"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known." ~ Carl Sagan
Why do people kill? Why do we sacrifice ourselves to save others from dying? Why do we close our eyes and try to ignore the suffering going on around us? Why do we feel sympathy, guilt, shame, righteous anger? Why do we act differently in groups than when we are alone?
This blog aims to explore all manner of "moral" behaviors and emotions, investigating the who, the how, the what and, of course, the why. Come along for the ride.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that you can't change bad human behavior without changing the bad situation. But at the same time, changing the situation won't fix everything. There will always be bad apples.
In response to these studies, a new physiological model was made, to distinguish between controlled and impulsive aggression. This model drew upon a body of work showing that low serotonin levels led to general impulsive behavior. Researchers surmised that people who were impulsively aggressive had low serotonin levels. People who exhibited dominance behavior, on the other hand, were driven by testosterone. High serotonin levels allowed them to control their impulses and to use their aggression to establish dominance. A study in chimpanzees found that unprovoked assaults and biting was associated not with high testosterone but low serotonin, and that dominance behaviors such as mounting of other males were associated with high testosterone and high serotonin levels.
Steven J. Milloy's* latest highly-paid and pretentiously polished piece of political spin for his pusillanimous corporate paramours. This is a good example of trying to create false balance (like the debate between gravity, and intelligent falling)** in order to spread FUD.
If you are comfortable with being manipulated by big business hacks, or are just looking for reasons to justify sticking your head in the sand, then this is the site for you.
Oh, and you'll probably also be glad to know that a recent 'study' has proven that if you quit smoking before you are 30, you actually live longer than someone who never smoked at all! No, really...
And while I have your attention, I've got this bridge... it used to belong to the ex-minister for finance of Nigeria, and now his family have asked me to help him dispose of it. If you were interested in buying, well, I could let you have it at under 1% of it's Real Market Value... I know, I know, it sounds too good to be true, but you know how it is, I need to get rid of it quickly as I have this slam-dunk tip on a long shot in the 2:15 at Cheltenham I plan to put money on...
* "Steven J. Milloy is a columnist for Fox News and a paid advocate for Phillip Morris, ExxonMobil and other corporations. From the 1990s until the end of 2005, he was an adjunct scholar at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute.
Milloy runs the website Junkscience.com, which is dedicated to debunking what he alleges to be false claims regarding global warming, DDT, environmental radicalism and scare science among other topics.[1] His other website, CSR Watch.com, is focused around attacking the corporate social responsibility movement. He is also head of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, a mutual fund he runs with tobacco executive Tom Borelli, who happens to be listed as the secretary of the Advancement of Sound Science Center, an organisation Milloy operates from his home in Potomac, Maryland . "
** "False balance is a term used to describe a perceived or real media bias, where journalists present an issue as being more balanced between opposing viewpoints than the evidence actually supports. Journalists may present evidence and arguments out of proportion to the actual evidence for each side, or may even actually suppress information which would establish one side's claims as baseless.
An example of issues sometimes handled with false balance are pseudoscience, as when a national nightly news program in the United States gave coverage to a backyard inventor who claimed to have invented a perpetual motion machine; the program presented scientific authorities to explain why such a device was impossible, but since they gave equal time to the claims of the inventor, it may have created a false impression with audiences that his claims might be credible, which they are not. Other issues sometimes handled with false balance are Holocaust denial, Global Warming, and Intelligent Design creationism.
Naomi Klein talking to Bill Maher about how government and mega-corps collude under the pretence of free market ideology in order to defraud the populace.
Ξ October 15th, 2007 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Words |
In the distant substations, at night,
Lamps are burning with white-cold light -
Electricity of the domestic breed is bearing.
In the distant substations, at night,
Shadows of no one are utmostly slight.
Electricity groans and smells like bleeding.
In the distant substations, at night,
Eyes of travelers get long-expected sight,
Singeing the eyelids with a clear-cut snapshot.
Darkling meadows are dreaming of morning-dew...
And you feel that someone is waiting for you -
In the distant substations, at night
...hundreds of miles from home.
--Sergey Mikhaylov
(Tapadh leat,
etc. ))
Ξ October 15th, 2007 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Misc |
Dilemma!
((p → q) ∧ (r → s) ∧ (¬q ∨ ¬s)) ├ (¬p ∨ ¬r)
Lawrence Lessig on corruption, cash, responsibility, independence, participatory politics and sugar lumps.
"You have heard your servant's prayer -- the uttered part of it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part of it -- that part which the pastor -- and also you in your hearts -- fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You heard these words: 'Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!' That is sufficient. the whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory -- must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it -- for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen."
