nerdgirl

“Observation” of what? Algeria? Indonesia in East Timor? (600,000 East Timorese killed, and they still fought til they got their separate state) Western Sahara (from Morocco)? Sri Lanka and the Tamils/LTTE? Phillipines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) Colombia and FARC? Russia and Chechnyan rebels? Various colonial small wars/insurgencies in Africa? Spain and Basque separatists (pre and post-Franco)? Prussia under occupation by Napoleonic forces? (Clausewitz on small wars, insurgencies, and asymmetric warfare, including but not limited to the “Arming of the People” chapter in _On War_. I.e., why large nations lose small wars and defense strategically is the strongest form of warfare. Small wars are tactically offensive and strategically defensive.) And to anticipate the ‘strawman’ response – it’s not about kindness, being nice, ‘comfy couch strategy’, idealism, or any such notional straw man. It’s about strategy and history. (See Book 1, page 1, _On War_.) Seriously, on what reading/perceiving of historical or military strategy do you base your assertion? What brings you to your statements that are made with such rhetorical force/stridency and confident assertiveness? Why are you so convinced in your “observations”? What do you think you have “observed” that supports your assertion? What led you to that opinion? And how do explain that the most recent Quadrennial Defense Review (2006, largely still under SecDef Rumsfeld, over 20 references to ‘stabilization’, etc), the latest US National Defense Strategy (from June 2008), DoDD 3000.05 on stability operations in support of reconstruction and transition (November 2005), and DoDD 3000.07 are directly opposite to your assertions? If belief is not grounded in facts (historical or contemporary), in what is grounded? I’m less interested in debunking a-history than in understanding on what basis you assert what you think you know. I wonder if it’s a temporal phenomenon – one can see & can count a dead insurgent/terrorist/enemy body. That moment/image is strong/vivid/final … rarely are the long term repercussions/consequences, composed of many small/incomplete moments felt or afforded the same weight. We don’t need to got warfare (small or conventional) to see that. Single large events are over-emphasized, e.g., deaths in plane crash over many small ones (automobile accidents) even though the death count of the latter is much larger (typically orders of magnitude in US per year). And the emotional component of revenge? Which I’m not even sure how to go about deconvoluting from a positivist realist approach. Can’t pretend it doesn’t exist and isn’t a strongly motivating emotion … just not sure how to unpack metaphorically … Humans also learn to count before they learn to read. We can count dead bodies *a lot* easier than we can measure deterrence/co-ercion/stabilization/reconstruction/counter-insurgency/cooperation. Again, why do you think you know what you think you know so confidently? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

That’s one interpretation/perspective. And from multiple perspectives I am sympathetic. Credibility from personal experience (& that does include professional education and experience) is important. And those personal experiences can add context that may be difficult to convey with the limitations of ASCII text and average attention span of SC-readership. (Goodness knows, I’ve pushed the latter.

Joe Stiglitz: "Stiglitz, appearing before a congressional oversight panel, provided a harsh sketch of the U.S. economy: millions losing their jobs and workers facing a retirement filled with 'hardship and uncertainty.' The only way to respond, he said, was an economic stimulus package with the 'biggest bang for the buck.' "'The failure to act quickly and effectively means that the downturn will be longer and deeper than it otherwise would have been,' Stiglitz said, drawing a picture of a national economy saddled with a 'larger legacy of debt.'" Two: "Something is better than nothing, and bigger was better than smaller in terms of the stimulus needed," said Chris Varvares, president of prominent forecaster Macroeconomic Advisers in St. Louis. "The economy needs a fiscal jolt." /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Thanks for the article. A lot of thought-provoking, & germane ideas in it. A lot of the issues brought up don't have easy answers. I do agree that the internet can facilitate the propagation of mean and dumb behavior. The lens through which I view it is that anonymous behavior can sometimes (not always) be a window to someone's behavior. If you’re mean or nasty when you're anonymous, what does that say w/r/t your non-anonymous behavior? When a guy takes me out to dinner, if he’s nasty to the waiter/waitress, there’s rarely a second date. (A further example that illustrates that rude behavior does not require cyberspace.) I am also viscerally cognizant of the rape and death threats against Kathy Sierra, who blogged (past tense) about computers and more user-friendly programming with some of the most fabulous images/graphics this side of xkcd. That & similar accounts is one significant reason why I largely stay anonymous on this forum - a choice that was further reinforced after I got death threats via PMs. At the same time, I appreciate & highly value the freedom & exploration afforded by anonymity. I would assert that one *can* be critical without invoking profanity, ad hominems, or other behavior too common on much of the internet. And concur heartily w/Jason w/r/t the a-historic idea/implication that this is somehow a new behavior traits among humans. I see it as something of a personal responsibility issue ... but it's hard to prove.

True. In some case, he didn't even ask Congress for permission, or if it wasn't there, he went ahead and acted on his own. Are you sure you want Obama to remember that lesson from Reagan? In 2009, who gets to be “Iran” and who are the “Contras”? It’s 2009 - ‘Teflon’ is no longer cutting edge. How about meta-materials? /Marg … ‘pithy’ for [rehmwa] ; ‘nano’ for someone else ; & Cal for [kelpdiver] [insert bear icon here] Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

I thought you would have caught more fish with this stinkbait. My question is how is that more "provable" than evolution? What are the standards of proof? I can think of a couple methods to explore correlations (divorce rates, incaceration rates) but am not sure one could ever prove, in positivist sense, a causal mechanism. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

This is where Fundamentalist Christians and Fundamentalist Atheists stop making sense. God does not stop existing, or begin to exist, based on whether or not Evolution occurred. (I think that's her point.) Yep .... /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

That's a really interesting idea. Not sure I agree with ... nor disagree with it ... but find it intellectually provocative. When I was in grad school, one of my colleagues commented, only semi-facetiously, that if I ever focused myself on one thing that I could take over the world. To some extent, that was his kind way of saying I needed to focus more on research. The world is full of so many interesting people to meet, ideas to explore, places to visit, books to read, & experiences to savor. There are grand themes that tie a lot of what I pursue together ... but sometimes the connections may only be visible to me. I do have something of an admiration for those who can devote themselves so deeply and fully, especially w/r/t service to others. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

I'm not sure that the current thinking associated with the 'god gene' hypothesis says anything w/r/t the existence or non-existence of God or a higher power directly but rather makes a hypothesis w/r/t higher/human cognition. My understanding is that the hypothesis asserts that there is a gene that up- and down-regulates production of specific neurochemicals, monamines iirc, that cause the brain to experience a sense of other-world-liness that is associated with spirituality across cultures, i.e., the gene isn't specific to one group or another. Iirc, there also was strong criticism from religious groups not dissimilar to the criticism when a potential "gay gene" was identified . (?) Are we thinking about the same thing? Or are you referring to some very recent work or different work? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Sounds interesting. Do you have a link or the title of the specific manuscript? I've never heard of the writer nor his ideas; I'd like to read more.

Guys - thanks for the initial post & discussion. What do see as best case scenarios? And worst case scenarios? Especially w/r/t the international repercussions in light of "and the vast majority of Citibank's $773 billion in deposits are uninsured, mostly because they're held outside the US" comment? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

I was going to change the subject to "plagiarism is okay?" but realized, perhaps in fabulous irony , that it fit. Point of clarification ... & please correct me if what I read is not what you meant. Are you asserting that if one cuts-n-pastes (copies) something written by another without any acknowlegdement that it is not their own work, the person who catches that is the asshole? I.e., plagiarizing is okay? And it's the other person's fault? Or do you mean that someone who acknowledges the something is not one's own work but makes a reasonable effort that may not include an explicit clicky and is subsequently chastised, that the chastiser is the "asshole"? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

In context of the initial cited survey, the thread subject title, and the above quoted response, do you see evolutionary theory as threatening to the existence of God/disproving existence of God? If yes, why? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Hmmm ... it seems that you have done a variant on what you accuse [frequentfaller] of doing -- taking some small percentage that fits what you want to see and assigning that to the overall group: "always" and "never", eh? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Since evolution doesn't really have a preference or implication for progress as we usually think of it, I'm not sure if thinking about it purely in terms of 'evolution' is approporiate. Perhaps contra-evolution, post-evolution, or human-induced mechanisms that intersect with but are not dependent on evolution? I don't know if that's true or not: 200 years ago there were a lot of hard-core Enlightenment deists, at least in the western world. The rise to prominence of the 'personal God' concept came in the late 19th Century. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

But what if that serves an evolutionary purpose? We know that altruism and cooperation serve evolutionary purposes. Just a few examples off the top of my head (when I first put responded to another thread

Theory... a belief, policy, or procedure proposed or followed as the basis of action b: an ideal .Blue Skies

Both father and grandfather died of MRSA. My sincerest condolences. There are about 18,000 deaths and about 100,000 illnesses a year related to MRSA in the US alone. (More deaths per year from MRSA than AIDS in 2005 and anticipated for years forward.) That Staphylococcus aureus evolved a methicillin resistance is a public health issue; some argue it's a crisis. The evolution of Staphylococcus aureus bacteria to acquire resisistance to antibiotics, i.e., to become a 'superbug', is largely based on human activities and human choices of other people, for which your family has had to bare consequences. Recognizing and understanding how such pathogens evolved is one step to understanding how to treat and prevent them. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

A) Because this site is full of Americans. [psuedo-silly] So how do you explain that link I posted about all those UK folks believing in ghosts? [/psuedo-silly] /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Would you give us a couple examples of what you consider "theories of religion"? Or perhaps ... backing up a few steps ... what do you mean by "theory"? /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Is it if it brings them happiness and a good life? How do you see evolution as having impacted your having or not having a good life? Unless you, a family member, or close friend died from an MRSA or has/had XDTB or other pathogen that has evolved antibiotic resistance, I'm not sure where the correlation or causality is. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

If that is true then why does 90% of the population believe otherwise? Because they want to or are stupid. Honestly, I don't think it's so much about "stupidity." Yes, decline in robust science education does play a role. I suspect that there may oven be an evolutionary biology explanation for some of the resistance to evolution ... even to deity sparked Big Bang (which is *NOT* ID): an extension of Maslow's needs. I was in Galveston a couple weeks ago. Running along the seawall and looking out into the Gulf, I was listening to a podcast about Carl Sagan's ideas on and practice of spirituality (defined in a most holistic sense that is completely reconcilable/reconciled with science): One of the neatest parts to me was the discussion of Sagan's role is getting this picture taken by Voyager as it reached farther than any human-created device had gone into the Universe and the commentary he gave: "We succeeded in taking that picture [from deep space], and, if you look at it, you see a dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever lived, lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every hopeful child, every mother and father, every inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam. "The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner of the dot. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. "Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity -- in all this vastness -- there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. "It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known." Moreso than just that picture and his commentary, it was thinking about it is comparison with the almost iconic stature that the Apollo image of Earth has attained, in which the Earth fills the full screen. We've all seen & recognize the Apollo picture ... but we don't have that same sort of iconic association with the pale blue dot image ... why? (More rhetorical question than interrogative ...) Is it because the Apollo ones makes the Earth seem much more important than the other??? The 'pale blue dot' picture was taken from 43 AU. That's pretty close in the grand scheme of things. Humans want (extension of Maslow's needs) to feel significant at some level – to their families and the people they love, in their work and community. But where does the need for significance or “specialness” end? Or when is it fulfilled that we don't need to extend our "specialness" further out into the Universe? Is it something about our species? Is there any evolutionary origin? Or cultural? (E.g., compare with Japanese and Chinese culture.) Evolution challenges that 'specialness' of humans on Earth. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

If that is true then why does 90% of the population believe otherwise? From where did your 90% number come? From the Fox News article cited by the OP in this thread: "A new poll released just in time for Charles Darwin's 200th birthday found only 39 percent of Americans say they 'believe in the theory of evolution' and just 24 percent of those who attend church weekly believe in the explanation for the origin of life. "The Gallup survey, released Wednesday, found a quarter of those polled do not believe in evolution, and 36 percent say they don't have an opinion either way. "The poll of 1,018 American adults, found strong ties between education level and belief in the theory. "Among those with high-school educations or less who have an opinion on Darwin's theory, more say they do not believe in evolution than say they believe in it," Gallup found. "For all other groups, and in particular those who have at least a college degree, belief is significantly higher than nonbelief." "Just 21 percent of respondents who had up to a high school level of education believe in evolution, compared with 74 percent of those with postgraduate degrees." And if the pollster would have asked me, I probably would have responded "No, I don't believe in evolution. It's not about believing or not. It's about data, evidence, direct observation of evolution happening, genomics, proteomics ... & I'd probably immediately be placed on the 'do not call' lists What this is indicative of, im-ever-ho, is a (1) decline in science education, (2) commodification of science, which opens it to rhetorical questioning, e.g., he said/he said-style arguments (cuz the reality is that, with variations across fields, most scientists & engineers are men), and (3) general anti-intellectual trends of the late 20th Century, including some specific ones in the US. When do I see more data to support that: "31% of the public believes in astrology including 36% of women and 43% of those aged 25 to 29 but only 17% of people aged 65 and over, and 25% of men." And trends across nations regarding "belief" in evolution. Only Turkey had a lower percentage (of the countries surveyed) than the US. Two easily found examples. One study in Britian even claimed to find that more people believe in ghosts than the Judeo-Christian God ... veracity of that poll needs further examination, imo. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

ID hardly warrants the label of Theory - it's not science based it's a fairly tale at best. Theories at least have a thread of tangible and logical substance. ID Does not. ID is not a scientific theory. Period. It is not falsifiable. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying

Myths ... some might call some of my strongest beliefs myths. And a little more than 500 years ago, many of them would have been out right heretical: freedom & justice as a right, equality, love (versus arranged marriage), private property, civil law (over religious-based or despotic law of king), American exceptionalism, public libraries, lots of things. I value those who ask questions ... even the ones who ask hard questions. /Marg Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters. Tibetan Buddhist saying