Or would you rather be a fish...

Wired.com has a new article up about the latest ina long trend of "leave the land, seek the sea" utopia projects. It's great, about 4 pages, and it will inspire you to laughter, if not thoughts of wonderful mischief.

One they didn't mention, but can be easily Googled, is New Utopia- a project of Lazarus Long (yes, after THAT LL; yes, we should do ALL of THAT, and more to him for usurping THAT name)...

In the vein of "Floating Island of Whatever-the-fuck-you-want", What would YOU do if you had an island nation of your own?
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OUTLAW

My version of "Down the Rabbit Hole" Day is a link blog. It continues, below:





Edit: Resized videos, added Link to Boing Boing

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Full of Shit? You're Not Alone.

I just finished watching the acclaimed Canadian documentary The Corporation. I have some problems with it.

A long-ish while ago, I was sent a link to the 9/11 Truther movie called "A Big Steaming Pile of Bullshit", or something similar. The movie made me so mad, inside of 15 minutes, that I made a HUGE rebuttal, minute by minute, and posted it online. I will probably never do that again, as it was time consuming, and- though I didn't know it at the time- much of that work had already been done (and done better).

Instead, I'll give a general overview of The Corporation, and my problems with it.


First off- for those who have not, or won't watch the movie- an overview. The Corporation lays out a picture that is, in a hyphenated word: anti-corporate. There are many notable names: Noam Chomsky, Milton Friedman, Naomi Klein, Ray Anderson, etc. There are many more notable corporations: IBM, Wal-Mart, Bechtel, Nike, Interface, GE, etc. The general consensus is: corporations are bad for people.

My take: maybe, but.

First off, let's start with a relatively limited sourcing of claims. There are many claims made in the movie, like all synthetic chemicals are bad for the environment, while only some are cited. The contracts between IBM and the Nazi government are shown, for instance; as are parts of the documents Jane Akre used to sue Fox News in her failed whistle-blower suit. In general, the film only shows a very few instances of corporate greed/malevolence/wrong-doing, and only in those few cases are there citations- if any are given, at all.

That's a minor point, as the few cases they show are all- generally- well documented. I bring it up because lack of documentation/citation is a warning sign. It means, usually, that: (a) the person has no proof whatever they're telling you wasn't a lie when it was told to them; or (b) they didn't figure you'd want proof so, despite their passionate position, they didn't bother actually researching it- and therefore have no idea that it's all conjecture and opinion, with little or no factual basis. There could be other reasons, but I'm too lazy to provide them- but have fun looking them up for yourself, consider it a lesson in how to do your own research when some asshole on teh intardwubz tells you something.

1) Not all synthetic chemicals are bad. Some of them are synthetic versions of chemicals that appear in nature. But, even if 99.999999999% of all synthetic chemicals are bad for people and the environment, there are those that are not. Seems like semantics, huh? It might be; but if you're gonna tell the truth, why exaggerate the claim? Especially when the truth is that some chemicals are only dangerous in large dosages.

2) At one point, while listing the sins of the Corporation, there is the caption: "Harm to animals: experimentation". To be highly pedantic: Fuck off. When is a chicken's life not equal to a humans? When killing that chicken can save the lives of thousands. When killing that chicken means prolonging the life of a family. Vegetarianism be damned. Sure, it may be morally ambiguous to test on animals in some cases, but not in others. Sure, we arbitrarily say: that animal is too cute to be tested on. But the claim is that animal experimentation isn't needed. That's an extraordinary claim, as animal testing has helped us develop much of modern medicine- including vaccines, insulin for diabetics, and better understanding of how our bodies work. So, prove it. "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof". Who said that, and why are they wrong? (Hint: They're not).

3) In general, the film makes pretty damning cases against certain corporations, or certain bits and pieces of corporations, or their histories. Then they take those cases and say "That's how all corporations work!" Which is not a logically valid argument. In fact, all it means is "Hey, I don't like what they did here, or how those people did that there, so all Corporations are bad." Want a quick way to check that reasoning? Change the word "Corporations" to the plural form of your favorite minority. Seems stupid, huh? Making broad generalizations- even if it's about a group that is generally despised- is never a logically valid tactic. In fact, it's an emotional argument, which has nothing to do with logic.

4) Furthermore, there are lots of loaded words used throughout- words that connotate heavily emotional ideas. Like saying "Patriots" instead of the more ambiguous "soldiers". Or "freedom fighters". In addition, there are loaded pictures/symbols. Buckets of skulls, barrels of radioactive waste, scenes of what looks like billowing clouds of polluted smoke pouring from smoke stacks. No way of knowing if that's just water vapor- not that I'm saying it is; but if it was, how would anyone know? These are shock tactics. For those of you who hate Micheal Moore, he's interviewed and footage from his movies/shows is cut-in at various points. It's easy to admit that Moore is very big on shock.

5) When alternate, or opposition, arguments are shown, they are shown mockingly. Mostly, though, they're just not shown. In fact, I'd say the only time a contrary opinion is shown, is when it's easily mockable.

6) Let's get this fucking straight, once and for all: 99% of all species that HAVE EVER LIVED.... EVER are already extinct. Extinction is the evolutionary norm, survival is the abnormality.

7)A point of interest: in 1991, when the conflict in Iraq took oil from $13/barrel to over $40. This is stated by a broker of some sort- I can't remember his name or title form the movie. It's just an interesting fact, it means nothing- he could have his figures wrong, he didn't cite his source(s).

8) On the mocking of alternate views, titles are changed based on what's being said. Watch closely, you'll see. One person is introduced with a mocking title, and it's not until much later int he movie that anything resembling a real title is given.

9) There is a discussion of FDR. There is no discussion of Keynesian Economics vs Austrian Economics, though blatantly Keynesian ideas are trumpeted at several points (especially during the brief bit about FDR).

10) They mention the nagging study. This is when they deride corporations for, you know, trying to sell people the stuff they make. What isn't mentioned, is that in all the psychological techniques, the absolute best way to resist them, is to know about them. Once you understand that you can be manipulated, and what they're trying to do, you're the most able to ignore their manipulations. This si true in interrogation, and it's true in advertising. This is why new ways of advertising have to be invented. By being aware, people are harder to manipulate.

11) After that whole movie, I still don't know what a corporation is, as opposed to an LTD, an LLC, INC, CO, etc... I have some general ideas- and some foreknowledge; but the movie never really explained what the fuck a corporation actually is.

12) Godwin's Law be damned, I guess. Though, by the very historicity of the case, it may actually be exempt- but still, as an avid internet type, my skin crawls at the violation out of reflex.

13)In general, their whole thing about IBM and the Nazis is the same argument in "Gun Manufacturers should be held accountable for their products being used in gun homicides." This seems apt when a gun company knowingly makes their guns easily moddable to fully auto, because it will sell better on the black market (increasing demand and profits). And yet, the argument isn't a great one. Guns made to shoot targets can be used, equally well, to kill people. The difference is in the user, not in the gun. [As a side note: I support laws that limit the types of firearms available to people. Mostly because I distrust all of you bastards; but also because I have a big mouth, and I'm a huge fucking target.]

In the end, I recommend the movie, in a way. It shouldn't be viewed by the terminally gullible. However, for those of you who aren't going to drink the tang, just because the video is sleek and has high production values, I say give it a look. You may learn something, or be inspired to learn more about something. Personally, I'm about to spend, what I estimate will be, many hours on theWikiGoodness looking up some things.

Also, there is a couple very unfortunate looking people later in the movie. So, if you're like me, and love to feel pretty at the expensive or the genetically unlucky, take a peek. Your self-esteem will thank you.
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Beating (what should be) a Dead Horse

an Italian study shows that thimerosal has essentially no effect on brain function in children who got a whooping cough vaccine.

1400 children who got a thimerosal-based vaccine for pertussis in the early 90s were tested for brain function impariments. The vaccines had different amounts of the mercury-based preservative in them (one had twice the amount of the other), so if thimerosal had any effect on the brain — like causing autism — then the children in the study should have clearly different results depending on what vaccine they got.

They didn’t, above what would be expected from chance variations. Even better, the study was randomized in such a way that outside factors like environment wouldn’t play a role, so antivaxxers cannot say it was something else that may be affecting these results.

Now let’s be clear: thimerosal has been known scientifically not to have any link to brain disorders for years (link goes to a Word doc), and the Measles/Mumps/Rubella (MMR) vaccine never contained thimerosal anyway. Antivaxxers wrongly targeted thimerosal as a health risk, and thimerosal was removed from vaccines in 2001, but no reduction in autism spectrum disorder diagnoses occurred. In other words, thimerosal is not linked with autism

This is all via The Bad Astronomy Blog. If you're woondering why, it's because Dr. Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer himself, is the current President of the James Randi Educational Foundation. Check them both out. (Note: The link to the BABlog is directly to the cited post).

Edit: For a more detailed analysis, by an actual Neurologist, check out Dr Steven Novella's Neurologica.
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i can haz VAXI Nay-shun?

"Geographic pockets of vaccine exemptors pose a risk to the whole community."

By way of The Bad Astronomer himself: Phil Plait
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Climate Change

I'm listening to the most recent Intelligence Squared Podcast, and it's about Climate Change.

I'm having some thoughts.



I don't like Climate Change.

It's not that I don't want it to happen, or that it's inexorably bad. I'm not sure of a lot of the facts about it. The problem isn't so much that the only "science" against it is funded by BIG OIL. Neither is it, that people are causing it. All of that is true enough, in it's way. My problem with it isn't even on whether it's happening. It is. (Over the past century the temperature of the entire planet has risen more than half a degree celsius.)

My problem is with what it means, what we can do to actually help, and the general eco-freak uprising surrounding the issue.

Listen to the debate on I^2. (The motion was "Major Reductions in Carbon Emissions Are Not Worth the Money.") The side against the motion says reducing Carbon Emissions will save the world. And they provide a lot of unsourced, vaguely sourced, or unapologetically anecdotal evidence.

The side against says, basically, the opposite; and they "prove" it using the same style.

What it comes down to is money. Let's say it would take 3-4% of the entire world's GDP to reduce carbon emissions by 30% in 20 years. First, understand these numbers do not reflect actual figures and estimates- those are more like 3-4% for less than 15% reduction. Second- and here's my main point- understand what 3-4% of the entire world's GDP actually means.

Here's where you should probably start: The combined net worth of the 25 million most wealthy people in the world, is equal to the combined net worth of the lowest 2 Billion [according to the BBC]. That's, roughly, 100 to 1. If we subtract 3-4% of wealth from going towards providing energy, groceries, wages, etc etc; where does it come from?

Either, it comes from everybody equally. Or, as it usually does: The large majority comes from the wealthy. But the rest comes from the poor.

The wealthy who could easily continue to be extravagant with 3-4% less; and the poor, who would still be barely living if their wealth were increased by 3-4%. 3% of 100 dollars is 3 dollars. 3% of a million is 30,000.

The side that says Carbon Emissions should be reduced, regardless of the costs, don't deny that even if they were reduced the climate would continue to change. No one is talking about stopping what's happened/happening/going to happen. However, the side that wants to curb Carbon, is dismissive of the expenditures required. Calling it "investments".

How are these "investments" different from simple costs? It's hard to pin-down the actual differences. Seeing as any difference is just supposition, it's unlikely we'd ever be able to fully tell if such expenditures were costs or investments, until after we'd made them. Remember the huge infrastructure spending of the New Deal, that helped to end the Great Depression? Well, according to Austrian School Economists, that prolonged the depression. (Kensians disagree.)

See how this is a bit more complicated than we're sometimes led to believe?

But, again, the point is the money. Take 3% away from a poor subsistence farmer in Africa, or South America, or Asia; and that could very well mean the death/starvation of the farmer. Okay, so we hit the really rich harder and we take away 1% from the poor.

Sure, that sounds good; until you start thinking about how these thing really would/will happen. It's going to be a rise in energy costs. Which means EVERYTHING, that requires any energy, becomes more expensive- especially consumables (i.e. food).

The people who want these dramatic sums of money used for their purposes- nobel as they may be- really don't seem to be in touch with the reality of people who struggle, not from paycheck to paycheck because they spend too much at the MacDonald's or "down at the pub", but from meal to meal because they don't have enough money to properly feed themselves. {Here's a tidbit I like to reference: it's only been since, roughly, the 1970s, that people in rural America could be accurately assumed to have enough to eat to be getting proper daily nutrition. Look it up.}

China wants less pollution in their cities, yet they need more power. So, they keep building coal plants, fund "clean coal" (which isn't), and research how to manipulate the weather to keep the coal smoke out of heavily populated areas. They also want to make some nuclear plants; but it takes highly educated workers to run nuclear facilities. People capable of problem solving on the fly. That sort of independent, intelligent, worker isn't conducive to the type of government currently running China. And the Chinese aren't stupid, they saw Russia's failures with nuclear- Chernobyl was due in no small part to the lack of adequate training and intelligence on the part of plant workers. (They were picking up radioactive waste with their hands and throwing it back into the exploded reactor core, all while wearing rubber chemical suits. These were not sophisticated nuclear physicists.)

So what will China do? They have a lot of coal. Coal is incredibly cheap, and they have the ability, supplies, and personnel to make more coal power plants. I'm betting they don't stop.

What about Ethiopia, Nigeria, Kenya, Sudan, Columbia, Venezuela, Peru, Mexico? How many of those countries have the people, money, or ability to the design, build, and safely run nuclear power plants?

And let's face it: Nuclear is the only option. Solar, wind, tidal... it's all intermittent. Hydroelectric is an option- but not for everybody, everywhere; and even when it is viable, it's got its own environmental impacts. The "renewables" are all HUGELY inefficient, expensive, and- worse- there's no reliable, clean, efficient way of storing the power they produce that isn't immediately used.

Nigeria, Venezuela, China.. they're not moving away from coal and petroleum any time soon. Neither is Russia. Neither are we.

Try to force it on them, and it'll get passed onto their poorest, their weakest, and their most vulnerable if they don't just laugh and continue doing what they want, regardless.

Try to only handle it ourselves, and it'll lead to the same untenable situation.

Imagine 50 years later, when the US is completely run on nuclear (or other clean, renewable energy), but Africa, Asia, and South America have made 2 coal burning power plants for every 1 we shut down. If you don't think it's possible, go find the numbers of coal power plants China is expected to build (or has announced it will build) over the next ten years.

Energy costs aren't taxes; but they have the same effect- they hurt the poorest the most. Raise the price of bread, milk, or rice by a dollar; and watch the fallout. Chances are Bill Gates won't starve to death, but children in sub-Saharan Africa are a different story.

There's a contempt, from the people who want everything done, as soon as possible, about global warming for the people who oppose their proposals. I can understand it, I feel the same way about anyone who tries to shine the light of reality on my own personal love of manned space exploration and colonization.

Just like I see a time of space stations, bases in the clouds of Neptune, and ships that travel hundreds of thousands of miles a day, as utopic (if not a true utopia); they see a time of clean energy and no global warming as idyllic. "Everything would be perfect, if only..."

It's bullshit, of course. Neither my dream nor theirs will result in anything but different forms of angst, depredation, and strife.

The only difference is, in my dream, if Earth were to suddenly- unexpectedly- blow up, all of humanity wouldn't perish in the blast.

My point is, the proactive responders to global warming are fooling themselves. They want a fundamental change, across the spectrum, and they're willing to go to any ends, regardless of how much they have to ignore, to get what they want because they think it will make the world better for their kids, or their kids' kids.

I have no idea how to save the planet from this "menace". My knee-jerk reaction is "get a new planet, and we've got a spare should one get ruined"; but that's not likely to happen. Reducing carbon emissions, so that everything gets more expensive, and those at the bottom die off a little more... it's not going to change anything.

It's the difference between keeping Terry Schiavo alive, or pulling the plug: Either way she dies, the only question is dignity.

I mean, in reality, how often do huge, fundamental changes, across the spectrum, actually happen. And when they do, how long does it take before we all realize that there are new/other problems the change didn't solve?
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It's cold

And Daddy needs a Blanket, Bitches.

So, which one of you fat bastards is I gonna cut open and crawl into to keep warm tonight?

Don't be scared...

This won't hurt me a bit...
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Shakes Peir 1

We find our zero,
Mired in loathing,
in yon' kingdom
of Wal Mart...

And verily, lo,
I say to thee,
See what wrong
We wrought, us
Bankers three.
With our Boil, Broil,
Your toil's troubles
Credit Markets Burn
And burst financial bubbles...
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Changes

I promised a long time ago,

that I would implement this functionality. As you can see, it is done. There will now be "Read More..." links on the bottom of every post, I am working to fix this, but it may just be a shortcoming inherent to blogger and/or the workaround I have implemented.

There are still problems with it. I will be making changes to fix them as I can, please bear with me.

If none of that made sense, or piqued your interest... Next time, don't go through the looking glass...
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Depression + Southern + Food

What you'll need:

1 - Worst recession since the Great Depression
1 - Poor or Lower Middle Class, possibly Middle Middle Class, Background
1 - Tin Vienna Sausages, drained cut (lengthwise) into halves.
4 - Slices American Cheese, folded into quarters.
28 - Crackers (I prefer Ritz or Club; but whatever you can afford is good, too).
1 - Bottle of your favorite Hot Sauce

A Note on the Hot Sauce Selection:
There are two main Hot Sauce choices: Mexican or Cajun. Mexican tastes more like hot peppers (jalapenoes, etc), which I prefer for this dish. Cajun tends to be more vinegar and cayenne tasting, which I prefer for Red Beans and Rice.

Take 1 Cracker, 1 Quarter Cheese Slice, 1 Half Vienna Sausage, two squirts Hot Sauce, place second cracker on top to form a sandwhich. Enjoy.

This typically serves between 1 and 14, depending on the size, money, and ability to make do of the eaters.

In case you're wondering: This tastes fucking awesome.

Beverage Recommendation:
- Sweet Tea
or
- Beer Read More...