stay human…
Posted on August 3, 2010
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a softer friendlier future
Posted on August 2, 2010
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have no fear….
Posted on August 2, 2010
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One of the best known episodes of the indian epic Mahabharata: Krishna is revealing the Bhagavad Gita to Prince Arjuna, one of the five Pandava brothers as depicted in a brilliant production from 1989, by Peter Brooks of the Royal Shakespeare company
Californian dreaming….
Posted on August 1, 2010
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the future of music….or the future of news
Posted on July 31, 2010
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epistemology
Posted on July 29, 2010
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Wonderful anecdote on the relationship between power and information. It involves a high ranking American analyst, Daniel Ellsberg advising the newly appointed Kissinger on what access to highly confidential information would do to him. Hang in for the twist.
From Daniel Ellsbergs book Secrets
“Henry, there’s something I would like to tell you, for what it’s worth, something I wish I had been told years ago. You’ve been a consultant for a long time, and you’ve dealt a great deal with top secret information. But you’re about to receive a whole slew of special clearances, maybe fifteen or twenty of them, that are higher than top secret.
“I’ve had a number of these myself, and I’ve known other people who have just acquired them, and I have a pretty good sense of what the effects of receiving these clearances are on a person who didn’t previously know they even existed. And the effects of reading the information that they will make available to you.
“First, you’ll be exhilarated by some of this new information, and by having it all — so much! incredible! — suddenly available to you. But second, almost as fast, you will feel like a fool for having studied, written, talked about these subjects, criticized and analyzed decisions made by presidents for years without having known of the existence of all this information, which presidents and others had and you didn’t, and which must have influenced their decisions in ways you couldn’t even guess. In particular, you’ll feel foolish for having literally rubbed shoulders for over a decade with some officials and consultants who did have access to all this information you didn’t know about and didn’t know they had, and you’ll be stunned that they kept that secret from you so well.
“You will feel like a fool, and that will last for about two weeks. Then, after you’ve started reading all this daily intelligence input and become used to using what amounts to whole libraries of hidden information, which is much more closely held than mere top secret data, you will forget there ever was a time when you didn’t have it, and you’ll be aware only of the fact that you have it now and most others don’t….and that all those other people are fools.
“Over a longer period of time — not too long, but a matter of two or three years — you’ll eventually become aware of the limitations of this information. There is a great deal that it doesn’t tell you, it’s often inaccurate, and it can lead you astray just as much as the New York Times can. But that takes a while to learn.
“In the meantime it will have become very hard for you to learn from anybody who doesn’t have these clearances. Because you’ll be thinking as you listen to them: ‘What would this man be telling me if he knew what I know? Would he be giving me the same advice, or would it totally change his predictions and recommendations?’ And that mental exercise is so torturous that after a while you give it up and just stop listening. I’ve seen this with my superiors, my colleagues….and with myself.
“You will deal with a person who doesn’t have those clearances only from the point of view of what you want him to believe and what impression you want him to go away with, since you’ll have to lie carefully to him about what you know. In effect, you will have to manipulate him. You’ll give up trying to assess what he has to say. The danger is, you’ll become something like a moron. You’ll become incapable of learning from most people in the world, no matter how much experience they may have in their particular areas that may be much greater than yours.”
….Kissinger hadn’t interrupted this long warning. As I’ve said, he could be a good listener, and he listened soberly. He seemed to understand that it was heartfelt, and he didn’t take it as patronizing, as I’d feared. But I knew it was too soon for him to appreciate fully what I was saying. He didn’t have the clearances yet
Politics in America
Posted on July 29, 2010
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Eleven men and a woman had mustered there for a weeklong boot camp run by the Appleseed Project, a group Dailey started that is dedicated to teaching every American how to fire a bullet through a man-size target out to 500 yards. So far Appleseed has taught 25,000 people to shoot; 7,000 more will learn by the end of this year. Its instructors teach this skill not for the purpose of hunting or sport. They see marksmanship as fundamental to Americans’ ability to defend their liberty, whether against foreigners or the agents of a (hypothetical) tyrannical government. Appleseed frames this activity as being somewhere between a historical re-enactment and a viable last resort. I came to find out how serious they were.
differences
Posted on July 29, 2010
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It seems that men and women really do think differently
Discoveries by scientists over the past 10 years have elucidated biological sex differences in brain structure, chemistry and function. “These variations occur throughout the brain, in regions involved in language, memory, emotion, vision, hearing and navigation,” explains Larry Cahill, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior at the University of California, Irvine.
While women and men struggle to communicate with each other and ponder why they don’t think and react to things in similar ways, science is proving that the differences in our brains may have more serious implications beyond our everyday social interactions.
Scientists are looking into ways that sex-based brain variations affect the thought processes and behavior of men and women differently. According to Cahill, “their discoveries could point the way to sex-specific therapies for men and women with neurological conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease, schizophrenia, depression, addiction and post-traumatic stress disorder.”
we do not forget….
Posted on July 29, 2010
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Here’s an interesting story on the power of 4chan’s grown up alter ego – anonymous – everyone’s favorite schoolyard bully
Sometime over the past few months the Tea Party, and more specifically the Oregon Tea Party, went shopping for a new slogan. They desired something pithy, no doubt, that was emblematic of their “every-man” persona yet still sufficiently antagonistic as to communicate the tacit threat the right-wing movement imagines it presents to the nation’s political elites.
It is not clear when or why or how the selection was made or even to what extent any formal decision making process was involved. What is clear is that over the past month or so the slogan “We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us” has appeared on Tea Party websites, posters, bumper stickers, and billboards.
To natives of the digital realm, the “We are Anonymous” slogan is instantly recognizable as the virtual banner of the erstwhile virtual vigilante group whose name it declares. “Anonymous” is both a group and a meme (and neither) – perhaps the most significant and least frivolous of the ideo-linguistic children of anonymous posting communities like 4chan. Anonymous is, in essence, an angry mob with idle hands and in appropriating their moniker, the Oregon Tea Party provoked them.
slo-mo
Posted on July 26, 2010
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