As I've been reading Chris Mooney's The Republican Brain, I've taken note of how Democrats can sometimes fall into the same trap with their cognition. The last section of his book promises an examination of this particular form of dissonance concerning things like nuclear power, GMOs, and vaccines. In looking at current events, we can see yet another example.
I live in Minneapolis and many of my friends are extremely liberal. Any mention of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and mouths begin to foam just as they do with Monsanto. It's completely ridiculous and, as the president notes above, they are just plain wrong. Not only does this agreement fix some of the issues with our domestic labor vis a vis NAFTA but it expands opportunity for our workers. We can't return to protectionist trade practices in this age of globalization. That's what causes world wars.
Why don't my fellow Democrats understand this?
Saturday, May 09, 2015
Friday, May 08, 2015
Absolute Lunacy
In looking at this video below, I have concluded that we should just let these paranoid fuck faces secede and let them fend for their own. What a bunch of lunatics!!
Thursday, May 07, 2015
Joss Whedon Stops Wasting Time...
Granted, it wasn't the greatest movie ever, but it's ridiculous to portray Joss Whedon as sexist. Whedon has been one of the greatest advocates for strong women characters in action adventure entertainment over the last 20 years.
First, Joss Whedon wrote the script for the movie Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the hilarious stereotype-shattering take on the whole damsel-in-distress horror movie genre.
Then Whedon wrote the script for Alien: Resurrection, which starred Sigourney Weaver and Winona Ryder, who were not weak female characters.
Then in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer television series, Whedon's strongest characters were female, nerds, or female nerds. They were the stars of the show, not just one-dimensional targets of derision that the male characters used for sexual or comic relief.
He continued this vein in the short-lived Firefly. Half the crew of the spacecraft in this western-themed space opera were women, including the nerdy engineer.
Then Whedon did Dollhouse, which had its flaws, but weak female characters were not among them.
Currently in production is the Marvel series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. It, again, is packed with strong female characters, who have driven most of the action in the current season.
Female actors from Whedon's various series have gone on to have strong roles in other shows, such as Person of Interest, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, The 100, etc.
Given this long history, no one can reasonably argue that Joss Whedon is sexist. When he has full creative control, his female characters are all over the board, from professional courtesans, to nurturing mother figures, to unstoppable martial artists and vampire slayers, to powerful witches and super-powered women with alien DNA, to vengeful soulless creatures.
Yes, the makeup of the Avengers team in the latest film is a sausage fest, with only two female characters. But that's not on Joss Whedon. That's on the Marvel Universe, and that's on the bigwigs at Marvel who have the final say on what's in and what's out in their movies: Marvel is renowned for maintaining tight control over a franchise that spans decades and includes dozens of films.
From where I sit, Whedon did what he could to improve the lot of female characters in the Marvel universe: he doubled the number of female Avengers in this latest movie. Previous Avengers cartoon series and comic books typically only have one or two women at a time. The Avengers can only have so many members, and in this movie it must include Captain America, the Hulk, Iron Man, Hawkeye and Thor. Story-telling constraints limit how many female characters can be on the team at one time.
The real problem with the Black Widow character isn't that she's female, it's that she has no super powers. She's basically just a spy, a vanilla mortal, who has to shoot the bad guys with pistols. Hawkeye is a normal too, but he at least gets exploding arrows.
The issue with feminists, it seems, is that the Black Widow character actually cares about other people. She isn't concerned solely with her own egotistical goals and blowing stuff up.
Anyway, good riddance to Twitter. I know the Twittersphere doesn't want to hear this, but it's a complete waste of time for a guy like Joss Whedon to pay any attention to what the Twittersphere has to say.
Actually, it's a waste of anyone's time...
Okay, Ted. Which way do you want it?
On Saturday Rafael Edward ("Ted") Cruz joined a long list of loonies who are afraid that the U.S. military is going to invade Texas, using the Jade Helm 15 military exercises to impose martial law and force Obamacare down Texans' throats!
A couple days later Cruz faulted President Obama for not stopping an attack on right-wing loonies hosting a Mohammed-insulting event specifically tailored to incite the exact same sort of attack that occurred in Paris against Charlie Hebdo.
Look, Rafael -- um, Ted. The purpose of Jade Helm is to fight the terrorists you're so afraid of!
Jade Helm is being staged in the American Southwest because its terrain resembles ISIS-controlled territory. We're training in the United States because every time we establish bases in the Middle East and train there it pisses off locals like Osama bin Laden and makes them think we're going to invade and occupy their countries. Which incites them to attack us here at home.
So we're using Jade Helm to train in the United States to train our troops to fight ISIS, while avoiding foreign entanglements. Got it, Rafael -- oops -- Ted?
Now, about the Mohammed-insulting event. Cruz blames Obama for the Texas attack, and the attacks in Boston and Fort Hood by the Tsarnaevs and Nidal Hassan. It's a load of crap. If this is true, then Bush was responsible for 9/11. Bush had a hell of lot more warning about bin Laden's elaborate plans involving dozens of conspirators in a dozen countries to crash jets into four buildings at once than Obama ever had.
The isolated attacks Cruz is pinning on Obama were cooked up by one or two people living in the United States. There are no dots to connect to ISIS, because the perpetrators executed these attacks on their own initiative, egged on by people like Ted Cruz and Pam Geller.
The domestic terrorists that make Cruz and Lindsey Graham wet their pants are motivated by American interventions in the Middle East that kill Muslims. Tsarnaev cited the the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as his motivation, and Nidal Hasan claims to have killed American soldiers to prevent them from killing the Taliban.
The recent attack in Texas was clearly incited by Pam Geller, who intentionally staged the event in order to elicit the attack. When you have 40 armed guards and a SWAT team on-site it's clear you're setting a trap. Ha ha, Pam, you really fooled those stupid Muslims!
These home-grown terrorists are outraged by what they see as injustice against Muslims. These terrorists are dead wrong about most Americans, who don't give a damn about Syria or Afghanistan or Iraq. But not all Americans are so benignly indifferent.
You can't win the hearts and minds of American Muslims by calling them traitors and un-American, and then indiscriminately killing their relatives and co-religionists in foreign countries.
Geller and Cruz and Graham know this. They don't care. They are intentionally inflaming Muslim opinion against the United States. They want war and death. They think it's to their advantage to scare people because they think scared people vote Republican.
If we want Muslims to stop attacking us, we have to stop attacking them. Both verbally and militarily.
A couple days later Cruz faulted President Obama for not stopping an attack on right-wing loonies hosting a Mohammed-insulting event specifically tailored to incite the exact same sort of attack that occurred in Paris against Charlie Hebdo.
Look, Rafael -- um, Ted. The purpose of Jade Helm is to fight the terrorists you're so afraid of!
Jade Helm is being staged in the American Southwest because its terrain resembles ISIS-controlled territory. We're training in the United States because every time we establish bases in the Middle East and train there it pisses off locals like Osama bin Laden and makes them think we're going to invade and occupy their countries. Which incites them to attack us here at home.
So we're using Jade Helm to train in the United States to train our troops to fight ISIS, while avoiding foreign entanglements. Got it, Rafael -- oops -- Ted?
Now, about the Mohammed-insulting event. Cruz blames Obama for the Texas attack, and the attacks in Boston and Fort Hood by the Tsarnaevs and Nidal Hassan. It's a load of crap. If this is true, then Bush was responsible for 9/11. Bush had a hell of lot more warning about bin Laden's elaborate plans involving dozens of conspirators in a dozen countries to crash jets into four buildings at once than Obama ever had.
The isolated attacks Cruz is pinning on Obama were cooked up by one or two people living in the United States. There are no dots to connect to ISIS, because the perpetrators executed these attacks on their own initiative, egged on by people like Ted Cruz and Pam Geller.
Domestic terrorist attacks are motivated by killing of Muslims and occupation of Muslim countries.
However, the dots that connect these terrorist attacks can be seen every day on television and the web as we watch American jets bomb Muslim countries, American drones kill innocent bystanders and Americans still occupying Muslim countries for more than a decade.The domestic terrorists that make Cruz and Lindsey Graham wet their pants are motivated by American interventions in the Middle East that kill Muslims. Tsarnaev cited the the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as his motivation, and Nidal Hasan claims to have killed American soldiers to prevent them from killing the Taliban.
The recent attack in Texas was clearly incited by Pam Geller, who intentionally staged the event in order to elicit the attack. When you have 40 armed guards and a SWAT team on-site it's clear you're setting a trap. Ha ha, Pam, you really fooled those stupid Muslims!
These home-grown terrorists are outraged by what they see as injustice against Muslims. These terrorists are dead wrong about most Americans, who don't give a damn about Syria or Afghanistan or Iraq. But not all Americans are so benignly indifferent.
The American Right has created far more Muslim terrorists than ISIS ever has.
Every time Pam Geller or Ted Cruz or Lindsey Graham and the other conservative whack jobs open their yaps and repeat that we need to wage a new Crusade against Islam, more American Muslims start believing that ISIS is right. The American Right and their bumbling wars and interventions and hateful rhetoric have created far more Muslim terrorists than ISIS ever has.You can't win the hearts and minds of American Muslims by calling them traitors and un-American, and then indiscriminately killing their relatives and co-religionists in foreign countries.
Geller and Cruz and Graham know this. They don't care. They are intentionally inflaming Muslim opinion against the United States. They want war and death. They think it's to their advantage to scare people because they think scared people vote Republican.
If we want Muslims to stop attacking us, we have to stop attacking them. Both verbally and militarily.
Wednesday, May 06, 2015
Are the Baltimore Riots Today's Boston Tea Party?
All Fox News can do is caterwaul about the violence in Baltimore, but what about these incidents that occurred in just the last week?
All conservatives can do is complain about "thugs" and "animals" running riot in our cities. But why are they rioting? Because the cops who are supposed to be protecting us are acting like thugs and animals.
Six cops arrested Freddie Gray for the abominable crime of running away from them in fear. They beat him up, injured him, bounced him around in the back of a van while he was cuffed and shackled, ignored his cries for help, delayed seeking treatment for him when he was clearly in distress, then lied about the whole thing. At some point in the affair they broke his spine, which killed him a week later.
Some people think these attacks on African Americans are all about race, and that's part of it. Some of the cops charged in the death of Freddie Gray were black. Some of the cops involved in other shootings and the subsequent coverups are also black.
The bigger problem is that way too many cops think they should hold a privileged position in this country, and their unions think they should be above the law. And they just lose it when people disobey or disrespect them. When people like Freddie Gray in Baltimore or Walter Scott in South Carolina run from police, the cops' reflexive action seems to be to run them down and arrest or shoot them. Even if there's zero evidence that they are guilty of any crime.
Freddie Gray, it turned out, had done nothing wrong. He had a knife whose legality the various camps are bickering about. Conservatives point to this as evidence of some evil intent. I'm curious: if Gray had had a concealed pistol, which conservatives seem to think is a panacea for making the world a safer place, would they now be touting him as hero for defending second amendment rights?
In short, the very act of disobedience is a crime punishable by death in the eyes of these cops.
There is clearly a strain of lawlessness, arrogance and violence in American law enforcement. They run roughshod over the civil rights of Americans, rarely being called to account for their crimes.
Clearly, not all cops are bad. Clearly, some of the rioters in Baltimore are just vandals and opportunists.
Equally as clearly, there are a lot of bad cops who dish out violence with high-handed impunity. The people of Baltimore have a right to be extremely angry about them.
If American conservatives truly believed in freedom and the threat of a tyrannical government, they would be the first ones to criticize these bad cops and demand accountability for law enforcement officials who constantly overstep their authority.
But right-wingers and Fox News keep fixating on the riots in Baltimore and Ferguson. And in doing so they are missing clear parallels with American history: they are cheering for the bad guys.
The Boston Tea Party was just one of many acts of vandalism and civil disobedience leading up to the Revolutionary War, including the burning of the Peggy Stewart.
Before the Revolutionary War, the Sons of Liberty protesters would have been called terrorists and thugs by the conservatives of the day: they burned the home of Massachusettes Lt. Gov. Thomas Hutchinson. They stole and burned the New York governor's coach to ash. They destroyed the home of Fort George's commander, breaking windows and stealing from the wine cellar.
The Sons of Liberty used violence to protest the Stamp Act and Sugar Act, tax laws imposed by the British government on a nation that yearned for independence. The rioters in Baltimore and Ferguson are protesting the harassment, thievery and wanton murder of American citizens by corrupt and arrogant cops.
You'd think Americans who call themselves patriots would be on the right side of history, rather than siding with Tories and petty tyrants in the police department.
- A drunk Staten Island cop pulled her service weapon and opened fire, hitting the car of the wife of the man she was dating.
- A drunk off-duty New York cop opened fire on a man in a car, hitting him several times, apparently for no reason whatsoever.
- A drunk NYPD detective shot his partner by accident, and then drove the hospital drunk.
- Thirteen current and former North Carolina cops were arrested by the FBI for drug trafficking.
- A Georgia sheriff who compares himself to Batman shot a real estate agent in a model home "in a tragic accident" while "practicing police tactics."
All conservatives can do is complain about "thugs" and "animals" running riot in our cities. But why are they rioting? Because the cops who are supposed to be protecting us are acting like thugs and animals.
Six cops arrested Freddie Gray for the abominable crime of running away from them in fear. They beat him up, injured him, bounced him around in the back of a van while he was cuffed and shackled, ignored his cries for help, delayed seeking treatment for him when he was clearly in distress, then lied about the whole thing. At some point in the affair they broke his spine, which killed him a week later.
Some people think these attacks on African Americans are all about race, and that's part of it. Some of the cops charged in the death of Freddie Gray were black. Some of the cops involved in other shootings and the subsequent coverups are also black.
The bigger problem is that way too many cops think they should hold a privileged position in this country, and their unions think they should be above the law. And they just lose it when people disobey or disrespect them. When people like Freddie Gray in Baltimore or Walter Scott in South Carolina run from police, the cops' reflexive action seems to be to run them down and arrest or shoot them. Even if there's zero evidence that they are guilty of any crime.
Freddie Gray, it turned out, had done nothing wrong. He had a knife whose legality the various camps are bickering about. Conservatives point to this as evidence of some evil intent. I'm curious: if Gray had had a concealed pistol, which conservatives seem to think is a panacea for making the world a safer place, would they now be touting him as hero for defending second amendment rights?
In short, the very act of disobedience is a crime punishable by death in the eyes of these cops.
There is clearly a strain of lawlessness, arrogance and violence in American law enforcement. They run roughshod over the civil rights of Americans, rarely being called to account for their crimes.
Clearly, not all cops are bad. Clearly, some of the rioters in Baltimore are just vandals and opportunists.
Equally as clearly, there are a lot of bad cops who dish out violence with high-handed impunity. The people of Baltimore have a right to be extremely angry about them.
If American conservatives truly believed in freedom and the threat of a tyrannical government, they would be the first ones to criticize these bad cops and demand accountability for law enforcement officials who constantly overstep their authority.
But right-wingers and Fox News keep fixating on the riots in Baltimore and Ferguson. And in doing so they are missing clear parallels with American history: they are cheering for the bad guys.
The Boston Tea Party was just one of many acts of vandalism and civil disobedience leading up to the Revolutionary War, including the burning of the Peggy Stewart.
Before the Revolutionary War, the Sons of Liberty protesters would have been called terrorists and thugs by the conservatives of the day: they burned the home of Massachusettes Lt. Gov. Thomas Hutchinson. They stole and burned the New York governor's coach to ash. They destroyed the home of Fort George's commander, breaking windows and stealing from the wine cellar.
The Sons of Liberty used violence to protest the Stamp Act and Sugar Act, tax laws imposed by the British government on a nation that yearned for independence. The rioters in Baltimore and Ferguson are protesting the harassment, thievery and wanton murder of American citizens by corrupt and arrogant cops.
You'd think Americans who call themselves patriots would be on the right side of history, rather than siding with Tories and petty tyrants in the police department.
The Good Guy With A Gun Lie Debunked Again
In the past couple of days, there have been two violent incidents that illustrate, once again, the whole good guy with a gun myth. Recall that this lie started when Wayne LaPierre noted after Sandy Hook that "the only thing the stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." Most of us living in the real world knows that this really isn't true. Remember Antoinette Tuff? So, no, not the "only" thing.
But what about the deterrence factor element of this myth? The Gun Cult likes to lie by shoveling out the "gun full zones make criminals think twice" pile of shit every other day. Yet reality says otherwise.
Minnesota farm couple fatally shot during burglary; home torched next day
The suspected gunman lived on a neighboring piece of property to the Hivelys. He was captured after a police officer stopped an alleged accomplice and found guns stolen from the Hively home in the car’s trunk.
Wait...what? I thought if you had guns in your house, they protected you from bad guys. What happened?
Continuing on with reality...
Two shot dead after they open fire at Mohammed cartoon event in Texas.
Two men who opened fire outside a contest for Prophet Mohammed cartoons in a Dallas suburb were shot dead by police Sunday night, authorities said. The men drove up to the Culwell Event Center in North Garland, got out of their car and began shooting just as the "Muhammad Art Exhibit and Cartoon Contest" inside was coming to an end, Garland police spokesman Joe Harn said. An unarmed security guard was shot in the leg. He was later treated and released from a hospital. Police who were helping with security at the event fired back, killing both gunmen.
So, the cops were there with guns and they...still attacked? Hmm...I wonder why...? And how on EARTH did they get those assault rifles so easily in Texas?
Nikto or myself might have a post coming soon about the "free speech" event that was attacked but for now I'm betting some heads are awfully 'splodey right now considering the lax gun laws of our nation basically are helping out ISIL.
What ever will the Gun Cult do now?
But what about the deterrence factor element of this myth? The Gun Cult likes to lie by shoveling out the "gun full zones make criminals think twice" pile of shit every other day. Yet reality says otherwise.
Minnesota farm couple fatally shot during burglary; home torched next day
The suspected gunman lived on a neighboring piece of property to the Hivelys. He was captured after a police officer stopped an alleged accomplice and found guns stolen from the Hively home in the car’s trunk.
Wait...what? I thought if you had guns in your house, they protected you from bad guys. What happened?
Continuing on with reality...
Two shot dead after they open fire at Mohammed cartoon event in Texas.
Two men who opened fire outside a contest for Prophet Mohammed cartoons in a Dallas suburb were shot dead by police Sunday night, authorities said. The men drove up to the Culwell Event Center in North Garland, got out of their car and began shooting just as the "Muhammad Art Exhibit and Cartoon Contest" inside was coming to an end, Garland police spokesman Joe Harn said. An unarmed security guard was shot in the leg. He was later treated and released from a hospital. Police who were helping with security at the event fired back, killing both gunmen.
So, the cops were there with guns and they...still attacked? Hmm...I wonder why...? And how on EARTH did they get those assault rifles so easily in Texas?
Nikto or myself might have a post coming soon about the "free speech" event that was attacked but for now I'm betting some heads are awfully 'splodey right now considering the lax gun laws of our nation basically are helping out ISIL.
What ever will the Gun Cult do now?
Tuesday, May 05, 2015
Four More Hats In The Ring
Since the last update on the 2016 presidential election, four more candidates have officially announced their candidacy for the presidency.
On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders, the democratic socialist from Vermont, has decided to challenge Hillary from the left. Smart move as it's going to keep her honest. He raised 1.5 million dollars and added 100,000 supporters in one day so this isn't a novelty run. There are many Americans out there who support his vision for America in what is an ever growing progressive base. I look for Hillary to continue to move to the left with Sanders in the mix.
On the Republican side we have Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, and Mike Huckabee. I don't expect much traction for these three as they polling pretty low behind the clear top tier candidates...Bush, Rubio, Walker and Paul. Bush and Walker haven't officially announced yet, btw, and I have to wonder what the fuck they are waiting for. Of all of these, Huckabee has a shot of winning enough southern states (and maybe Iowa) to stay in the mix but he seems all news to me.
So, we have 2 on the Democratic side and 6 on the GOP side. Anyone else out there looking forward to the first GOP debates?:)
On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders, the democratic socialist from Vermont, has decided to challenge Hillary from the left. Smart move as it's going to keep her honest. He raised 1.5 million dollars and added 100,000 supporters in one day so this isn't a novelty run. There are many Americans out there who support his vision for America in what is an ever growing progressive base. I look for Hillary to continue to move to the left with Sanders in the mix.
On the Republican side we have Carly Fiorina, Ben Carson, and Mike Huckabee. I don't expect much traction for these three as they polling pretty low behind the clear top tier candidates...Bush, Rubio, Walker and Paul. Bush and Walker haven't officially announced yet, btw, and I have to wonder what the fuck they are waiting for. Of all of these, Huckabee has a shot of winning enough southern states (and maybe Iowa) to stay in the mix but he seems all news to me.
So, we have 2 on the Democratic side and 6 on the GOP side. Anyone else out there looking forward to the first GOP debates?:)
The Republican Brain Part Three: A Dream Ever Failing
In the prelude to the first section of his book, The Republican Brain, Chris Mooney laments a lost dream.
The dream was that the power of human reason would eventually stamp out lies, prejudices, and falsehoods, delivering a truly enlightened society. It would be a society in which ideologically driven misinformation would gradually decline or disappear, vanquished and chased from the public sphere by rational arguments (like mine). It would be a society in which everybody could agree on the core facts about the world, especially those that matter to public policy and the future.
Truly, a fantasy world today given how fiercely conservatives avoid core facts and rational arguments. In fact, their rallying principle is to fight against them with their own version of reality and far too many people follow along. Worse, they "turn the tables" and say that it's the Democrats who aren't rational, truly killing this dream or a rational world.
But this dead dream didn't just recently die. It has been dying all along human history. Mooney cites the example of Marquis de Condorcet as an excellent illustration of this idealism. Condorcet was a passionate philosopher during the Age of Enlightenment. He hung out with Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Like all the great thinkers of this time, he championed the science of society and a society of social mathematics. He predicted a world that where reason and facts win out. He saw the villains of this world as dictators and priests and the heroes were the scientists and the innovators.
As Mooney notes...
...free inquiry and critical thinking-"that spirit of doubt which submits facts and proofs to severe rational scrutiny"-must prove unstoppable. It's virtually a law of nature. In the long run, our better faculties will enable not only the expression of human reason, but the creation of political system based upon universal human rights, social contracts, majority rule, and so on-precisely the sort of constitution Condorcet tried to establish in France as the terror descended.
The terror, of course, being the French Revolution. As Condorcet vainly tried to instill this philosophy in the new constitution, angry and hateful men (the Jacobins) rebelled against this rationality. Of course, Condorcet believed that if he got the word out about his type of society, through widespread dissemination via the printing press, rationality would "stamp out" wacky, ideological nonsense. Imagine what Condorcet would have thought about the internet and social media!
What he didn't realize was that the wider nets of communication allowed many other messages to mix in with the rational ones. Further, he neglected to understand that the human mind, in capturing these irrational messages, might be affected by them. The human mind had indeed progressed but, at its base, it was still primitive. So, the question is...how does this happen?
More importantly, what are the facts regarding why we deny facts? Science doesn't always persuade us let alone mere facts. Education doesn't really help either. Even having more information means that there are many more instances to twist reality and skew the facts. Why? What is the science about why we deny science?
This is what Mooney will be exploring in the next section of the book and the topic of my next post in this series.
The dream was that the power of human reason would eventually stamp out lies, prejudices, and falsehoods, delivering a truly enlightened society. It would be a society in which ideologically driven misinformation would gradually decline or disappear, vanquished and chased from the public sphere by rational arguments (like mine). It would be a society in which everybody could agree on the core facts about the world, especially those that matter to public policy and the future.
Truly, a fantasy world today given how fiercely conservatives avoid core facts and rational arguments. In fact, their rallying principle is to fight against them with their own version of reality and far too many people follow along. Worse, they "turn the tables" and say that it's the Democrats who aren't rational, truly killing this dream or a rational world.
But this dead dream didn't just recently die. It has been dying all along human history. Mooney cites the example of Marquis de Condorcet as an excellent illustration of this idealism. Condorcet was a passionate philosopher during the Age of Enlightenment. He hung out with Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Like all the great thinkers of this time, he championed the science of society and a society of social mathematics. He predicted a world that where reason and facts win out. He saw the villains of this world as dictators and priests and the heroes were the scientists and the innovators.
As Mooney notes...
...free inquiry and critical thinking-"that spirit of doubt which submits facts and proofs to severe rational scrutiny"-must prove unstoppable. It's virtually a law of nature. In the long run, our better faculties will enable not only the expression of human reason, but the creation of political system based upon universal human rights, social contracts, majority rule, and so on-precisely the sort of constitution Condorcet tried to establish in France as the terror descended.
The terror, of course, being the French Revolution. As Condorcet vainly tried to instill this philosophy in the new constitution, angry and hateful men (the Jacobins) rebelled against this rationality. Of course, Condorcet believed that if he got the word out about his type of society, through widespread dissemination via the printing press, rationality would "stamp out" wacky, ideological nonsense. Imagine what Condorcet would have thought about the internet and social media!
What he didn't realize was that the wider nets of communication allowed many other messages to mix in with the rational ones. Further, he neglected to understand that the human mind, in capturing these irrational messages, might be affected by them. The human mind had indeed progressed but, at its base, it was still primitive. So, the question is...how does this happen?
More importantly, what are the facts regarding why we deny facts? Science doesn't always persuade us let alone mere facts. Education doesn't really help either. Even having more information means that there are many more instances to twist reality and skew the facts. Why? What is the science about why we deny science?
This is what Mooney will be exploring in the next section of the book and the topic of my next post in this series.
Monday, May 04, 2015
Sunday, May 03, 2015
Another Small Step Preparing for the Giant Leap?
The recent tests, performed in vacuum, indicated that the EM Drive produced thrust without any emitting any propellant. This defies the basic laws of classical physics put forth by Newton centuries ago -- the whole "for every action there's an equal and opposite reaction" thing.
Rockets work by ejecting propellant, pushing the vehicle forward. In the weightless vacuum of space, there's nothing to "grab hold" of, like the ground for cars, the water for boats or the air for planes.
The EM drive works by bouncing around microwaves inside a closed cavity, converting electricity directly to momentum. It's not a lot of thrust -- but it's constant. In a weightless vacuum you just keep going faster and faster because there's no friction or gravity to slow you down.
How does this work? They don't know for sure.
The head of NASA Eagleworks, Dr. Harold "Sonny" White, theorizes that the thrust comes from virtual particles of the Quantum Vacuum. Virtual particles are a real thing, though they seem pretty far out there -- but quantum mechanics is like that.
A 2014 test of the drive in in air was also successful, but thermal interaction with the air could have been responsible for thrust. The vacuum test eliminates that uncertainty.
This type of drive has more immediate applications closer to earth. One of the main problems for satellites is stationkeeping -- orbits decay over time to due to atmospheric drag. They need to use tiny rockets to maintain their orbits. But they have only a finite supply of propellant -- once it's gone, the satellite falls out of orbit. The lower the orbit, the more drag.
With the EM drive, no propellant would be needed -- just electricity, which is obtained from solar panels. An EM drive would drastically increase the useful lifespan of satellites. It would also allow photographic reconnaissance satellites, such as military spysats, weather satellites, low-earth orbit communications satellites, to reposition themselves without having to worry about running out of fuel. (Solving the whole, "Chloe, I need that satellite repositioned right now!" problem.)
The same Eagleworks team is looking at warping space, and has already had some preliminary successes. Those tests have yet to be validated in a vacuum.
The researchers are talking in terms of decades before EM drives will be ready for use. But I'm not so sure. These EM drives are relatively small electronic devices that depend on quantum mechanics for their operation.
That means they have more in common with semiconductor electronics -- which are tiny electronic devices that depend on quantum mechanics -- than the engines in giant rockets that have proven so difficult to master.
As evidenced by the billions of cell phones out there, if there's one thing we're really good at, it's making tiny electronic devices.
Minnesota Wall Eye and Climate Change
The warming waters of Minnesota due to man made climate change are affecting the Wall Eye population as my home state heads into fishing opener.
In other words, if they can’t survive, then other fish won’t either. But they won’t be alone. A major study published last week in the journal Science found that if greenhouse gases and average temperatures continue to rise at current rates, the world will see a major loss in diversity. One in six species around the globe could disappear because they can’t move or adapt fast enough to changing habitat.
My hope is that those fishermen who deny that climate change is man made and are now personally affected by this will help create more action. Of course, Mooney tells me otherwise:)
In other words, if they can’t survive, then other fish won’t either. But they won’t be alone. A major study published last week in the journal Science found that if greenhouse gases and average temperatures continue to rise at current rates, the world will see a major loss in diversity. One in six species around the globe could disappear because they can’t move or adapt fast enough to changing habitat.
My hope is that those fishermen who deny that climate change is man made and are now personally affected by this will help create more action. Of course, Mooney tells me otherwise:)
Yet Another Responsible Gun Owner
Man drops gun, shooting woman in both arms outside Macon elementary school gym
A woman was wounded on both arms during what deputies deem may have been an accidental shooting caused by someone dropping a gun Monday night outside an elementary school gym in Bibb County. Deputies on Tuesday were still searching for the shooter.
The woman told deputies she was standing outside the school’s gym when she heard a popping noise, Howard said. Then she looked down and realized she had blood on her hands, Howard said.
Good thing guns are allowed everywhere in Georgia.
Ground stood!!
A woman was wounded on both arms during what deputies deem may have been an accidental shooting caused by someone dropping a gun Monday night outside an elementary school gym in Bibb County. Deputies on Tuesday were still searching for the shooter.
The woman told deputies she was standing outside the school’s gym when she heard a popping noise, Howard said. Then she looked down and realized she had blood on her hands, Howard said.
Good thing guns are allowed everywhere in Georgia.
Ground stood!!
Saturday, May 02, 2015
Friday, May 01, 2015
The Personal Computer Revolution and Personal Energy Independence
Tesla has been testing these power systems in companies like Walmart and Cargill, and a pilot project in 300 California homes.
Most homes with rooftop solar panels feed their electricity back into the grid, and then draw power from the grid when it's dark. But with Tesla's Powerwall battery system, all that excess solar power can be stored in your garage. It can supplement your household power when the grid is overloaded, or recharge your electric car, or allow you to go off the grid completely. This could be very bad for electric utilities, especially in sunny southern climes.
For months Hawaiian Electric (HECO) had been stonewalling customers who wanted to install solar panels on their houses. HECO complained that the grid isn't up to the task, and that it just isn't economical to change it. Since HECO doesn't control the output of home solar panels, they said, they couldn't predict how much power they will produce. That makes it very hard to balance the various sources of power, which could destabilize the grid. This is a completely valid concern, but this mindset may ultimately doom utilities like HECO.
Why are Republicans propping up government-sanctioned monopolies?
A great many utility monopolies have been making the same claims. A
lot of states
make it very difficult to install rooftop solar. Curiously, these
states are mostly in the south, where photovoltaics could generate
a lot of power. These states are generally controlled by
Republican majorities, who are in turn controlled by the
Koch brothers, who with their legislative arm ALEC have been
fighting solar power tooth and nail. This seems contradictory to the basic Republican ideology of independence and self-reliance. Why are Republicans propping up government-sanctioned monopolies?Though they had been delaying since last October, recently Hawaiian Electric approved all the rooftop solar applications on Maui and Hawaii, and is working to remove the backlog on Oahu. Why?
Maybe Hawaiian regulators turned up the heat after citizens who invested in solar panels complained. Maybe HECO resolved their technical issues. Or maybe HECO saw the writing on the wall, and realized that if they didn't hook these customers up, they might lose them completely.
Hawaii is really the perfect place for people to go off the grid. It's warm and sunny, but not too hot, so it doesn't need as much energy for heating and cooling as the rest of the country does. Hawaii has to import all its oil, coal and natural gas across the ocean, making it much more expensive: electric rates in Hawaii are about two and a half times higher than the US national average. That means rooftop solar is already much cheaper in Hawaii than fossil fuel-generated power.
The technologies that made the Internet and mobile revolutions possible are doing the same for power generation.
But now the same technology that made the Internet revolution possible is starting another revolution in power
generation. Solar cells are essentially the same as the computer
chips that go into our computers and cell phones. Production
efficiencies have now made photovoltaic cells as cheap as any
other kind of chips. That has made power from rooftop solar is almost as cheap as power from coal and natural gas, and it's only getting cheaper.Similarly, high-density lithium ion batteries developed for the mobile phones and tablets have revolutionized battery technologies, making electric cars and home power storage technologies possible.
Going off the grid isn't limited to tropical paradises. Buildings designed to the Passive House standard use almost no energy for heating and cooling. They are super-insulated and airtight and use heat exchangers in their ventilation systems to minimize energy use. The Passivhaus standard was developed in Germany -- almost all of which is further north than the Canadian border -- and is applicable anywhere in the United States. Germany also generates almost 7% of its electricity from solar, producing power even when it's cloudy. About the same amount of power is generated by wind turbines.
The fossil fuel industry likes to paint wind and solar as being "unpredictable" and "unreliable" sources of energy. But as we've seen in the past, oil prices are extremely unpredictable and supplies are unreliable, subject to wild swings. The availability and price of oil and gas fluctuate based on turmoil in the Middle East, closures of refineries, ports and rail lines (due to strikes, maintenance and explosions), or the whims of terrorists and tyrants in Libya, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Russia and Iran.
Instead of fighting wind and solar, power utilities like HECO should be working closely with companies like Tesla and SolarCity to free themselves from the vagaries and manipulations of the international energy markets. They should be working with homes and businesses to install rooftop solar so that they can integrate those systems into the grid more reliably.
Because, although they have no idea what the price of fossil fuel will be in two weeks or two months or two years, they know exactly what time the sun is going to rise, every day.
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