"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate." - Noam Chomsky.

For Example: you are allowed to debate how much government we should have, and what kind of government that should be.... but the idea that no government should exist is never given any serious consideration in the mainstream.

Concrete-Bound

A realisation from Ayn Rand which has really helped me understand the psychology of others is the concept of being "concrete-bound" which took me a while to understand. When I would debate with my dad for example, he would often say things like "well there are very well researched people, as intelligent as you are, who disagree with you" - or (my favourite) "if you ask 100 people the vast majority would disagree" ; not realising these were not actually arguments - never mind valid or sound.

When I would make as obvious reductio ad absurdum like "Well if you asked 100 people if the world was flat in 1066 ..." he would say things like "I don't like your analogies..." as though my example had nothing whatsoever to do with what he said. Ayn Rand helped me realise he was "concrete-bound" he didn't know how to move from a specific example such as "if you ask 100 people they will disagree with you (on this issue)" to the underlying principle of the assertion (the truth is what the majority says it is.) Have you any experiences of interacting with the "concrete-bound" ?

I have found a method of intervening in a way that helps explain the leap but it requires a bit more patience.

You have to first make explicit the principle, "are you saying that if most people believe something then that something is true?" - Wait for them to respond. They are unlikely to say yes, if they say "no - but..." listen to what they have to say and then respond, "But you accept that just because the majority of people say something is true that doesn't mean it is true?" and proceed in the same fashion without hostility so avoid provoking defensiveness.

In other words: don't skip steps in your reasoning, and don't use hidden premises. Take people through the argument stage by stage.

Afterwards you can explain the concept of the particular logical fallacy

Why Government is Antithetical to Freedom

"When two people meet in a political discussion, regardless of the political affiliations, there are bound to be a number of issues that they agree on. For example, a socialist and a free-marketeer - despite having completely different opinions on how an economy should be run - are likely to agree on a dearth of issues including ending foreign military interventions, the war on drugs, reducing government surveillance into the private lives of citizens, and ending corporate welfare from the government to rich business issues. Nevertheless, under the political system which most people favour - parliamentary democracy of some description - both are almost completely powerless to fight back against these (real or perceived injustices) because they have to simply accept one of the "package deals" of policies offered by one of the parties that can win. If none of those parties offer the option of ceasing to sink state funds into nuclear weapons, for example, these supposed political enemies alike will both be forced to pay for them through the tax system - regardless of their personal values. It is the power to divest which is the real basis of political freedom. The power to say "no, I don't believe in this, I don't want to pay for it, and so I am going to spend my money elsewhere." That is the freedom that the non-state sectors of society (be they businesses, charities, cooperatives or other non-government organisations) offer, but the state does not, and fundamentally why the state is antithetical to freedom." - Antony Sammeroff

 I think if you use this argument when you get into political debates with statists, "even where we both agree - and there is lots of common ground - we are still powerless to make change under the system you support, which is parliamentary democracy" - the penny might drop.

It looks like this: "Both you and I agree on lots of issues, for example against the wars, against the war on drugs, against corporate welfare. But under the system you support, we are relatively powerless to change it because even if we vote - we can only vote for the package deals of party x or party y - if those issues are off the cards on both platforms, we will still have to pay for it whether we like it or not through the tax system - even if one is one platform, another one is not likely to be on the other platform. "

marriage

you know, my whole life I have taken it for granted that if I got married I would take the ladies name as well as her taking mine. So much so that the first time I realised it was when I mentioned a scenario that it was a feature of in passing to a flatmate around 6 years ago and rather than comment on the scenario he remarked that it was "very modern" of me to add a girls last name before my own. Isn't it weird? I never even regarded it as a thing, even although I knew that most people don't do that. Only problem is that if the tradition continues my descendants will have a massive long list of names.

Confirmation Bias

Idiots can convince themselves that they are extremely smart and well informed by reading erudite people who agree with their already existing views.

Complaining

Complaining about what is without working towards what could be is immature.


Most people think changing the world is more about changing other peoples habits than their own, but most people who make a positive impact in the world lead by example.

What is Islam?

So what is Islam? Is it what Muslims do?

No, otherwise eating pork or drinking alcohol could be considered Islamic, as some Muslims certainly do.  Clearly not all Muslims follow Islam, as not all Christians or Jews follow their religion. Actually what Islam is - is not all that open to interpretation. There are two statements that all Muslims agree with: "There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is his profit." If you say that declaration in Arabic you become a Muslim.

Islam is the worship of Allah + the imitation of Mohammed as described in The Koran (of which there are two, one written in Medina and one in Mecca), the Siras, and the Haddith. The earlier Koran is not really a problem, it has the phrases about how "let there be no compulsion in religion", that "you have your religion and I have mine", &c. in it and was written by Mohammed when he was in Mecca. The later Koran is more problematic as it has the most intolerant and radical passages in it, "I shall cast terror into the hearts of the Kafirs. Strike of their heads, strike off the very tips of their fingers!" Unfortunately there is a notion in Islam that "later verses take priority of importance over earlier ones" (abrogation.)  Every tolerant verse in the Koran is later somewhere abrogated in the text.

Islam is a peculiar religion because you cannot actually practice Islam with its primary text, The Koran, alone. The Koran states in over ninety verses that every Muslim should live his life as Mohammed lived his life. If Islam were only the worship of Allah, then one could practice Islam simply by reading the Koran, however, because Islam is also the imitation of Mohammed we need to go to The Sira (an eight-hundred-page biography of Mohammed) and the Haddith - a collection of little stories about Mohammed called "The Traditions" - in order to find out how he lived.

Unfortunately, when we turn to these texts we find that Mohammed - who is meant to be emulated - was a conqueror who cut heads off and consummated a marriage with a 9 year old. In light of this the Islamic doctrine as a whole is not very friendly to non-Muslims or Muslim women. The Kafir can be tortured, raped, enslaved, deceived and murdered. Women are men’s “fields,” worth half what a man is; men can have sex with them whenever they want, marry them at a prepubescent age, or own them as sex slaves.  There is no notion of the golden rule in Islam, as pertains to non-Muslims, only other Muslims are under the protection of the doctrine.

While to us the "good Muslim" is the moderate Muslim, in Islam proper - the "good Muslim" is the one who best emulates Mohammed, therefore when we talk about radical Islam we are talking about a literal reading of the text (particularly the second Koran.) When we talk about "moderate Islam" that is actually also an accurate reading of the text - all those passages are in there. Both are true. It's not that one is right and the other is wrong. Open it up and you will find passages to support both interpretations.

Conservatives will say that radical Islam is caused by the doctrine, and Liberals that it is all the fault of Western foreign policy. Certainly, the US and its allies have regularly supported radical Islamists, certainly in Afghanistan against the Russians, Saudi Arabia being the most obvious example, president Reagan supported Zia ul-Haq, the most brutal of Pakistan's dictators who carried out a programme of radical Islamisation (with Saudi funding). America has also infuriated the Muslim world by supporting Israel, stationing troops on the Arabian Peninsula, and propping up its dictators in spite of movements in various countries towards democracy or the adoption of socialistic governments, and waging war on predominantly Muslim nations. Since our 2003 incursion into Iraq, at least 151,000 and possibly over a million Muslims have been killed in that country.

It is ignorant for conservatives to turn a blind eye to the history of Western Imperialism, and naive for liberals to imagine that the Islamic doctrine has nothing whatever to do with how Muslims behave. The truth about why Islamic people of the world are, on average, more radical than Western religionists is more likely to be a combination of both, as well as other factors - particularly the very authoritarian parenting styles which are prevalent in Islamic countries and even amongst many Muslim families in Western countries. (We not that in the "bible belt" where we encounter a far more radical form of Christianity, the parenting styles are more retrograde than in the more secular parts of America - in some states corporal punishment is legal in schools.)

Whenever an aspect of Islam is unpleasant people will say “That’s not the real Islam” - but there is only one authority on what Islam is, and that is Mohammed. That is to be found in The Koran (both of them), The Sira, and The Haddith.


I would like to acknowledge Dr. Bill Warner, Sam Harris, and Dr. Noam Chomsky for being my main sources of education on Islam.

Nietzsche

I think, like many continental philosophers, Nietzsche studied himself and his own inclinations and universalised them to the world. he found that his will to power was the dominant force in his psyche. To me the genealogy of morals is an interesting historical myth, through the lens of which we see one man's attempt to understand why his contemporaries so slavishly accepted the norms of their society without question or critical thought. It must have been hard for Nietzsche. In the introductory passages he acknowledges three, at most four, people who truly influenced and revolutionised his thinking. How lonely for a man so a head of his time to struggle to find mental stimulation and peers in a world that shone a flame so dull in comparison to an intellect that burned so bright.

For someone hailed as a nihilist, right-winger, or anti-humanist for me his writing is exceedingly humanitarian, exemplified - for me - by the first passages of the untimely meditation on the comparative advantages and disadvantages of history for life. He is a beautiful writer, and I love his secular myth - the Zarathustra.

Passive or Aggressive

I know everyone is dysfunctional but I rather begin friendships with people who are the more passive kind that aggressive kind, because I can help them become more assertive, brave and honest, and they see can easily see the benefits.  People who are at the other polarity are less likely to change in my experience because using the hammer seems to "get things done" - they often get what they want from being aggreessive, it's harder to see what they are missing out on, what they are destroying in the process of being aggressive.

Gender Issues

Me interviewed by Steven Summerstone on Freedom Words

I interview Roslyn Ross

Exploiting the State

The state is not an effect of capitalism, but because the state exists capitalists will exploit it because the state is the only institution that can pass regulations. Were this not the case, Starbucks would lobby McDonalds, and McDonalds would lobby Coca Cola who were lobbying Microsoft. None of these companies are allowed the use of force, but because of this unique trait - the ability to regulate - it would be the end of any capitalist who had the capacity not to make use of this privilege so long as they had competitors who were willing to do so. These conflicts of interest are foundational to the system in place.

Supposing I am the CEO of a rich corporation and I have $1,000,000 to spend developing my business,

One of my options is to spend that money doing R&D, improving the product, employing highly trained staff, bringing our a better version, or something related which amounts to offering a better service to the consumer. I could also try to advertise it to people I hope will be willing to buy it.

Supposing as a consequence of whatever one of these things I choose to do, then my revenues rise by $1,200,000 then, ok, great! My customers are happier and I have made $200,000

But...

Supposing I can use the $1,000,000 to lobby the state, and they will pass preferential regulations to favour my company, or they will give me other kickbacks or benefits worth - lets say- $1,500,000, then this poisons the whole economy because now I have MORE incentive to engage in bribery and corruption than on pleasing my customers.

I would do this, not because I was evil, but because I was rational. In fact, if I failed to do it I might well be competed out of the market by an actor who did not. Poorer or less established companies cannot do what I just did and so they are a disadvantage against the giants in industry so long as there is a state and the state can be lobbied.

By this process of "unnatural selection" the most successful firms become, not those who are able to best serve their customers, but those who are best able to play the system to get privileges from the government.  And it's not necessarily for the evil of all would-be congressmen or parliamentarians either! Even a somewhat integerous politician, who wants to hold office to push through the "least-bad" legislations can only get away with so much before industries begin to back a more complicit candidate to replace them. They really will go to any lengths to retain their special privileges, however unjust, because their livelihoods depend on them.

Perhaps the only solution is making it impossible for politicians to dish out public funds to special interest groups from the public purse, but for this to even be achievable people must be aware of this problem of incentives.

According to The Sunlight Foundation $5.8 billion were spent on federal lobbying and campaign contributions by America’s 200 most politically active corporations between 2007 and 2012.  For every dollar they spent buying politicians they got $741 in return.



If someone in a business commits a crime they don't get arrested for it because they have this thing called a corporation which takes the blame.

The corporation gets sued, which  means the customers pay more and potentially the employees get paid less.

Making the corporation culpable instead of the individuals responsible for making the decisions
removes the moral hazard from the individuals  implicated in the unlawful or anti-social behaviour. That's why we see corporation getting away with doing all these horrible things: oil spills, bad bank loans, environmental hazards,

If the individuals personally responsible were at risk of losing their own assets, including their houses - the way an individual who gets sued or fined is - we would ind them far less likely to take these risks.

What is the difference between Left and Right anarchism?

Left anarchism, which was the common usage of the term up until recently, is a political philosophy very closely related to communism, with the central socialist principle that workers should own the means of production. Having bosses run businesses or capitalists own the means of production is considered to be expploitative and hierarchical, wheras right anarchists see these relationships as acceptible so long as they are voluntary: if employees can agree to contractual terms, quit any time they like, unionise except where probhibited by voluntary agreements, etc. it is considered that the bosses are providing value by organising the work force, and capitalists are providing value by anticipating the market, organising production in terms of demand, and risking their investment (and also their property where uninsured, as the state would not exist to give them limited liability in the form of a Ltd. corporation  or Plc.) Right anarchists are not opposed to workers owning their own workplaces as long as this is organised by mutual agreements and voluntary interactions rather than imposed by violations of property rights (eg. workers getting a loan from the bank to buy out bosses and owners.)

Right anarchism is a more recent development but it can also be traced back to Baukunin who is seen as influential to both schools as an anarchist. It's more of an extension of American libertarianism, with the central principle being the NAP - ie. Thou shalt not initiate the use of force - no violence or theft, including taxation, as a rule, although levies for public goods could be extracted through a system of social pressure, ostracism, and refusal to engage in collective buying for people who did not pay their share (eg. If you don't pay your share for street lights you can expect to have to make your own arrangements for garbage collection as well.) Government regulation would similarly be be replaced by a system of insurance companies or cooperatives (often referred to as DROs - dispute resolution organisations) who were financially incentived to solve problems before they occurred instead of being called upon to respond after the fact (like police, government fines, universal sick care, fire fighters, climate taxes etc. and all government services which are called upon only when a problem has all ready arisen.) These companies would lose money through payouts when they failed to protect their clients from harm or loss of property, which would encourage them to develop preventative measures and disincentives to criminals which would be constantly optimised through competition on the free market - whichever organisation was most effective as preventing harm or loss would gain the greatest market share, if someone advanced on their developments they would become lucrative, and if any such company got "too big for its boots," or abused its authority, its clients would have the option to pick another service provider, rather than remain at the behest of a state monopoly for provision of this service.

Left anarchism tends to focus more on problems of capital and capitalism, much like state socialists do. Right anarchists tend to talk primarily about the problems of statism, those which are created or exacerbated by governemnt, and they therefor tend to have the most convincing arguments for the abolition of states.


Despite coming from different angles, both agree that the state is based on force or the threat of force for its existence, that the state is a tool wielded by the ruling class for unfair advantage over everyone else, and that corporations and corporatism are products of statism which allow the rich to privilege from privatizing gains and socialising losses, which is immoral.

All forms of anarchists acknowledge that where there are rulers there can be no rules, as rulers by their very nature, make themselves the exception to the rule. Anarchists are egalitarians, no special privileges for law-makers or corporations. If you kill, harm, steal, or damage someone else's property, you are to be held personally liable for it - not the state (tax payer) or corporation (consumer/share-holder) - you personally. There is to be no hiding behind institutions which are mere abstractions of the mind in anarchy. This implementation of this moral hazard for the privileged is meant to do away with much of the corruption, cronyism, and war crimes which are part and parcel of statist societies.

So some common ground between the two despite philosophical difference on very key points.

For example, left wing ideals such as workers running their workplaces are thought by some to be more likely under right anarchism that statism, since the public education system trains children for individualism and competition, but the evidence on how individuals learn best is in favour of a cooperative learning environment. Without the kind of schooling which is prevalent and imposed by the state (which right anarchists are strongly opposed to) children would be raised with lots of experience of cooperation and mutualism, and so would more likely to create workplaces that capitalised on those skills than top-down hierarchies which follow the prevalent pattern of schooling and parenting.

Discourse on Necessity

 on retreat 01/09/13

There has been a lot of talk in this circle about needyness.

Bu what about needed-ness? Is that not more important? To know that we are needed? 

Perhaps when we reflect upon this a question arises inside us: Do I really need to be needed or do I just think I do? Perhaps I shouldn’t have to feel like I am needed and that is just my insecurity talking or my ego trying to make itself important. 

Perhaps you do not even feel the need to be needed and think me projecting the fruit of my own self-examination onto you.

Needed perhaps comes from the same root as necessary. We love to know that we are needed, because we are. And since we are, better then, that it is necessary for us to be. That we serve some purpose.

The universe, in its perfection, wastes nothing - recycles everything, thus by its very nature all that exists must serve some purpose. To know that we are is in to know that it is necessary for us to be. Should we cease to be necessary then we are surrendered to the oneness of all things, just as leaves become the soil, which becomes the fruit, which becomes the pray, which becomes the predator, and so forth.

A conscious surrender, in eastern traditions, is known as liberation, escape from samsara, or the path to enlightenment.

Should we choose this surrender to a life in service of the whole then even death is welcomed as a gift. We have already surrendered our life and so nothing remains to be taken from us. We are all going to die, and so it is better we learn to welcome it. 

An unconscious surrender is known as samsara, some believe this leads us to be born and reborn again in our habits into the material world of cause and effect, but it can be understood by the skeptic as a lack of willingness to change which leads us to have several similar unpleasant experiences occur and reoccur ad infinatum until we examine ourselves to find the root of the problem.

The practice of self-knowledge reveals to us our qualities, our qualities reveal to us our purpose, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say the purposes from which we can choose to serve. Knowing our purpose shows us our value, which satisfies our need to be needed.

Perspective on "Tough Justice"

People become violent as a result of suffering severe trauma, such as childhood neglect, abandonment or abuse (physical, emotional and/or sexual) --- that is the conclusion of established social science based on the psychological data available to us. 

The latest science on nature versus nurture says that human nature is 70-80% adaptation to environment, particularly early childhood experiences. The idea that "tough justice" ie. inflicting more trauma on an already traumatised/abused individual, will make them better rather than worse, is the result of a primitive kind of thinking, ie. if you do something unpleasant to me then I will do something unpleasant back to you to teach you a lesson. The psychology shows clearly that It Does Not teach them a lesson, it makes them worse because they are now humiliated and want to get revenge. Since the trace of trauma can be tracked in the brain, Brain Scans Of Criminals Can Predict Recidivism (returning to prison.) If we want to rehabilitate criminals we have to understand trauma and learn how to reverse it.

The reason why people continue to believe in "tough justice" even though all the data shows it is a wrong-minded approach to deterring violence, is usually because they were treated punitively as children, exposed to punishments, spanking, "strict-discipline" and told it was "for their own good" - and so looking at the situation clearly for what it is would also ential having to reassess their own childhood for trauma and wounds inflicted on them advertently or inadvertently by their own care-givers. That can obviously be a very painful process for most people.

Harsh corporal punishment produces a dogmatic personality, meaning an inability to adapt and change opinions in light of new information. Evidence shows that people who receive corporal punishment are more likely to support punitive public policies such as the death sentence. These views are psychologically motivated, they are not based on reason and evidence, but avoidance of the suffering entailed in bringing childhood wounds into the conscious awareness so they can be dealt with, the benefit of doing so is being given the opportunity to overcome them, and go from seeing the world through irrational biases to seeing it as it really is.

When prisons were originally introduced as the weapon of choice in the fight against crime we did not know much about how to halt the cycle of prisoners reoffending. Now there are several methods which have shown to be effective. The recent science of rehabilitation shows that criminals who are able to study and attain a masters degree in prison are ecxeedingly unlikely to reoffend. Also, recidivism can be reduced by teaching Transindental Meditation to prisoners, as does teaching prisoners Nonviolent Communication - which stands to reason as in many instances violence is the only way that people who have not been taught to negotiate with others know to get what they want. One study conducted in a Nevada Prison showed that a technological process that appears to help the brain reverse the effects of trauma, Brainwave Optimisation, can rehabilitate violent criminals.

With enough will we can understand and end violence for good.

The Death of Reason

"People have not the ability to critically thing. People are born with the ability to critically think. People are punished for critical thinking. When you bring criticial thinking to people what you are doing is you are evoking all the punishments they received as children for true critical thinking. So if they were reaised religions, they have questions and they ask those quesitons and they are attacked and mocked and humilated and punished for having those questions. A child who is hit by a mom when the mom says dn't hit has some critical questions to ask of that mother. These are all questions that children that want to ask their parents. I know this for a fact because my daughter is continually asking me these kinds of questions. She is curious about my level of inegrity with the values I put forward. So when I say we don't use aggression to get what we want she is constantly scanning to see if I'm using aggression. She is trying to find out if I have integrity or if I'm just using rules to control her. All hypocrisy results in brutality because the hypocrisy that doesn't enforce itself through hypocrisy doesn't last." - Stefan Molyneux

Staying Happy

In my time here I have found the most indispensible attribute towards maintaining hapiness in life is a conscious discipline of choosing not to view situations, even adverse ones, as oppositional to us, but instead as opportunities to learn specific skills we have have prescribed for ourselves. This attitude frees us from comparing ourselves to any (impossible to acheive) standards of perfection, but instead as students on our journey to mastery. Our awareness is now freed to view the effects of our actions empirically as we assess "what is happening here? what did I leanr? what would I do next time to acheive better results?" We begin growing into life instead of experiencing it as a never ending serries of challenges that undermine our sense of adequacy.

I Interview Stefan Molyneux

Why doesn't beef cost 7 times as much as grains?

If it takes 7 times as much grain to create the same amount of beef, so why isn't beef 7 times as expensive as grain? Because the vast majority of farming subsidies go to meat and dairy farmers. In other words we are forced to pay for the mistreatment of animals whether we can conscience it or not. Fruits an vegetables have increased in price faster that other products and they are the building blocks of health, while confectionaries have gone down in price in real terms and they destroy the quality of life. If we could end these subsidies the whole society would be healthier, we would also save NHS money on preventable illnesses that could be allocated to those who still needed it. What is more, Western agricultural subsidies for domestic farmers have been a horrendous catastophe for the poor in the developing world, because excess produce is dumped there putting their own producers out of a livelihood and building their own economy. Crazy world we live in, where money is shifted from the people to self-interest groups at the point of a gun, despite the harm it does to the whole of society.