These primaries have been incredibly dull for me. In my opinion, when following the candidates, we're not so much measuring the merits of the candidates, or their likeliness to win, but rather we're grading them by how much political baggage they carry, and the various points of concern for each. It's, in essence, a collection of losers, and it'll be a bloody war of attrition to decide who will earn the right to look ridiculous in a general election.
Let's spice this up a bit by making a game of it. Each of us is given 10 imaginary dollars to bet on whichever candidates we want, in whatever proportion that we want. I'll offer the house odds on each standing candidate, and we'll place our bets in the comments section. When the race is over, we'll tally up a winner, who'll receive the glory.
Note: This is just a bet on who the winner of the GOP primary will be. The outcome of the general election doesn't figure as a part of this in any way.
On to the candidates...
Rating: Secure
Mitt Romney 3 to 2
Rick Perry 2 to 1
Rating: Growth
Jon Huntsman 5 to 1
Michelle Bachman 4 to 1
Paul Ryan (should he run) 5 to 1
Rating: Speculative
Newt Gingrich 15 to 1
Herman Cain 20 to 1
Sarah Palin 20 to 1
Ron Paul 20 to 1
Rick Santorum 15 to 1
Gary Johnson 30 to 1
Rating: Junk
Jonathon Sharkey 100 to 1
Buddy Roemer 100 to 1
Andy Martin 100 to 1
Fred Karger 100 to 1
Thaddeus McCotter 100 to 1
Jimmy McMillan 1000 to 1
Friday, August 26, 2011
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Evangelism, New Atheism and the "Book Of Mormon"
Matt and Trey's Broadway musical, "The Book Of Mormon" has won a lot of praise. It's well deserved (judging by the cast recording). It's not just funny, like the South Park episode, "All about the Mormons", it's also quite touching. However, one criticism that I haven't quite heard enough to my satisfaction is this. Isn't the moral of this story kind of cynical?
To explain, let me sum up the plot. Two 19 year old Mormon Elders are sent on a 2 year missionary trip to Uganda. The conditions there are terrible, women are mutilated, human life carries little to no value, and 80% of the villagers have AIDS. After the more "capable" of the two fails to persuade any villagers to convert, his chunky sidekick has better luck by tweaking the content of the Book of Mormon to include morals about dealing with AIDS, not cutting off clitorises (clitorii?), and not raping babies (not to mention inserting Boba Fett, Sauron and the fiery pits of Mordor). This persuades the entire village to convert and reform. Mormon bigwigs don't like the liberal attitude toward the scriptures and throw the two (along with the villagers) out of the church. They all decide to continue with their own scriptures and their own church.
The moral of the story is that it's OK to tweak the facts, or to put only 50% belief into those "facts" as long as, at the end of the day, you're helping people live a better way.
This seems like a popular viewpoint. The viewpoint of lukewarm believers and non-believers alike, that what's true or real is not as important as taking the stories and proverbs and rolling with them. What's true is not as important as avoiding being a dick. Like by being a stickler about truth and falsehood.
Yeah, I kinda take exception to that. What is real and what is true does matter. I enjoy a rest from reality as much as the next guy. Taking a break to read some fantasy or sci-fi is fun. But to live your life according things which you figure are probably false, but ignore because your quality of life is better. That's just bogus and wrong. Or the flip side, to believe that you do indeed possess some understanding of the truth, but refusing to engage others for fear of looking like a dick.
It just surprises me that this isn't more amity, or at least grudging respect between devoted evangelists and "new atheists" like Dawkins and Hitchens. They both share the quality of belief in hard truths which should be promoted, and conversely, blatant falsehoods which should be publicly refuted and given the boot.
To explain, let me sum up the plot. Two 19 year old Mormon Elders are sent on a 2 year missionary trip to Uganda. The conditions there are terrible, women are mutilated, human life carries little to no value, and 80% of the villagers have AIDS. After the more "capable" of the two fails to persuade any villagers to convert, his chunky sidekick has better luck by tweaking the content of the Book of Mormon to include morals about dealing with AIDS, not cutting off clitorises (clitorii?), and not raping babies (not to mention inserting Boba Fett, Sauron and the fiery pits of Mordor). This persuades the entire village to convert and reform. Mormon bigwigs don't like the liberal attitude toward the scriptures and throw the two (along with the villagers) out of the church. They all decide to continue with their own scriptures and their own church.
The moral of the story is that it's OK to tweak the facts, or to put only 50% belief into those "facts" as long as, at the end of the day, you're helping people live a better way.
This seems like a popular viewpoint. The viewpoint of lukewarm believers and non-believers alike, that what's true or real is not as important as taking the stories and proverbs and rolling with them. What's true is not as important as avoiding being a dick. Like by being a stickler about truth and falsehood.
Yeah, I kinda take exception to that. What is real and what is true does matter. I enjoy a rest from reality as much as the next guy. Taking a break to read some fantasy or sci-fi is fun. But to live your life according things which you figure are probably false, but ignore because your quality of life is better. That's just bogus and wrong. Or the flip side, to believe that you do indeed possess some understanding of the truth, but refusing to engage others for fear of looking like a dick.
It just surprises me that this isn't more amity, or at least grudging respect between devoted evangelists and "new atheists" like Dawkins and Hitchens. They both share the quality of belief in hard truths which should be promoted, and conversely, blatant falsehoods which should be publicly refuted and given the boot.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
On Cognitive Dissonance And Crimethink
Ever since I came across the wikipedia entry on cognitive dissonance (I'd heard of the phrase a long time ago, but didn't investigate until about a year ago), I keep coming back to it every few months. It's an interesting topic regarding psychology and sociology. Here's a bit about the most famous example of cognitive dissonance:
Neat. Anyway, where am I going with this?
Well, I've had a notion for quite a while that I haven't really been able to define, having to do with the proper, human way of thinking. Shortly before I started college, I had something of a brief, accidental out-of-body experience, while trying to get to sleep. For just a moment, I could see myself as if from the ceiling looking down. And I was free to judge myself, both physically and mentally, with all my emotional baggage, insecurities and teenage defensiveness. And it didn't bother me to do so, I felt no dissonance - again, just for a moment. I had a split second of total objective observation of myself.
It wasn't anything grandiose or spiritual, but it was useful and I believe that it had something to do with how I developed afterward. After that, especially during college, I became a lot more honest with myself about what I wanted, and why. It didn't feel self-deprecating at all, because these things that I criticised about myself (even my baser tendencies) weren't really at the core of my identity anymore. My mind had shifted in some way, and I wasn't exclusively centered in the part of me that held desire or judgements. Part of me was now centered in the part of me that objectively analyzes, and that allowed me to analyze myself from inside and out. I didn't need to justify or prove personal values or appetities, they simply were what they were. I could judge them, and reorient myself if I wanted to, but either way it didn't threaten my sense of identity.
In some way, I think this ties into the theory of cognitive dissonance. This is a weapon for fighting crimethink. What I want is to fully understand it so I can spread this special kind of perspective that I found. I don't think it has to do with eliminating dissonance completely. And I'm aware that the experience that I had may have just been the late onset of some child-to-adult development that everyone goes through. But I can think of at least a handful (more like dozens) of individuals I've run across that have their identity riding on things in their external life (I'm thinking of the line in Fight Club about "That wasn't just a bunch of stuff in my apartment, that was me" and "You're not the car you drive, you're not your job, you're not your fucking khakis"). This seems like a useful area of inquiry. What do you guys think?
A classical example of this idea (and the origin of the expression "sour grapes") is expressed in the fable The Fox and the Grapes by Aesop (ca. 620–564 BCE). In the story, a fox sees some high-hanging grapes and wishes to eat them. When the fox is unable to think of a way to reach them, he surmises that the grapes are probably not worth eating, as they must not be ripe or that they are sour. This example follows a pattern: one desires something, finds it unattainable, and reduces one's dissonance by criticizing it. - Wikipedia, Cognitive DissonanceWhat's really interesting to me is regarding the role that self-concept plays in dissonance. Meaning one's sense of identity, or one's ego. We all see ourselves as basically good, obviously. We see ourselves as smart, capable and morally decent. These prejudices about our own inherently good nature are occasionally tested by reality. We find ourselves in situations where we freely make bad decisions, or find ourselves incapable of achieving goals that we presuppose are attainable. Reality creeps in and challenges our most basic assumptions about ourselves. In a such a conflict, something has to bend. Either we bend ourselves to accommodate new facts, or we bend the facts to accommodate our ego.
Neat. Anyway, where am I going with this?
Well, I've had a notion for quite a while that I haven't really been able to define, having to do with the proper, human way of thinking. Shortly before I started college, I had something of a brief, accidental out-of-body experience, while trying to get to sleep. For just a moment, I could see myself as if from the ceiling looking down. And I was free to judge myself, both physically and mentally, with all my emotional baggage, insecurities and teenage defensiveness. And it didn't bother me to do so, I felt no dissonance - again, just for a moment. I had a split second of total objective observation of myself.
It wasn't anything grandiose or spiritual, but it was useful and I believe that it had something to do with how I developed afterward. After that, especially during college, I became a lot more honest with myself about what I wanted, and why. It didn't feel self-deprecating at all, because these things that I criticised about myself (even my baser tendencies) weren't really at the core of my identity anymore. My mind had shifted in some way, and I wasn't exclusively centered in the part of me that held desire or judgements. Part of me was now centered in the part of me that objectively analyzes, and that allowed me to analyze myself from inside and out. I didn't need to justify or prove personal values or appetities, they simply were what they were. I could judge them, and reorient myself if I wanted to, but either way it didn't threaten my sense of identity.
In some way, I think this ties into the theory of cognitive dissonance. This is a weapon for fighting crimethink. What I want is to fully understand it so I can spread this special kind of perspective that I found. I don't think it has to do with eliminating dissonance completely. And I'm aware that the experience that I had may have just been the late onset of some child-to-adult development that everyone goes through. But I can think of at least a handful (more like dozens) of individuals I've run across that have their identity riding on things in their external life (I'm thinking of the line in Fight Club about "That wasn't just a bunch of stuff in my apartment, that was me" and "You're not the car you drive, you're not your job, you're not your fucking khakis"). This seems like a useful area of inquiry. What do you guys think?
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