Archives for category: alternative ways of acquring knowledge
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A small matter of choice.

July 22, 2021 //
2

The difference between us and the rest is that we can choose.
People – humans, that is, are capable of deciding things while the rest of the animals use simpler mechanisms of determining the way forward.

The ability to decide has consequences.
The most important being ‘responsibility’.
The most common being ‘blame’.

When confronted with ‘uncomfortable’ consequences of the decision making process, people get to choose between blame and responsibility.
Between apportioning blame – and feeling better, and determining responsibility.

I’ve long ago given up ‘blame’.
Because blame is driven by emotion. Hence blinds the blamers. Prevents them from checking all the angles. Prevents them from getting as close to the reality as possible.

Let’s go back to the current pandemic.
A large number of people have not yet been immunized against Covid -19, despite the vaccine being widely available. In certain ‘jurisdictions’…

Because each of the yet unvaccinated has chosen to pass the opportunity?
Or because so much ‘dubious’ information has been floated around that it has almost drowned the sensible voices?

Should we blame the as yet unconvinced or should we ask ourselves what’s going on in the heads of the ‘gaslighters’?

Facts are clear.

WSJ is a highly reputable source, the information is old enough – if ‘fake’ it would have already been ‘debugged’,…
Then why isn’t this being hammered down our throats? Constantly?

The vaccine which had been used was Chinese?

Let’s make the same experiment using one of ours!
It has been already done?
Let’s hear about it!

We are in the middle of a pandemic.
Which will continue until we’ll build ‘herd immunity’. Which can be achieved through vaccination or by surviving the disease. Surviving the disease takes longer and costs way more than the vaccine. Lives lost, money spent for health care and money lost because of business interruptions.
And if we don’t build herd immunity fast enough, the virus might mutate into a new one. And we’ll be back to the square one.

The only section of the society which has anything to gain from our reticence to get the vaccine is BigPharma.
They are the ones who will eventually come up with a vaccine for the new strain of virus.
They are the ones providing the treatment given to the infected patients. They are the ones providing the tests.

Want to give the finger to BigPharma?

Go out there and get the jab!

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, biology, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, cooperation, Economy, effective communication, In English, man as a measure for all things, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology, Transparency, Trust

Pleasure

July 14, 2021 //
0

Pigs have orgasms.
What?!?
And why does it even matter?

Orgasm consumes a lot of energy.
By itself, not what it takes to reach it!
And it somewhat incapacitates the individual experiencing it.

Try evading an aggressor while having one…

Then how could they have survived?
The orgasmic pigs… experiencing orgasm must produce an evolutionary advantage to compensate the costs incurred, right?

The way I see it, orgasm – as well as all other ‘pleasures’, is the reward for a job well done.
For having sex, for eating, for doing the right thing…

Or used to be!

Those which/who naturally/naively experience pleasure are quite different from those who, and some ‘which’, experience pleasure for it’s own sake.

With an entire gamut of consequences…

Having a drink with friends versus drowning your sorrows in booze.
Experience a gourmet dinner versus ‘digging your grave with your own teeth’ out of sheer boredom.
Feeling high after successfully climbing a mountain versus just feeling ‘high’.

Why are we doing this?
Why do we put the cart before the horses?

Out of ‘boredom’, as Calhoun’s experiment strongly suggests?

I’m afraid that for us, humans, boredom is only the circumstance. The circumstance in which we happen to choose.
‘Cause ultimately it’s us who do the choosing.

Yes, we are under an immense pressure.
To conform.
To obey the rule.
To do what is expected of us.

But is it right?
Is it really good?
And, above all, is it sustainable? At any level…

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, cooperation, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology

‘Eyes wide shut’

July 9, 2021 //
0

We start by being borne.

After a while, we are delivered. To the world. Born, that is.

That is when we open up our eyes.
When we start learning.
When the world starts teaching us.

Slowly, we develop a conscience.
We start adding meaning to what we see.
Which meaning is heavily influenced by what we had learned up to that moment.

Our conscience depends heavily on memory.
The place where we deposit both what we have learned and how we felt each time when we learned something.
How we felt actually ‘fuels’ our conclusions. The stronger the feelings, the more acute the memories.
Stronger feelings give birth to longer lasting memories.

But there’s a small problem here.
Each time we learn something new, everything we already know is reinterpreted in the light of the understanding we’ve just developed. Our memories are actually rewritten. As in ‘born again’.
Exactly the same – only stronger, if what we’ve just learned reinforces what we already knew.
Slightly to completely different if what we’ve just learned contradicts everything we’ve been previously taught.

Now, how many times did that happen?
How many times did any of us ‘turn around’?

Rarely? Seldom?
Because the meaning we attach to what we see is “heavily influenced by what we had learned up to that moment”?
Because changing our mind implies contradicting ourselves? Implies admitting that we’d been wrong up to that moment? Which makes us feel bad?

That being the reason for us tending to forget everything which contradicts our ‘biases’.
Not only we do not see it in the first place…
We might see it – some things we cannot unsee, no matter how hard we try. It’s there but we don’t remember it. We just act as if it wasn’t there.
Until so many unseen things pile up that we’re no longer able to hold them back…

And we are forced to open up our eyes!
Only those things are no longer there…
We’d already changed them. To fit our previously held convictions!

What do we do?
We close back our eyes? In the name of consistency?
Or we go to Canossa to learn how to make amends?

How much time do we still have?

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Psychology, skin in the game

Knowledge

June 29, 2021 //
0

Well, all knowledge is, ultimately, false. Or, at least, incomplete.

Bearing this in mind, we understand there is no such thing as false knowledge.
Only people unwilling to adapt their understanding of things to the newly discovered facts…
In this sense, it’s not the false knowledge which is dangerous, it’s those who worship ‘self made idols’!
Those who are so convinced that what they know is enough.
That their understanding of the world is so right and so complete that it has reached ‘perfection’.
That their Weltanschauung is, hence, ‘sacred’. ‘Worship-able’, if you’ll allow this word.

“Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image, neither shall ye set up any image of stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I am the LORD your God.”

How about this ‘interpretation’ of Shaw’s words?

Further reading:
“Do not love your neighbor as yourself. If you are on good terms with yourself it is an impertinence: if on bad, an injury.“

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, limited rationality, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, re-definitions, skin in the game, teleology

Seeing is believing, right?

June 29, 2021 //
0

One of my FB friends shared this meme and created the ‘opportunity’ for an interesting conversation.

“Say the same about the antics of parading gay pride activists…if you dare.”

I couldn’t resist:
“Gay activists parading peacefully are no threat for anybody. ‘Activists’ who actually whip other ‘activists’ during a parade… Same thing here. You really want/need to make your point? OK, take your 9mm Beretta for a walk. But an AR-15?!? Common…”

I have the ‘bad’ habit of proofreading my comments before hitting enter…

That was when it hit me!

‘Is this for real?
Was the guy actually ‘open carrying’?
Was it staged?
Could it be that the guy just bought it? Had it repaired? Or any other situation, but trying to make a fool of himself?’

OK, open carrying a gun in a public setting is… an exaggeration. For me, at least.
But this is besides the point.

The point being that we’ve reached the stage where appearance is more important than substance.
The point from which we no longer carry guns for protection but to make a point.
The bigger the ‘gun’, the more important, for us, the point we’re trying to make.

The more preposterous the meme, the more convincing we feel ourselves to be…

I’m afraid FB got us where it needs us to be!

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, Frames of mind, In English, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology, The kind of world we live in

Respecting opinions

June 25, 2021 //
0

Respecting other people’s opinions means respectfully telling them how wrong they are – when they are, of course, instead of shouting, in their faces, about how stupid they are – in that precise moment.

In this sense, this meme is, actually, inflammatory.
Nobody who has paid some attention in high-school – and has maintained a working eye-sight, will ever opine about something like this.
Only those who
1. don’t see/know the difference between a ‘factor’ and a ‘base’ and/or
2. don’t care enough to pay real attention – and want to get it over with,
would fall prey to this ‘ruse’.

Using this example to demand ‘stop the antiscience movement’ is, in fact, disrespectful!
And counterproductive.
It will only deepen the chasm between those who believe in science and those who see the ‘science peddlers’ as being arrogant know-alls.

Math isn’t that complicated, after all…

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, arrogance, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, In English, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, teleology, Trust

The chicken or the egg?!?

June 4, 2021 //
0

The whole thing raises a poignant question.
We have a business here.
The sporting tournaments live by selling advertising space. To do that, they need to grab our attention.
Given the insistence with which the organizers insist that the athletes have to attend the press conferences, which is the main attention grabber? The ‘athletic prowess’ itself or the ‘big talk’ that follows the actual ‘sports meeting’?

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, Economy, effective communication, freedom, In English, limited rationality, man as a measure for all things, Mindset, Money as goal, Mutual Respect, Psychology, teleology, Trust

Myopia

June 1, 2021 //
0

One of my eyes is short-sighted. Both are astigmatic.
Hence my visual relationship with the ‘exterior’ is impaired. Relative to that of a ‘normal’ person…

When I took up photography, as a hobby, there were no such things as self focusing cameras. Pictures as those you are about to see were way ‘out of range’ for me.

Because of my inability to focus a camera fast enough. And because long ranged lenses were too expensive for me, in those times.

Being conscious of my limits was no cure for my frustration!

Thankfully, technology made it possible for me to indulge in my hobby!
To overcome some of my limitations.

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, biology, Bounded rationality, Chance, Choices we make, effective communication, In English, man as a measure for all things, Mindset, Psychology, skin in the game, Trust

Compromise to Kompromat

May 14, 2021 //
2

Good Old Politics used to be about identifying the common ground.
And making it wide enough to harbor the foundation for a stable – as in ‘sustainable’, future.
A future where ‘everybody’ could claim a place. As in ‘fulfilling the American Dream’.

Nowadays, politics is about identifying the most effective way to pull the rug from your opponents’ feet.

How wise is this?

How sustainable is it?

We learn from Michelle Obama’s book – Becoming, 2018, that her father, a blue collar worker, was the only breadwinner who provided for the family. A family of four, leading a decent life in a decent home. Who was earning enough to send both kids to school.
Is this still possible today? In America? The Land of Opportunity?

Trump got elected after a huge number of well paying blue collar jobs had been exported.
After wealth disparity had become ridiculous.

What convinced so many people into believing that Trump, the billionaire, was the answer to their plight?

Historian Nancy MacClean has just published “Democracy in Chains”, a book in which she looks at a group of ultra free-market thinkers who have been working to change the government systems of the United States since the 1950s. While Donald Trump was not part of their plan, MacLean says “there is no way Donald Trump would be in the White House were it not for their strategy”, which includes gerrymandering and taking control of the judiciary. She joined us for Perspective to tell us more.

No, this is not yet another post about Trump.
This is about Political Science.

You see, physics and chemistry are hugely important sciences.
Physics has taught us how to build planes. And atomic bombs.
Chemistry how to make life saving drugs. And deadly explosives.

And so on.
Science is nothing but a formalized method of gathering consistent information.
What we subsequently do with the technology built around the above mentioned ‘consistent information’ is something else.
It no longer depends on ‘science’.

It solely depends on us. On what plans we have for the future.
On how we – the ‘meaningful’ amongst us, to be more precise – chose to use the above mentioned stash of ‘consistent information’.

J. Robert Oppenheimer, the ‘father of the atomic bomb’, had eventually figured out that “Never before had mankind possessed destructive power that truly posed a threat to civilization“.

Nowadays we’re toying with even more powerful tools.
Tools which are able to turn back the flow of history.
To make a joke out of the fabled ‘checks and balances’.

The H bomb is such a blunt tool that nobody in their right mind would ever consider using.

Tools made possible by political science are way more insidious.
So insidious that most of those who wield them ignore the true amount of fallout their actions will unleash.

Compromise – give some to get some, is debatable to start with. But, ultimately, workable. History is full of successful examples.
Kompromat is nothing but mutually assured destruction. MAD. Made worse by its trivial appearance.

By engaging in compromise, you give hope a chance. The other has a scope. For as long as negotiation is going on earnestly, both sides have a fair chance of getting out alive.
By engaging in Kompromat, the aggressor actually sends the message: ‘I’ll stop only over your dead body’.

Sustainable?!?
Are you kidding me?

Later additions:

“WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Republicans blocked creation of a bipartisan panel to investigate the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, displaying continuing party loyalty to former President Donald Trump and firm determination to shift the political focus away from the violent insurrection by his GOP supporters.”

“Antonio, who wore a patch for the far-right anti-government militia group The Three Percenters, is charged with five counts, including violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds and obstruction of law enforcement during civil disorder.
Joseph Hurley, Antonio’s lawyer, said he won’t use his client’s belief in false claims of election fraud in an attempt to exonerate him. Instead, Hurley will use them to argue that Antonio was an impressionable person who got exploited by Trump and his allies.
“You can catch this disease,” Hurley said. Misinformation, he said, “is not a defense. It’s not. But it will be brought up to say: This is why he was here. The reason he was there is because he was a dumbass and believed what he heard on Fox News.””

“Many of us have been disappointed of late by the actions of some people who’ve chosen the easy way, playing to the crowd, itching the ears of the resentful with conspiracies and accusations,” the Utah Republican said Wednesday. “I take heart in the fact that such displays are still newsworthy and are generally met with disdain.”
The domestic political squabbles are having a real impact, Romney said, by diverting the nation’s attention away from three great challenges facing the country: the rise of China, global climate change and the “degradation of the national balance sheet.”
Romney said there’s plenty of blame to go around.
“Some of us on the right infect the nation with claims of election fraud, tech and media outrages, even vaccine fantasies. From the left come hyperwoke accusations and antipathy toward free enterprise, the very means of our prosperity,” the Utah Republican added.”

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Categories alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, cooperation, democracy, effective communication, evolution, In English, Intent, man as a measure for all things, manipulation, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology

Three rules

May 13, 2021 //
1

1. Always remember that your ‘ride’ doubles up as your home.
And as your pantry!
‘Redecorate’ with extreme caution and be extra careful when it comes to ‘waste disposal’. For the simple reason that today’s stool will, sometime in the near future, become tomorrow’s lunch. No ‘ride’ is infinite, you know… “all come from dust, and all return to dust“, remember?

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) recently captured a unique view of Earth from the spacecraft’s vantage point in orbit around the moon.

2. Treat the entire ‘crew’ as your family. For the simple reason that no mutiny has ever ended well… Even the winning parties have been presented with huge ‘cleaning up’ bills… while there is a very short supply of desert – but habitable – ‘islands’ where the loosing parties might be left to fend for themselves. So, in the end, all those interested in continuing their lives must – the sooner the better – find where is the middle ground between them.

Another fantastic thing to see at the fortified church of Biertan is the marital prison, precisely what its name suggests. Legend has it that whenever a married couple in Biertan wanted to divorce, they had to go through a particular test first. They were locked inside a room within the fortified church walls, and they were forced to use one bed, one chair, and one set of cutlery for two whole weeks. 
After this time period, if they still wanted to divorce, they were free to do so. However, in 400 years, only one couple is said to have gone through with the divorce in the end. If that’s not exemplary couples therapy, I don’t know what is.  

3. ‘I’ll be dead long before the hit shits the fan’ is no longer a viable option.
If Covid hasn’t taught you that already…
There’s a huge difference between dying comfortably in your bed, with a cold glass of water just a wish away, and gasping for air, alone, with other moribund people as your only company!

“Beyond the images, the cremation grounds bear a painful routine of trauma that will weigh on families long after the headlines fade. The pandemic has stripped the final rites of their usual space and dignity.
Instead, this intimate ritual has become both a public display, with the world watching India’s crisis, and a lonely burden.”

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, awareness, biology, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology, The kind of world we are building for our children, Trust
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