HERE

re: Conservatism and Free Markets

I’ve been rather busy lately and haven’t posted the kinds of wrong-headed declarations and substantive HERE rebuttals that many of you have grown to love. My sincerest apologies.

Today I found a juicy one. Take it away, fringeelements:

In the United States, people who are atheists tend to think for themselves more than theists. This is not necessarily a good thing. I would say that the hardcore theists are more free-thinking than the mushy ones. This is because they have internalized that “the koran / bible is the word of god”, and then from there think for themselves, which is to say they have developed intellectual defenses and arguments against secularists and atheists. Mushy theists generally cannot think for themselves at all, and so are pushed around by all arguments until they come to a mushy position.

But anyway, by becoming an atheist, you see that the people around you are amazingly, spectacularly wrong on something which is so obvious. This then casts doubt on all other beliefs they hold, and because of the collossal failure of theism the atheist begins trying to do something he is in all liklihood not prepared for: thinking for himself.

The atheist will get the easy ones right, which is to say the social issues. But he will probably be a moralist even though morality came from religion and there’s no reason morality would ever be coherent without an omnipotent being. This wastes time and screws up his thought in the same way as religion, and sometimes even more.

But where the atheist really fails is in economics. In the US the republican party, which is supposedly more free market than the democrat party, is also the more religious party. This is because the republican party is the party of the past, and has the characteristics of the past dominant ideology. And in the past, for a variety of factors, the US was more religious and more free market.

What will happen is the atheist will think of a problem, have no way to imagine it being done on a market, and thus invoke the intervention of a higher power (the state). The state is the default answer when someone cannot think of how something can be solved. So when most people think for themselves, they come to statist conclusions.

That’s why you have theists and statheists.

While I might agree on small points — that mushy thinkers of any kind will probably get things wrong, for example — this post is a fine example of pseudo-intellectualism, which uses certain tonal and linguistic cues to establish a thin facade of rigorous reason. Meanwhile, it skips from one implicit false dilemma to many others, wherein the range of possibilities are enormously constrained to accommodate a delusional and decidedly unworldly worldview. Let’s go to the tape.

Fringeelements, you said: Morality came from religion and there’s no reason morality would ever be coherent without an omnipotent being.

This is wildly incorrect. First, morality does not “come from religion.” Morality arises from social grouping (as does language, as does religion). When beings get together, rules of engagement inevitably follow. Moreover, morality has biological traces that far precede the advent of religion. Morality is present in what the average non-thinker would deem “lesser” species, who, to their great luck, may not be distracted by religious meanderings. Second, I implore you to defend your claim that morality cannot make sense without the presence of an omnipotent being. Is this because you cannot imagine yourself acting rightly in the absence of the promise of divine retribution? If so, you’ve completely missed the point about morality. If not, please — make your case.

You said: But where the atheist really fails is in economics. In the US the republican party, which is supposedly more free market than the democrat party, is also the more religious party. This is because the republican party is the party of the past, and has the characteristics of the past dominant ideology. And in the past, for a variety of factors, the US was more religious and more free market. What will happen is the atheist will think of a problem, have no way to imagine it being done on a market, and thus invoke the intervention of a higher power (the state). The state is the default answer when someone cannot think of how something can be solved. So when most people think for themselves, they come to statist conclusions.

Republicans on average are far more deferential to the state than Democrats — when Republicans are in power. They are only less deferential to the state than Democrats when Democrats are in power. Meanwhile, Democrats are quite consistent in their mild distrust of government. The evidence is right here — in particular, take a look at a chart titled “Trust In Government by Administration,” which shows Republicans drastically changing their trust in government based on who occupies the White House.

One explanation? Conservatives are in fact authoritarians. They like nothing more than a daddy figure in the White House, as long as that figure is deemed to be “like them.” Conservatives only distrust government when the person they perceive to be running their lives is deemed not “like them.” You’ll notice from the chart that this trend began with Nixon/Ford. That is, of course, precisely when the Republican Party strategically became what it still is today: an uneasy alliance of single-issue Christianists, status quo racists, and “free-market” corporatists, forged together by mutual hatred of egalitarian thinkers. Why? Egalitarians would upset a prevailing power structure that benefited Christians, whites, and corporations.

Meanwhile, I found that same passage of yours to be rather insight-giving on an entirely different level than you intended. Let’s refresh:

What will happen is the atheist will think of a problem, have no way to imagine it being done on a market, and thus invoke the intervention of a higher power (the state). The state is the default answer when someone cannot think of how something can be solved. So when most people think for themselves, they come to statist conclusions.

I do not say it is insight-giving because it is correct or insightful. Your premises are so laughably unjustified that there is no need to rebut them. Rather, through this passage (and further evidenced by your vague insistence that an omnipotent being is required for morality to make any sense), you have provided great insight into the limits of your own imagination. It shows that you, at present, feel that it is necessary to cling to some vague, easy solution (God) for your answers. I infer this because you then project that simple-mindedness onto atheists, who, without belief in a god or many gods, “will” use the state instead. You declare this even though there is no necessity whatsoever to that conclusion.

It is a common thing. One assumes others to be like onself, warts and all, even though it is perfectly within the realm of possibility — heck, it seems as plausible as anything can be — that there are others who far exceed one’s own limitations. I invite you to imagine as much.

—Dan

Twit of the Day — 11/15/09

fanofhockey: UN used ‘climate change’ hoax to get more power over nations. Obama uses healthcare ‘crisis’ to grab more power over us. #tcot #tlot #ocra

(Strictly speaking, this was tweeted 5 days ago. Oh well.)

Dear fanofhockey,

Climate change? Not a hoax — no air quotes necessary when you speak about it. That’s the beauty of peer-reviewed empirical inquiry — the incentives bend towards discovering the truth. I realize such a thing must be very hard for you to understand, but there are people — unlike you, and unlike the people you must admire — who serve truth and thereby try to understand it, especially before spouting off without a clue.

As for the UN, you seem to have a deep misunderstanding of what it is. The UN is comprised wholly of member nations, and is thus incapable of getting “more power over nations” than it already has. Moreover, the UN’s climate change actions thus far have involved two types of activities: (1) commissioning scientific reports and analyses, and (2) booking glorified conference rooms so that said nations may work out agreements. To the latter, member nations have been asked to give input and come up with a common accord. This hardly describes a power grab. Your claim that member nations have “used” climate change to increase their own power over themselves is stupid enough; but it appears even worse when one considers the ineffectiveness of the meetings thus far. Private economic interests have been waging war against climate change measures, just as they have waged war against the common good throughout the history of civilization, and they have succeeded to this point.

Which brings us to healthcare reform in the US. Private interests are muddying the debate and hoping that people like you will give in to their prejudices about government, or liberals, or non-white people. Here is a dose of reality: the Congressional Budget Office, the non-political outfit that calculates projections on proposed congressional legislation, has projected that single payer (i.e. the most “extreme” public plan) costs the least of all possible insurance systems while accomplishing the most. Meanwhile, for the various plans put forth over the past few months, the closer they come to being single payer, the more efficient and effective they are. Of course, to thinking people, this makes perfect sense: health insurance is something we buy into collectively already, in order to reduce individual risk. The larger the pool, the lower the risk. If each and everyone of us buy into the same pool, the individual risk is lowest and the overall efficiency is highest (i.e. costs go down). This is not up for debate — this is how health insurance works. So tell me: why do you want to pay more for less effective insurance? Is it some mindless allegiance to corporations — corporations which would rather pump up their stock price than insure the people who have paid them for it? Is it some mindless allegiance to your own prejudices?

A parting thought: Those who would sacrifice the whole to indulge their own paranoid fantasies are among the lowest of the low. Mind your own honor, please.

Sanely yours,
Dan Mims

Do not hire

Condoleezza Rice and Stephen Hadley have started a consulting firm “focused on helping U.S. companies doing business abroad — especially in key emerging markets.” (source: TPM)

I wonder: Would their demonstrated incompetence help or hurt as they attempt to help corporations exploit these emerging markets other countries? Perhaps destabilization is the name of the game. They’re experts at that.

Burden of Proof

According to UK outfit The First Post, recent scientific data demonstrates that certain religiously prescribed methods of slaughter cause pain for the slaughtered animals. I know what you’re thinking: who would believe otherwise? Well, for one example, there are the religious folks who believe that these rituals physically and morally minimize, or even neutralize, what they’ve done. Meanwhile, the author of the linked article only sees fit to raise less-than-urgent questions about human religious freedom, pivoting from the research to ask whether or not the British government should ban these ritual slaughter methods merely because they don’t jibe with other British laws, and despite a probable religious outcry. In fact, there is something much more significant to discuss: the anthropocentric standards of “proof” that implicitly dictate that non-human animals have nothing in common with humans, even pain responses, unless experiments show otherwise.

The concept of “burden of proof” is key in scientific inquiry (both in the formalized field of research and in everyday life). When examining the validity of any claim, the investigator makes a decision about which of the possible investigation outcomes is the more probable. This result, known as the “null hypothesis,” is assumed to be true until/unless the data suggest otherwise. For example, when testing a new medication, the null hypothesis is that the drug does not work any better than placebo. When deciding whether or not alien spacecraft have visited Earth, the null hypothesis is that they have not. Based on the data, these null hypotheses may either be rejected or not (for technical reasons, the null hypothesis can never be “accepted” because this implies certainty, and absence of evidence for something cannot technically disprove it). To reject the null hypothesis in the first scenario, the drug must be proven to work significantly better than a placebo. To reject it in the second, unambiguous evidence of alien spacecraft must be shown.

On the heels of the Enlightenment and before the concept of “common-ancestry” was vindicated by Charles Darwin, the prevailing consensus among scientists and philosophers — who were generally and not coincidentally religious at that time — was that humans are metaphysically distinct from all other animals, created separately and endowed with a proprietary and exclusive set of cognitive mechanisms like emotions, pain, consciousness, and so forth. Under this worldview, the “null hypothesis” for comparative scientific experiments was that non-human animals shared none of the manifest psychology of humans, and so the burden of proof fell upon anybody who believed otherwise. This is still the position of many individuals — scientists and laypeople alike — who approach animal research today.

This perspective is in direct opposition to a post-Darwinian worldview. It is accepted scientific fact that the essential human neural and cognitive structure is shared among all of our mammalian cousins; likewise for reptiles, amphibians, birds, and fish, to differing degrees. The systems regulating pain and emotion must be present in other vertebrates, in some form, because these psychological features have been salient behavioral motivators for hundreds of millions of years. It would be improbable indeed to have survived very long without them. To posit that these brain features sprang into existence only after our lineage split from chimpanzees and bonobos should be ludicrous to any modern biologist.

Why then the constant surprise whenever studies find that animals can do things we can do? Why should we have to hurt animals to prove that they can feel pain? The null hypothesis should be that of course they can feel pain and fear, because human exceptionalism is now the more outlandish claim, in light of a modern evolutionary framework. If anyone believes otherwise, the burden of proof is on them—but I’d rather they not try to prove it.

—Daniel Glass

Daniel Glass, aside from having an awesome last name, is HERE.am’s newest contributor. We’ll have a bio up soon in our About section.

Label Without a Cause

“Resistance” is a fashion label. Though I can’t find a home website — which is amazing — I found some items from their recent line via an email from TheCoolHunter. [Sidepoint: TheCoolHunter folks have lost their aesthetic touch, if Resistance makes the cut — the execution is sloppy at best and, as one would expect, the items are blatantly over-priced.]

Anyway, I have to ask: What are you resisting, Resistance? Are you resisting… resistance? Because, when I see that 6 out of 7 of your tacky-as-shit featured items are made with feathers, wool, and/or leather — gleaned from unimaginable suffering and deepest usurpation at the hands of industrial fatcats — I can’t help but question your sincerity.

That’s phall-acious!

A lot of people try to make a moral argument in favor of eating meat by appealing to human biology or human evolution. They’ll say humans are biological omnivores, that eating meat is just a fulfillment of our biological nature. (Never mind the animals’ suffering and loss.)

To be clear, this is an absolutely fallacious rationale. It would be like saying: “I have a phallus; therefore I am morally entitled to fuck you (irrespective of anything else).” Or: “I have fingernails; therefore I am morally entitled to scratch your eyes out (irrespective of anything else).”

That said, even if narrow appeals to biology weren’t entirely inadequate in this case, the actual biological facts tell a completely different story (via fuckyeahanimalrights and goveg):

• Meat-eaters: have claws
  Herbivores: no claws
  Humans: no claws
• Meat-eaters: have no skin pores and perspire through the tongue
  Herbivores: perspire through skin pores
  Humans: perspire through skin pores
• Meat-eaters: have sharp front teeth for tearing, with no flat molar teeth for grinding
  Herbivores: no sharp front teeth, but flat rear molars for grinding
  Humans: no sharp front teeth, but flat rear molars for grinding
• Meat-eaters: have intestinal tract that is only 3 times their body length so that rapidly decaying meat can pass through quickly
  Herbivores: have intestinal tract 10-12 times their body length.
  Humans: have intestinal tract 10-12 times their body length.
• Meat-eaters: have strong hydrochloric acid in stomach to digest meat
  Herbivores: have stomach acid that is 20 times weaker than that of a meat-eater
  Humans: have stomach acid that is 20 times weaker than that of a meat-eater
• Meat-eaters: salivary glands in mouth not needed to pre-digest grains and fruits.
  Herbivores: well-developed salivary glands which are necessary to pre-digest grains and fruits
  Humans: well-developed salivary glands, which are necessary to pre-digest, grains and fruits
• Meat-eaters: have acid saliva with no enzyme ptyalin to pre-digest grains
  Herbivores: have alkaline saliva with ptyalin to pre-digest grains
  Humans: have alkaline saliva with ptyalin to pre-digest grains

Based on a chart by A.D. Andrews, Fit Food for Men, (Chicago: American Hygiene Society, 1970)

BOOM.

Twit of the Day - 10/21/09

biblejournal: 2 Peter 1:5 “and to integrity add knowledge” You need knowledge of God and the Bible to have integrity, otherwise it is meaningless…

To which I reply: “Please, do continue — I’m really interested in the ontological ideas of people who just make shit up.” Sarcasm aside, I am fascinated — morbidly — by people who strongly believe their own bullshit. Mr. or Ms. biblejournal doesn’t have any idea whatsoever what he/she is talking about, and they would know that if they had stopped to consider whether or not they could even define “integrity.”

In fact, the word “integrity” is ideology-neutral — it simply means “consistency.” When I say integrity is meaningful, it is because the presence of contradiction within a particular system entails that the system is false. Ascription to falsehoods, whether active or passive, is the #1 cause of destruction and evil acts in our world, so it’s extremely consequential whether or not someone has integrity or cares about embodying integrity. 

On a related note, the meaning-ness of a genuinely meaningful concept is, by definition, independent of whether or not it’s been asserted in writing — in the Bible or anywhere else. Indeed, the meaning or value of “integrity,” like all concepts, is independent of whether or not anyone ever acknowledged it in any way whatsoever. If something is actual or meaningful, it must by definition be belief-independent.