August 7 2015. The American Revolution 2. It is sorely needed. Will it ever happen?

THE STATUS QUO IN THE U.S. HAS TO CHANGE

THE PRESENT SITUATION IS DISASTROUS, WRONG, AND—AS FAR AS THE SPIRIT OF THE U.S. IS CONCERNED, UN-AMERICAN

IS ROBERT REICH RIGHT? I TRULY HOPE SO

“They don’t understand that the biggest political phenomenon in America today is a revolt against the “ruling class” of insiders that have dominated Washington for more than three decades.”

Robert Reich

For a whole host of reasons I have written about before—often many times—Americans should be seething with anger and be positively ripe for revolution. Privately, that may, indeed, be the situation. Publicly, it doesn’t seem to have reached that point yet.

I find the thought that the 2016 presidential elections will feature Hilary Clinton against Jeb Bush deeply depressing—and yet more proof that the U.S. is a plutocracy right now—and no longer a democracy.

As matters stand, I don’t see the kind of drastic change that the U.S. requires coming as soon as 2016. But it absolutely has to come.

On the other hand, change has a habit of being unpredictable—and coming with little warning. Sometimes, if enough rage and frustration has accumulated, it can be brutal and bloody.

It has long struck me that Robert Reich understands and articulates the current American tragedy better than anybody.

Robert Reich: There’s a Revolt Against the Ruling Class Brewing — Elites Don’t See It Coming

alternet.org

Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks while campaigning for US Senate Democratic candidate and Kentucky Secretary of State, Alison Lundergan Grimes (D-KY), in Louisville, Kentucky, on October 15, 2014

“He can’t possibly win the nomination,” is the phrase heard most often when Washington insiders mention either Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders.

Yet as enthusiasm for the bombastic billionaire and the socialist senior continues to build within each party, the political establishment is mystified.

They don’t understand that the biggest political phenomenon in America today is a revolt against the “ruling class” of insiders that have dominated Washington for more than three decades.

In two very different ways, Trump and Sanders are agents of this revolt. I’ll explain the two ways in a moment.

Don’t confuse this for the public’s typical attraction to candidates posing as political outsiders who’ll clean up the mess, even when they’re really insiders who contributed to the mess.

What’s new is the degree of anger now focused on those who have had power over our economic and political system since the start of the 1980s.

Included are presidents and congressional leaders from both parties, along with their retinues of policy advisors, political strategists, and spin-doctors.

Most have remained in Washington even when not in power, as lobbyists, campaign consultants, go-to lawyers, financial bundlers, and power brokers.

The other half of the ruling class comprises the corporate executives, Wall Street chiefs, and multi-millionaires who have assisted and enabled these political leaders — and for whom the politicians have provided political favors in return.

America has long had a ruling class but the public was willing to tolerate it during the three decades after World War II, when prosperity was widely shared and when the Soviet Union posed a palpable threat. Then, the ruling class seemed benevolent and wise.

Yet in the last three decades — when almost all the nation’s economic gains have gone to the top while the wages of most people have gone nowhere — the ruling class has seemed pad its own pockets at the expense of the rest of America.

We’ve witnessed self-dealing on a monumental scale — starting with the junk-bond takeovers of the 1980s, followed by the Savings and Loan crisis, the corporate scandals of the early 2000s (Enron, Adelphia, Global Crossing, Tyco, Worldcom), and culminating in the near meltdown of Wall Street in 2008 and the taxpayer-financed bailout.

Along the way, millions of Americans lost their jobs their savings, and their homes.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has opened the floodgates to big money in politics wider than ever. Taxes have been cut on top incomes, tax loopholes widened, government debt has grown, public services have been cut. And not a single Wall Street executive has gone to jail.

The game seems rigged — riddled with abuses of power, crony capitalism, and corporate welfare.

In 2001, a Gallup poll found 77 percent of Americans satisfied with opportunities to get ahead by working hard and 22 percent dissatisfied. By 2014, only 54 percent were satisfied and 45 percent dissatisfied.

The resulting fury at ruling class has taken two quite different forms.

On the right are the wreckers. The Tea Party, which emerged soon after the Wall Street bailout, has been intent on stopping government in its tracks and overthrowing a ruling class it sees as rotten to the core.

Its Republican protégés in Congress and state legislatures have attacked the Republican establishment. And they’ve wielded the wrecking balls of government shutdowns, threats to default on public debt, gerrymandering, voter suppression through strict ID laws, and outright appeals to racism.

Donald Trump is their human wrecking ball. The more outrageous his rants and putdowns of other politicians, the more popular he becomes among this segment of the public that’s thrilled by a bombastic, racist, billionaire who sticks it to the ruling class.

On the left are the rebuilders. The Occupy movement, which also emerged from the Wall Street bailout, was intent on displacing the ruling class and rebuilding our political-economic system from the ground up.

Occupy didn’t last but it put inequality on map. And the sentiments that fueled Occupy are still boiling.

Bernie Sanders personifies them. The more he advocates a fundamental retooling of our economy and democracy in favor of average working people, the more popular he becomes among those who no longer trust the ruling class to bring about necessary change.

Yet despite the growing revolt against the ruling class, it seems likely that the nominees in 2016 will be Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton. After all, the ruling class still controls America.

But the revolt against the ruling class won’t end with the 2016 election, regardless.

Which means the ruling class will have to change the way it rules America. Or it won’t rule too much longer.

Robert B. Reich has served in three national administrations, most recently as secretary of labor under President Bill Clinton. He also served on President Obama’s transition advisory board. His latest book is “Aftershock: The Next Economy and America’s Future.” His homepage is www.robertreich.org.

alternet.org

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August 6 2015. The Law of Little Brain (and Voodoo Science).

THE U.S. IS NOW PRETTY MUCH AT STATISTICAL FULL EMPLOYMENT (around 5% if you are an economist—decidedly less if you are out of a job).

PAY SHOULD  BE GOING UP—BUT, MOSTLY, IT ISN’T. COSTS ARE.—MORE THAN YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO THINK

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN ECONOMICS DOESN’T WORK THE WAY IT IS SUPPOSED TO?

Speaking of costs going up, you have got to love this absolute gem of corporate bull. Does the woman think we are idiots? She probably does. Some of us probably are.

It’s from GalleyCat.

By Dianna Dilworth on Aug. 3, 2015

Textbook prices are up 1,041 percent since January 1977, according to new numbers released by NBC News.

The media outlet looked at Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data and determined that these prices have gone up three times the rate of inflation. A spokesperson for the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, claims that students are ‘captive consumers.’ While this number sounds staggering, not everyone in the industry agrees with the math. NBC News has more:

Marisa Bluestone, spokeswoman for the the Association of American Publishers, called the BLS data “misleading” because of the “law of small numbers” where a small item that increases from $100 to $200 will appear as a 100 percent increase whereas if tuition increases from $10,000 to $11,000 it’s only a 10 percent increase.

As for as economics is concerned, the important thing to understand is that it is not a science. It’s a professional discipline, based upon a bunch of theories (frequently misunderstood and misquoted), which certainly help when it comes to understanding an economy, but which depend on so many variables that the results are very far from predictable. Indeed, economists are notoriously inaccurate forecasters. No problem. They just revise the figures.  

That said, even if economics is not a perfect compass, it is (normally) better than none. It depends a great deal on the economist—and the brand of economics he or she practices.

The best version, in my opinion, is behavioral economics which relies less on financial models—and more on studying how we humans behave.

We’re damnably odd, you know.

But, of course you do.

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August 5 2015. Shades of dirty math—and good enough. And there has also been a massacre—which continues. Blood in the newsroom.

IN SOME IMPORTANT WAYS, THE U.S. MEDIA DOES A LOUSY JOB--

BUT THERE ARE SOME GREAT JOURNALISTS OUT THERE. SO WHAT’S MISSING?

Generalizations are dangerous, but—broadly speaking—the current feeling about the media seems to be that they are fine for entertainment—but can’t be trusted, particularly when it comes to the news.

That’s a rather disturbing development because we rely heavily on the news for the information that helps make democracy work—and trust underpins the workings of any healthy society. Unfortunately, research shows a major breakdown in trust in the U.S.—virtually right across the spectrum—with only the military and law enforcement being held in generally high regard.

When the guys with guns are the only people you feel you really rely on (and a significant minority of c.30% don’t even trust them) all is not well.

Personally, because of my line of work, and particular orientation, I hold the media in high(er) regard—but am  selective in who, and what, I trust.

I don’t rate mainstream U.S. TV news highly, but am a great fan of many less mass-market publications including The Atlantic Monthly and some of the newer internet publications such as Salon, Vox, and so on.

I regard both the New York Times and the Washington Post (much improved recently) as excellent journals (within the limits of their prejudices and human nature). I checkout the Drudge Report daily just to keep some balance—and because it’s very handy to have all those links in one place. 

If you are prepared to invest the time, it will be well rewarded. They are some very talented media people out there—and I have learned to trust some as completely as you can trust any source whose work you cannot independently verify. Trust, under such circumstances, always has to be qualified.

So what is missing?

• CONTEXT. Context—though publications like vox.com are trying to remedy that. I think they should go into greater detail (perhaps I am too much of a perfectionist) but their approach is both to explain and include context—and they are gaining audience fast—so they are clearly on the right track.
• HOLISTIC CONTEXT. Holistic analysis. There is a tendency for publications to announce important details—such as the employment figures—without either qualifying the data, or explaining it holistically. In effect—particularly where economic news is concerned—we get drowned in the detail, but miss the larger picture. There is, if you will, immediate context (important in itself) and the wider variety (history, perspective, and analysis). You have also got to join the dots. Everything is connected, but not always in obvious ways. Unfortunately, thinking this way requires a developed mind and is hard work.
• INTERNATIONAL COMPARISONS. The U.S. just plain sucks in this regard—because it is naturally inwardly focused, and because so many international bureau have been closed down. To do that, at a time when the world is becoming ever more globalized, strikes me as perverse. How can we know if we are using best practice if we don’t know what others are up to? The U.S. is a global power, both militarily and commercially—but curiously insular all the same. It’s a weird and dangerous combination. 
• PERSISTENT FOCUSED QUESTIONING. The U.S. media are long on sensationalism, but the media are downright timid—by British standards—when it comes to nailing an interviewee. What I call ‘The Art of the Second Question’ is lacking.  
• INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM. Serious investigative journalism is time-consuming, slow, demanding, risky (legally), sometimes dangerous (to both reputation and life), and expensive. Though it is very far from dead, it is becoming harder and harder to do within any reasonable time framework. The stated reason it has been cut-back so severely is cost—but I am far from sure it is the only reason. Investigations have a habit of developing their own momentum and of uncovering things that make all kinds of people in high places uncomfortable—especially those who own the media.  Since what goes around has a habit of coming around, media owners like to keep their investigative dogs well leashed—or keep fewer of them. It makes for a much more peaceful life. True, democracy may suffer, but one has to live in the real world… Rationalization is ever ingenious. But, a healthy democracy needs investigative journalism.
• LOCAL JOURNALISM. Local journalists used to keep an eye of local news—and particularly on local government. Thanks to truly massive staff cut-backs, local oversight by reporters is going the way of the dodo. This is disturbing because the local scene represents the soft underbelly of any nation. It is generally out of sight, but vulnerable.

So many journalists and other media staff have been laid off over the last decade and a half that soon the U.S. will down down to about half the original staffing levels. That’s not staff reduction. That’s a massacre! We are talking tens of thousands of highly qualified people here.

Where do they go? What do they do? A disconcerting number—of necessity—go over to the dark side and become PR people, or lobbyists. The ratio of media managers and manipulators is ever increasing as the numbers of journalists dwindle. 

Even if you factor in the internet, and the increased velocity of information, social media, and blogging, you would have to wonder whether an adequate job can still be done. A well-trained, experienced, and properly resourced investigative reporter is very hard to match.

The space in the publication can still be filled—but is oversight still as thorough?

I don’t profess to know the answer. I have my doubts—strong doubts.

But, some very fine feature journalism continues. The following article is a good example. It focuses on the admirable notion that ‘'”good enough” is often more useful than perfectionism. My stepfather called the mathematical version “dirty math,’” and memorably taught me how to do rough and ready calculations which were good enough.

It was, and remains, an invaluable skill.

Good Enough

Why rules of thumb beat precision.

Morgan Housel – The Motley Fool

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2015/07/20/good-enough.aspx

NASA's New Horizons spacecraft passed by Pluto last week, which is amazing. It was a three-billion mile trip that took nine and half years.

But here's what blows my mind. According to NASA, the trip "took about one minute less than predicted when the craft was launched in January 2006."

That is astounding. In an untested, decade-long journey, NASA's travel forecast was 99.99998% accurate. It's the equivalent of forecasting a trip from New York to Boston and being accurate to within four millionths of a second. (Your move, Google Maps.)

This is a great reminder that some fields work with amazing precision. They are governed by pure math and physics, and aren't burdened by the whims of human emotion.

It's also a great reminder that investing is not one of these fields.

Investing is often taught as if it's something like aeronautical engineering. It's filled with precise equations that give exact answers in the way you would calculate, say, how long it takes to fly to Pluto. Seriously, look at this stuff.

Traders calculate moving averages and support bands. Economists create forecasting models to tell us how much GDP will grow this year. Chief market strategists model what the S&P 500 will do in the next year. The bulk of academic finance is based on the idea that if we try hard enough and crunch enough numbers, we can grab capitalism by its horns and forecast what will happen next. And I shake my head at that idea.

Sometimes I say, "Well Morgan, maybe you just don't understand this stuff." Which is true! But the evidence is overwhelming that those who wield complicated investing math don't understand it, either. A novice would never think stocks falling is a once-in-a-billion-year event. You need a Goldman Sachs forecasting model to think that. A normal person would have a hard time losing everything during the booming late 1990s. You need a team ofNobel Prize winners to do that. Find me one person who has gotten rich investing with his mathematical chops and I will show you nine who blew themselves up, plus 20 bumpkins who became rich using simple rules of thumb.

There are two types of stupidity. One is simple ignorance. The other -- far more dangerous -- is brilliance so deep that you assume it applies to unrelated fields. At the center of every financial catastrophe is the latter; a genius whose forecast was mathematically unassailable right up to the moment of bankruptcy. It wasn't that their math was wrong. It was that their clean math didn't apply to the hormonal jungle of finance.

One of biggest investing lessons I've learned is that the more precise you try to calculate, the further from reality you're likely to end up. Precise calculations creates a spell of overconfidence, which makes you double down on whatever you want to believe no matter how wrong it is. Some examples are staggering: Wall Street's top market strategists predict each January how much the S&P 500 will go up over the following year. Their collective track records are worse than if you just assumed stocks go up by their long-term history average every year.

In a messy world of emotions and misinformation, broad rules of thumb can be an excellent strategy.

Rules of thumb aren't perfect, of course. But that's their advantage. By starting with a strategy you know isn't perfect, you naturally leave yourself room for error, and are more flexible in accepting the market's whims.

So I don't use fancy valuation models to calculate how much stocks should return over the next 10 years. I assume 6% a year after inflation over the long haul. I figure that's good enough.

I don't forecast what the market will do this year. I assume the market will go down half of all days, a third of all years, and a fifth of all decades. That's probably good enough.

I don't predict what the economy will do this year. I assume we'll have a recession every five to seven years. Good enough.

Don't bother me with calculators that show me how much money I'll have in 30 years. I don't know what my bills will be next month. I save as much money as I reasonably can while living a lifestyle that I'm content with. I figure that's good enough.

Spare me with your analysis of why I should own stocks from some country because of economic trends. I'm diversified, and accept part of my portfolio will always be doing worse than others. I figure that's good enough.

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August 4 2015. Are facts persuasive? Are facts evidence? What do you do with the damn things anyway? What’s wrong with gut instinct? It has served us well since the beginning of mankind. Or has it?

GIVEN THE AMOUNT OF DATA THAT IS AVAILABLE THESE DAYS—MUCH OF IT CLEARCUT

BASED UPON THE EVIDENCE, WE SHOULD BE AGREEING ON MUCH MORE THAN WE DO

ENTER THE AGE OF WILFUL IGNORANCE

I like to think that there is such a thing as ‘the logic of the argument,’ and to try and reach conclusions based upon the best evidence available. That doesn’t mean to say that I don’t have opinions and prejudices, but I make a conscious effort to be aware of them and put facts ahead of prejudice.

Do I always succeed? Probably not—but I try. I also change my mind if fresh information, that undermines my original position, becomes available.

Thanks to the internet, and technology in general, much more data is now both available and accessible—so you would think that we would be reaching more evidence- based, rational conclusions—and minimizing the impact of our prejudices. Yet, if anything, the opposite seems to be happening. Perhaps, too much evidence is becoming available to the point where evaluating it is too much like hard work. Perhaps thinking rationally is more of a learned skill that we—who pride ourselves on our instincts—like to admit. Perhaps many of us don’t know how to think in a logical fashion. 

I tend towards the latter view.

The following piece tackles this important topic head on. Check out http://chronicle.com/article/The-Attack-on-Truth/230631/

I run across willful ignorance most often when researching the economic sector as part of my quest to find what works best—where the economic wellbeing of the population as a whole is concerned.

The quest for what works!

The extreme right likes to argue that government is the problem, less government is the solution, and that anything and everything is best done by the private sector. The extreme left holds to the view that capitalism needs to be abolished—but is less than clear when articulating alternative systems. Its general thrust is that government is the answer.

The evidence shows that a dynamic mixed economy, linked to an activist government works best—and that what matters most is the effectiveness of the institution at any given time, not whether it is publicly owned or not. As a practical matter, government owned institutions have achieved significant results in nation after nation, but I tend towards the view that most business activities are probably best performed by the private sector (assuming the private sector is structured competitively and hasn’t become monopolistic (as is the case in much of the U.S.). I doubt I’d be happy to see supermarkets run by the state.

But, I have an open mind on the subject, and believe there is a strong argument in favor of public banks. Similarly, I don’t think the private sector has covered itself with glory when it comes to U.S. healthcare. It’s a disgrace.

The principle cause of such willful ignorance is ideology which seems capable of denying any and all evidence without effort, remorse, or any kind of consideration.

I find it a truly frightening mindset.

The best statement in this article is as follows:

Good reasoning is a skill that can be learned.

Clearly, not enough of us are learning it as matters stand. It is a major problem where the U.S. educational system is concerned.

There is an excess of argument by assertion—and a decided shortfall of evidence-based debate. Indeed science, itself, is under attack—and much that purports to be scientific—like medicine—is, in many cases (far from all), nothing of the sort.

Yet, the evidence is out there. It is certainly not the complete answer—there is a great deal to be said for the WAG (wild-assed guess) and trial and error—but it strikes me that evidence deserves a great deal more consideration than it gets.

 

June 8, 2015

The Attack on Truth

We have entered an age of willful ignorance

Brian Taylor for The Chronicle Review

By Lee McIntyre

To see how we treat the concept of truth these days, one might think we just don’t care anymore. Politicians pronounce that global warming is a hoax. An alarming number of middle-class parents have stopped giving their children routine vaccinations, on the basis of discredited research. Meanwhile many commentators in the media — and even some in our universities — have all but abandoned their responsibility to set the record straight. (It doesn’t help when scientists occasionally have to retract their own work.)

Humans have always held some wrongheaded beliefs that were later subject to correction by reason and evidence. But we have reached a watershed moment, when the enterprise of basing our beliefs on fact rather than intuition is truly in peril.

It’s not just garden-variety ignorance that periodically appears in public-opinion polls that makes us cringe or laugh. A 2009 survey by the California Academy of Sciences found that only 53 percent of American adults knew how long it takes for Earth to revolve around the sun. Only 59 percent knew that the earliest humans did not live at the same time as the dinosaurs.

As egregious as that sort of thing is, it is not the kind of ignorance that should most concern us. There is simple ignorance and there is willful ignorance, which is simple ignorance coupled with the decision to remain ignorant. Normally that occurs when someone has a firm commitment to an ideology that proclaims it has all the answers — even if it counters empirical matters that have been well covered by scientific investigation. More than mere scientific illiteracy, this sort of obstinacy reflects a dangerous contempt for the methods that customarily lead to recognition of the truth. And once we are on that road, it is a short hop to disrespecting truth.

It is sad that the modern attack on truth started in the academy — in the humanities, where the stakes may have initially seemed low in holding that there are multiple ways to read a text or that one cannot understand a book without taking account of the political beliefs of its author.

That disrespect, however, has metastasized into outrageous claims about the natural sciences.

The strategy is to say, "I refuse to believe this," and then filibuster in the court of public opinion.

Anyone who has been paying attention to the fault lines of academic debate for the past 20 years already knows that the "science wars" were fought by natural scientists (and their defenders in the philosophy of science) on the one side and literary critics and cultural-studies folks on the other. The latter argued that even in the natural realm, truth is relative, and there is no such thing as objectivity. The skirmishes blew up in the well-known "Sokal affair" in 1996, in which a prominent physicist created a scientifically absurd postmodernist paper and was able to get it published in a leading cultural-studies journal. The ridicule that followed may have seemed to settle the matter once and for all.

But then a funny thing happened: While many natural scientists declared the battle won and headed back to their labs, some left-wing postmodernist criticisms of truth began to be picked up by right-wing ideologues who were looking for respectable cover for their denial of climate change, evolution, and other scientifically accepted conclusions. Alan Sokal said he had hoped to shake up academic progressives, but suddenly one found hard-right conservatives sounding like Continental intellectuals. And that caused discombobulation on the left.

"Was I wrong to participate in the invention of this field known as science studies?," Bruno Latour, one of the founders of the field that contextualizes science, famously asked. "Is it enough to say that we did not really mean what we said? Why does it burn my tongue to say that global warming is a fact whether you like it or not? Why can’t I simply say that the argument is closed for good?"

"But now the climate-change deniers and the young-Earth creationists are coming after the natural scientists," the literary critic Michael Bérubénoted, "… and they’re using some of the very arguments developed by an academic left that thought it was speaking only to people of like mind."

That is the price one pays for playing with ideas as if doing so has no consequences, imagining that they will be used only for the political purposes one intended. Instead, the entire edifice of science is now under attack. And it’s the poor and disenfranchised, to whom the left pays homage, who will probably bear the brunt of disbelief in climate change.

Of course, some folks were hard at work trying to dispute inconvenient scientific facts long before conservatives began to borrow postmodernist rhetoric. In Merchants of Doubt (Bloomsbury Press, 2010), two historians, Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, have shown how the strategy of denying climate change and evolution can be traced all the way back to big tobacco companies, who recognized early on that even the most well-documented scientific claims (for instance, that smoking causes cancer) could be eroded by skillful government lobbying, bullying the news media, and pursuing a public-relations campaign. Sadly, that strategy has largely worked, and we today find it employed by the Discovery Institute, the Seattle organization advocating that "intelligent-design theory" be taught in the public schools as balance for the "holes" in evolutionary theory, and the Heartland Institute, which bills itself as "the world’s most prominent think tank promoting skepticism about man-made climate change."

What do such academically suspect centers have to offer by way of peer-reviewed, scientifically reputable evidence? Almost nothing. But that is not the point. The strategy of willful ignorance is not to fight theory with theory and statistic with statistic. It is instead to say, "I refuse to believe this," and then filibuster in the court of public opinion. It is not crackpot theories that are doing us in. It is the spread of the tactics of those who disrespect truth.

Remember the great dialogue Euthyphro, in which Socrates, soon facing trial for impiety and corrupting youth, admonishes a callow young fellow for professing to know what "righteousness" is? Socrates demonstrates again and again that Euthyphro has no idea what he is talking about when he argues that it would be righteous for him to prosecute his own father for murder on the basis of some pretty shoddy evidence — and shows that Euthyphro cannot even define the meaning of the word. Socrates is adept at questioning and at verbal humiliation — his standard method throughout the dialogues — but not because he knows the answers. When challenged, Socrates always demurs. He has no wisdom, he says, but is only a kind of "midwife" who can help others to seek it. Even though the goal of philosophy is to find the truth, Socrates customarily professes ignorance.

Plato here teaches a central lesson about the philosopher’s search for knowledge, which has ramifications for any quest for true belief. The real enemy is not ignorance, doubt, or even disbelief. It is false knowledge. When we profess to know something even in the face of absent or contradicting evidence, that is when we stop looking for the truth. If we are ignorant, perhaps we will be motivated to learn. If we are skeptical, we can continue to search for answers. If we disbelieve, maybe others can convince us. And perhaps even if we are honestly wrong, and put forward a proposition that is open to refutation, we may learn something when our earlier belief is overthrown.

But when we choose to insulate ourselves from new ideas or evidence because we think that we already know what is true, that is when we are most likely to believe a falsehood. It is not mere disbelief that explains why truth is so often disrespected. It is one’s attitude.

In a recent paper, "Why Do Humans Reason?," Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber, both of them philosophers and cognitive scientists, argue that the point of human reason is not and never has been to lead to truth, but is rather to win arguments. If that is correct, the discovery of truth is only a byproduct.

The fact that humans do reason poorly is beyond dispute. The psychological literature is replete with examples of mistakes like "confirmation bias" (seeking out only information that confirms our preconceptions) and "hindsight bias" (relying on current knowledge to assume that something was predictable all along). The work goes back to the 1970s and ’80s, with Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky’s groundbreaking research on irrationality in how people weigh risks and losses, which helped establish the field of behavioral economics and undermine the reigning idea in economics of rational choice. Kahneman, a psychologist who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science, updated his work in Thinking, Fast and Slow (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011).

The fundamental question that motivates Mercier and Sperber’s analysis is this: Why would being a persuasive speaker be valuable to humans as they evolved? Here the authors tell a story about the importance of argumentation to the evolution of communication. In a group setting, where people were not already inclined to trust one another, they would need some way of evaluating claims. That’s where arguments come in. Just to make an assertion does not rise to the level of overcoming what Mercier and Sperber and colleagues have called the "epistemic vigilance" against being deceived or manipulated. If you present other people with the reasons for your belief, however, you have now given them the means to evaluate the truth of your claim and also, if you are right, presumably extend more trust to you in the future. Thus, according to Mercier and Sperber, providing arguments for our beliefs improves the quality and reliability of information that is shared in human communication.

The philosopher Andy Norman and others have criticized this theory by pointing out that it relies far too heavily on the idea that rhetorical skills are valuable within an evolutionary context, irrespective of the truth of the beliefs being advocated. What if the reasons for your beliefs are not true? In a response to Mercier and Sperber, the psychologist Robert J. Sternbergpointed out that while reason and argument are closely related, "persuasive reasoning that is not veridical can be fatal to the individual and to the propagation of his or her genes, as well as to the human species as a whole."

We are faced with the prospect of a significant change in the temperature of our planet if we continue to harvest and use all of the fossil fuels at our disposal. Suddenly the stakes for a longtime problem of human irrationality seem enormous. But if the seeds of disrespecting truth were planted so long ago, why are they now growing with such force?

One likely candidate is the Internet. It facilitates not only the spread of truth but also the proliferation of crackpots, ideologues, and those with an ax to grind. With the removal of editorial gatekeepers who can vet information, outright lies can survive on the Internet. Worse, those who embrace willful ignorance are now much more likely to find an electronic home where their marginal views are embraced.

An obvious solution might be to turn to journalists, who are supposed to embrace a standard of objectivity and source-checking that would be more likely to support true beliefs. Yet, at least in part as a result of the competition that has been enabled by the Internet, we now find that even some mainstream journalists and news media are dangerously complicit in the follies of those who seek to disrespect truth. There have always been accusations of bias in the media, but today we have Fox News on the right and MSNBC on the left (along with a smattering of partisan radio talk-show hosts like Rush Limbaugh), who engage in overt advocacy for their ideological views.

Yet those are not the kinds of journalists we should be so worried about, for they are known to be biased. Another tendency is perhaps even more damaging to the idea that journalism is meant to safeguard truth. Call it "objectivity bias." Sensitive to criticism that they, too, are partisan, many news sites try to demonstrate that they are fair and balanced by presenting "both" sides of any issue deemed "controversial" — even when there really aren’t two credible sides. That isn’t objectivity. And the consequence is public confusion over whether an issue — in the case of climate change or childhood vaccination, a scientific issue — has actually been settled.

To fight back, we should remember the basic principles of evidence-based belief and true skepticism that got us out of the Dark Ages. Although behavioral economists, among other scholars, have amply shown that human reason is not perfect, that is no excuse for lazy thinking. Even if our brains are not wired to search for truth, we can still pursue a path that might lead to better answers than those supplied by Kahneman’s "fast" part of our brain. Truth may not be automatic, but it is still an option. Socrates taught us as much long before we knew anything about cognitive science: Good reasoning is a skill that can be learned.

We are no more a slave to nature in reasoning than we are in morality. Few people would argue that we are genetically programmed to be moral. We may be hard-wired to do things that increase the survival value of our genes, like killing our rivals when no one is looking, but we do not do them, because they are unethical. If we can make such a choice in morals, why not also with reason?

The choosing is what makes us human. It’s not our imperfect brains, but the power to decide for ourselves how we will live our lives, that should give us hope. Respecting truth is a choice.

Lee McIntyre is a research fellow at the Center for Philosophy and History of Science at Boston University. His book Respecting Truth: Willful Ignorance in the Internet Age will be published this month by Routledge.

August 3 2015. What looks like growth often isn’t.

MODEST GROWTH SUPPOSEDLY—BUT FROM WHAT?

IS GROWTH BASED ALMOST ENTIRELY ON CONSUMER DEBT A GOOD THING?

I have written many times about the inadequacies of GDP (Gross Domestic Product) as a way of assessing economic performance. It isn’t a bad statistic in itself, but it is a limited one, and fails to factor in the nuances which make all the difference in terms of the quality of our lives.

For instance, it makes no distinction between good economic activity—like exporting more goods and services—and bad—like war. It also can be misleading if inflation is not factored in—which it normally isn't when initially announced. So the U.S. second quarter’s growth of 2.3%—when inflation is roughly at that level—isn’t growth at all. It sounds like growth, but the nation is really standing still—or worse. GDP figures are often revised over time, as more data becomes available—down more often than not.

The media should explain such details (and we should adopt a different standard of measurement of economic progress), but mostly they do not. Why not? I suspect a mix of the following. They are too lazy, don’t understand themselves, seem to think the American public is too dumb to understand—and/or the owners of the media don’t want to rock the boat.

GDP also doesn’t communicate the causes of growth (assuming there is some). If apparent growth is based upon debt, that is rarely a good thing—except for the money lenders.

This is all explained rather well by that useful site http://www.mybudget360.com/credit-card-debt-economy-equifax-credit-card-debt-us-cities/

The bottom line is that while the media are crowing that the U.S. is doing better than most other economies in the world, it really isn’t. Meanwhile, key costs like healthcare, housing rental, third-level education, and car purchase costs are rising faster than inflation—dramatically so in some cases.

Some geographic areas in the U.S. are thriving—but the economy, as a whole is not.

Meanwhile, there are serious problems with investment, productivity, exports, and infrastructure—not to mention labor relations in general.

All of these problems are solvable—but not without changing the ABM (American Business Model) significantly.

Are there any signs of that? Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren apart, not really.

Is another recession a possibility? No. It’s a certainty.

Don’t be fooled! Factor in inflation and household income has changed little in 30 years—an indictment of the ABM (American Business Model). Many key costs, of course, have gone up. Most Americans are actually less well off today. This is an economy in (largely unnecessary) decline. The issues are structural.

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August 2 2015. In the face of the facts, some sobering reflections on guns.

GUNS ARE FASCINATING TO MANY, GENERALLY WELL MADE, AND FUN TO SHOOT

YET THE EVIDENCE IN FAVOR OF GUN CONTROL IS OVERWHELMING.

GUNS ARE JUST ONE MANIFESTATION OF A DEEPER CULTURAL PROBLEM IN THE U.S.

I dislike writing about gun control because not only do I like guns myself, but I feature both them and their use in my thrillers. When I say I write ‘researched action thrillers,’ I mean exactly that—and all my thrillers are about as action-packed as such a book can be. Where action is featured in my books, guns are rarely absent.

Nonetheless—though I am not entirely easy (not that I am going to stop) about writing about violence and guns for entertainment—there is a profound difference between featuring guns in fiction and the reality of having guns readily available throughout society.

The track record, if people have easy access to guns, is death and injury on a scale comparable to a war—each and every year. True, that doesn’t happen in every country—Switzerland is a notable exception—but it certainly happens in America.

Why is the situation so bad in the U.S.? Is it just easy access—or are their other factors at work?

It is my belief that easy access is the primary cause, and also ignorance and carelessness make a significant contribution, but other factors would seem to be.

• A DEEPLY TROUBLED SOCIETY. That the U.S. is a deeply troubled society at present—where the American Way of Life is proving to be more myth than substance, as far as many Americans are concerned, and increasingly unattainable because the American Business Model is rigged and deeply flawed. As a consequence, many Americans are insecure, stressed, and frightened (even if not overtly). Such social unease, linked with soaring inequality, has consequences—which are likely to be even more severe in the future.
• A CULTURAL TOLERANCE OF VIOLENCE. Because the American attitude towards violence generally is just plain wrong. There is a tolerance of it, which manifests itself in all kinds of ways (whether it be in policing, war, the prison system, or in entertainment). This cultural defect is both incredibly serious—and pervasive—especially when linked with a deeply corrupt MICC (Military Industrial Congressional Complex). The argument that the U.S. is, in itself, the greatest threat to world peace that currently exists is not to be dismissed. The U.S. is not only the most powerful nation militarily in the world, but the greatest seller of weapons to other nations. As is demonstrated daily, it is also militarily aggressive.  
• HEALTHCARE COSTS CAN LEAD TO SUICIDE. Where suicide is concerned, because the healthcare system is so expensive and inadequate, that shooting yourself becomes an appealing option. Health problems are a major reason for suicide just by themselves. Guns make it easy. Bankrupting yourself and your family is something many would prefer to avoid. The figures speak for themselves. It’s a sad business.

The following story is from the Washington Post’s Wonkblog. It covers only one facet of the gun problem—but it is troubling.

The U.S. has experienced, on average, one mass shooting per day this year

Some people maintain that the proper time to discuss gun control is not right after a shooting. That may be with good reason — perhaps lawmakers would draft bad legislation in a panic to respond.

But as Wonkblog’s Chris Ingraham points out, if that is the case, we would sadly never be able to discuss gun control in America. We haven’t gone more than eight days this year without a mass shooting.

In fact, we’ve averaged at least one mass shooting per day since the beginning of the year. That’s because, on many days, there are multiple mass shootings happening in America.

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August 1 2015. I don’t remember my mother with much affection—for very good reasons—but she was a remarkable woman in many ways—and charismatic to the point of being dangerous. In truth, she was dangerous. She had 12 children (5 fathers were involved) and outlived 3 husbands.

I HAVE REMARKABLY FEW PHOTOS OF MY MOTHER—BUT NOW AND THEN ONE APPEARS THAT I HAD FORGOTTEN ALL ABOUT

MOTHER WAS A MAN-KILLER—AND IN THIS PHOTO YOU CAN SEE WHY. SHE WOULD HAVE BEEN IN HER MID TWENTIES THEN

ME (VICTOR), MY MOTHER JOJO, AND MY SISTER, MAXINE

Sadly, neither my mother nor stepfather were much interested in photography—and my much loved grandmother, who had all the right intentions, may have been one of the worst photographers on record. She had a Box Brownie, and took quite a few, but then they seemed to vanish into Sturm Und Drang

Speaking of which:

Origin of the term[edit]

The theatre director Abel Seyler

The term Sturm und Drang first appeared as the title of a play by Friedrich Maximilian Klinger, written for Abel Seyler's Seylersche Schauspiel-Gesellschaft and published in 1776. The theme of the play is the unfolding American Revolution, in which the author gives violent expression to difficult emotions and extols individuality and subjectivity over the prevailing order of rationalism. Though it is argued that literature and music associated with Sturm und Drang predate this seminal work, it was from this point that German artists became distinctly self-conscious of a new aesthetic. This seemingly spontaneous movement became associated with a wide array of German authors and composers of the mid-to-late Classical period.^[2]

Sturm und Drang came to be associated with literature or music aimed at shocking the audience or imbuing them with extremes of emotion. The movement soon gave way toWeimar Classicism and early Romanticism, whereupon a socio-political concern for greater human freedom from despotism was incorporated along with a religious treatment of all things natural.^[3] There is much debate regarding whose work should or should not be included in the canon of Sturm und Drang. One point of view would limit the movement toGoethe, Johann Gottfried Herder, Jakob Michael Reinhold Lenz, and their direct German associates writing works of fiction and/or philosophy between 1770 and the early 1780s.^[4]The alternative perspective is that of a literary movement inextricably linked to simultaneous developments in prose, poetry, and drama, extending its direct influence throughout the German-speaking lands until the end of the 18th century. Nevertheless, it should be noted that the originators of the movement came to view it as a time of premature exuberance that was then abandoned in favor of often conflicting artistic pursuits.^[5]

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