Another thing.
Attacking Obama's leadership in comparison to Bush is faulty.

It is a fact that Obama has a wealth of cognitive prowess.
It is a fact that Bush was & is in a severe cognitive decline.

This video illustrates Bush's early onset dementia
http://videosift.com/video/Bush-used-to-be-sharp

Imagine your Alzheimers stricken father had bankrupted the family & burnt down the house.

Your neighbor criticizes you for taking your family to the hospital, instead of immediately rebuilding the house.

Shouting "Your father was a much better head of the household!"

If you want people to sincerely consider your point. You have to be willing to stick to objective, concrete facts WITHIN context of the situation.

While I agree that Obama is a passive leader.
Obama is an adept politician.

It's okay to admit this.
If anything, it strengthens the argument that he's running the nation into the ground.

Not to mention, all the State & Federal elected officials.
They need to be held accountable FIRST.

Holy heck. I haven't been active on this site in like 3 years.!

But somehow I ended up clicking thru the "Cake-day" notification and what do I see?

Mind-numbing denialism & illogical double standards.

Was it Mark Twain who say NOT to argue with stupid people, because they'll "drag you down to their level & beat you with experience"?

Screw it, the cognitive dissonance is too much to bear.

So now I'm back [from outer & inner space] to deliver this:

Stop arguing about which corrupt body of political hacks are "better".

Focus on the fact the BOTH Bush Obama and all presidents after will continue to erode any protections you hold dear.

No matter which political ideology you subscribe to.
Sheesh!

What a load of horseshit.

I have no intention of arguing that Mohammed was anything other than a terrible human being.

But to say that all Muslims are guilty of mass rape or genocide is so patently absurd it's barely worth rebutting.

Are they guilty of cognitive dissonance? Hell yeah.

I've argued in the past that almost all members of religions are hypocrites; either you believe your religion is divine and therefore, infallible, or you're just making up your own morality and therefore tacitly acknowledging your religion is a flawed man-made thing.

But since the alternative is insane fanatical fundamentalism, I can forgive a little hypocrisy.

The moral gap between hypocrisy and mass rape or genocide is pretty fucking substantial. If you can't or won't understand that, then you're looking at the world in terms of absolutes and little better than a fanatic yourself.

Oh, and ordinarily, I would take this as given, but just in case you really are that simple, I think mass rape and genocide are Bad Things.

Do not rape people. Do not murder people. Especially do not do this to lots of people.

Clear?

I knew this would happen. Talking to you, too, @oritteropo:

I'm leaving it with just this, because people are attached to their bacon and steaks as tightly as they are tied to religion. Perhaps it's again apples to oranges, but I'm guessing a lot of you are the same folks who rant against religion and wonder why people are so stupid and don't look at logic and science, blah blah blah. This is the perfect time to look in the mirror and see a touch of what you're up against. When you've been indoctrinated with something since you were literally born, you fight against being wrong so hard. So, so hard. Seriously. Take a moment, take a deep breath, and take a little search inside looking at how much of you knows for a fact that eating meat is just fine, and how much of it is cognitive dissonance. How much of it is emotional and how much of it is logical. Look at a video of people going on and on about how Jesus Christ is Lord and another video of people going on and on about how much they love bacon. It's kind of disturbing how zealous bacon-lovers get. Try it. It's fun. It's why I became vegetarian only about 4 or 5 years ago. And I gotta say, getting rid of that cognitive dissonance is very, very relieving and satisfying.

Yes, yes, yes. Loads and loads of vegetarians and vegans are unhealthy. Actually, I would argue that most vegetarians and vegans are wholly less healthy than omnivores since most of them have a high-and-mighty "I'm vegetarians/vegan so I'm automatically healthy" and eat some of the most disgusting, heart-disease-inducing, oily, fatty, un-nutririous, processed shit that's ever been made. Look at some of the fake meat stuff to just have a peek.

No. If you actually watched any of the videos you will see that it's not just being vegan that is important. It's to be a healthy vegan. You know, all that shit you can't ever, ever argue is bad for you. Fruits. Leafy greens. Beans. Lentils. Whole grains, occasionally. But mostly leafy greens and fruit.

And there are loads of studies that control exercise and all sorts of other arguments for "NO NO NO! IT'S NOT MY MEAT! STAY AWAY FROM IT IT'S ANYTHING BUT MY MEAT!". I can think of a specific one that I read/watched about controlling for exercise, and I can find it for you if you'd like, but I'm guessing you aren't really interested. They discovered that very aerobic, exercising, running omnivores were as healthy as lightly walking vegans. He even had a cute graphic for it.

And it's not just this guy, either. Head over to Dr. Fuhrman's website for more of the same. Except Dr. Fuhrman is toting stuff to sell, so that unnerves some people. They claim he's just trying to make a buck. But all the money he makes goes to nutritional research.

The last thing I'll say is this:

I honestly don't give a flying shit about what you eat. I don't really care about the environment at all. I'm not planning on having kids, and I'm sure I'll kick the ol' bucket before antibiotics stop working, water is scarce, the waters rise above NYC, and all the other possible doomsday things that'll probably happen within the next 100 or so years. It's true that I also enjoy not feeling guilty for eating animals who live. It'd make me happy if you stopped eating them because the main thing I believe I'm around for is to minimize suffering in the world. So, that'd be nice if more people didn't eat them.

But if you want to live a nice, long, healthy life where you don't die of a stroke, heart attack, or diabetes by the time you're 65, eat better.

There's a reason why the milk, sugar, meat and pharmaceutical companies pump out study after study about how it's totally fine to eat their shit. They spend so much money on it, it's ridiculous.

Cheers to your health, either way.

But society tells a man, enshrined in law and tradition, that if he does not want to be forced into wage-slavery for 18 years of an unwanted child's life, he should not have had sex with the girl in the first place. It makes women victims of sex, not equal participants, fully capable and fully responsible. The woman chooses to have, abort, abandon or offer for adoption. The man does not have any choice over that, including if he wants to keep and she does not.

And that double standard stems from the inherent sexist bias that men are the big strong responsible ones, and women need protecting and helping. I keep seeing Emma Watson's face plastered all over facebook with "He For She" gash-tagged. He for she? HE... for SHE? She does not need he, and the campaign ridiculously reinforces the male hyper-responsibility and female hypo-responsibility that has led us to this system which is sexist to both males and females. If anything, we need we, but wee-wee probably isn't a good tag-line.

So why did i bring sexism up? Well, either you can't tell people to act a certain way if they don't want consequences, or you can.... and we as a society do not have a standard to use, because we legally force fathers into wage-slavery at the whim of the mother and tell him exactly that. Is it any surprise men are using the same unfair argument by which they can be and are financially crippled? That's the heart of the debate imo; society raises men to be fully responsible for their actions, but raises women not to be (which as we see is sexist and unfair to both).

Only one thing is certain - equality of the sexes is important for both sexes. Because when society is willing to accept that women can be responsible for themselves, men will not be held responsible for a woman's decision to have a child. And then maybe men will stop using the argument which they must bow to by law.

Pre-emptive edit:
I will never let it be said that the views expressed herein are sexist, nor that i am sexist. I am a huge proponent of the fact that women are gifted with the same cognitive potential as men, and that any physiological differences are irrelevant in the modern world. But equality comes with a price - and that price is real equality. I am not encouraging irresponsible male behaviour... i am stating, loud and proud, as a feminist.. that women should be allowed to be fully responsible for their choices and actions, because i believe them to be fully capable of it.

That statement is really a reflection of your own cognitive dissonance.

Chomsky doesn't pontificate about right/wrong or problems.

He's describing the applied game theory present in society.

If you think that's 'bad', then that's your own personal judgment of the matter.

Like 'the prince', his message is a conveyance of the relationship between intelligent actors manipulating perceptions, and intelligent actors acting on perceptions.


Imagine a fish seller, with too many fish. The fish will go bad soon if he does not sell them quickly.
Should he :

A) Ask people to buy more fish, before they go bad, please.

B) Go speak with the distributor that's buying fish from the fisherman and get him to spread the rumor that there is an incoming fish shortage.

(A) may be honest, but (B) will sell faster and for higher prices.

The idea is not to get what you want the most direct way - the idea is to get what you want the most efficient way.
You can be direct about getting what you want, or you can give people information that makes them come to a conclusion for themselves that makes them do what you want.
More abstractly : If it takes less energy to 'persuade' than to 'do for yourself', then use information to 'get people to do for you'. Let others spend their time and resources for you, and save your own.


Politically, this means ruling not by telling citizens what you want, but ruling by nurturing an environment where the media provides information that makes citizens ask for what you want of their own volition.
Then you aren't telling citizens what to do, you're merely obliging their wishes. You not only avoid appearing overbearing (which is not sustainable on account of eventual public disdain) - you actually appear obliging (which is perpetually sustainable).


If you want examples in an a-political environment (if in fact the political backdrop is foiling your ability to take the message in an impartial manner), you should look at Boyd's OODA loop and the Conceptual Spiral.

Analysis, synthesis, etc, etc, etc.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_fjaqAiOmc&index=8&list=PLDB0DF43AA0B67552
http://www.iohai.com/iohai-resources/destruction-and-creation.html

Related matters :

Game theory (life/politics/economics is a game)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9Lo2fgxWHw
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Lro-unCodo

Persuasion (use tools [real or perceived] to apply influence)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFdCzN7RYbw

*keep in mind that "from the responder's perspective" there is no difference between you doing X, or the responder thinking you did X - because in both cases the responder is acting on his personal perception of what happened (be it real or not).

-scheherazade

"That depends on who you ask...witnesses..." Really... Yeah, the same shit is argued by "witnesses" for the CIA that argue the CIA does not "torture" people. THAT ARGUMENT in general is utterly asinine. A group of people, many who contradicted each other in the heat of the moment want to portray the outsider as a bad guy...it doesn't help that most of them are low intelligence. Imagine if it had all been white police officers who were the "witnesses", you sure as hell would not side with them. You would say they lie, or defend one another...

Additionally, even if not intentionally, I know that mistaken identity has screwed so many innocent people because in a crisis situation your cognitive functions all but lie to you. You just don't remember things very clearly--even if you are unbiased.

So what do you do? Fault imperfect humans in an imperfect situation? No, you look at the physical evidence. Did the bullet enter the top of his head? Well then he was under the officer and people underneath someone usually try to take someone to the ground, etc. The DA threw the cases away...um, no...the Grand Jury did...the DA has considerable sway there, yes, but then so does public perception...

As a sidebar I should add that in proper uses of force, not Garner's particular situation at all, the more officers on a subject the better. This prevents injury by immobilizing someone. The more someone moves the more force that eventually has to be used. That is the principle behind the tazer. Yeah, I could rip you off the car door you grab on to resist arrest, or I could taze you. Potentially rip your arm out of its socket, or shock you for five seconds...same with three or four people grabbing you to gain compliance. Same reason handcuffs are applied.

@newtboy
told ya he was pissed.
i admire this mans passion.
in fact,i applaud it.

while i do not agree with his attack therapy tactics and do not subscribe to his over-all conclusions.i absolutely ADORE how he calls out the cognitive dissonance of the american voter.

because he is right.

how can you subscribe to a law that makes prostitution illegal,yet porn legal?
or the guy who deals crack or meth as being a criminal? yet opiates are,by far,the leading cause of death in regards to controlled substances.so who is the bigger criminal?

and what,exactly,IS a criminal?is it because the state says so?if you subscribe to that,then i am a criminal.

i found his condemnation of the christian church to be the most delicious.
jesus christ was an insurrectionist,a radical,a dissident and a dissenter.a zealot in the face of the powered elite.

so how can you fight a war of aggression in jesus christs name?
how can you state that god blesses america with over 2.4 million people incarcerated?or to categorize and demonize those who may be different i.e:gay,lesbian or atheist and yet still call yourself a christian?

i giggled with delight when he pointed out that the very same people who are championing those insurrectionists,dissidents and agitators of the past as somehow being representative of their morals and ethics,are the very same people they are demonizing today for breaking the rules.

this man is so pissed off and i love it.
he says things that will make conformists extremely uncomfortable,and we NEED to be a bit uncomfortable.if only to shake off the apathy and lethargy.

as for the taxes argument..meh..i dont subscribe to the "privatize everything" ,because some things should not be profit driven,but i also do not subscribe to the 'taxes pay for essential services",unless wars of aggression,corporate welfare and big-agribusiness subsidies are considered "essential".

our democracy is broken,our government dysfunctional and serves only to keep the balance of the status quo on top..and fuck the regular dude.

can you REALLY say your government represents you?
ok,go ahead and vote.here are your choices:chocolate or vanilla but both are made by hagen daaz.

you really should watch to the end..he just gets madder and madder.
truths can often be uncomfortable,but that never changes the fact that they are truths.

and goddamn i love your optimism! just cant share it on this issue,though if you could bottle it up i am betting you would make a fortune.

ill have three bottles of newt please...to go.

The cop called in for backup after a severe and unsustainable bout of cognitive dissonance (reading aloud in his own voice the law that proved he was wrong).

Unable to process this information because his fragile concept of self is shattered publicly and captured on video to the cheers of the crowd, but yet also trying to reason with the madness in his mind, he decides that "ejecting" is better than "arresting". Fully knowing that both solutions are wrong.

Fearful, because his brain is scrambling like an egg in a blender, he moves far away from what is really just a man standing alone singing. Moves away because somehow he is unable, unsafe as an NYPD cop, to handle a man armed only with a guitar and a voice. He needs backup.

With all of his bravery, and hand on his holster, he marches back to the musician and takes the guitar away, but the song keeps on playing.

Literally unable (4:37) to physically affect an arrest or "ejection" against a completely docile and non-resisting "suspect", our embarrassed crime fighter lets everyone know it's none of their business.

But don't worry, help arrives at last! (6:03) And now officer illiterate can be a tough guy hero in front of his cop buddies and manhandle the dangerous singer. See? He didn't even need their help. He was just biding his time for the right opportunity to capture that criminal guitar player.

Yeah, all I'm saying is that this statement (by Cleese) is facile (and I think he'd be fine with that assessment, given he had less than a minute to make it for full impact). Most learning and motivational theory indicates a strong jump in confidence and perceived ability in the initial learning stages (even just after a few minutes, if it's a simple task) and then a sharp drop off as the cognitive effect of "I did it" reconciles with the awareness that "I don't have this skill, though." That initial boost is what we need to be a learning species.

At the same time, that effect is tempered by a host of other effects - previous experiences of other learning tasks, society's communicated expectations and obstacles (for example, I picked surgery in my example because that's been communicated to me as being difficult; I don't have the same reservations about my janitorial skills, even though that's also an area I've no experience in), and all that will play in equally or even more strongly when estimating your own ability.

Up until I saw my fellow countrymen (including many I respected) fawning like chimps at a tea party during that whole "jubilee" thing I might have agreed. There seems to be a huge cognitive dissonance for most people when it comes to the royals.

On the one hand most don't really take it very seriously, on the other many (maybe even most) appear to have a sub-conscious desire/need to submit to their natural betters. Our whole national identity is built on the myths of Kings and failed rebellions and I fear for many the Monarchy represents a kind of bizarre political security blanket. We claim to not really care but deep down I think many of us secretly fear loosing our mythical matriarch.

One might liken it to celebrity worship backed by 100's & 1000's of years of religious mythology. The Royal's aren't really human to us, they are more like some closely related parent species born to a life we could only dream of. I realise that when asked directly most people would consciously acknowledge that was silly, but most would also respond the same to say Christian sexual repression. They know sex and nakedness when considered rationally are nothing to be ashamed of, but they still continue to treat their own urges as somehow sinful when they do not fall within rigidly defined social parameters.

We still haven't gotten over such Judeo-Christian self policing because the social structures built up around it are still with us (even if we fool ourselves into thinking we are beyond the reach of such sub-conscious influences). I don't think we will ever get over our master-slave culture while class and unearned privilege are still built into the fabric of our society. Having a Royal family, no matter how symbolic, is the very living embodiment of this kind of backwards ideology.

It's like trying to quit heroin while locked in a room with a big bag of the stuff.

It's true to say most don't take the whole thing very seriously but that to me is almost as concerning. Most people when asked don't believe advertising has a significant effect on their psyche but Coke-a-cola still feels like spending about 3 billion a year on it is worthwhile. One of them is clearly mistaken!

Our royal family here, is to me working in the same way as coke's advertising. It's a focal point for a lot of sub-conscious concepts we are bombarded with our whole lives. Naturally there are many sides to this and it wouldn't work without heavy media manipulation, state indoctrination etc. but it's an intrinsic part of the coercive myth none the less. Monarch's, Emperors and wealthy Dynasties are all poisons to me. No matter the pragmatic details, the sub-conscious effect seems significant and cumulative.

"Dead" symbolisms IMHO can often be the most dangerous. At least one is consciously aware of the devils we see. No one is watching the one's we have forgotten.....

The above is reason enough for me but I have bog all better to do this aft so I'll dive into the rabbithole a bit.....

(We do very quickly start getting into conspiracy theory territory hare so I'll try to keep it as uncontroversial as I can.)

A. The UK is truly ruled by financial elites not political ones IMHO. "The city" says jump, Whitehall says how high. The Royal family being among the wealthiest landowners and investors in the world (let alone UK) presumably can exert the same kind of influence. Naturally this occurs behind closed doors, but when the ownership class puts it's foot down the government ignores them to their extreme detriment. (It's hard to argue with people who own your economy de-facto and can make or break your career)

B. The queen herself sits on the council on foreign relations & Bilderberg group and she was actually the chairwoman of the "committee of 300" for several years. (and that's not even starting on club of Rome, shares in Goldman Sachs etc.)

C. SIS the uk's intelligence services (MI5/6 etc.), which have been proven to on occasion operate without civilian oversight in the past, are sworn to the crown. This is always going to be a most contentious point as it's incredibly difficult to prove wrongdoings, but I have very strong suspicions based on various incidents (David Kelly, James Andanson, Jill Dando etc.), that if they wanted/needed you dead/threatened that would not be especially difficult to arrange.

D. Jimmy Saville. This one really is tin foil hat territory, but it's no secret he was close to the Royal family. I am of the opinion this is because he was a top level procurer of "things", for which I feel there is a great deal of evidence, but I can't expect people to just go along with that idea. However given the latest "paedogeddon" scandal involving a extremely high level abuse ring (cabinet members, mi5/6, bankers etc.) it certainly would come as little surprise to find royal family members involved.

Points A&B I would stand behind firmly. C&D are drifting into conjecture but still potentially relevant I feel.

But even if we ignore all of them, our culture is built from the ground up upon the idea of privilege of birth. That there are some people born better or more deserving than the rest of us. When I refer to symbolism this is what I mean. Obviously the buck does not stop with the monarchy, England is hopelessly stratified by class all the way through, but the royal family exemplify this to absurd extremes.

At best I feel this hopelessly distorts and corrupts our collective sense of identity on a sub-conscious level. At worst....Well you must have some idea now how paranoid I'm capable of being about the way the world is run. (Not that I necessarily believe it all wholeheartedly, but I'm open to the possibility and inclined to suggest it more likely than the mainstream narrative)


On a pragmatic note: Tourism would be fine without them I think, we still have the history and the castles and the soldiers with silly hats etc. And I think the palaces would make great hotels and museums. They make great zoo exhibits I agree, just maybe not let them continue to own half the zoo and bribe the zoo keepers?


Anyway much love as always. You responded with considered points which is always worthy of respect, regardless of whether I agree with it all.

@lucky760

Well, the terminology you used is a bit charged, isn't it? "Manipulate oneself" into feeling something? Compassion is all about putting yourself in someone else's shoes--imagining being them. It's not manipulation; it's actually perfectly natural thanks to mirror neurons--when we see other people in pain we activate the areas in our brain as if we were experiencing pain. The thing is, our higher order cognitive abilities can override this natural function. Basically compassion is our natural state and we later learn how to turn it off. I'm sure there is some evolutionary advantage to that but what I've been trying to discuss here are the disadvantages.

But that's more of an aside to the main issue. The main point is we both agree that showing compassion is important. Splitting hairs about the semantics of feeling/showing compassion doesn't add anything to the discussion so I'll simply tip my hat to you for being willing to engage in this conversation with me for so long and be on my way.

And, by the way, this may be why you're having such a hard time reconciling what I'm saying with your worldview. Just because I don't think that people who use cocaine are not "cognitively deficient," doesn't mean that I must also use cocaine 'all day'. It's not black or white. The sooner you get this, the better off you'll be (i.e., the fewer "fights" like this one you'll find yourself embroiled in).

Yes, you're ignored, and I read your comment anyway.

No, in saying "use drugs," I was not "implying cannabis." I said "use drugs" because I meant "use drugs." Rather than trying to interpret or 'read into' what I'm saying, it might help if you responded to my post, and not what you post in your mind on my behalf.

And I will take you up on your 'challenge:' below is a list of ten "highly intelligent" people who have used cocaine (note: at no point did I say "encourages the use of cocaine." I said "use drugs" without becoming addicted, and being able to function), so that you can provide me with 10,000 more** whose lives and families have been destroyed by it. (**And note here, we're talking about individuals whose lives were destroyed by the use of cocaine itself, and not by the pointless drug laws that imprison people for having a mental or emotional condition that provokes "self-medication" as a form of treatment. Nor are we talking about the illegal status of cocaine which, itself, gives rise to violent cartels that function in the shadow of its legal status.)

So, while certainly many of the following list of "highly intelligent" (non-cognitively deficient) and successful "celebrities" may no longer be using cocaine, all of the following have used cocaine and are/were not addicted and function(ed) just fine:

Sigmund Freud
Thomas Edison
Oprah Winfrey
Stephen King
Tim Allen
Hunter S. Thompson
Angelina Jolie
Robert Louis Stevenson
Steven Tyler
Robert Downey, Jr.

There are others (like William Burroughs, Eric Clapton, Grover Cleveland, David Crosby, Arthur Conan Doyle, Isadora Duncan, Ulysses S Grant, Abbie Hoffman, Elton John, King George V, Larry Kudlow, Sir Paul McCartney, & Barack Obama), but I thought I'd stop at 10.

And if you post the 10,000 names of those whose lives and families were destroyed by cocaine (and not by the pointless drug laws or its illegal status) by the end of the week, I'll take your point.

Oh, I see. You think people use drugs out of a deficient cognitive ability. Wow, that's some bigoted thinking! Do you have any research to support this assumption or do you just think that people become addicts because of "low IQ" (or some other prejudiced stereotype)? By the way, NEWSFLASH: many highly intelligent (non cognitively deficient) people use drugs and, furthermore, they don't get addicted and are able to function just fine. How do you propose to "educate" them (outside of passing laws) to get them to do what you want them to do, rather than allowing them to live their lives however they see fit?