Wednesday, December 29, 2004
Welcome to "liberal Iraqi"
I wish you freedom, strength, happiness, and the hope of peace...in that order. Other arrangements don't seem to last very well.
Monday, December 27, 2004
Personality Tests and Their Fascinating Lies
I am not at all fond of the arrogance of the psychological experts who put together personality tests. Michael Totten is claiming that his recent test, affirming what an amazingly wonderful person he is, was a remarkably accurate assessment of his overall character. Michael is a spiffy fellow, but the test has no way of telling if he is actually despicable. As I see it any such test has three central problems; it is a static description of a chaotic condition, important questions regarding character cannot be asked, and the test wants to be taken.
Humans exist in a chaotic changing world with a functionally infinite number of variables. Arguably the central reasoning behind fascism is that the variability of human experience must be focused and redirected to serve the strength of the state. Of course this test is not the central element of a fascist takeover of the free world, but it must be remembered that it exists as a tool to simplify comprehension of humans. This is inherently dangerous in both its limitations and the limiting effect it has. In addition to the behavioral changes accepting the results has on the tested person, there is a more profound impact on the outlook of the behavior of those who accept the worldview presented by the test. The test must always be viewed with suspicion or it functions as a control on the people it attempts to define. Anyone who has worked extensively with advanced measurement tools takes it for granted that you routinely calibrate test equipment. I rarely see significant calibration descriptions associated with these tests; when it was compiled, what culture it was created by, what cultures it is intended for, what references it uses as a baseline, and so on. These tests attempt to define the human condition, a deliberately incomprehensible chaos.
How would Saddam Hussein do on personality tests? Do you honestly think there is a "Conniving Rat Bastard Fascist" metric? Central questions regarding decency cannot be asked, mostly because the important questions are too obvious not to skew the results. How many people would honestly answer how often they pulled the wings off of flies, when they did it every day one summer as a child? On any test where the results are out of their control, how often will intelligent evil people answer in ways that will affect them adversely? How often will any person answer harmful questions honestly? To make things worse, the more intelligent a person is, the less functional these tests become. Smarter people are better at rationalizing and the extremes of the human condition are inherently difficult to describe because there is so little normative data. For instance, Michael is pretty darn smart and recently told me he can talk himself into almost anything…goodbye accurate data!
Another problem of personality tests is that they are created to be passed. There is no way to fail in such test, which is a dramatic departure from real descriptions of the human condition. Humans fail, and how they recover from failure is itself a central aspect of the human condition. Instead of telling you to pull your head out of your ass, these tests quite routinely try to pipe sunshine to your eyes and make things out to be shiny and good. Part of this is that the creators of the test are interested in having their views accepted. Ambitious people make these tests because unconcerned slackers don't do anything. The problem is that there is only so much filtering that can be done to keep the preconceptions of the test creators out. If the test creators did not believe in their views, they wouldn't have made the test. Additionally, the test creators probably have a clear understanding that the test will eventually be taken by suicidal persons, so these tests aren't going to tell folks to end it all. Finally, the test has to pass peer review, so there is going to be an inherent bias towards making psychology experts feel like gods.
I am glad that Michael feels good about himself, and I do not want to take that away from him, but these tests should not be taken too seriously. The tests that count are not standardized and the very best ones are those that require you to define yourself. Michael understands this; otherwise he would be less proud of choosing his own political identity. It must be very difficult to resist the siren call of classification, but it really is the duty of free people to do so. Our capacity to create new definitions requires us to resist the conclusions of these tests.
Tuesday, December 21, 2004
An Open Appreciation of Steven Den Beste
Steven,
Thank you very much for your writing. Your examination of obscure energy sources is an outstanding resource that I use again and again. I am deeply sorry that the bastards ground you down, but I understand the phenomenon. As a science fiction fan, I have been purged on more than one occasion by just such individuals.
Like any addict I hope for more from you, but as an adult, I can accept that some things just won't come again.
If you had not spoken such truths, you would not have caused so many liars to attack you. Thank you for the courage you have shown.
Patrick S Lasswell
Sunday, December 12, 2004
Thanatos and All That Stuff
My nephew Thomas (who has become confused about spelling his name for reasons I'll get into later) took a hit Friday. One of his close friends took a gun to school and killed himself. Like a lot of friends and families, my job is to help clean up the wreckage that decision created. While I don't normally bother my nephew, this time he asked for my help and wanted my words on the subject. Just to establish the ground rules; I won't be making out of date pop-culture references, making bombastic excretory statements, or demeaning the dead.
Out of Date Pop-culture Reference
You know that car in Ferris Beuller's Day Off, the really cool Ferrari? Up until a couple of weeks ago, I thought that they trashed a priceless auto in the scene where Cameron kicks it off the jack. The acting and the direction is so good that you really feel that this thing of great value, that provided such great joy, is lost. Matthew Broderick was on Letterman the other night and let the cat out of the bag. It turns out that the real Ferrari was only in some of the "beauty passes", shots where they established how perfect the car was in the audience's mind. It is one of the great moments in film and it works because almost twenty years later I was genuinely surprised to discover that the car seen in most of the movie was a fiberglass replica built on a Ford frame. The thing is that you really don’t know how valuable something is until it is gone, and a lot of the time you are fooled, even then.
The thing about folks is that most of us are actually performance internals with a fairly crappy shell that we interact with the world covering our actions. I have been some places and done some thing where I had the chance to figure this out. Time without number, I've watched directionless losers step up to the plate and do the real jobs better than the motivated winners. In desperate situations, or even just really hard ones, the people who don’t seem to have a singular direction often are the ones to grab the bull by the horns and do what needs to be done. I think this is probably because people with a massive agenda on their backs aren't quick at changing priorities to deal with new things that are important. With the weight of all those expectations, their window of importance gets crushed, and they lose sight of opportunities, significant changes, the future, and what is actually important. I guess character is what helps you keep the window propped open.
Uncle Patrick Wearing Wildly Unauthorized Headgear While Manning a Heavy Machinegun (Forget about not having a machinegun, you don't even have an unauthorized hat!)
Bombastic Excretory Statements
Kid, you haven't done shit yet. I've spent more time picking my nose while doing something critical than you've spent doing anything critical. I've cleaned more earwax out on deployment than you weigh. I've sweated enough in pressurized chambers performing high risk work for you to swim in. I've puked enough while accomplishing…ok, you probably get the point. The worst thing about all that is not the disgust, but the essential truth. The worst thing about being young is being unproven. Nobody trusts you because you have not shown you are dependable. Of course now we protect children so heavily that they never really get a sniff of dangerous important work. When I was eleven, I spent the summer commercial fishing with my dad. When he was fourteen, he ran away and joined the Marines to catch the last remnants of WWII. He got to go to TJ and help a mission there…but let's be honest, the risk of drowning or getting shot were pretty slim. I'm not saying that you didn't want to do anything significant, I'm just saying what we both know; people treat you like a kid regardless of how you spell your name, and that's crap.
This is one of the main reasons I joined the Navy, to accomplish something significant. I joined during the Regan late Cold War buildup and re-enlisted shortly after the Gulf War; both times when it seemed that I could contribute to something significant. One of the key reasons I dropped Aviation Officers Candidate School is because it became apparent to me that the Naval Aviation community was self-obsessed and not interested in accomplishing anything. One of the key reasons I left the Navy in 1995 was that the civilian political leadership showed pretty clearly that they were not interested in committing to accomplishing anything meaningful with military force. Funny thing, until I wrote that just now, the suicide of the US Navy's top officer when I left didn't make any sense to me. In case you are wondering, the military LOVES George W. Bush. Although he works them harder than anyone since WWII, W lets today's military accomplish more than any President has since WWII.
The most important thing I was able to accomplish in the military was to improve the lives of some of the people around me. I didn’t get to sink any submarines, I didn't win any medals for personal accomplishment, and I didn't gain much rank. Most of that was due to circumstances more than anything else. I still get people I worked with looking me up and thanking me for my time with them. One guy did attempt suicide while he was working with me, though. I didn't catch it for a lot of reasons; the most important was that he didn't talk to me when he made his decision.
Demeaning the Dead
Here's the thing: suicide is the most fundamentally selfish thing you can do. They have suicide hotlines precisely because talking to somebody else does a lot to un-ass the heads of a lot of people who are focused on their own problems. I don't know what my nephew's friend had going on in his mind, but I bet he wasn't letting a lot of other folks in on his problems, either. I could be well and truly full of crap on this, but I bet I'm not. I bet that my nephew Thomas would have done the right thing and stopped his friend however he had to. If that meant beating his friend up, a remarkably effective method of redirecting anger that is rarely given the consideration it deserves, he would have kicked his ass. Thomas, however he chooses to mangle his name's spelling, is a good kid, and sometimes that means throwing a punch in the right direction for the right reasons.
Everybody gets confused, angry, stupid, and screwed up enough to think seriously about ending it. My nephew was brave enough to ask me to talk him out of it, so here I am blathering on. I was in was in my late thirties before I un-assed my head and unscrewed my life enough to make a serious commitment to another person, so don't tell me I don't know about selfish. I made some sincere compromises in my life to be able to relate honestly and civilly with my lady. We make a very good life for each other. It didn't come easy and it took a lot of time. One of the ways we commit to each other and go on is to diminish those who give up. My nephew's friend is nothing to me but a traumatic event that occurred to my family.
What about Those Ground Rules?
What matters at the end of the day is that you lived your life with some kind of integrity, and suicides define abandonment of integrity. The assholes blowing themselves up in the Middle East are chickenshit sons of bitches that don't have the guts to make the world work. They accomplish nothing but pain. Real men heal. Real men build. Real men make things work. Real men make things safe for others. Real men break the rules if that means saving lives. Real men keep their windows of importance open and look around for different solutions. Real men ask for help.
Thursday, December 09, 2004
Righteous Fury
Jason Van Steenwyk has one of my favorite blogs, and today he reminded me again exactly why.
...So my mom called me last night. She told me a friend of hers is a lawyer who's son was in Iraq with the Army, and he's taken an interest in a recent class action lawsuit by soldiers protesting the stop-loss policy.
Anyway, this lawyer told my mom that I can get out of another overseas tour by resigning my commission.
I told my mom to quote me verbatim: tell this lawyer he can kiss my ass.
[...]
I'm all for an honest critique. But why is this idiot trying to sabatoge the army by undermining its officer corps?
My mom said me going back to Iraq is unthinkable to her.
I told her what was even more unthinkable to me is losing.
I've adjusted myself to the notion that civilians have the option of being selfish with how they serve in their own lives, but I hope I never adjust to the idea that strangers get to be selfish about how I choose to serve in my life. Luckily, my wife accepts that I want to serve. She isn't wild about my doing a tour in Iraq, but she understands that I have a calling to serve. The rest of my family...let's just say that I know exactly where Jason is coming from...
Newly Released Enron Documents Hint at Oil for Food Complicity
An investigator looking at Enron's energy trading fraud has put in my hands a very disturbing find from the avalanche of data dumped into the public record. Documents recently released by Enron for one of their Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) trials reveal that at least one in-house corporate spy had an extremely good track record at predicting changes affecting UN sanctions on Iraq. The Enron legal team methodology is to release bulk drops of documents at the last moment they can avoid contempt of court charges. For instance, two hundred full storage boxes released with two weeks to review them.
The documents, Enron Specialist G. Britt Whitman's record of his predictions for the year 2001, show that on four separate occasions he was able to cue Enron's Crude/Products Trading unit about events that would affect Iraq's sanctions. While it would normally be within the scope of the analyst's job to alert the trading unit of events that would change the price of crude oil, the amounts of oil sold through subversion of Oil for Food were not enough to affect the general market price. The most logical reason to cue the trading unit, and reminding them of doing so, is if they have a direct financial stake in the effectiveness of UN sanctions on Iraq. Here are the four entries from Whitman's "Success Tracking 2001":
February 27
Group Forecast: UN will consider a new strategy to screen out small lifters of Iraqi oil.
Actual Occurrence: UN diplomats announced the plan later that day. The plan resurfaces in June during debate over "smart sanctions."
May 16
Group Forecast: British draft UN resolution to include "smart sanctions" proposals. Iraqis would resist and oil disruptions would result.
Actual Occurrence: Same day- Reuters reveals British plan. May 21- Iraq threatens to suspend exports if plan is approved.
August 6
Group Forecast: Chances of US strike on Iraq are low.
Actual Occurrence: CNN reported same the next day
September 26th
Group Forecast: Despite pressure from Pentagon hawks to target Iraq, the first wave of reprisals is likely to be limited to Afghanistan because of its clear links to bin Laden.
Actual Occurrence: First wave of attacks beginning October 7th focus on Afghanistan. October 7th edition of Newsweek reports that VP Cheney asks leading hawk Paul Wolfowitz to quiet down.
Could this just be coincidence, could it be that in late 2001 G. Britt Whitman was just trying to show off that he called some stuff that touched on the Middle East, could this just be routine? Sure. On the other hand, this is the company that shut down power to hospitals across California for energy trading scams. It is easy to believe that after they got nailed for stealing in California, where state bureaucrats made it almost impossible to get caught, they would start stealing where UN bureaucrats made it utterly impossible to get caught, Iraq.
Did Enron have a part in laundering money for Saddam Hussein and the officials on his payroll? At this point, their documents put that question in play.
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
I Feel the Need…the Need for Alternate Feed
My local radio station is using CNN as a source for audio feed for its news. That is a problem, because CNN does things like send audio bites to radio stations of the President talking to troops…and censoring the troop's response. Wildly enthusiastic troops greeting the President is not news that fits…I guess.
So the blogsphere has another challenge: make open-source, verifiable audio bites available to radio stations. I am uncertain how expensive this will be, but it seems a fairly straightforward exercise of news collection and web publishing. As a starting project I suggest we try to get a bunch of audio recordings of Bush visiting the troops this holiday season and publish them with attribution and details to allow the recordings to be verified.
If you want to help break the big media monopoly on audio feed, email me: pslblog at yahoo DOT com and tell me what you can do to help. Alternatively, you can send me a concise explanation why I am mad… mad…mad! (Like I didn't get that at the University!)
A letter to the news staff of KINK-FM 101.9 Radio.
The Sound of One Military Clapping
Yesterday on the KINK afternoon show, Sheila Hamilton played a sound bite of President Bush speaking to Marines at Camp Pendleton. I was puzzled because the normally complete news coverage on KINK missed half the story, the military's response to President Bush. Every eyewitness report I have read of servicemen meeting the President Bush in the last three years has noted the extreme affection the troops have for him, and the extreme fondness he shows for them. While this has not been covered extensively or well by most of the media, it is a phenomenon, it is verifiable, it has not been driven into the ground, and so it seems to qualify as news.
I personally do not care if you are not fond of the President. The KINK on-air staff has shown a fair willingness to at least attempt impartiality. (Comments made on November 3rd, notwithstanding.) The problem is that your demographic is the bluest part of the bluest part of the state, and they just don't understand why they lost the last election.
While I am not asking you to start channeling FOX NEWS, it is a basic public service to provide your audience with an awareness of the reality of Bush's relationship with military personnel. Although the military is not unanimously behind the President, they overwhelmingly support and approve of him. This administration gets enough things they do wrong covered; they deserve the one thing they do right to get some coverage.
Sunday, December 05, 2004
In response to this post by Jeremy Brown, I offer a humble alternative:
In Defense of Abusing Socialist Revolution
Three critical developments since the death of Marx show the utter futility of pursuing Socialist revolution in the current era; John Nash's work on cooperation in complex economies, the expansion of economic roles available to individuals in diverse economies, and the historical consequences associated with the overwhelming number of socialist revolution that have already occurred.
John Nash's work on cooperative games as models for complex economic systems destroys the requirement for revolution by showing that cooperation can be beneficial to all parties, especially the worker. Mathematical proof that choices can be made, agreed upon, and improved over time by multiple parties with disparate goals to the benefit of all is a stake through the heart of socialist revolution. You can do what is best for yourself and the group for optimal results, John Nash proved this. The Nobel winning "Nash equilibrium" means that individual choices about personal contribution to group benefit have value. This is a concept that socialist revolutionaries throw away the instant they start to seek power; I am not sure that they have to, but I am sure that they have never reached power without abandoning individual needs.
Hairdressers and massage therapists are the death of socialist revolution. The existence of these non-essential occupations are not valuable (in the sense that they are not assigned a significant value) to socialist revolutionaries. Regrettably, in large and prosperous economies, occupations like these are available as independent businesses to individuals in unplanned ways. More to the point, the millions of hairdressers, massage therapists, web page designers, and such have vital reasons to oppose socialist revolutions that would disenfranchise their independent economic activities. It is impossible to believe that socialist revolution will come from a "Supercuts"; however it is easy to believe that the revolution will die there. Hairdressers talk about winning the Lottery, not sacrificing everything for socialism. While there are not as many hairdressers as traditional laborers; diversity of economic roles means that individual economic choices blur the differences between labor and capital to the point where critical mass is unobtainable by revolutionaries.
While socialist revolutionaries have become inured to recanting the horrific results of past revolutions, their cognitive dissonance is not shared by the masses. The tens of millions of dead, the ecological disasters of global proportions, and the brutal suppression of culture happened and are known by the "proletariat". There is no explanation available to socialist revolutionaries for why this time they won't put millions more up against the wall, especially when so many of their fellows and supporters are screaming for this to happen. There is a suspicious lack of discussion about the impact draining the Aral Sea and turning it's tens of thousands of square miles of arable land into a salt desert has had on global warming, or any of the other massive ecological disasters performed by socialist revolutionaries. Probably this is because scientists can do enough math to realize that there is no point in shaking down bankrupted governments with a pronounced tendency to kill inconvenient persons. The destruction of indigenous cultures practiced by socialist revolutionaries to suppress dissent is a documented historical fact that is being played out on a smaller, so far less lethal, scale, on university campuses here in the United States. We do not have to imagine the consequences of cultural suppression; we can go to any local campus and witness it.
All of this is why socialist revolutionaries are fair game for denouncing, ridiculing, and abusing at every turn. I am not entirely convinced that efforts to date to do so have been the most effective. It should be noted that the simpler and more wildly fraudulent your claims are, the more sensational they can be. People committed to telling the truth have more restrictions on their speech than those who abandoned honesty as the price of admission. I am interested in working towards improving this situation, and so I am going to work with the local chapter of Protest Warrior towards developing responses to the endless wave of protest here in Portland. I am not interested in violently confronting the socialist revolutionaries here, because I do not respect them that much. Ridicule, however, is a tool I plan on using a lot!
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