On Brains, Science, and Political Positions

Recently I was sent an article by my old friend (literally, on both attributes) and theology teacher from seminary. The article was by George Lakoff, a professor of cognitive science and linguistics at Berkeley, and titled, "Obama, Tea Parties, and the Battle for our Brains."[1] The grand theolog rightly sniffed-out that something was fishy about this article, but he couldn't quite identify the problem.  (Since I was his T.A. some decades ago, he apparently thinks he can still simply assign me tasks at whim and I'll drop everything and jump right on them. Dang it -- apparently he's right!)

At the general level, the article is not too surprising: that the metaphors we use to mentally frame issues are often tied to how our brain processes bodily states. And since conscious mental states are also processed by the brain, it's not surprising that there would be shared processing structures, or similar processing structures involved in both mental processes and body-monitoring processes.

Again, that people use different metaphors to frame common issues, and then fight to understand one another is also well known. People have preferred metaphors, and words are not limited to strictly defined or precisely understood meanings. Yet, happily, metaphorical language can be decoded into less-metaphorical or even non-metaphorical language, the latter being what scientists do when they utilize mathematics and logic to explain and predict phenomenon. Reasoning with analytical languages give us the precision, understanding, and control of concepts that would otherwise be unavailable with natural languages.

Mr. Lakoff is a cognitive scientist and reports on studies that are well attested, and there's no reason to suspect his accuracy in recounting of those results. However, he seems to be defending a troublesome argument:

1. The vast majority of political reasoning by people is by metaphorical framing.
2. And those people who reason with metaphorical framing are people who are hearing only what they want to hear. Whether affirming or denying how they've framed the issue, the very re-statement of their frame simply reinforces it.
3. Therefore, the argument goes, people on the liberal and conservative sides of political issues are generally hearing only what they want to hear.

Furthermore, as an additional argument, he thinks conservatives of one brand or another are committed to eliminating any contrary positions, and any riding-the-fence positions, thus leaving their ideology as the only one around. After all, on Mr. Lakoff's analysis, conservatives think their position is the only one that "should" be around.

What can one make of all this? On my view, Mr. Lakoff draws a false dichotomy between what he misleadingly labels "real" reason and "false" reason, where the former is how people (allegedly) really think, and the latter is what is traditionally associated with Enlightenment ideals of reasoning. I would point out straightway how suspicious one should be of this bifurcation, as if somehow humans didn't use metaphorical framing during the Enlightenment era, or that humans are not deeply engaged in using the traditional kind of reason in science everyday. (Recall my math usage observation earlier.) Although I think the argument above is often an accurate portrayal of how the general populous operates, premiss one allows for other kinds of thinking (which Mr. Lakoff himself is doing), and premise two is plainly too strong; that people use metaphorical framing does not mean they are locked into it; it's just that people are generally ignorant, unwise, and easily manipulated -- a view of the citizenry that our U.S. founding fathers, themselves Enlightenment figures, mind you, were quite happy to maintain.

Mr. Lakoff wants his readers to think that there is a direct, uncomplicated circuit between metaphors and words in our brains, and even that "every word is neurally connected." This is complete poppy-cock. First, that every word has a location for a convenient connection has not been shown, not even partially, not even remotely. (Where is the word 'trinity' stored in my brain, or 'infinity'? Is 'stairway' stored as one word or two?) This is idle speculation tossed about as good science. Second, even if there were found circuits between metaphors and words, there would be a host of other branching circuits modulating and interfering with how that information is exchanged. Indeed, the average single neuron has 7,000 connections to it, so I hardly think that a simple, on/off mutual inhibition of brain circuits explains why, in Mr. Lakoff's words, "There is no moral system of the moderate or the middle." This claim is laughably simplistic, and all the more surprising coming from a scholar of Mr. Lakoff's level. Contrary to what computerniks wish, neurons are not like on/off switches, but fire in analog fashion and modulate the signals among one another with great subtlety and by means of complicated, even recursive feedback loops.

Granted, people can be pig-headed and stubborn, but they are not merely slaves to stimulus-response conditioning when it comes to abstract philosophical matters like politics. On the supposition that humans do have some level of free will, they can chose to reason using several different modalities, not just by their metaphorical framing. Oh but that they would pause for a while and recognize (or learn) that traditional reasoning has it's place in politics too, and can be beneficial for everyone in the political community!

REFERENCES

[image] ABC news

[1] George Lakoff, "Obama, Tea Parties and the Battle for Our Brains" Feb. 22 2010 Truthout (Accessed Feb. 27, 2010)

Why Religion Won't Go Away

In a book review of God is Back: How The Global Rise of Faith Is Changing The World by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge, reviewer Mark Vernon gives an excellent overview of why the U.S. is such a religious nation and, more generally, why religion has hung on in the face of modern developments in science and advance commerce:

The more modernity undermines people's sense of identity, through the leveling forces of globalization, the more they seek a distinctive identity through religious commitment. The more turbulent people's work lives become, the more appealing a stable church life can seem. The more people suffer under a harsh capitalism, the more religious organizations offer welfare and help, thereby drawing folk in.[1]

This is probably the best, pithy analysis of religion's continued influence as I've seen. I have to admit, I utterly believe it. Importantly, it gives the reason why religion survives, and what it's proper function should be in society. Also, it tacitly acknowledges that even were market forces and goods distributed equitably among all people, the desires for identity would still make religion attractive. Next, Vernon goes onto talk about how religion functions specifically in U.S. culture:

But there are certain political conditions that have aided God's return too, or rather sustained his presence, for he never really went away. Top of the list, the two authors argue, is America's constitution, and its First Amendment: "that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." The first part of that clause is the one that is commonly remembered, in effect, the separation of church and state. But the second part is equally important when it comes to creating the right conditions for religion to thrive. It forms what might be called a free market for religion, in which everyone can set out their stall, and moreover can do so in the public square. What America's modernity has not tried to do is force religion into the private sphere, a tendency that has characterised European reactions to belief. At the same time, though, it has ensured that there is at least a theoretical distance between religion and the exercise of political power.[1]

So when religious groups are allowed to exist, but not allowed to run each other out of the country (or worse), then this forces pluralism upon society, whereby "every day people rub up against belief systems and lifestyles different from their own."[1] I would also add that in a pluralistic, open environment, where religions have to compete with one another for advocates, the weak systems will die, and the stronger ones will morph and become even more attractive to its advocates. Of course, people's psychological profiles and regional preferences will differ, so there will always be a plurality of religions in a pluralistic socio-political environment.


REFERENCES

[1] Mark Vernon "Why God is back" guardian.co.uk, 18 May 2009 (Accessed 5 Dec. 2009)

O.

Ecoprotests increasing not clearly a good thing.

Bright Green Blog is reporting on how climate protests are rising. The article notes that one movement's numbers,

"just exploded and went from being a sizable amount of people, several thousands of very active youth all around the country, to just hundreds of thousands of young people [....] The floodgates are about to open. We have the numbers. We have the skills. We have the passion."

Well, that might be the case, but I worry -- were such a large movement to really take-off, then there would be fringe elements that would inevitably take to eco-terrorism methods, such as vandalizing or even bombing coal-fire plants. For comparison, when anti-abortion groups occasionally gain substantial popularity there are always radicals who take the next step into intimidation and violence. I think it's great that people are taking global climate issues seriously, but sudden quasi-political "movements" to force the market to change faster than its ready for will be counter-productive.

REFERENCES

[image] Cox and Forkum editorial cartoons. (Accessed November 23, 2008)

Kafka, Dickinson, and the issue of no sour cream

There are two thinkers which, when their methods are combined, can give one a very fine micro sketch of contemporary life in our consumer society. Both are fairly well known.

The first thinker, Franz Kafka (1883-1924), is often invoked to make summary of the strange paradoxes in which we can get caught-up. Indeed, this “Czech-born German-speaking writer's posthumously published novels expressed the alienation of 20th century man. Kafka's nightmares of dehumanization, bureaucratic labyrinths, and totalitarian society have much in common with the works of George Orwell (Nineteen Eighty-Four, 1949; Animal Farm, 1955).”[1]

The other thinker whose methods can be invoked for sketching society's current quirks is Emily Dickinson. Dickinson is held to be of the level of such a poet as Walt Whitman, and she is considered one of the most original 19th Century American poets. She is well known for her creative use of metaphor and overall innovative style. She admired the works of John Keats and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, but avoided the florid and romantic style of her time, creating poems of pure and concise imagery, at times witty and sardonic, often boldly frank and illuminating the keen insight she had into the human condition. Her sophistication and profound intellect has been lauded by laymen and scholars alike and influenced many other authors and poets into the 21st Century.[2]

Since a person in my position often must do the oddest of internet searches for obscurantist topics, by serendipity I regularly run across all sorts of things. The very existence of this blog is partially motivated by such findings. Here is an item I found, which is both Kafka like and Dickinson like in its description of a Taco Bell visit. Admittedly, I have modified it somewhat to remove the low-brow use of vulgar language and to set in relief the players in the situation; but, the account is still well-developed by its original author, a man whose dilemma shares a family resemblance with situations we have all found ourselves in.

* * *

When in Hell did it become so necessary for tacos to be drenched in sour cream? Sure, sour cream is awesome; it provides a nice contrasting taste with anything you eat. But when you buy a taco and it tastes like you're eating a tortilla filled with sour cream, it's completely nasty. (This is one of the major reasons I decided to stop going to Taco Bell.) Last week, however, while returning home from a friend's house, I became unexpectedly hungry. The only thing close was a Taco Bell, so I thought to myself, "Hey, I'll just ask for no sour cream!"

It was a simple plan. However, the process would not be simple, and the final goal would not be achieved.

I entered the Taco Bell, and went up to the counter; no one else was in line. The employee, asked me what I wanted. I told him, "I want a Chicken Chalupa, with Baja sauce...." The employee began to enter my order into the machine. "...with no sour cream." This last I added quietly, as if a mere aside. But when I muttered these additional words the employee looked up at me startled.

"What?" He said.

"I want a Chicken Chalupa, with Baja sauce, and no sour cream," I repeated. He stared at me bewildered. After a few seconds he walked away to talk to a manager. I'm not very fluent in Spanish but I got the gist of what they were saying.

"This guy, he wants NO sour cream!" The employee announces as he passes the factory-line taco jockeys.

"NO sour cream?” I hear the manager responds from the bowels of his around the corner, hidden office. “Impossible! He must have meant ALL sour cream."

"No, no,” the employee haggles. “He said NO sour cream."

The managers emerges in the back of the store, and they continued to talk for a short while, completely perplexed by the sheer novelty of the order. Finally, the manager came up to me with the employee in tow behind him.

"What is it that you want sir?" he asked me. He asked completely without guile, as if, perhaps, the employee was assumed too stupid or too confused to have gotten the order correct in the first place.

"I want a Chicken Chalupa, Baja sauce, no sour cream," I duly repeated. The manager looked blankly at me, as if he was trying to stare me down. I didn't let him. After what seemed to be the longest 5 seconds of my life, he spoke.

The manager abruptly announced, as if asked to shoot his neighbor's beloved dog, "I'm sorry, we can't do that."

“What?!” I asked incredulously, “'We can't do that?!'” I parroted back. I must say that I didn't expect them to say that, of all things. At least make up a good excuse -- like, 'We mixed the sour cream with the chicken'; or, 'Our sour cream doesn't have real milk in it anymore. You should try it!'. But a simple, “'We can't do that'” -- What kind of bullshit is that?

Well, the natural question arose, "Why not?" From what I can understand, this is not like asking these people to violate an ordinance against sodomy, or perhaps a law of physics.

"Because,” The manager explained, now becoming a bit irritated, “you have to get the sour cream if you order the Baja sauce."

Immediately, a martial arts fight of sorts breaks out between he and I. My prowess in ordering was not diminished, and his artful defense of the Taco Bell machine was anything but exhausted.

"Okay, I want the regular sauce."

"I'm sorry, you have to get the sour cream if you order the regular sauce."

“I want the sauce that doesn't need any sour cream."

"I'm sorry, there is none."

In swordplay, this kind of back and forth is often analyzed as an extended parley. So I thought I'd switch techniques. Perhaps I could appeal to the very value that Taco bell purports – efficiency.

“Look. It's not that hard,” I began, as a summary of my case. “In fact, it's much easier than what you normally have to do. You don't have to put any sour cream on my Chalupa. That's less work for you, and a better taste for me. No - quiero - un - sour – creamo." That last part I added, not exactly knowing why. I think my sub-conscious must have also starting getting pissed-off at the whole situation.

"I'm sorry, sir, but I'm going to have to ask you to leave." The manager pretty much called it checkmate right there.

"Yea! I AM going to leave!” I announced, entering chew-them-out tonal mode. “I'm gonna leave cause I feel like it, not because you told me to. If you told me to then I WOULDN'T leave because I'm not gonna listen to you, but I'm gonna leave cause you guys SUCK!" I'm sure the chain of premiss indicators nesting around that conterfactual must of mind thrusted him badly; he is probably down about six I.Q. points even to this day.

So I left. I didn't want their roach grind tacos anyway – bunch of chicken chokers.[3]


REFERENCES

[1] “Franz Kafka” Pegasos (Accessed April 21, 2008) {http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/kafka.htm}

[2] “Emily Dickinson – Biography and Works” The Literature Network (Accesed April 21, 2008) {http://www.online-literature.com/dickinson/}

[3] “I'm going to kill the employees at Taco Bell” Ubersite.com March 11, 2005 (Accessed April 21, 2008) {http://www.ubersite.com/m/61748}

O.

Army generation gap causing increasing officer tensions

{ Podcast this essay } In a recent NY times article, there was an extended treatment about how elite junior officers in the U.S. Army are starting to challenge the Army generals on Iraq strategy and policy. This tension is interesting to me; because, in my experience, there is seemingly a significant change in the outlook of college-age people about every seven years or so. And many of these junior officers are of approximately the same age group.

My speculation is that Junior High school-age young people track what Senior High school-age young people are doing, but after about six-years (two years J.H. + four years S.H.) there is a cultural turn-over. In a similar window of cultural change, we are now approximately seven years into the Iraq conflict as we now know it (and even longer if you count the Kuwait pre-cursor activities to it all). And as I mentioned, junior grade officers are very close to college age, typically representing the age group of graduate students. So where arises the tension?

Since those in senior strategic military command positions (i.e. Generals) have been culturally (or actively) formed by combat experiences from the late 1960s, or by cold war maneuverings from the 1970s and 1980s, they appear from the perspectives of junior grade officers (lieutenants, captains, majors) to be improperly understanding, or to be unwilling to change, the circumstances of the military's engagement in Iraq. In the NY times article, Fred Kaplin comments on the differences between the two groups:

Today’s generals rose through the officer corps of the peacetime Army. Many of them fought in the last years of Vietnam, and some fought in the gulf war. But to the extent they have combat experience, it has been mainly tactical, not strategic. They know how to secure an objective on a battlefield, how to coordinate firepower and maneuver. But they don’t necessarily know how to deal with an enemy that’s flexible, with a scenario that has not been rehearsed.

This disagreement about how Iraq is going which is voiced by many of the best junior grade officers who have actually done tours in Iraq, who have formed opinions drawn from their own intense exposure to that theater, is probably fueled in part by differences in how the younger generation evaluates "success" in military action. The senior grade officers have not been explicitly trained to deal with the odd circumstances wherein the U.S. finds itself, and the junior grade officers are noting the implications of their senior officer's confusion on the matter -- i.e., at the combat and operations level. Eventually, it seems even the generals themselves admit the problems, but this just exasperates the junior officers further. Another quote from Kaplin:

[In April of 2006] six retired Army and Marine generals publicly criticized Rumsfeld, who was still the secretary of defense, for sending too few troops to Iraq. Many junior and field-grade officers reacted with puzzlement or disgust. Their common question: Where were these generals when they still wore the uniform? Why didn’t they speak up when their words might have counted?

One can easily summarize the junior officers' attitude about such admissions: too little, too late.

That the younger generation is reassessing the U.S.'s military role can also be seen elsewhere. Trends of attendees at West Point are showing a clear trend of change in attitude. Potential officer recruits are exiting at a much higher rate:

West Point cadets are obligated to stay in the Army for five years after graduating. In a typical year, about a quarter to a third of them decide not to sign on for another term. In 2003, when the class of 1998 faced that decision, only 18 percent quit the force: memories of 9/11 were still vivid; the war in Afghanistan seemed a success; and war in Iraq was under way. Duty called, and it seemed a good time to be an Army officer. But last year, when the 905 officers from the class of 2001 had to make their choice to stay or leave, 44 percent quit the Army. It was the service’s highest loss rate in three decades.

That 44 percent decided it was not in their interest or ultimate values to support American military policy in Iraq, or in the greater world more generally, is a telling statistic. Again, this is all occurring at West Point, where young people enter that premiere institution already friendly to the idea of being a military officer, already probably primed to pursue that track, but their academic and social experiences eventually move 44 percent to outright change their mind. I would also suspect that a significant fraction of the remaining 56 percent who went on to active duty were not exactly enamored with their future career possibilities.

In the end, I note two more quotes from the NY Times article, ones which are so representative of ambiguities in U.S. military history that one is left wondering if the awareness of history, even in excruciating detail can make any difference at all to American political policy. First, there is the role that senior officers should play (or should not play) in a constitutional republic where civilians decide military policy:

The very discussion of these issues discomforts many senior officers because they take very seriously the principle of civilian control. They believe it is not their place to challenge the president or his duly appointed secretary of defense, certainly not in public, especially not in wartime. The ethical codes are ambiguous on how firmly an officer can press an argument without crossing the line. So, many generals prefer to keep a substantial distance from that line — to keep the prospect of a constitutional crisis from even remotely arising.

Second, this upper-echelon cultural hesitancy of pressing arguments against risky (or even stupid) use of military policy can create situations that eventually take on a life of their own, situations that have no option of solution, but only of cessation. In 1982, Wass de Czege was ordered to rewrite the Army’s field manual on combat operations, and in doing so incorporated many of the lessons of classic treatises on war, from both Eastern and Western sources, and from his own experiences from Vietnam. A quote from him leaves one wondering if the U.S. simply has the same problem, but with a different geography:

In an essay for the July issue of Army magazine, Wass de Czege wrote that today’s junior officers “feel they have much relevant experience [that] those senior to them lack,” yet the senior officers “have not listened to them.” These junior officers, he added, remind him of his own generation of captains, who held the same view during and just after Vietnam

Once Rumsfeld said that the Iraq situation was not like Vietnam. "Different Place. Different time." He stridently said to the press. He was right, but I think history will add a third phrase: "Same mistake."


REFERENCES

Fred Kaplin, "Challenging the Generals" NY Times (Accessed 8/27/2007)

O.

The economics of how to live happily ever after

Stay in school as long as possible, and then get married to somebody else well-educated. That's what been reported in a recent article of The Economist. It also helps if you become a professor:

Research also suggests that middle- and working-class parents approach child-rearing in different ways. Professional parents shuttle their kids from choir practice to baseball camp and check that they are doing their homework. They also talk to them more. One study found that a college professor's kids hear an average of 2,150 words per hour in the first years of life. Working-class children hear 1,250 and those in welfare families only 620.

And make sure you put the bulk of your big spending on their education earlier rather than later, even kindergarten is probably too late. Early childhood education programs (think preschool and earlier) yield profound results:

Participants achieved greater literacy and higher grades, and they were more likely to graduate high school. Later in life, they were more likely to be employed—and to earn more—and less likely to be on welfare. They also committed less crime and had lower rates of teen pregnancy.[2]

The study also points out that not only your kids, but all of society benefits from not having to invest in crime and welfare support for the many children that otherwise are affected by not receiving such care.

The science of family values is giving me creepy, right-wing religious Republican feelings. But as studies and common attestation by their political representatives clearly show ( [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [etc. etc.] ) these people are scientifically illiterate as a social group; so, I'm safe from becoming likeunto them.



REFERENCES


[images] The Economist


[1] "The frayed knot" The Economist (May 24th, 2007)

[2] "Teach your children well." Slate (May 25, 2007)

[3 - 6] in-line links provided.



O.

Plague: nature's past; war's future

{ Podcast @ 9 min. } Plagues have been a nasty part of human history for a long time. Today we have antibiotics which have helped keep these nation-destroying blights at bay. However, antibiotics are a class of substances that kill or inhibit only a very specific type of organism -- bacteria:

Examples [of common antibiotics] are penicillin, tetracycline, and fluoroquinolones. Originally, antibiotics were derived from natural sources, e.g., penicillin from molds, but many currently used antibiotics are semi-synthetic and modified with additions of synthetic chemical components. Some scientists reserve the term antibiotic for naturally produced substances and use antimicrobial to encompass both synthetic and natural forms.[1]

Other kinds of plagues are viral based. Viri are described as follows:

[A]ny of a large group of very tiny infectious agents that are too small to be seen with the ordinary light microscope but can often be seen with the electron microscope, that are considered either very simple microorganisms or very complicated molecules, that have an outside coat of protein around a core of RNA or DNA[2]

Viri can grow and multiply only in living cells, so they are parasitic on more complex biological machinery already in place. Research in antiviral drugs is much inferior to what has gone before in antibiotics. "Historically, the discovery of antiviral drugs has been largely fortuitous. Spurred on by success with antibiotics, drug companies launched huge blind-screening programmes - with relatively little success."[3]

That there is not a straight-forward process for discovering antiviral drugs would make viral bio-warfare all the more problematic, since even identifying a viral agent is little guarantee that a nation could counter its effects. A sane policy of the aggressor nation would be to use a viral agent only if it has available an anti-viral "cure", though one seriously doubts even the general sanity of nations when it comes to mere bio-weapons research. For example, consider the case concerning smallpox, an extraordinarily nasty virus.

Supposedly, in 1977 the last wild smallpox virus case was located, isolated, and killed in Somalia. From that time on, there have been no occurrences of smallpox anywhere, ever. Since there is no smallpox, there is no need for a vaccination against a disease that no longer exists. Well, actually, it does still exist -- in weapons labs. At first, it existed in only two, the US and Russia. But as I earlier noted, things are never sane in these matters:

Just in case, two storage sites were permitted to keep the last surviving frozen samples of the virus. One of these sites was in the United States, the other in Russia. Needless to say, both sites had the highest biosecurity levels and were heavily guarded.. The demon might be captured and on ice, but no one doubted what would happen should it escape. In a world of unvaccinated billions with absolutely no immunity, a global apocalypse was a certainty should the virus ever reach the open air. A small laboratory freezer held prisoner a monster that could literally destroy the world. Presumably the freezer door had a padlock on it.

As you might guess, this made people a bit uneasy. Proposals were put forward to destroy these last remaining stocks. Why keep something so insanely dangerous? Various counter-arguments were put forth. Some felt that it was ethically wrong to drive any species to extinction, even a killer virus. Others felt that the value to future genetic research outweighed any hypothetical concerns about viral escape. The Clinton administration, however, seemed inclined to destroy these stocks because of their intrinsic danger. The Russians agreed.

But then reality interfered, as it often does. Intelligence reports began to indicate that the virus had been acquired by other countries, including Iraq and North Korea. Where did these countries obtain the virus? No one is sure, but one likely candidate is Russia. It turns out that, for many years, the Russian viral store was not so well-guarded after all. Through theft or bribes a few test tubes had gone missing. Once seed stock was in the hands of a rogue regime, it was easy to breed up fresh stores. In this way the demon was given a fresh lease on life.

Smallpox is just too good at killing people and thus makes a terrifyingly perfect biological weapon. Mankind couldn't pass up such an opportunity.[4]

It is well known that other microbials are stored in various pandora box bio-research sites actively operating in the US (map1), and in programs sponsored by other nation states (map2).

What would happen if an incurable, man-made plague were effectively launched in the US? I think history gives some hints about how the casualties would be handled. Naturally, there would be social unrest, especially if a vaccination was not available, or whose safety was controversial. An example of just this situation from Canada is noteworthy for smallpox outbreaks which occurred there:

The epidemic of 1885 was especially dramatic; its scale persuaded municipal authorities to make vaccination obligatory, but medical opinion divided into pro- and antivaccination camps, with the latter accusing the former of spreading the disease. The population, terrified, refused to be vaccinated. On 18 September 1885 a riot broke out in the city. People tore down provaccination posters and ransacked the home of the official medical vaccinater, the city hall, pharmacies and the homes of municipal magistrates. The extent of the catastrophe (it took 3164 lives, 2117 of them children) finally sobered Montréalers into more reasonable behaviour and they obeyed the sanitary authorities and the clergy.[5]

It strikes me that people are no more scientifically informed today than they were then. Furthermore, it appears that contemporary young people are far more tempted to anarchic action in the face of uncertainty or strongly perceived state action.[6] Such a contemporary social mindset would not be good news for law and order if a plague strike were to hit the US (military or otherwise).

Perhaps of necessity there would be required huge, off-shore boat quarantines, where people could be readily monitored and easily housed. This was what happened during the great tuberculosis outbreaks in the 1920s, for "before the discovery of specific antibiotics for the treatment of tuberculosis, there was no cure. Mortality of those with pulmonary disease (disease of the lungs) was about 50%."[7] Thus, in the event of a military strike of non-treatable plague, perhaps with a much higher mortality rate, such isolation would still be a cheap, immediate and pragmatic response today. However, if drug-resistant tuberculosis (and other pathogenic microbes) continues on its upswing, then such boat quarantines might already have become a prevalent part of national medical culture, and any subsequent war would merely demand a greater degree of nationalized commitment to an already existing flotilla of medical real estate.

Ironically, Masood Khan, of Pakistan (hardly known as a passive, peaceful nation, it being filled with Islamic fundamentalists) was elected President of the UN Conference States Parties to Biological Weapons Convention. Even so, he correctly summarized that "there was no room for complacency as biological weapons were a real, potent threat to humanity, not a figment of the imagination. They were weapons of mass destruction that might be as deadly as nuclear weapons, and even deadlier."[8]

Yes, Mr. Khan, I'm thinking, "...and even deadlier".


REFERENCES

[image] "Floating TB Ward" Complexity Digest 2007.22 (Accessed 6/5/2007)

[1] "Glossary of Terms Often Used in Discussing Antibiotic Resistance" Union of Concerned Scientists (Accessed 6/5/2007)

[2] "Virus" The Nasa SCIence Files - Research Rack: Glossary (Accessed 6/5/2007)

[3] "Antiviral Drugs" MicrobiologyBytes Accessed 6/5/2007)

[4]"Smallpox, History" ZKEA (Accessed 6/5/2007)

[5] "Epidemic" The Canadian Encyclopedia (Acessed 6/5/2007)

[6] Amy Klein "Lecture addresses riot trends, students' desire to start riots" Iowa State Daily(Accessed 6/5/2007)

[7] Peter D.O. Davies "Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis" Priory Medical Journals (Accessed 6/5/2007)

[8]"Sixth Review Conference of the Biological Weapons Convention Opens" The United Nations Office at Geneva (UNOG) (Accessed 6/5/2007)

O.

Iraq, a mom, and a cold hard truth

{ Podcast @ 2.5 mins.) I'm not exactly big on publicity stunts as a means of social action, though I am aware that in American politics such techniques have been effective in the past.[1] Cindy Sheehan is an American activist whose son was killed during his service in the Iraq War. She reasoned that setting up personal peace camp outside President George W. Bush's Texas ranch would be an effective way to demonstrate against the administration's Iraq war policies. Recently, she has decided to end her public camping demonstration. However, she did so with an extraordinary synopsis of her position:

The U.S. troops in Iraq "have been abandoned there indefinitely by their cowardly leaders who move them around like pawns on a chessboard," she lamented, saying she would return to California to rebuild her life.

"I am going to take whatever I have left and go home. I am going to go home and be a mother to my surviving children and try to regain some of what I have lost."

She added: "I have been called every despicable name that small minds can think of and have had my life threatened many times.

"The most devastating conclusion that I reached this morning, however, was that Casey did indeed die for nothing.

"His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think.

"I have tried ever since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives."[2]

I think this one of the coldest, most realist remarks I've heard about the American public consciousness concerning Iraq. In my opinion, the reason there is so little social action on the US cultural radar is due to the US fielding an all-volunteer force -- those people who join seeking the advantages of economics, adventure, or whatever. As long as the American people are not forced to send their sons and daughters to support this idiotic administration's favorite foreign policy hobby, the nasty dog of populism will slumber quietly.

Stipulating that her son is in evangelical heaven, and that Mrs. Sheehan will eventually arrive there too, I can only surmise her son would soon enough remark, "Mom, you were so right."

REFERENCES

[1] "Opposition to the Vietnam War" Wikipedia (Accessed 5/29/07)

[2] "Dead U.S. soldier's mom calls it quits as antiwar symbol" CBC News (Accessed 5/29/07)

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Evolution and the uninformed U.S. American Christian

Here is the sort of of thing that really frightens me about my fellow U.S. American peers – that they have no clue about biology. Any political intuitions they have about stem cells, therefore, must be highly suspect, if not outright invalidated on that basis alone. Consider the following results from a study which came out this week in Newsweek:

Nearly half (48 percent) of the public rejects the scientific theory of evolution; one-third (34 percent) of college graduates say they accept the Biblical account of creation as fact. Seventy-three percent of Evangelical Protestants say they believe that God created humans in their present form within the last 10,000 years; 39 percent of non-Evangelical Protestants and 41 percent of Catholics agree with that view.[1]

Although at first glance it appears as a shocker that over a third of college graduates accept “the Biblical account of creation as fact”, there is probably some room for a less dire analysis to this response. Many Christians I know would be perfectly content to say that (1) it's a fact that the world is God's creation; and (2) it's a fact that God constructed the world such that evolution is God's mechanism for the development of living things. I suspect there would be a split between these two options, with many U.S. conservative Evangelicals (the least scientifically informed group) denying the second; but with other Christian groups affirming both.

Still, this is not good news for America's voting system. A scientifically uninformed populous can only hurt itself in the long run by being clueless on even the most rudimentary foundations of biology. Moreover it's easy to manipulate people with political rhetoric and confusing information on such matters when this is their default view.

The study also notes how deeply religious American sentiments run:

A belief in God and an identification with an organized religion are widespread throughout the country, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. Nine in 10 (91 percent) of American adults say they believe in God and almost as many (87 percent) say they identify with a specific religion. Christians far outnumber members of any other faith in the country, with 82 percent of the poll’s respondents identifying themselves as such. Another 5 percent say they follow a non-Christian faith, such as Judaism or Islam.[1]

Again, and as a sociological observation, the least scientifically informed group, the socially conservative U.S. American Evangelicals, are often decrying how religion is being muted in the public school system and how society is continually suppressing the exercise of Christianity. With 82% of U.S. Americans identifying themselves as Christian, it doesn't appear there could be that many “suppressors” out there to do the job!

REFERENCES

[image] "The New Monkey Trial" Salon News Jan. 10, 2005.

[1] Brian Braiker “God’s Numbers” Newsweek March 31, 2007

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Pondering two American essayists: Vidal & Buckley

"[T]here is not one human problem that could not be solved if people would simply do as I advise". -- Gore Vidal

The quote is from Gore Vidal, though intellectuals from Plato onward have shared this attitude, especially when dealing with political subjects. Vidal would have classicists as kings, while Plato would have philosophers. (Naturally, I'd prefer the latter, thank you.)

This Vidal character strikes me as someone whom I would despise when within eight feet of him, but whom I actually appreciate when he's located a few states away. Here's another quote:

"[T]here is only one party in the United States, the Property Party . . . and it has two right wings: Republican and Democrat. Republicans are a bit stupider, more rigid, more doctrinaire in their laissez-faire capitalism than the Democrats, who are cuter, prettier, a bit more corrupt — until recently... and more willing than the Republicans to make small adjustments when the poor, the black, the anti-imperialists get out of hand. But, essentially, there is no difference between the two parties."[1; Vidal]

I know the French tend to make celebrities out of their cultural commentators. If America were to do so -- and I'm mostly glad we don't -- Vidal would probably be ours.

Every good intellectual has a nemesis, and I was surprised to learn that Vidal's was none other than William F. Buckley, another of my favorite American commentators. On my view, Buckley's two choice quotes are these:

"The purpose of an open mind is to close it, on particular subjects. If you never do — you've simply abdicated the responsibility to think." [And:] "Government can't do anything for you except in proportion as it can do something to you."[1; Buckley]

The latter is reminiscent of the late Gerald Ford's view: " "A government big enough to give you everything you need is also big enough to take it all away."

Once, a long time ago, in an America far, far away, Yoda briefly tangled with a Sith. Wikipedia gives a nice summary of what happened:

"In 1968, ABC News hired Vidal and William F. Buckley, Jr. as political analysts of the Republican and Democratic presidential conventions, predicting that television viewers would enjoy seeing two men of letters — famous for their acerbic wit and sarcasm — engage in on-air battle; as it turned out, verbal and nearly physical combat were joined. After days of mutual bickering that devolved to childish, ad hominem attacks, Vidal called Buckley a 'pro-crypto Nazi', to which the visibly livid Buckley replied: 'Now listen, you queer. Stop calling me a crypto Nazi, or I'll sock you in the goddamn face and you'll stay plastered.'" [1; Vidal]

So much for the measured response of two rational scholars towards one another. Afterwards, they apparently both acquired the hobby of suing each other for libel over the next few years as they wrestled to become king commentator of the American essayist galaxy. They were both born the same year, so perhaps their sole victory conditions lie in seeing who can outlive the other.

REFERENCES

[photo] Composite
Vidal: "Palästina: Zerrissenes ,Heiliges Land’" Zeiten Schrift (Accessed 2/3/07)
Buckley: "William F. Buckley II on today's Republican Party" Zmetro.com: Politics Archives

[1] All quotes from Wikipedia articles on "Gore Vidal" and "William F. Buckley, Jr." (Accessed 2/3/2007)

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Iraq, and Why We Fight

Today I was thinking about Iraq. I don't like to think about Iraq, because it is not a problem I can solve, nor a public policy that I can influence. So why was I thinking about Iraq?

I just want to know why we fight in Iraq. Perhaps it is the philosopher in me, always wanting to know the truth about some state of affairs. It's a bad habit that I maintain, this ever searching for the truth of things.

I was clicking around on the Internet, wasting time while my two-year-old was napping, and I came across a Google video title that seemed to call out for investigation -- "Why We Fight." And so I proceeded to invest one hour and thirty-nine minutes of my life watching this video. Here's a summary:

"The film describes the rise and maintenance of the purported United States military-industrial complex while concentrating on wars led by the United States of the last fifty years and in particular on the 2003 Invasion of Iraq. It alleges that every decade since World War II, the American public has been told a lie to bring it into war to fuel the military-economic machine, which in turn maintains American dominance in the world. It includes interviews with John McCain, Chalmers Johnson, Richard Perle, William Kristol, Gore Vidal and Joseph Cirincione. The film also incorporates the stories of a Vietnam War veteran whose son died in the September 11, 2001 attacks and then had his son's name written on a bomb dropped on Iraq, a 23-year old New York man who enlists in the United States Army citing his financial troubles after his only family member died, and a former Vietnamese refugee who now develops explosives for the American military."[1]

Apparently, the title of the film was drawn from World War II-era propaganda newsreels titled "Why We Fight," which had been commissioned by the US government.

The film indeed gives an almost hypnotic, yet carefully developed explanation for why America fights, with special attention given to the Iraq conflict.

Along the way, one of the more interesting insights comes from a speech that President Eisenhower gave back in 1961, cautioning the country about just how much domestic infrastructure gets sacrificed when one maintains (contrary to Pres. Washington's warnings) a standing military. Hospitals, medical research, space exploration, educational scholarships, community school programs -- who knows what else gets put to the side or stands long-delayed because of priority of military funds. Perhaps this especially struck me because, as is well known, Bush has "a plan" to send even more troops to Iraq, and which may cost taxpayers up to an additional $27 billion during *the first year*. (Figures are from the Congressional Budget Office.)

I remember when when I was a kid, we had a black and white TV that sat in the kitchen, and occasionally there would be evening news footage of the Vietnam war. (Ironically, therefore, Vietnam is a black-and-white issue for me, at least in terms of memory perception.) Now it's not like I was paying lots of attention, being perhaps only nine years of age. But it had to be on TV enough that I saw such coverage now and then. What is strange of today's media is the complete lack of television coverage of the more tactical engagements of our soldiers. This "Why We Fight"[2] video has a very convincing explanation of that lack.

Today I was thinking about Iraq. I don't like to think about Iraq, because it is not a problem I can solve, nor a public policy that I can influence. So why was I thinking about Iraq?

Maybe so that you might.

REFERENCES

[1] Why We Fight (film)" Wikipedia (Accessed 2/2/2007).

[2] "Why We Fight (film)" Google Video 1hr, 39min. (Accessed 2/2/2007)

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