For Our Own Good
Wired describes how the FBI is actually engaged in the ethnic profiling of Muslims because they’ve found a correlation between being Muslim and the commission of certain types of crimes. The data collected underlies “crime maps” and has proved useful to the Bureau. However, the discovery of the correlation is itself being treated as a scandal. How dare the Bureau suggest such a thing, whatever the evidence?
Last month, Danger Room revealed that the FBI was training its agents that religious Muslims tended to be “violent” and that Islamic charity is merely a “funding mechanism for combat.” In response, both the FBI and the Justice Department promised full reviews of their training materials.
The ACLU … blasted the mapping effort, and in an interview with the New York Times, FBI agent turned ACLU attorney Mike German tied the maps to the incendiary anti-Islam trainings first revealed by Danger Room. Agents who received the briefings might be “predisposed to treating everyone from a particular group as suspect,” German said.
Everybody knows that correlation is not causation, but even supposing there were a causative relationship between a certain belief systems and a particular sort of behavior, there are some who would argue that truth of this sort should never be recognized for the public good. One person who believed this was Plato, who coined the concept of the “noble lie”. In his Republic, the philosopher said that “we want one single, grand lie which will be believed by everybody – including the rulers, ideally, but failing that the rest of the city.”
Plato’s example lie was to claim that the gods had pre-ordained the difference between the social strata. By acccepting that this “foundational myth” as mandated by heaven, those who would otherwise take offense at their overlords would meekly submit to the divine will and the general peace would be preserved.
What lies would be told? Those chosen by the Guardians, or the “Philosopher Kings” — another Platonic concept — for the good of all. According to this theory, “we can’t handle the truth”, and therefore it is in our own best interests to let our betters guide us, telling us such fables as are necessary to lead us on to progress.
John Izzard, writing in Quadrant Magazine, cites the peremptory demand that everyone accept the doctrine of Climate Change as an example of how it is now impolite to question our betters. The pestilential tendency of individuals to challenge the consensus, to try and figure things out for themselves, was destabilizing society. He cited various pronouncements by famous academics to prove is point.
as Professor Clive Hamilton put it: “instruments of democratic practice” were “adroitly used” to “erode the authority of professional expertise”.
Another unhappy intellectual, Professor Robert Manne, stated in his recent essay, “Bad News” that:
Democracy relies on an understanding of the difference between those questions that involve the judgment of citizens and those where citizens have no alternative but to place their trust in those with expertise. …
The practices of democracy at times do not sit comfortably with the best advice of those most qualified and knowledgeable…
They [citizens] have attempted, with considerable success, to undermine the authority of climate science by skilful exploitation of a free media, appeal to freedom of information laws, the mobilization of vociferous citizens, and the promotion of their own to public office. In this way democracy has defeated science.
Victor Davis Hanson, a classical scholar, noticed this tendency from the start. In Real Clear politics, he wrote that in the view of some, the people ought to just shut up and obey.
In Plato’s ideal society, philosopher kings and elite Guardians shepherded the rabble to force them to do the “right” thing.
To prevent the unwashed from doing anything stupid, the all-powerful, all-wise Guardians often had to tell a few “noble” lies. And, of course, these caretakers themselves were exempt from most rules they made for others.
In a world ruled by the Guardians the right people, could from an Olympian height, still recognize the ‘secret truth’, the one not vouchsafed to the excitable masses. The Guardians might dispatch the Furies, otherwise known as Reaper and Predator Drones, to any point on the face of the planet and zap whoever they want. The Great Unwashed are consoled with the thought that the world is inhabited by the “religion of peace” so that the Philosopher-Kings can discreetly command the men at the remote flight consoles to treat it as a “religion of war” without arousing too much excitement.
We can’t handle the truth, so the Guardians give it the necessary spin. One suspects that the FBI will simply denounce their map of Muslims as a politically incorrect abomination — and then go right on compiling it just the same. The problem was not the map. It was never the map. The only problem was that the Obama administration was caught out telling their Noble Lie.
But the problem with the habit of treating the voters as if they were children is that the Philosopher Kings does violence to the real foundational myth of the United States, which holds that everyone potentially has the ability to discover the truth directly from “God” from an inquiry into the facts through the operation of reason. The idea that all men are created equal under a “Creator” is the real foundational myth of democracy, one that is anathema to the Guardians. Ayn Rand in her testimony before Congress called the concept of the “noble lie” nothing more than the “theory of the Nazi elite”. Speaking of the fictions told about Soviet Russia she said
If it is to deceive the American people, if it were to present to the American people a better picture of Russia than it really is, then that sort of an attitude is nothing but the theory of the Nazi elite — that a choice group of intellectual or other leaders will tell the people lies for their own good. That I don’t think is the American way of giving people information. We do not have to deceive the people at any time, in war or peace. If it was to please the Russians, I don’t see how you can please the Russians by telling them that we are fools.
But if telling Nobles Lies is generally evil, do not all foundational myths stand condemned? Tolkien for one, argued that not all myth was pernicious. He maintained that the truth might appear as a lie, since we could only ever apprehend it imperfectly, but for so long as we never mistook the current state of knowledge for absolute perfection, it was possible to treat the “lie” as something glimpsed “as through a glass darkly”, a child’s representation of the real thing; a provisional mistake that would in the fullness of inquiry be corrected. Tolkien, arguing with CS Lewis said, “we have come from God and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, will also reflect a splintered fragment of the true light, the eternal truth that is with God.”
We just have to keep remembering at every step along the way that we haven’t gotten to the end of the road yet.
The key proposition in seeking the truth is each proposition should either falsifiable or immediately assigned to the sphere of faith about which no rational determination can be made. “Falsifiability or refutability is the logical possibility that an assertion can be contradicted by an observation or the outcome of a physical experiment.” The problem with asserting that “Islam is always a religion of peace” or “global warming is the truth” is that neither of these propositions is a falsifiable proposition under the rules of political correctness. They are true no matter what. Adducing evidence against them is not allowed. As tenets of a religion, such concepts are fine. But as articles of scientific knowledge they are defective.
Perhaps the worst thing about “noble lies” told us by the Guardians is that once exploded they are replaced by equally unprovable and unfalsifiable propositions. If the statement “Islam is always the religion of peace” is proved false, the truth is not necessarily that “all Muslims are bad”. The truth may be that some kinds of sects tend to be bad; or it may be that even those militant sects may be benign someday. But the starting point in each case must always be truthful inquiry, however unpalatable. A mature democracy is rarely served best by the “noble lie”, but for those who don’t want to take the trouble to think for themselves, it is often easier to accept the received wisdom.
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I like it.
And that seems to well-describe the Liar-in-Chief.
We are now subjects of a government built upon nothing but “noble lies.” If one lie becomes seen as such, another is floated to replace it. It’s not even important that one lie “sticks,” it is only important that some lie is out there, continually sucking up the time and energies of truthseekers. A continuing string of lies is required to retain their power. The increasing maliciousness of the current “Guardians” combined with the increasing shallowness of the American public, (see, e.g., American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, Lindsay Lohan, Michael Jackson), does not bode well.
A recent Gallup poll claims that 64% who answered the poll want to do away with the Electoral College.
Here’s a provocative thought: Is there not some justification to the idea that the people “don’t always know what’s good for them?”
I’ll leave it at that, and everyone else is welcome to comment on it as you see fit. I have my own thoughts, but I can elaborate in another post.
Another wonderful essay. Along the line of doing it for our own good, I think that both the Alinskyites and those mythical Republican Elite are both so inclined. The former are trying to destroy capitalism and the latter to globalize it.
No one, not even an organization as powerful as the FBI, can “ethnically profile” Muslims, since as everyone knows, Islam is a religion, not a race, and “Muslim” is not an ethnic or racial designation, but a term that refers to a believer in the religion of Islam.
As a religion, Islam has certain tenets or beliefs. If Muslim spokesmen are to be believed, these tenets include, among other things, 1) a religious duty to make war upon non-Muslims until they (or, should I say,we) submit to the rule of Muslims and agree to be subservient to them, 2) free license for Muslims to steal what we own and kill us without compunction, 3) the duty to impose Islam on the entire world, and 4) the lack of necessity for Muslims to obey non-Muslim laws, even if they live in a non-Muslim country.
Islam is, in short, a declaration of war against non-Muslims. Presumably, believing in and following these tenets and beliefs will predispose a Muslim to act upon them, just as the belief in, say, Communism will predispose a Communist to do everything he or she can to destroy capitalism and install a Communist system in its stead.
In light of this, it would be a dereliction of duty for the FBI NOT to profile Muslims, just as it would be a derelicition of duty to not profile other groups such as, say, the Aryan nations, who are also dedicated to the overthrow of the US government.
Islam is a deadly threat to non-Muslims everywhere and needs to be treated as such.
The fact is that people are not rational–they rationalize.
Look at the case of Steve Jobs–from the interview with his biographer.–
“Once the doctors found the cancer and do a biopsy, they tell Jobs the good news,
“This is good… this is one of those slow-growing, 5% of pancreatic cancers that can actually be cured.”
But Steve Jobs doesn’t get the cancer operated on right away.
“He tries to treat it with diets, he turns to spiritualists, he goes through various ways of doing it macrobiotically,” according to Isaacson.
“And he doesn’t get an operation.”
“By the time they operate on him [9 months later], they notice it has spread to tissues around the pancreas.”
Steve Croft: “How could such a smart man do such a stupid thing?”
“You know, I think that he kinda thought that if you ignore something, that if you don’t want something to exist, you could have magical thinking.
It had worked for him in the past.”
The worst part, for me, was that even though Steve Jobs continued seeking secret cancer treatments, he was telling everyone he had been cured, according to the CBS News interview.
And that’s what people believed — including Apple stockholders — until 2008, when they saw how much weight he had lost at a public Apple event.”
http://e-patients.net/archives/2011/10/steve-jobs-cancer-denial.html/comment-page-1
Magical thinking had worked for him in the past—
And if you tell a nobel lie you get a nobel prize!
So, obviously, we should all find ways to tell more nobel lies. Like, “we aren’t targeting you because you’re a Moslem, we would never do that!”
Have a nice taqqiya.
Re: “. . . the real foundational myth of the United States, which holds that everyone potentially has the ability to discover the truth directly from “God” from an inquiry into the facts through the operation of reason.”
In what sense is this a myth? It seems pretty sound to me. “Potentially” being the operative qualifier.
This argument, that the common people need to be protected from themselves by their betters, comes up over and over again. One of the best comments on this idea was from Lincoln, during the Lincoln-Douglas debates. He was addressing the issue of slavery, but you can see from his remarks that he saw this as just the latest version of an old evil that has plagued humanity from the beginning:
“Those arguments that are made, that the inferior race are to be treated with as much allowance as they are capable of enjoying; that as much is to be done for them as their condition will allow,–what are these arguments? They are the arguments that kings have made for enslaving the people in all ages of the world. You will find that all the arguments in favor of kingcraft were of this class; they always bestrode the necks of the people not that they wanted to do it, but because the people were better off for being ridden. That is their argument, and this argument of the Judge is the same old serpent that says, You work, and I eat; you toil, and I will enjoy the fruits of it. Turn it whatever way you will, whether it come from the mouth of a king, an excuse for enslaving the people of his country, or from the mouth of men of one race as a reason for enslaving the men of another race, it is all the same old serpent.”
However, the discovery of the correlation is itself being treated as a scandal. How dare the Bureau suggest such a thing, whatever the evidence?
This is just plain PC in it’s most ugly self.
When the muskets are raised mine will be raised against the Guvment and their supporters.
great pull, wws
“In this way democracy has defeated science.”
But the real problem is that the High Priests of Climate Change do not want to have to convince everyone, or even a majority of people (although it really would have to be everyone). They just want to present their conclusions – not including any actual data, by the way – to the Ruling Class and have them employ the State’s Use of Deadly Force to both fund their own scientific empires and and impose lifestyle and personal choice standards on everyone (except those Special People who deserve to have homes that consume 10 times the normal electicity for a domicile, like Al Gore and John Edwards).
Sounds more like Democracy defeating Totalitarianism to me.
The best Noble Lie I know of:
“Men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights.” That is a demonstrably a myth. But if you build a nation around that myth it can be a pretty damn fine place.
3. Don Rodrigo
Is there not some justification to the idea that the people “don’t always know what’s good for them?”
There are times when none of us know what’s good for us. The point is that we should be free to discover, individually, what is and what isn’t good for us. Otherwise how can we ever know? Another point is the dirty secret that the “Guardians” are as clueless as the rest of us. We can all cite laws and regulations that “are for our own good” that have bizarrely unintended consequences.
Life is not a perpetual series of ‘yes maam’s and yes sir’s’ to some do-gooders who torment us with the full approval of their own conscience. Life is an adventure of individual discovery, for good or ill. Sometimes we can even figure out for ourselves what to go for and what to avoid.
Screw the Guardians.
Interesting seeing how the news is breaking that the DOJ wants to be able to directly lie to the American people and deny documents exists when they are requested in a Freedom of Information submission, which the DOJ, Administration or perhaps that group that decides which Americans can be Murdered without trail and no public release of crimes they are guilty of or how they were found guilty if at all, of course those things are too sensitive to be released, of course it would be to sensitive to release any documents between the current administration and DOJ or ATF or DEA on the fast and furious… Yes sir we have Plato’s world now! We have our philosopher King and the elite guard and it is becoming more likely that they will not want to release that power.
Economic model shows ‘heavy defeat’ for Obama in 2012:
The president could win re-election, the firm said, if the economy starts to rebound sharply over the next year and if Republicans nominate an “ineffective” candidate who fails to win the support of less ideological independent voters.
2012 is going to be a tough election year because nobody in his/her right mind wants to run for public office. I’m expecting another cycle – or two – of place-holder political leadership, but it’s telling that the country is looking to the gal from Wasilla or the guy from Louisiana or Cuba. The country is rolling away from the past, in its own unique American Way.
Everybody knows that correlation is not causation
This is irrelevant – if the correlation exists, then it can be used as a heuristic to aid in detecting something, regardless of the existence or not of a causal link.
I downloaded the free Kindle two voulmes of “The Memoirs of General William T.Sherman.”
There is a lot the more things change the more they stay the same information in it.
One meme was that there was more than enough information and informed opinion that the possibility of a Civil War was increasing, but that the Powers that be in the North did very little to militarily prepare for it, as we say these days, they kept kicking the can down the road even after Ft. Sumpter and the declarations of secession.
Sherman was in California when the gold rush started and he was also involved in banking before the Civil War. Reading about what happened in California had me humming, “All the gold in California, is in a bank in Beverly Hills in someone else’s name.” Real estate bubbles popping, Ponzi schemes, the whole 9 yards without the buzz words.
Then there are the effects of Lincoln’s assassination. It happened while Sherman was negotiating with Gen. Joe Johnston for the surrender of both Johnston’s army and the possible surrender all of the remaining Confederate military. Sherman informed Johnston about the assassination and how the Confederate General broke out into a sweat, and started explaining how deplorable he found political assassinations. His well founded fear was the war would continue and the destruction and mayhem would be much worse.
Anyway the “Guardians” of the rule of the elite always seem to end up messing up, and never learning.
Sherman’s observation of the Press shows they haven’t changed much either.
ntk @ 16: if the correlation exists, then it can be used as a heuristic to aid in detecting something, regardless of the existence or not of a causal link.
exactly. and correlation is PC, even heuristics are acceptable – as long as you keep strip-searching a few grannies, just to be sure. it’s really only claiming a causal link that is non-PC. of course, the guilty will assert that non-causation is innocence and correlation is just a pretense for prejudice.
this is something of a post-post-modern trope, btw, correlation has new virtue made acceptable in some large part by – Google, whose heuristic associational search links are working pretty durn well. more in general, by computers who can sift enough data dispassionately enough, that such things can show whatever predictive power they may have. it’s actually quite remarkable. I live it when the math comes through.
again, correlation has to be PC because it is brute empirical and progressives love empiricism. that’s – as long as it is. you can come up with bogus metrics and build a bogus statistical analysis that leads to some pre-chosen conclusion (global warming cough), so it’s not like everything is now easy and beautiful and the computers can run the world, and is also why progressives aren’t nearly as smart about it as they think.
still, the math that works is at least not a noble lie, but maybe about as close to actual truths as we ever get.
“the authority of professional expertise”
“those most qualified and knowledgeable…”
There is one tiny problem with the position of those who would not be Tribunes of the people, although they may disguise themselves as such, but who would act as Censors imposing the will of the Optimates by wielding the power to impose infamia. What they really want is the power of the Lictors to display their power destroy with an axe, although Censors lacked that power. They would be, in that the Lictor’s axe was wrapped in fasce, the true fascists. The problem is that if you want that power and claim that expertise then you have to be correct in your judgments. You must deliver and demonstrate that you have “professional expertise” and that you are in fact “qualified and knowledgeable.” Possessing those qualities is not the same thing as having a credential.
If you want the people to respect your pronouncement of the Law if you are a member of the Judiciary then know that the effects of your rulings will be seen. Judges must show good judgment. Justices must not act unjustly lest they discredit their office. If you want the people to respect your actions as a politician then remember that reality, that harshest of examiners, will test your choices. If you want posterity to honor your opinions as an intellectual or scientist then consider that the Truth will out.
The problem with the refusal of the noisy rabble to respect the decrees of the Great and Good regarding topics such as AGW and Public Finance is not that they refuse to accept what is for their own good. It is that they refuse to accept what is demonstrably nonsense. If a Roman haruspex misread the entrails as noisily and persistently as these would be holders of secret wisdom get it wrong they could have faced an unpleasant end.
“This is for your own good.” Traditionally said to the trusting puppy before his operation.
The news came out today that one of Obama’s re-election gambits will be to promise college-loan holders a significant easing of their debt — they will need only pay 10% (vice 20%) of their disposable income and only for 20 years (vice 30). After that the remainder is forgiven.
So I’m thinking the Republican nominee should one-up Obama with a Noble Lie. He or she should promise to decrease those numbers to 5% of disposable income and 5 years if s/he is elected. This of course follows the principle “first liar doesn’t have a chance”. And when the Republican is elected, s/he can treat the campaign promise the same way Obama treated his promise to close Gitmo (or any of the others).
oh good, the new site has learned to close an open style! (mine at #18)
every day in every way things are getting a little better …
The problem with the refusal of the noisy rabble to respect the decrees of the Great and Good regarding topics such as AGW and Public Finance is not that they refuse to accept what is for their own good. It is that they refuse to accept what is demonstrably nonsense.
How true. If the Wise were truly what they claim to be they would not need lies to hide behind. The results of their decisions would justify their actions.
Life imitates art. The predicament of the current crop of the Wise reminds me of the scene in The Wizard of Oz where the fake Wizard was commanding Dorothy and the others to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. The jig may soon be up. But con men can never truly believe that the illusions they weave will ever be shattered until they lie in pieces on the ground. The potential consequences to them are too horrible to contemplate.
Regarding the “noble lie” of “man-made global warming,” “global cooling,” etc., Glenn Reynolds said it best-”I’ll believe there’s a crisis, when those who claim there’s a crisis, start acting like there’s a crisis.”
There were apparently serious problems with that FBI program as Wired documents exstensively
1/ They hired crazy bigots like Robert Spencer as consultants and instructors
2/ There is a hard won rule in intelligence that you must separate
–those who collect the data and intelligence from
–those who analyze the intelligence
If you do not separate you have at best groupthink and at worst crazy self fulfilling prophesies.
For example
” Under von Rumsfeld’s aegis, a cell of non-intelligence ideologues was assembled in OSD for the express purpose of achieving direct access to the raw data held by the intelligence community and to make their own judgments as to what was true and what was not.
This is the famous “Office of Special Plans.”
They looked at the raw reporting and decided that DIA’s decisions as to what was true and what was not were all wrong.
Based on their reading of “history” they decided that Iraq had a nuclear weapons program, was successfully hiding their program, and that Saddam and Usama were the best of buddies.”
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2011/10/the-dnis-bad-idea.html#more
Don R (3),
Of course there is. I can demonstrate this with numerous instances, sadly, from my own life–can’t you?
No, the troubling thing with Plato’s formulation isn’t so much the idea that sometimes people are their own worst enemies, it’s that there exists an elite who can get it all right, and is therefore justified in lording it over others.
F – “first liar doesn’t have a chance”
That’s a keeper!
The only noble lie is the one not told. Plato was mistaken. Perhaps he meant to write “convenient lie” instead (as I understand it, he wasn’t a native English speaker and computerized translation tools must have been rather unreliable back then).
Tell a noble lie, win a Nobel Prize. Ha! That’s dynamite Josh!
Plato more or less invented philosophy. So he naturally allowed himself the thought experiment of a world ruled by philosophy. His metaphysics was an assault on religion, on the world of societies bound by myth and ritual. Something like the cult of global warming, even as practised by the scientists extrapoloating beyond the specifics of their research, strikes me as rather more a religion than a serious metaphysics. Likewise, the inability to speak plainly about the dangers of Islam seems to me less a “noble lie” than a taboo against breaking what is sacred to our postmodern cult. See, for example, how one febrile mind above calls Robert Spencer, a “crazy bigot”. Not quite the same as a dastardly sophist.
Great topic and comments. Charles White/14 I share your concern about new DOJ effort to enable government to lie about records requested under FOIA. I think that specific program of lying is a necessary part of the larger enterprise of Noble Lying. If you are to win and hold power over others because of your extraordinary skill, you must protect the predicate –the notion that you are, indeed, one of extraordinary skill. Any goofs must disappear. Even the effort to ask if there are goofs must be blocked and denigrated and, ideally, made to seem so absurd and irrelevant that it no longer occurs to anyone to ask. “What a waste of my time!” becomes “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain” becomes “These are not the droids you’re looking for.”
This dynamic –having to protect from inspection the predicate on which the claim of authority is based, and then to protect from inspection even that protection– is obviously unstable. And since the Noble Lie produces error-laden work, reality soon enough drives the instability toward failure. The only response before failure occurs is a “stiffening” of the system, with stonewalling, repression and doubling-down. At an exponentially-worsening magnitude and rate.
Unfortunately I think that’s where we are today.
O’narcissist.
Zero: the ignoble liar’s end.
“I don’t even know what he stands for,” said Susie Tompkins Buell,”.
“*This is his sole legacy: a massive post-traumatic stress disorder.”
…-
“Disappointed Democrats protest Obama’s SF visit”
“In a powerful display of profound disappointment with President Obama, some of the Democratic Party’s biggest donors gathered Tuesday – not inside his tony San Francisco fundraiser at the W Hotel, but outside on the sidewalks carrying signs in protest of his policies.
“I don’t even know what he stands for,” said Susie Tompkins Buell, a co-founder of the Esprit de Corps clothing company and one of the most generous Democratic Party donors in the nation – instrumental in backing such powerhouse progressive organizations as the Democracy Alliance and Media Matters.”
“While the largest faction rallied against the pipeline, there were also anti-war protesters; supporters of Bradley Manning, the U.S. soldier accused of giving documents to WikiLeaks; people from the Occupy SF camp and a group protesting the Obama administration’s recent crackdown on medical marijuana dispensaries across California.”
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/25/MN3J1LM0N6.DTL
…-
“Barack Obama – Narcissist or Merely Narcissistic?
Sam Vaknin, Ph.D. – 8/13/2008″
“*The “small people”, the “rank and file”, the “loyal soldiers” of the narcissist – his flock, his nation, his employees – they pay the price. The disillusionment and disenchantment are agonizing. The process of reconstruction, of rising from the ashes, of overcoming the trauma of having been deceived, exploited and manipulated – is drawn-out. It is difficult to trust again, to have faith, to love, to be led, to collaborate. Feelings of shame and guilt engulf the erstwhile followers of the narcissist. This is his sole legacy: a massive post-traumatic stress disorder.”
http://www.globalpolitician.com/25109-barack-obama-elections
I believe the question “What is true?” is one of the hardest questions for the mind. I don’t see how it could be any other way.
We can develop and test tools to assist us in the process, but even those are not infallible.
It seems to me that to deliberately inject falsehood can only make the process more difficult.
I offer as an example the ruminations of James Clerk Maxwell:
Theory of Heat, 10th ed., page 330
The second result of our theory relates to the thermal equilibrium of a vertical column. We find that if a vertical column of a gas were left to itself, till by the conduction of heat it had attained a condition of thermal equilibrium, the temperature would be the same throughout, or, in other words, gravity produces no effect in making the bottom of the column hotter or colder than the top.
This result is important in the theory of thermodynamics, for it proves that gravity has no influence in altering the conditions of thermal equilibrium in any substance, whether gaseous or not. For if two vertical columns of different substances stand on the same perfectly conducting horizontal plate, the temperature of the bottom of each column will be the same ; and if each column is in thermal equilibrium of itself, the temperatures at all equal heights must be the same. In fact, if the temperatures of the tops of the two columns were different, we might drive an engine with this difference of temperature, and the refuse heat would pass down the colder column, through the conducting plate, and up the warmer column; and this would go on till all the heat was converted into work, contrary to the second law of thermodynamics.
But we know that if one of the columns is gaseous, its temperature is uniform. Hence that of the other must be uniform, whatever its material.
This result is by no means applicable to the case of our atmosphere. Setting aside the enormous direct effect of the sun’s radiation in disturbing thermal equilibrium, the effect of winds in carrying large masses of air from one height to another tends to produce a distribution of temperature of a quite different kind, the temperature at any height being such that a mass of air, brought from one height to another without gaining or losing heat, would always find itself at the temperature of the surrounding air. In this condition of what Sir William Thomson has called the Convective equilibrium of heat, it is not the temperature which is constant, but the quantity (phi), which determines the adiabatic curves.
St. Thomas had it right: Faith before reason.
All knowledge begins with faith. In the case of science, for example, every scientist is making an implicit statement of faith in the order of the universe.
It is also the case that faith is what allows one to see “through a glass darkly,” to glimpse a clouded version of the absolute, of the truth that we can never access in all its fullness while we are humans living in the material realm. I’m sure that’s how Tolkien, a devout Catholic, must have seen things.
The awareness that profiling of at least some Muslims takes one closer to the truth didn’t arise out of the collected data – which nonetheless seems to support it – but out of reason predicated on, if nothing else, the faith that freedom is good and tyranny is not.
Even the notion that some things are good and others are not is a statement of faith in the existence of absolute good.
The alternative is a relativistic universe in which the elite call the shots based on the assumption that the only truth is that there are no truths, the only sin is the act of labeling something sinful.
This is the theology of the liberal Secular-humanist, the practitioner of the state religion of most countries in the west, including the U.S. This is the central tenet of a faith that stems from the notion that we are an accident, the result of stuff banging into itself until we (they) happily develop to where we can fashion the world as we would like it to be.
It’s the state religion causing the problems here, interfering with access to common sense and well established truths. That’s why a high school educated housewife in Ohio can see right through the twisted ideas that the left keeps feeding us, thinking that their rationalizations will have an impact on someone with a simpler, more grounded understanding reality.
Instead of seeing through a glass darkly, they are descending into a darkened glass with no end in sight.
O’Duck.
…-
What message does it send when some Democrats are ducking President Obama?”
“It’s a time-honored political tradition: Ducking a presidential candidate with sagging poll numbers.
And a year out from the 2012 election, it looks like some Democrats can’t get far enough away from President Obama.
Plenty of Democratic lawmakers, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, insist that this president is not a political liability.
But as Politico reports, there are growing signs that he is just that.”
http://caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/25/what-message-does-it-send-when-some-democrats-are-ducking-president-obama/
The real problem with the FBI maps is they appear to be to general and simplistic. They put mosques on a map. Useless waste of taxpayer resources.
They should be sending people into mosques undercover and taping the sermons to identify the muslim communities that may be breeding violent people. Following the identified provocative imams around to see who they talk to. Hacking their computers to see who they email.
They should be examining financial data to find the people who donate to the muslim “charities” which are linked to terrorists.
If we map and track the people, places, and institutions that are actually doing things to incite violence, we could prevent terrorism – and it would be totally legitimate (though I don’t think the ACLU understand reasonable suspicion and probable cause also apply to minorities).
Jay, Who said they are not infiltrating the Islamic community? Of course, in the evil days of J. Edgar, JFK and LBJ, it would have been a lot easier.
I do not think Eric the Racist is clever enough to spoil FBI thinkers.
There is great danger in infiltrating Islam. If caught, death.
But to refute myself, who says the FBI hasn’t been PCed to ineffectiveness?
Islam is the Problem.
W: “In his Republic, the philosopher said that “we want one single, grand lie which will be believed by everybody – including the rulers, ideally, but failing that the rest of the city.” Plato’s example lie was to claim that the gods had pre-ordained the difference between the social strata. By acccepting that this “foundational myth” as mandated by heaven, those who would otherwise take offense at their overlords would meekly submit to the divine will and the general peace would be preserved.”
This is the same argument as that for the “Divine Right of Kings.” The atheists of Marxist dictatorships believe they are appointed by Darwinian natural selection as rulers over their lessers – which amounts to a self-serving foundational myth similar to that of the Medieval Christian Monarchs.
Plato was the father of Medieval Christian Feudalism – and the father of Communist Dictatorships – because both forms of tyranny are based on the foundational myth (the big lie) that “some are more equal than others.”
“Plato’s metaphysics holds that the universe consists of two opposed dimensions: true reality – a perfect, immutable, supernatural realm, nonmaterial… non-perceivable – and the material world in which we live. The material world, Plato holds, is only an imperfect appearance of true reality. Momentous conclusions about man are implicit in this metaphysics: since individual men are merely particular instances of the universal “man,” they are not ultimately real. What is real about men is only the Form which they share in common… all men ultimately comprise one unity, and no earthly man is an autonomous entity… Each man therefore must strive, as far as he can, to wipe out his individuality (his personal desires, ambitions, etc.) and merge himself into the community, becoming one with it and living only to serve its welfare. On this view, the collective is not an aggregate, but an entity. Society (the state) is regarded as a living organism (this the so-called “organic theory of the state”), and the individual becomes merely a cell of this organism’s body… The first and highest form of the state and of the government and of the law,” Plato writes, is a condition “in which the private and individual is altogether banished… and all men express praise and blame and feel joy and sorrow on the same occasions… The advocacy of the omnipotent state follows from the above as a matter of course. The function and authority of the state, according to Plato, should be unlimited… The program of government domination of the individual is thoroughly worked out. In Plato’s “Republic and Laws” one can read the details, which are the first blueprint of the totalitarian ideal… The blueprint includes the view that the state should be ruled by a special elite: the philosophers. Their title to absolute power, Plato explains, is their special wisdom, a wisdom which derives from their insight into true reality… the so-called “Form of the Good”… The Form of the Good cannot be known by the use of reason… It can only be grasped, after years of ascetic preparation, only by an ineffable mystic experience… which is reserved to the philosophical elite… The mass of men, by contrast, are entangled in the personal concerns of this life. They are enslaved to the lower world revealed to them by their senses. They are incapable of achieving mystic contact with a supernatural principle. They are fit only to obey orders.” Leonard Peikoff
http://www.peikoff.com/lr/review_rand.htm
http://www.peikoff.com/lr/chapter1.htm
“Instruments of democratic practice” were “adroitly used” to “erode the authority of professional expertise.” Professor Clive Hamilton
“Democracy relies on an understanding of the difference between those questions that involve the judgment of citizens and those where citizens have no alternative but to place their trust in those with expertise… The practices of democracy at times do not sit comfortably with the best advice of those most qualified and knowledgeable.” Professor Robert Manne
“It [Socialism] is based on big and patronizing government, on extensive regulating of human behavior, and on large-scale income redistribution….There is always a limiting (or constraining) of human freedom, there is always ambitious social engineering, there is always an immodest ‘enforcement of a good’ by those who are anointed on others against their will, there is always the crowding out of standard democratic methods by alternative political procedures, and there is always the feeling of superiority of intellectuals and of their ambitions.” Václav Klaus
http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/206
“They [intellectuals] prefer ideas, which give them jobs and income and which enhance their power and prestige…They look for ideas, which enhance the role of the state because the state is usually their main employer, sponsor or donator… Hence it is not surprising that the intellectuals are mostly interested in abstract, not directly implementable ideas… Hayek put it clearly: “the intellectual, by his whole disposition, is uninterested in technical details or practical difficulties.” He is interested in visions and utopias, and because “socialist thought owes its appeal largely to its visionary character” (and I would add lack of realism and utopian nature), the intellectual tends to become a socialist.…The free market system does not typically reward those who are, in their own eyes, the most meritorious. Because the intellectuals value themselves very highly, they disdain the marketplace. Markets value them differently than their own eyes and, in addition to it, markets function nicely without their supervision. As a result, the intellectuals are suspicious of free markets and prefer being publicly funded. That is another reason, why they are in favour of socialism…” Václav Klaus
http://www.klaus.cz/klaus2/asp/clanek.asp?id=wFYl3mgsTzI6
Thanks to all who replied to my question at #3. They were good answers, I think.
My own view is that, in the case of the Electoral College poll, that people are responding to something that has ben proposed by others. Otherwise they would not have given the Electoral College issue a thought. Also, Gallup comes up with the craziest poll results at times, very often due to deliberate skewing of the sample, and the leading nature of the questions. As to the Electoral College thing itself: be aware that there is a big push going on to at least weaken the Electoral College even further, and eventualy do away with it, which will prove catastrophic in the end.
The underlying problem to me in modern America is that we’ve become to used to government solutions, rule by judicial decrees, bureaucratic ukases, etc., and Americans are susceptible to suggestions for “streamlining” the process; i.e., doing away with Constitutional barriers.
“Instruments of democratic practice” were “adroitly used” to “erode the authority of professional expertise.” Professor Clive Hamilton
Professional experts are not supposed to have authority outside the confines of their own narrow section within a given professional field. Prof. Hamilton believes that “experts” have a kind of governing power. They do now, but are not supposed to.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…” Thomas Jefferson
http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/index.htm
The American Declaration of Independence not a “foundational myth” — it is self-evident moral truth — the opposite of Plato’s big self-serving lie — the opposite of the foundational myth of tyranny — that “some are more equal than others.”
michael(35),
If you mean sneaking into Mecca while not really a Muslim (a la Richard Burton), perhaps. But here in the US? What on earth can you mean, and do you have some cites? On the opposite side from your assertion, you have folks as visible as reprehensible Ibrahim Hooper, or the conversely non-reprehensible Stephen Schwartz, who are American-born converts to Islam, and they’re surviving just fine. How could it be risky to pose as a convert to a religion that is actively seeking such?
wws 9,
“Those arguments that are made, that the inferior race are to be treated with as much allowance as they are capable of enjoying; that as much is to be done for them as their condition will allow,–what are these arguments? They are the arguments that kings have made for enslaving the people in all ages of the world. You will find that all the arguments in favor of kingcraft were of this class; they always bestrode the necks of the people not that they wanted to do it, but because the people were better off for being ridden.” Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was restating the founding idea of our nation best expressed by Thomas Jefferson in our Declaration of Independence – and in his other writings. Abraham Lincoln was able to see farther than many – because he stood on the shoulders of a giant.
“Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him?” Thomas Jefferson
“All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.” Thomas Jefferson
http://www.rjgeib.com/thoughts/jefferson/jefferson.html
Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.
-Thomas Jefferson
The last part of the quote suggests that Jefferson considered the question of whether or not man can govern himself to be unanswered.
YBR 43,
Thomas Jefferson answered the question in the second quote.
“All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.” Thomas Jefferson
It is interesting that, as your rush to paint Thomas Jefferson with an untruthful ambivalence regarding the natural law of mankind’s equal rights and the corresponding natural law of self-government, you ignored the second quotation. Many of your posts suggest that your answer is opposed to that of Thomas Jefferson – that you agree with unnatural law of Plato, Marx and other philosopher kings of tyranny – that the mass of mankind has been born with saddles on their backs, and a favored few booted and spurred, stand ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God’s enemy. Thomas Jefferson – the other Founding Fathers – and the American People – made history – they answered the question with no hesitation, ambiguity or ambivalence. The question remains – who stands with them?
Count me in. I believe in the self-evident moral truths in our Declaration of Independence – that “the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.”
S-R@44: It is interesting that, as your rush to paint Thomas Jefferson with an untruthful ambivalence regarding the natural law of mankind’s equal rights and the corresponding natural law of self-government, you ignored the second quotation.
Many of your posts suggest that your answer is… that the mass of mankind has been born with saddles on their backs…
No and no. Not sure how you get to that point. Acknowledging humanity’s (enduring) flaws and supporting the concept of government (USA needs more of it in some areas and less of it in other areas) doesn’t quite put my boot on anybody’s neck. I have errands now so this is short.
(Goodness – blert’s folly of “educating retards” is orders of magnitude more incendiary (intentionally so I surmised but??) than anything I have suggested.)
YBR 45,
Acknowledging the enduring flaws of self-serving government (a small group of other people after all) and supporting the concept of limited government (via our Declaration of Independence and Constitution) ensures that the boot doesn’t come down on anybody’s neck – or face.
“The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others… We are different from all the oligarchies of the past in that we know what we’re doing… Power is not a means, it is an end… The object of power is power… Always there will be the intoxication of power… We are the Priests of Power… Power is power over human beings, over the body; but above all over the mind… The real power; the power we have to fight for night and day is not power over things but over men. How does one man assert his power over another… by making him suffer… We shall crush you down to the point from which there is no coming back… everything will be dead inside you… You will be hollow. We shall squeeze you empty and then we shall fill you with ourselves… If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face forever.” George Orwell – 1984
YBR 43,
The immediate antecedent of “this question” was “Have we found angels…”. The only other question was “Can he, then, be trusted with the government of others?”. Jefferson has stated that man’s ability to self-govern is less than perfect. His rhetorical question has to do with finding men with the angelic right to rule others. I think that history has answered “not yet”.
John Henry 47,
“Have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him?”
History has answered not yet, and common sense tells us not ever. There will never be angels in the form of kings, dictators, czars, or oligarchies that can be trusted with the government of others because human evil is part of human nature. As Lord Acton rightly observed “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
The answer is just as Thomas Jefferson and our other Founding Fathers laid out – limit the power of government – limit the power of those who govern others – limit their power via amendable secular law (Constitution) – and above all – limit their power via unamendable natural law (Declaration).
“Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny… Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories.” Thomas Jefferson
“It should be remembered, as an axiom of eternal truth in politics, that whatever power in any government is independent, is absolute also; in theory only, at first, while the spirit of the people is up, but in practice, as fast as that relaxes. Independence can be trusted nowhere but with the people in mass. They are inherently independent of all but moral law [Declaration of Independence].” Thomas Jefferson
http://www.restore-government-accountability.com/judicial-tyranny.html
S-R@46: Acknowledging the enduring flaws of self-serving government (a small group of other people after all) and supporting the concept of limited government (via our Declaration of Independence and Constitution) ensures that the boot doesn’t come down on anybody’s neck – or face.
What is the expression – absence of intent does not imply intentional absence. Government by its nature is dangerous, when it’s not busy being annoying, belligerent, intrusive, inefficient, slow – and messy, as I wrote in my response to blert’s resource allocation argument (at the end of the Goodwill to Men thread which concluded with what was surely an indictment of the idea of natural (or god-given) rights – the suggestion that resources be allocated to the most useful, productive and efficient among us is Marxist to the core.) At any rate, USA government was designed for “bulky” performance to prevent the kind of precipitous decision-making that guards against the “go-go” environment which ultimately sent Enron into the abyss of history, and Wall St into a financial crisis of global proportions that had more to do with man’s enduring flaws than any government boot.
However. As I have written before on many occasions, marrying the “enduring flaws” of man with those of the State leads to the (possibly not so) simple conclusion that multiple forms of balance are required to “steady the ship” and “limit the power.”
This country achieved what I have called a “20% balance” which was maintained for close to half a century until (1) the post-9/11 ME wars started to drain the sovereign bank balance and (2) the investment community (pressured by $70 trillion in global capital seeking double digit investment returns using funny paper) surgically removed itself from regulatory restraint (Efficient Market Hypothesis being the new model) and gained access to vast new capital reserves no longer isolated from trading risk by the Glass-Steagall “Chinese wall.” Wall St (and the Fed) need to experience 40 years in the wilderness wandering in thoughtful consideration of what they did. Dodd-Frank has been decimated in the name of “limited government” and “free market capitalism.” The coming Financial Repression is going to eviscerate my middle class portfolio. Whose boot is clamped where?
I have also stipulated many times to the need for tax code reform, SS reform to realign with modern demographic changes, and reform of the health care delivery system which is figuratively and literally killing old people through private sector usury.
My assessment is that you are reading me wrong, or perhaps my writing has not been clear (although I believe it has), or possibly there are some lingering issues my with stated preference for a deistic theology. But jack-booted thuggery? I’m afraid others here and elsewhere have traveled much farther down that road than I.
RE: the Jefferson quote on angels and history
Jefferson was tricky with words. John Henry’s interpretation might be correct but the loose sentence structure leaves room for my more broad view that man has not yet demonstrated an ability to maintain the necessary balances for a significant period of time, the most recent history being about 40 years or so. We will have to do better than that to become more than a blip on the cosmic time scale.
YBR 49: “I have also stipulated many times to the need for tax code reform, SS reform… and reform of the health care delivery system…”
I believe the consensus here at Belmont Club and other conservative sites – and increasingly in the general population – is that Federal Government is not authorized under our Constitution to provide national social security or national healthcare in the first place. In addition these functions turn out to be in violation of the general welfare of the nation because there are always exceptions, exemptions, waivers, alternative (superior) plans for those in government or connected to government, etc. etc. – not to mention the fact that Federal Government is bankrupt and can’t pay for those services without unjust taxation, unjust borrowing or unjust creation of money out of thin air. The best way to reform SS and healthcare is to obey the Bill of Rights.
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.”
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/billofrights#amendmentx
SS and healthcare may be Constitutionally set up by State governments – as long as there are State tax-breaks for individuals who wish to provide SS and healthcare for themselves.
S-R@50: I believe the consensus here at Belmont Club and other conservative sites – and increasingly in the general population – is that Federal Government is not authorized under our Constitution to provide national social security or national healthcare in the first place.
Not sure about a BC consensus in re constitutionality (and not at all sure about the ‘general population’), but neither do I recall threads on Justice Cardozo’s majority opinions (Steward Machine Company vs Davis (1937) and Helvering vs Davis (1937)) declaring SS (and unemployment compensation) constitutional. The argument was “general welfare” and I have posted a fair amount on the subject. I’m not seeing black and white.
Health care is its own issue and I have written rather extensively (for me) on the subject. Single payer might not have been the best way to go but the private sector was just killing the elderly – and the rest of us (the about to be elderly.)
YBR 51,
The Supreme Court is not the final arbiter of what is Constitutional and what is un-Constitutional.
“You seem to consider the judges the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions; a very dangerous doctrine indeed, and one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy. Our judges … and their power are the more dangerous as they are in office for life, and are not responsible, as the other functionaries are, to the elective control. The Constitution has erected no such single tribunal, knowing that to whatever hands confided, with the corruptions of time and party, its members would become despots. It has more wisely made all the departments co-equal and co-sovereign within themselves… When the legislative or executive functionaries act unconstitutionally, they are responsible to the people in their elective capacity. The exemption of the judges from that is quite dangerous enough. I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society, but the people themselves.” Thomas Jefferson
http://www.restore-government-accountability.com/judicial-tyranny.html
The Executive and Legislative branches have a say in this too. Ultimately the States, acting in concert, are the ultimate defenders of the Constitution and the people, and ultimate arbiters of what is Constitutional and un-Constitutional because, as James Madison wrote, the States are “the authority which, in fact, made the Constitution; the authority which being paramount to the Constitution was paramount to the authorities constituted by it, to the Judiciary as well as the other authorities [Congress and President].”
http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=1940&chapter=119399&layout=html&Itemid=27
As a member of the private healthcare system I can tell you from first hand experience over a 33 year career that the private sector of American healthcare is not killing the elderly. Unjust and un-Constitutional Federal regulation of American healthcare is the problem.
S-R: Unjust and un-Constitutional Federal regulation of American healthcare is the problem.
No.
From a previous link of mine detailing the health care costs for care and treatment of the elderly.
I’m not going to do the point-by-point treatment on health care again, unless there is a thread on the subject.