Author: Psybertron

Wisdom of Age

A recurring theme that age is part of wisdom (yes I would say that) but here a great example.

Ayn Rand always was atrocious, but it’s often necessary to grow up to appreciate the fact. I was already mid-40’s before coming across her, so I was OK 😉

[, as a college freshman] was very intimate with her ideas, but that just gave [her] more insight into their outright dysfunctionality, and the strength to say “sayonara!”

What’s scary is that so many Americans have not grown out of that mentally puerile phase. Instead, this contingent — now largely comprised of Tea Party radicals — remains mired in her pop philosophy.

Hat tip to David Morey on FB for the Guardian link.

[Post Note : As if to prove the point. Rand 1, 2, 7 & 8 on this top 100 list!!! Hat tip to Michael Brown on MD.)

Outage Apologies

Due to work-related installs and reconfigurations of our server, I lost visibility of all my normal WordPress and other static content for a few days. But after a reset it looks like everything is up and back to normal. No damage done.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

Classy

To repay our debt to Greece.

Asperger’s #Breivik

Hmm, trial by Powerpoint. Not sure the clinical descriptions (with my limited Norwegian) stack up as conclusive, but Apserger’s Syndrome, as one of three possible diagnoses, is getting close to the mark. Total rationality is autism, as I’ve already suggested several times, and Asperger’s is one form of that.

Ill but not psychotic (Reuters in English). Sounds about right, doesn’t seem psychotic or paranoid schizophrenic – just hyper-rational (autistic / Asperger’s) without normal human emotion. Sick. Half a human – the dangerous half.

Forget the expert, stick to the facts about #Breivik – on his own admission, by his own design – totally rational, selective empathy – not sane – sick.

And, on balance, this is about right too. My initial reaction was they should not invest in special prison quarters for #Breivik, but as I also said earlier, good that the conclusion is that his insanity / sickness is irrelevant to his sentence. Whatever the questionable aspect of the verdict he will be incarcerated – if he wants treatment for his illness he can have it, if not his brain can fester.

[Post Note 12 June – Yes, “not psychotic“, but that’s not the same as being sane. Mental illness is more complex.]

The Causation Meme

Here a great example – the “Miami Bath-Salts Zombie Cannibal” case.

Spookily, Tom Kreider’s current “This is the Worst” project has an image linked to the case too. Gruesome.

Need to Watch

http://www.edge.org/conversation/a-philosophy-of-physics

Science is “narrow minded” if it rejects metaphysical philosophy; in fact it is narrow minded if it fails to recognise that is already operating with dependency on existing engrained metaphysics, taken for granted – without scientific basis, naturally. One reason science is much less certain than some of its very predictable, useful, empirically-supported theories. The uncertainties are in the metaphysical foundations.

A return to science as natural philosophy, rather than the science (since 1930’s physics) of technological application.

Steiner Education

BHA has a current campaign “against” Rudolf Steiner schools and Anthroposophy, same as it campaigns against religious faith schools. I’ve noted Steiner and Anthroposophy many times before, but I’ve not come across Steiner as an active education movement until recently, but …

Steiner education is based on an esoteric/occultist movement called Anthroposophy, founded by Austrian mystic Rudolf Steiner. Anthroposophy, or spiritual science, is centred on beliefs in karma, reincarnation and advancing children’s connection to the spirit world.

Steiner schools will always argue that they do not teach Anthroposophy, and in a narrow sense this is true as it is not a term that pupils will ever come across. However, the beliefs of Anthroposophy form the core of the teacher training courses and are the pedagogical motivation for everything that is taught in Steiner schools.

Sure, Steiner and Anthroposophy are mystical – they’ve been in my whacky list for some time. You wouldn’t want to teach Anthroposophy to any immature mind, but anyone teaching (in any school) would do well to understand Anthroposophy rather than simply dismiss it.

[…] SWSF schools do not teach children to read and write before the age of 6/7, or use computers before 13, […] because anthroposophists believe that to do so damages this connection by quashing this naivety and playfulness. In reality, all it does is damage children’s education.’

Everything ? All ?

Clearly trying to couch mysticism as “science” is mad, bad and dangerous, and it’s another symptom of scientism, that even non-scientific things somehow need to be made scientific (or branded scientific) to have value knowledge-wise. Conversely the scientistic zealots believing science is the one true knowledge, not only rightly dismiss pseudoscience, but wrongly dismiss any knowledge that is not scientific, full stop.

Education is not a science. Education is not all about science. Some education benefits from wise pedagogy. It is not possible to learn scientifically (empirically) in one lifetime all that is useful that humans have come to know – that’s a reductionist fallacy and a waste of valuable learning time. And yes, discouraging reading (computer aided or otherwise) is equally mad, bad and dangerous, but stating the obvious misses the real point, that quantity of unqualified input is no substitute for quality – there is such a thing as too much information communication – quality control has its value.

What is important is balance – a balance between trust and authority on the one side and empirical discovery on the other. The balance may be difficult and problematic, but either extreme is lunacy.

The problem with the BHA is that we know what it’s against, but not what it’s for. If scientism is all they believe humanism is then they’re a waste of time. Was Philip Pullman just an anomaly?

All science and no mysticism makes Jack a dull boy.

The Pope’s Banker

Talking of Godfather III, as we were.

Desired Outcome ?

So how convoluted is this game. #Breivik, as tweeted by @TrygveSorvaag

#Breivik sent a very clear message directly to judges.
Saying he will not appeal if he is declared ‘of sound mind’.

Personally as you know, I believe for future good of rationality, he should be declared insane (*), even if the psychiatrists fail to identify a treatable disorder – in fact especially if that is the case. His only therapy may be to grow up and become wiser in captivity – but captivity it must be. But is he playing double-double-double-bluff in terms of his own desired outcome?

[(*) Post Note – mustn’t fall into the same “simplistication” trap as all the journo’s. When I say insane I mean to say mentally ill, suffering from a mental disorder or two. My own thrust is that his hyper-rationality, and ability to selectively suppress human empathy, suggests autism / Asperger’s, as some witnesses have also since suggested. There are of course other delusional / paranoid / narcissistic disorders. Sanity is not a single black and white issue. And just to be clear, my focus on the autistic tendency of “hyper-rationalism” is nothing to do with whether he is given / offered / accepts treatment – so long as he’s incarcerated – but with wider recognition of the wider lack of sanity.

My logic on his sentence would be this :  He has recognisable mental disorders. He shares these disorders with many of us whose behaviour does not incite or commit acts of criminal violence. He is criminally responsible for 77 murders and a lot more, justified and rationalised by him by his lack of (totally) sound mind. He is guilty and not of sound mind. Where’s the problem?]

Karakoram / Karakorum

Karakoram has been one of my must visit places since before I’d ever heard of  bucket lists. Heard Karakorum mentioned several times in today’s BBC R4 In Our Time as Marco Polo interacted with the Grand Khan of the Mongol Empire. In fact the Mongol Empire is itself a fascinating piece of history.

Political instabilities notwithstanding, I first saw Karakoram as a road trip holiday through Gilgit after visiting Baluchistan, Pakistan in the aftermath of the Russian / Afghan war and becoming fascinated with the peoples of northern Pakistan and Afghanistan. In fact if you take northern Iraq as the early cradle of human civilisation, then all points north of Karakoram into the central Asian republics – Tajik, Kyrgyz, Uzbek and Turkmen – are its crossroads.

So what does the Karakoram Highway, in Northern Pakistan, named after the Karakoram Mountains have to do with Karakorum / Qara Qorum still further north between Urumqi and Ulan Baatar in modern Mongolia ? Maybe nothing apart from a common root in naming the “black place”.