwhile” or “sacrifice”? I am inclined to believe that it is the latter, however. But there’s nothing to worry about here. We are all bound to understand the meaning of these words some day — some of us, (or should I say, most of us?), the “hard” way.

Now, for an exercise in unfunny humor, you really should try comparing search results between the two sites, that is, between google.com and google.cn. And if I may suggest some terms, you may want to try out the standards “Tiananmen Square,” “Human Rights,” “Taiwan Independence,” “Liberty,” etc … After that, if you’re still having fun, try “Ayn Rand,” “Capitalism,” and “Mises.”

On these three latter terms, Google itself should make certain to look them up — it might just help them learn the actual meanings of the words “capitalism” and “sacrifice” … and possibly bring them back closer to Ludwig von Mises’ motto: Do not give in to evil, but proceed ever more boldly against it.

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Roundum Randup January 17, 2006

Posted by Resident Egoist in : Culture, Misc, Politics, Sci-Tech , comments closed

This is a roundup of interesting things from the past few days which I’ve had no time to fully comment upon.

This is a must-read from Andrew Dalton at Witch Doctor Repellent. He sheds much needed light on the leftist concept of “root cause”, or rather, their sneaky corruption of the actual concept of “root cause”:

[T]here is a whole array of words and phrases like this: not only root cause, but also diversity, sustainability, and proportional response. All of these terms have broad meanings in everyday English. But when used by a leftist, they are actually Trojan horses for a specific worldview.

“Root cause” wears the cloak of reason. After all, what rational person could be against finding the root cause of a problem? The problem is, “root cause” is usually a code word for something on a list of purported causes that have been pre-approved by leftists. Things not on that list, like human choices or philosophy, don’t count. Go ahead, just try saying that the root cause of bullying is a bully’s choice to use violence. Or that the root cause of Islamic terrorism is Islam. Both are correct, but the self-appointed experts in “root causes” will treat you as either a Neanderthal or a Hun if you say such a thing.

The Hat Tip for that goes to the Secular Foxhole.

This is a hilarious must-see. After much dancing around, Allah (that’s “God” for the English speaking) has finally accepted to pose for Robert Tracy at Illustrated Ideas. The result is an excellent piece of art, and a very fitting portrait for the Madman Upstairs.

Charles Krauthammer has a … well … not-so-nice review of Steven Spielberg’s Munich at the Washington Post. I haven’t seen the movie yet, but from the mere trailers that I’ve seen, I wouldn’t be surprised if he were right — here’s an excerpt:

It is an axiom of filmmaking that you can only care about a character you know. In “Munich,” the Israeli athletes are not only theatrical but historical extras, stick figures. Spielberg dutifully gives us their names — Spielberg’s List — and nothing more: no history, no context, no relationships, nothing. They are there to die.

The Palestinians who plan the massacre and are hunted down by Israel are given — with the concision of the gifted cinematic craftsman — texture, humanity, depth, history. The first Palestinian we meet is the erudite translator of poetry giving a public reading, then acting kindly toward an Italian shopkeeper — before he is shot in cold blood by Jews.

Then there is the elderly PLO member who dotes on his 7-year-old daughter before being blown to bits. Not one of these plotters is ever shown plotting Munich, or any other atrocity for that matter. They are shown in the full flower of their humanity, savagely extinguished by Jews.

But the most shocking Israeli brutality involves the Dutch prostitute — apolitical, beautiful, pathetic — shot to death, naked, of course, by the now half-crazed Israelis settlingprivate business. The Israeli way, I suppose.

Feel free to have a crack at the rest.

Gus Van Horn points to a very disturbing article from City Journal concerning the possible, and imminent overt loss of freedom of speech in this country, through the inclusion of alternative media [e.g.: blogs, talk radio, etc...] within the sphere of Campaign Finance Reform laws. Yes, I am speaking of censorship in worse form than it exists right now, including that institutionalized through the FCC. Gus Van Horn has his own excellent thoughts on the subject, as well. Excerpting either article here would do them rather little justice, so make sure you read them both in their entirety.

As an aside though, I’d like to note that this continuing loss of freedom in the intellectual realm is nothing but a consequence of the now almost-complete process of interpreting away the concept and principle of the sanctity of property rights from the Constitution. Without property rights, no rights can be practiced in reality at all — and if people think that they can have any social system other than capitalism and still keep their rights, they are (parahrasing their Father, Kant) about to be woken up from their dogmatic slumbers.

Amit Ghate has a great colum of the above name at Capitalism Magazine. It does a pretty good job at showing how far today’s politcians have strayed away from the actual meaning of the constitution and the kind of government established by the Founding Fathers of this great country. Specifically, the article is about the nowadays-too-common confusion (or is it deliberate?) between (1) a Democracy and a Constitutional Republic, and (2) the institution of the Right to Vote, instead of the Right to Life, as the fundamental human right.

Both misconceptions are actually only two sides of the same coin, and you can see the evidence all over the news: Free and high-voter-turnout elections in Iraq and Afghanistan are celebrated all over regardless of the outcome, because allegedly, these people have the right to govern themselves even if that means voting not only oneself, but others as well, into tyrannical theocracies. And if you have any doubt as to just how serious these people are, you should know that some of them think this alleged “right to vote” should be mandatory. Yes, a mandatory “right”! If this isn’t a blatant contradiction in terms, I wonder what on this earth could possibly ever be?!

If you’ve followed the news lately, you must have heard of the safe return of NASA’s Stardust Capsule — which had the mission of capturing comet samples from space, which in turn could probably tells us “where we came from.” Obviously these scientists are incredibly behind the times! For it is written:

In the begining there was nothing,
Then God came out of nothing,
And created everything
… out of nothing.

That is from Part I, Chapter I of the Grand Infallible Book of Eternal Truth (or simply “G.I.B.E.T”, as it is popularly known) — which was written about 6 millenia ago. Where have these scientists been living all this time? Don’t they know that all True Knowledge resides within the Book, and only within the Book? Or are they just not aware of the Existence of the Book? I wonder what Reverend Pat is going to say about this … people tryin’ to disprove the Infallibility of the Book an’ all…

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Vulcan Capitalism, Austrian Drivel January 3, 2006

Posted by Resident Egoist in : Culture, Economics , comments closed

The things that come out of the Mises Institute nowadays are starting to become nearly unbelievable. Mr. Rockwell & Co. seem to be publishing every piece of B.S that labels itself as “pro-market.” A recent example is an article by a certain Jack Maturin which entertains the [literally] out-of-this-world idea that the Vulcans of the Star Trek universe are “really future Austrians in disguise.” By “Austrian,” he means “advocate of the free market social order.” As proof of his megatheory he offers his collection of quotes from Uber-Rationalist Mr. Spock — among them the following one:

Being a Vulcan means to adopt a philosophy, a way of life which is logical and beneficial. We cannot disregard that philosophy merely for personal gain, no matter how important that gain might be. — Journey to Babel.

Altruism anyone? As to logical, give me a break! What the hell does Spock mean by a “beneficial way of life” [sic] if said way must be followed without — or better yet, at the expense of — personal gain, i.e., benefit? Somehow however our dear author seems completely blind to this blatant contradiction, for according to him the meaning of the above quote is this:

… if you want to understand the social sciences, adopt the praxeological method of a priori logic. You need to have your theory straight before you begin to try to come to some clear understanding of how the world around you works. In the long term some of us may die, but our children will succeed to inherit our decisions, good or bad. So if you want your children and your neighbor’s children to prosper, always follow the Austrian method of logic.

Excuse me, but what the [bleep] is he talking about? How on earth did he arrive at this bizzare interpretation? I must let you divine, as I have no idea. Mr. Spock’s quote is clearly an ode and an urge to principled Altruism, and Altruism in Ethics translates into Statism in Politics, as demonstrated both in our actual history and the fictional semi-socialistic world of Star Trek. To the credit of the series’ authors however, the Borg race is an excellent depiction of the nightmare of collectivism. As to the allegedly “Austrian” way of doing “logic”, well, it must be rather good — so good that it is incapable of spotting a glaring self-contradiction in the same single sentence.

Thankfully, a commetator with a cooler head on his shoulders quickly put Jack Maturin’s dreams to rest with one quote of his own:

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Yes, that was Mr. Spock speaking — guess who else spoke (and still speaks) in similar ways? So much for Vulcan Capitalism.

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Economists ‘Discover’ that Artificial Restrictions on Supply Lead to High Prices December 12, 2005

Posted by Resident Egoist in : Culture, Economics, Politics , comments closed

From the Washington Times, via FEE:

Escalating prices that have made houses unaffordable for many people in Washington are mostly the result of homeowners using political and regulatory means to block construction of new housing, economic studies show.

[...]

The remarkable run of record housing sales and prices since 1998 has become a major puzzle and topic among economists. The high prices have put homeownership out of reach for many young people and low-income households hoping to break into the market.

Economists increasingly are concluding that the shortage of affordable housing in Washington and other major U.S. cities on the East and West coasts is a result more of man-made restrictions on development than high construction costs or other market forces.

Well, stop the presses, ladies and gentlemen! “A major puzzle and topic among economists” has been solved … if only this groundbreaking discovery weren’t at least three centuries behind the times! It’s almost sad really: that most contemporary econmists are still in the process of catching up to Adam Smith. It’s good to hear however that Capitalism isn’t being falsely blamed for once.

You should read the whole article. It might surpise you the things people are ready to do in order to actualize and protect their petty aesthetic visions — if only they spent half that effort defending their individual rights …

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