Studying music July 7, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : open access , add a commentVia Neurophilosophy, I learn of a .pdf version (free!) from Nature combining a series of recent essays about current scientific inquiry into music. Duly added to my overlong reading list.
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Weekly quote #32: D. Graham Burnett July 4, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : supernaturalism , add a commentThis week’s quote is a paragraph from “Funhouse Goddess” — an essay in the current issue of Lapham’s Quarterly (pp 183-189 of Vol I No 3). In the paragraph, which appears on page 188, Burnett explains a possible take on Charles Fourier’s reasoning behind a rather liberated philosophy, involving really loving thy neighbor:
“Assuming a loving God who’s trying to speak through nature, it followed that our desires are His very clearest instructions. And even if they are bizarre (Fourier briefly touched on foot fetishes, dress-up fantasies, and a variety of other unconventional appetites), they must all fit together somehow in that “divine order” that the theologians had been ratcheting on about since the age of the Church Fathers. You can sort of understand Fourier to be calling their patristic bluff: “Loving God? Divine Plan? Natue as Norm? Okay, my firends, let’s try to make this work, given what we know about life down here….” In view of his answer, Fourier was either a satirist of super-Swiftian proportions or one of the most devout men ever to live. That you can’t quite decide which is testimony to his uncanny literarty gifts.”
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A fabulous delusion? July 3, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : supernaturalism , 2comments“I was watching the 1966 classic film, A Man For All Seasons, about the Thomas Moore’s principled stance in opposition to Henry VIII’s grab for power. Ultimately, Moore is found guilty of treason, and in the final scene, after giving his executioner the customary tip for a clean blow, tells him, ‘don’t worry, you are sending me to God’. Considering the fear of death is one of the greatest anxieties for a conscious being, what a fabulous delusion!”
That’s how a post on investing behavior begins at OB. And the analogy is quite fitting. But, I fixated on the last phrase quoted above, describing the delusion held by one about to die that paradise awaits as fabulous. I would say that it is hardly so. Rather, a belief that death is merely a passing on to something better — or, in the case of most afterlife beliefs, something vastly or even infinitely better — can’t have much of an effect other than to render the believer much more willing to die. And I don’t see much good in that at all; even if one discounts the negative consequences that come to mind — an increase in reckless behavior, a willingness to ignore the future, and of course the perhaps too-obvious example of our time, suicide attacks — anything that makes people less likely to struggle to exist, to continue to live as much as they possibly can, is something that can only work to deprive them of the only thing they have: their lives.
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Crisis = dangerous opportunity July 3, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : economics , add a commentThere’s a popular expression about the Chinese pictogram for crisis is made up of two other characters which is, of course, too true to be correct.
At any rate, here’s an op-ed that originally appeared in the Financial Times (link to the original at the end of the CFR copy) about how the current crisis involving rising food prices worldwide could just be an opportunity (albeit a dangerous one) for the Doha round of international trade negotiations.
I found two of the statements made in the op-ed very interesting, because they seem to go against what my (so far still woefully limited) reading of economics would indicate — but one of the authors is Jagdish N. Bhagwati, Senior Fellow for International Economics at CFR, so I assume he knows what he’s talking about much better than I. So, now I have to go figure out what I don’t know about the two claims:
1. “…a substantial reduction in agricultural subsidies… would reduce the supply of grains from some countries that subsidise them and increase it from other countries… The net effect on supply would be negative.”
Why would reducing the supply in some countries but increasing it in others, with no change in demand that I can see, produce a net reduction? Is this only in the short-term, until the supply can rise to meet demand again, or does it involve some sort of time-lag, or is it something else I’m missing?
2. “…the impact of reduced tariff barriers on agriculture would be to aggravate food shortages. The reason is that such tariff reductions would lead to reduced food prices and increased demand for grains within the OECD countries.”
So, if demand is increasing, is this again referring to the short-term, until suppliers can increase production to meet the higher demand? I realise that there is a finite amount of arable land on the planet, but a lot of that is currently not used for food production, because it’s not profitable — wouldn’t increasing demand be met by brining those lands into use, and isn’t there enough of it to meet demand, even taking good old Malthus into consideration?
Any way, color me slightly confused.
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Naturally opposed July 3, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : open access , add a commentSeveral blogs over at ScienceBlogs are discussing a recent review of PLoS, a major open access organization, in Nature. Their opinions of the piece are not very high. Here’s Gene Expression, whose post lists out several others on the subject; here’s Greg Laden’s Blog, which brings a broader discussion of peer review into the discussion; and here’s Living the Scientific LIfe, which has what I think is the best summary of the main points in the review, and the problems with them.
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Weekly photo #86: Coastal July 2, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : other , add a comment
I’m fortunate in that I live very close to some of the most spectacular scenery in the world: the coast of Big Sur. I’ve certainly grown to love Big Sur over the few years that I’ve spent stationed in Monterey; so the fact that ash from the fires clouds and hazes over the area periodically now is quite depressing, even though I know that fires are (or at least are supposed to be) a natural occurrence that the flora and fauna have adapted to deal with. This week’s photo was taken looking north towards Bixby Bridge, which is the most famous of Highway 1’s several bridges along its run down Big Sur. Hopefully, once the fires have run their course and the area has recovered, the coast will look as breathtaking as it always has.
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Voters July 1, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : politics , add a commentBryan Caplan also* blames the voters:
“1. Politicians predictably lie to get elected…
2. Politicians habitually accuse each other of something they virtually all do.
3. Voters largely ignore #1, but respond positively to #2.
{snip}
Just to be clear, I commend Westen for his candor about the political process. What’s hard for me to understand on an emotional level is how Westen - or anyone - can recognize the above and remain an enthusiastic partisan.”
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Religion as spandrel, the book June 27, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : supernaturalism , add a commentVia Mind Hacks, a link to a review at The Immanent Frame of a book written by Pascal Boyer which takes a cognitive science-based approach to religion, Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought.
The review seems mostly dismissive, but it’s description of the author’s explanation is one to which I am sympathetic:
“…we should understand religious ideas… and related practices… not as more-or-less functional (or dysfunctional) human responses to recurrent human conditions and experiences but, rather, as the effects of the automatic operation of a number of specific, highly specialized, innate and universal mental mechanisms.”
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weekly photo #85: On The Run June 25, 2008
Posted by ocmpoma in : other , add a comment
Not much to say about this one, except perhaps to note that those are my kids in the right foreground, running away from me as fast as they can.
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