Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close
In my continued Avoiding real work/progress today, I had to weigh in one more time... I lean more towards the "Forrest Gump" philosophy on this issue: "Stupid is as stupid does." --Doug I prefer Thomas Freidman's Dumb as we Wanna Be . Many of my "redneck" friends (as many with brown or red skin as pink like mine, if it matters) have a limited perspective which when I can shoehorn my head into, makes pretty good sense to me (if I ignore the pain in my head from the force-fit into said limited perspective). Similarly, many of my "educated elite" friends have an equally (but different) limited perspective (never really worked with their hands, or been hungry, or lost a loved one to lack of something or ...). This shoe horn is more of a silver spoon, but works pretty much the same as the utilitarian steel one I use with the former crowd. What do these folks have in common? I can't say they are unintelligent (though the latter categorically assume that of the former) but I do often think of both camps as "Dumb as they wanna be". They have a bunch of self-serving, limited perspective, ideas that they cling to despite everything, including the facts. If they were in a true survival situation, I would hope they would stand back and assess a little larger, zoom in and deduce a little more carefully. But maybe not, maybe the unction for a simple, actionable answer to everything is deep human (primate/mammalian/vertebrate/animal?) nature and trumps any attempt at higher processing when confronted with significant amounts of greed or fear. I suspect myself of the same (too often) and find myself suspecting myself anytime I feel too smug or sure about anything, especially "public policy". It is "easy" to assume that "anyone voting for Dubya (or McCain by extension)" is an idiot. Or that "most people" are idiots, but as Owen's original question suggests, it probably isn't that easy. That doesn't mean I'm not looking forward to "regime change" in a few days (or months, depending on how you demarcate). Carry on, - Steve FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close
Tom, of course the question Why isn't Obama white? is perfectly valid. Most of us supposedly enlightened types would like to think that we all agree that, especially in a world where intermingling of a genetic nature among traditional genetic groups has made the notion of race fairly undefinable, it is of course not yet irrelevant. There are presumably genetic reasons why the children of mixed-race marriages between Caucasians and descendents of sub-Saharan Africans tend on average to preserve more of the physical traits of their African heritage, which contributes to our ease of identifying a Barack Obama as black, without qualification. But our own sordid history as a nation of course also contributes to how we tend to identify people. (And how interesting it is that all the false reports of Obama being a closet Muslim -- and the assumptions that that would make him a terrorist by association -- seem to have trumped at least public debates about his being black. I suppose it's just that the rumor-mongers know that they have to be more careful about racial epithets than non-American-standard religious ones.) Another couple of interesting data points (recognizing that I'm getting wildly off-topic here): My wife, who somewhat to her chagrin is descended from a number of prominent slave-owning southerners, is reading the book The Hemingses of Monticello, which sounds fascinating. Jefferson's relationship with Sally Hemings was of course no aberration. I think one of the basic tenets of the book (which I haven't read yet) is that basically everybody on the plantation was related, and they all knew it. If I remember correctly, Sally Hemings was a blood relative of Jefferson's wife. So we have a long tradition of carefully identifying the children of (typically) the rape of a black (slave) woman by a white man as black, so that they could clearly be identified as slaves. (Interesting point of comparison -- continuing wildly off-topic): White Australians discovered that the distinctive physical traits of aborigines tend to disappear much more quickly on average when they intermarry or otherwise mix genes with whites, maybe because the original gene pool of those aboriginal settlers must have been pretty small. So the Australian government took exactly the opposite tack of our own nation, and went through a period --shockingly recent -- of kidnapping young aboriginal children from their families, raising them in their equivalent of Indian schools, and encouraging poor whites to marry them, in effect to wash away the aboriginal blood. If you haven't seen it, rent the wonderful Australian film Rabbit-Proof Fence on this subject. While I'm in book review mode, I am reading Paul Krugman's excellent book The Conscience of a Liberal, which I highly recommend to anyone trying to figure out how to save liberal from being a dirty word. Enough. john On Oct 31, 2008, at 1:30 PM, Tom Carter wrote: All - I'm not singling out John for this comment, but just using it as a trigger . . . On Oct 31, 2008, at 11:45 AM, John Sadd wrote: it is totally effing amazing that a black man which raises the question, Why isn't Obama white? If that question sounds silly to you, think a little about how deeply you and I and everyone seem to have internalized the Jim Crow one drop rule (i.e., one drop of black blood makes you black . . .). Part of the trouble is that we're all willfully ignorant in our own ways, it's just hard to notice our own . . . But back to Owen's question . . . I'd say that the Republicans have really gotten on board with the idea that it's OK to say and do *anything* to get elected. In my experience, Democrats tend to have at least a little trouble flat out lying . . . I often play the projection game when I listen to political rhetoric -- i.e., if they accuse their opponents of something, it's probably because they know that's what they'd do (or are doing). A few examples: McCain says Obama will say anything to get elected (charge doesn't really apply to Obama, but certainly does to McCain).McCain/Palin say Obama is a socialist (Palin is popular in Alaska because she increased taxes on the rich (corporations) and gave the money directly to ordinary people, no strings attached). McCain says Obama wants to `spread the wealth around' -- meaning, he wants you to believe, take money from some people and give it to others (he, and rich Republicans, are all for it, as long as what you mean is, take $700 billion from ordinary people and give it to financial institutions . . .) Oh, well . . . tom p.s. On the Why isn't Obama white? question: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/27/EDQI13NPIT.DTLhw=why+isn%27t+obama+whitesn=003sc=242 FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
[FRIAM] Religion and human nature
-0700 From: glen e. p. ropella [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Thus spake Douglas Roberts circa 10/31/2008 05:15 PM: It is if you are my shill, sitting out there in the audience amongst all the rubes. I live to serve! -- glen e. p. ropella, 971-222-9095, http://tempusdictum.com -- Message: 15 Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2008 22:10:10 -0600 From: Tom Johnson [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [FRIAM] Ruth Charney on Modeling with Cubes [Macromedia Flash Player] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] com friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 From the Internet Scout *Ruth Charney on Modeling with Cubes [Macromedia Flash Player]* http://www.maa.org/news/102308charney.html The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) continues to build on their already solid online presence with the addition of this lecture by noted mathematician and scholar Professor Ruth Charney. This particular lecture was given at the MAA's Carriage House Conference Center in the fall of 2008 and it deals with how cubes can be used to represent a variety of systems. As Charney notes, The geometry of these spaces is strange, complicated, and a lot of fun to study. Visitors to the site can watch several particularly lucid examples from Charney's talk, read her biography, and also read a detailed interview with her conducted by Michael Pearson. [KMG]https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1view=pagename=gpver=sh3fib53pgpk# 11d532fd493691f2_team tj == J. T. Johnson Institute for Analytic Journalism -- Santa Fe, NM USA www.analyticjournalism.com 505.577.6482(c)505.473.9646(h) http://www.jtjohnson.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete. -- Buckminster Fuller == -- next part -- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20081031/0570cae 0/attachment-0001.html -- Message: 16 Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2008 22:30:43 -0600 From: Owen Densmore [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes People: I'm thinking Freakonomics here. Statistics. Human behavior patterns. You know, Science! Thus far I've heard only rants on religion, stupidity, and probably bad spelling. Is there *any* reason for the close vote (especially in the 2000 2004 2008 elections). Here are a few possibilities: - Parties form attractors. - Classism. - Single Issue voters. - Marketing to a tie. - The Central Limit Theorem. This is especially interesting seeing how the rest of the world is so *hugely* for Obama. What's different about us? And don't tell me Europeans are smarter than us, they aren't. Different, yes. But they elect assholes as often as we do. I heard an interesting talk about how historians look at this: http://radioopensource.org/a-longer-view-of-2008-historian-gordon-wood/ One of his points is that: I think that all of these candidates will find that they have been carried along by forces that they can scarcely understand. -- Owen -- Message: 17 Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2008 22:50:18 -0600 From: Owen Densmore [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes Hmm..this may be spot-on. -- Owen On Oct 31, 2008, at 12:07 PM, Richard Harris wrote: Saw an interesting article on this topic in the Guardian the other day. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/oct/28/us-education-election-ob ama-bush-mccain Don't really know what to add. Rich -- Message: 18 Date: Sat, 01 Nov 2008 08:12:42 -0600 From: Steve Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20081101/95932d4 a/attachment-0001.html -- Message: 19 Date: Sat, 1 Nov 2008 08:51:33 -0600 From: John Sadd [EMAIL PROTECTED
Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close
Douglas Roberts wrote: Like a dog returning his own vomit, I can't seem to distance myself from this thread. Owen Densmore speculated: People: I'm thinking Freakonomics here. Statistics. Human behavior patterns. You know, Science! . . . - Parties form attractors. Maybe by staring into this image (like a (swirling) pool of our own dogs-breakfast?) of the forces in an idealized 2-body gravitational system (Earth-Moon) we can find portents and signs (or inspiration) by analogy for some psuedo-scientific hypotheses that we can then psuedo-test against our (anecdotal) psuedo-evidence. On gross inspection I'd offer that L2 and L3 are where voters/supporters of the two parties orbit while independents and undecides hang out in orbits crossing L1. What of L4 and L5? Do Libertarians and Greens represent enough of a "different perspective" to be completely off the axes of Left/Right? If our election rules were different, would more voters/supporters accrete in these basins until we had three or more systems? To make the analogy work, I think there have to be both repulsive and attractive forces at work... not only can we vote *for* a party/candidate but we might instead be voting *against* the other(s). I know that my scant voting record has really been voting *against* a candidate, disguised as voting *for* his opposition. Just another thought to avoid real work and deadlines. - Steve FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Religion and human nature
To which of the 19 emails you forwarded do you refer? -- Owen Probably any/all of the 18 not labeled Modeling with Cubes ;-} I'd say we were off on a Rant yesterday! And the flurries continue today! Today's Topics: 1. Re: Election: Why So Close (Tom Carter) 2. Re: Election: Why So Close ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) 3. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 4. Re: Election: Why So Close (Marcus G. Daniels) 5. Re: Election: Why So Close (Roger Critchlow) 6. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 7. Re: Election: Why So Close (Steve Smith) 8. Re: Election: Why So Close (Jochen Fromm) 9. Re: Election: Why So Close (Russ Abbott) 10. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 11. Re: Election: Why So Close (glen e. p. ropella) 12. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 13. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 14. Re: Election: Why So Close (glen e. p. ropella) 15. Ruth Charney on Modeling with Cubes [Macromedia FlashPlayer] (Tom Johnson) 16. Re: Election: Why So Close (Owen Densmore) 17. Re: Election: Why So Close (Owen Densmore) 18. Re: Election: Why So Close (Steve Smith) 19. Re: Election: Why So Close (John Sadd) FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Religion and human nature
On Nov 1, 2008, at 11:18 AM, Steve Smith wrote: To which of the 19 emails you forwarded do you refer? -- Owen Probably any/all of the 18 not labeled Modeling with Cubes ;-} Well, my interest in the knowing the specific point, other than excellence of DSW's writing, was that I'd read some of the second book (lent to me by Nick). This came in the context of my trying to find a good, formal, mathematical treatment on Evolution. (Not genetics .. just basic Darwinist Evolution) If anyone knows of such a text, I'd love to know of it! SFI's David Krakauer gave a good talk on the stability requirements of variation and selection at the summer school. Here's his site: http://www.santafe.edu/~krakauer/Site/Welcome.html Re: Religion and Evolution -- Evolution was formally accepted into Catholic teachings in the early 1900s as I recall. (I suspect this to be true for most of the non-fundamentalist Christian religions.) There's never been much bother about it. I presume the same to be true for Judaism, Buddhism, Islam et. al. as well. -- Owen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
[FRIAM] New Topic: Stodgy Scientists (Happy, Nick?)
Tearing myself away from Steve's scientific representation of Dogs's Breakfasts for a moment, Here's what all you stodgy old scientists missed by staying home last night: http://tinstarmusic.blogspot.com/ --Doug On Sat, Nov 1, 2008 at 11:18 AM, Steve Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: To which of the 19 emails you forwarded do you refer? -- Owen Probably any/all of the 18 not labeled Modeling with Cubes ;-} I'd say we were off on a Rant yesterday! And the flurries continue today! Today's Topics: 1. Re: Election: Why So Close (Tom Carter) 2. Re: Election: Why So Close ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) 3. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 4. Re: Election: Why So Close (Marcus G. Daniels) 5. Re: Election: Why So Close (Roger Critchlow) 6. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 7. Re: Election: Why So Close (Steve Smith) 8. Re: Election: Why So Close (Jochen Fromm) 9. Re: Election: Why So Close (Russ Abbott) 10. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 11. Re: Election: Why So Close (glen e. p. ropella) 12. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 13. Re: Election: Why So Close (Douglas Roberts) 14. Re: Election: Why So Close (glen e. p. ropella) 15. Ruth Charney on Modeling with Cubes [Macromedia FlashPlayer] (Tom Johnson) 16. Re: Election: Why So Close (Owen Densmore) 17. Re: Election: Why So Close (Owen Densmore) 18. Re: Election: Why So Close (Steve Smith) 19. Re: Election: Why So Close (John Sadd) FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close
I have just now skimmed through the why so close discussion and would like to point out that the neo-conservative movement in the mid 1980s hired many think tanks, e.g. Rand, to establish a strategy with appropriate tactics for running campaigns, gaining power and changing laws and regs to hold onto power. Lee Atwater then Karl Rove were the main point persons for this strategy. The Republican party was organized using corporate methodology (and money) and IT, while the Dems who relied on older grassroots, sloppy organizational techniques. Also as Orlando and some others have pointed out racism is still a motivation in the US along with greed and fear to which the Rs have very successfully and subtly appealed. And of course the media which is virtually controlled by a couple of dozen powerful people and organizations has only served to dumb down the population. De Toqueville in the 19th century understood all this. Just my rather inane thoughts with hopes that McCain and Palin don't make it. Paul ** Plan your next getaway with AOL Travel. Check out Today's Hot 5 Travel Deals! (http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/10075x1212416248x1200771803/aol?redir=http://travel.aol.com/discount-travel?ncid=emlcntustrav0001) FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
[FRIAM] Book List
It's getting close to that time of year when I tell my relatives which books I would like to receive for Christmas. (This is looked on as a favor as I am otherwise a tough person to shop for). I have already gotten some good leads (including the David Wilson books and The Hemingses and Paul Krugman). I would be delighted to receive more suggestions. John From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of John Sadd [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, November 01, 2008 10:51 AM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close Tom, of course the question Why isn't Obama white? is perfectly valid. Most of us supposedly enlightened types would like to think that we all agree that, especially in a world where intermingling of a genetic nature among traditional genetic groups has made the notion of race fairly undefinable, it is of course not yet irrelevant. There are presumably genetic reasons why the children of mixed-race marriages between Caucasians and descendents of sub-Saharan Africans tend on average to preserve more of the physical traits of their African heritage, which contributes to our ease of identifying a Barack Obama as black, without qualification. But our own sordid history as a nation of course also contributes to how we tend to identify people. (And how interesting it is that all the false reports of Obama being a closet Muslim -- and the assumptions that that would make him a terrorist by association -- seem to have trumped at least public debates about his being black. I suppose it's just that the rumor-mongers know that they have to be more careful about racial epithets than non-American-standard religious ones.) Another couple of interesting data points (recognizing that I'm getting wildly off-topic here): My wife, who somewhat to her chagrin is descended from a number of prominent slave-owning southerners, is reading the book The Hemingses of Monticello, which sounds fascinating. Jefferson's relationship with Sally Hemings was of course no aberration. I think one of the basic tenets of the book (which I haven't read yet) is that basically everybody on the plantation was related, and they all knew it. If I remember correctly, Sally Hemings was a blood relative of Jefferson's wife. So we have a long tradition of carefully identifying the children of (typically) the rape of a black (slave) woman by a white man as black, so that they could clearly be identified as slaves. (Interesting point of comparison -- continuing wildly off-topic): White Australians discovered that the distinctive physical traits of aborigines tend to disappear much more quickly on average when they intermarry or otherwise mix genes with whites, maybe because the original gene pool of those aboriginal settlers must have been pretty small. So the Australian government took exactly the opposite tack of our own nation, and went through a period --shockingly recent -- of kidnapping young aboriginal children from their families, raising them in their equivalent of Indian schools, and encouraging poor whites to marry them, in effect to wash away the aboriginal blood. If you haven't seen it, rent the wonderful Australian film Rabbit-Proof Fence on this subject. While I'm in book review mode, I am reading Paul Krugman's excellent book The Conscience of a Liberal, which I highly recommend to anyone trying to figure out how to save liberal from being a dirty word. Enough. john On Oct 31, 2008, at 1:30 PM, Tom Carter wrote: All - I'm not singling out John for this comment, but just using it as a trigger . . . On Oct 31, 2008, at 11:45 AM, John Sadd wrote: it is totally effing amazing that a black man which raises the question, Why isn't Obama white? If that question sounds silly to you, think a little about how deeply you and I and everyone seem to have internalized the Jim Crow one drop rule (i.e., one drop of black blood makes you black . . .). Part of the trouble is that we're all willfully ignorant in our own ways, it's just hard to notice our own . . . But back to Owen's question . . . I'd say that the Republicans have really gotten on board with the idea that it's OK to say and do *anything* to get elected. In my experience, Democrats tend to have at least a little trouble flat out lying . . . I often play the projection game when I listen to political rhetoric -- i.e., if they accuse their opponents of something, it's probably because they know that's what they'd do (or are doing). A few examples: McCain says Obama will say anything to get elected (charge doesn't really apply to Obama, but certainly does to McCain).McCain/Palin say Obama is a socialist (Palin is popular in Alaska because she increased taxes on the rich (corporations) and gave the money directly to ordinary people, no strings attached). McCain says Obama wants to `spread the wealth around' --
[FRIAM] religion and human nature
Sorry, everybody, When I replied with the message below, I cc'ed the entire digest into my reply. BAD! BAAD! SysAdmin will kill me. I would feel guiltier except that Owen did the same thing. Anyway, with apologies to Owen and to Steve Smith, here, below, are cc of the messages I inadvertently buried when I hit reply. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, Clark University ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) Message: 2 Date: Sat, 1 Nov 2008 10:56:25 -0600 From: Owen Densmore [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Religion and human nature To: Nicholas Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED],The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes To which of the 19 emails you forwarded do you refer? -- Owen [20 messages below deleted] - Message: 3 Date: Sat, 01 Nov 2008 11:14:15 -0600 From: Steve Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Election: Why So Close To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20081101/0eedafb 6/attachment.html -- next part -- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 330px-Lagrange_points.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 31371 bytes Desc: not available URL: http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20081101/0eedafb 6/attachment.jpg -- ___ Friam mailing list Friam@redfish.com http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com End of Friam Digest, Vol 65, Issue 2 Message: 1 Date: Sat, 1 Nov 2008 10:52:20 -0600 From: Nicholas Thompson [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [FRIAM] Religion and human nature To: friam@redfish.com Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII I highly recommend David Wilson's two books, THE DARWINIAN CATHEDRAL and EVOLUTION FOR EVERYONE. The writing is strong and clear (if a little smug) and he has the issues nailed down absolutely tight. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology, Clark University ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
[FRIAM] New Topic: Science-based Fundamentalism
Here you go, Owen. I propose this example of a particular class of social dynamic to used as a case study for developing science-based explanations for human behavior patterns, rather than religious ones. I believe there are possibilities with the first and second categories that you suggest below, and particularly the Central Limit Theorem. This is an especially interesting study candidate, seeing how the many parts of the rest of the world are so *hugely* for stoning. What's different about us? And don't tell me Muslims are smarter than us, they aren't. Different, yes. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27484976/ --Doug PS: No ranting about my bad spelling, please... On Fri, Oct 31, 2008 at 10:30 PM, Owen Densmore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: People: I'm thinking Freakonomics here. Statistics. Human behavior patterns. You know, Science! Thus far I've heard only rants on religion, stupidity, and probably bad spelling. Is there *any* reason for the close vote (especially in the 2000 2004 2008 elections). Here are a few possibilities: - Parties form attractors. - Classism. - Single Issue voters. - Marketing to a tie. - The Central Limit Theorem. This is especially interesting seeing how the rest of the world is so *hugely* for Obama. What's different about us? And don't tell me Europeans are smarter than us, they aren't. Different, yes. But they elect assholes as often as we do. I heard an interesting talk about how historians look at this: http://radioopensource.org/a-longer-view-of-2008-historian-gordon-wood/ One of his points is that: I think that all of these candidates will find that they have been carried along by forces that they can scarcely understand. -- Owen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
[FRIAM] The first article on the cloud
http://www.economist.com/specialreports/displayStory.cfm?story_id=12411882 A survey of corporate IT: IT's global cloud | Let it rise | The Economist ( The one previous post and the others come after ) -- Peter Baston *IDEAS* /www.ideapete.com/ http://www.ideapete.com/ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] New Topic: Science-based Fundamentalism
On Nov 1, 2008, at 2:53 PM, Douglas Roberts wrote: Here you go, Owen. I propose this example of a particular class of social dynamic to used as a case study for developing science-based explanations for human behavior patterns, rather than religious ones. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27484976/ I think I'm missing something here. A horror occurred. Apparently due to religious extremism/fundamentalism. Are you saying that the all idiocy is of this sort? That it is pointless to wonder why the elections are so close when there would seem to be good reason for one candidate to be much preferred? That the election is close due to fundamentalism? I believe there are possibilities with the first and second categories that you suggest below, and particularly the Central Limit Theorem. This is an especially interesting study candidate, seeing how the many parts of the rest of the world are so *hugely* for stoning. What's different about us? And don't tell me Muslims are smarter than us, they aren't. Different, yes. Er, am I to assume that fear of Islam, or possibly Muslims, is the core reason for the close race? Or is this just an example of just how horrid the world can get? I understand that, at least. I appreciate being fed up with this sort of horror. But, getting back to voting, wouldn't that lead to wanting more enlightened leadership? Or maybe it just gets folks mad enough to go to war to try to stop it. Looks like a tie in terms of who to vote for. Oh, wait ... --Doug PS: No ranting about my bad spelling, please... My bad .. I included that quip as an indication of the extreme range of reasons we were groping for. -- Owen On Nov 1, 2008, at 2:53 PM, Douglas Roberts wrote: Here you go, Owen. I propose this example of a particular class of social dynamic to used as a case study for developing science-based explanations for human behavior patterns, rather than religious ones. I believe there are possibilities with the first and second categories that you suggest below, and particularly the Central Limit Theorem. This is an especially interesting study candidate, seeing how the many parts of the rest of the world are so *hugely* for stoning. What's different about us? And don't tell me Muslims are smarter than us, they aren't. Different, yes. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27484976/ --Doug PS: No ranting about my bad spelling, please... On Fri, Oct 31, 2008 at 10:30 PM, Owen Densmore [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: People: I'm thinking Freakonomics here. Statistics. Human behavior patterns. You know, Science! Thus far I've heard only rants on religion, stupidity, and probably bad spelling. Is there *any* reason for the close vote (especially in the 2000 2004 2008 elections). Here are a few possibilities: - Parties form attractors. - Classism. - Single Issue voters. - Marketing to a tie. - The Central Limit Theorem. This is especially interesting seeing how the rest of the world is so *hugely* for Obama. What's different about us? And don't tell me Europeans are smarter than us, they aren't. Different, yes. But they elect assholes as often as we do. I heard an interesting talk about how historians look at this: http://radioopensource.org/a-longer-view-of-2008-historian-gordon-wood/ One of his points is that: I think that all of these candidates will find that they have been carried along by forces that they can scarcely understand. -- Owen FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] Ruth Charney on Modeling with Cubes
Yes great stuff BUT sad that the you tube postings of the presentations suck and are un-viewable due to poor camera work ( I have emailed Ruth for a copy of her power point presentation and will post it when I get it ) There is also a fascinating guy on a similar program called Martin Golubitsky http://www.maa.org/news/090508mg.html and http://www.math.uh.edu/~mg/ discussing Patterns Patterns Everywhere which will blow your socks of ( Sadly same problem as Ruth's with the camera work and ditto with the powerpoint posting if he will send it to me.) I heard a lecture or interview of his once in which he says / Its especially important to realize that most models are just theories which may have no connection to anything in real life except in the mind of the modeler / Just about says it all. ( : ( : pete Peter Baston *IDEA-* /www.ideapete.com/ http://www.ideapete.com/ Tom Johnson wrote: From the Internet Scout *Ruth Charney on Modeling with Cubes [Macromedia Flash Player]* http://www.maa.org/news/102308charney.html The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) continues to build on their already solid online presence with the addition of this lecture by noted mathematician and scholar Professor Ruth Charney. This particular lecture was given at the MAA's Carriage House Conference Center in the fall of 2008 and it deals with how cubes can be used to represent a variety of systems. As Charney notes, The geometry of these spaces is strange, complicated, and a lot of fun to study. Visitors to the site can watch several particularly lucid examples from Charney's talk, read her biography, and also read a detailed interview with her conducted by Michael Pearson. [KMG] https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1view=pagename=gpver=sh3fib53pgpk#11d532fd493691f2_team tj == J. T. Johnson Institute for Analytic Journalism -- Santa Fe, NM USA www.analyticjournalism.com http://www.analyticjournalism.com 505.577.6482(c)505.473.9646(h) http://www.jtjohnson.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete. -- Buckminster Fuller == FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
Re: [FRIAM] New Topic: Science-based Fundamentalism
Here I am, staring into the Doug's Breakfast again! I just can't help myself! Same theme, Owen. No change. You are looking for scientific explanations for fundamentalist human behavior, rather than religious ones. I think Owen is looking for scientific explanations for why the election (appears to be) so close, given how much evidence there is for the need for an extreme change in our government, not for the motivation of the many (but not all) of McCain/Palin supporters who come from a religious fundamentalist perspective. I'd estimate no more than 50% of the Red voters are voting Red for these (religious/racist) reasons. For example, my own parents are neither Christian nor Racist, yet they still believe that liberal excesses are more dangerous than what we have just been through (8 or 28 years, depending on your measure). I don't get it, but I DO know that you can vote Red without being a religious fundamentalist. My parents may be the exception, but I don't think so. Hell, *I* voted for Reagan because in my own limited view/ignorance in my youth thought I was shutting down this very same thing (in the person of Jimmy Carter) in favor of a good honest actor who didn't speak southern and didn't invoke Christian Values. No Central Limit Theorem. I was more than half serious when I invoked the Lagrange model of orbital stability in two-body gravitational systems. I also believe that some application of the central limit theorem might be invoked as well. Some sampling theory might help too. For example: When one side (or the other) mobilizes and gets a groundswell of support, it is not surprising that the other side will react in kind. To the extent that everyone operates (politically) on a continuum between far left and far right (which I find a sad and probably self-reinforcing way of being) and can be polarized by greed or fear (or rhetoric) away from the center, it does seem that we would get a central-limit-esque bimodal distribution. I think this is why candidates often try to appear centrist during an election, to try to pick up part of the other hump, while the radicals on both sides try to polarize the issues to get those humps separated cleanly. I prefer a higher-dimensional model (like as many dimensions as there are issues? which if you press me, I will probably claim is uncountable or fractal or something) or at least the two-body orbit model. In that one, I personally tend to wander between L4 and L5 with only the occasional visit to L1 and with little or no interest in L3 or L2.. the issues are almost never so simple. For example, I can believe in the right to own guns without wanting (most) people to own guns and I can believe in the right to have abortions without wanting (most) people to have abortions, or the right for individuals to create and apply wealth without wanting them to use that to inhibit other's ability to do the same, etc. ad nauseum. No stochastic ABM rules. Doug's question about why people have a fondness, almost a need to be told what they should think is part of flocking (more aptly packing, herding, banding?) instincts, and *does* suggest some stochastic ABM rules might capture at least *some* of the results we see. No scientific proof. We still have little or no data in this realm (as far as I know), so it is hard to imagine more than some scientific models semi-validated only by anecdotal evidence and scant/weak data sources (polls, election results). So I agree, no scientific proof of much at all. Belief in the divine imperative of the right to stone 13 year old rape victims is based in religious dogma. A niggling point, but I think said stoners believe it is their *imperative* not their *right*... a subtle but important point. If we take it to be them acting on their right then it is easy to judge them wrongly. Belief that Barack Obama is a Muslim, or even more importantly is *not* a Good Christian is fed by religious dogma. Check this out: http://crooksandliars.com/david-neiwert/mccainpalin-supporters-let-their-rac Now, instead of looking for a scientific explanation of why those folks are acting this way, perhaps we should be investigating why it has been socially acceptable to teach people that this type of behavior is acceptable? I think xenophobia is deeply rooted and in our modern culture it looks like racism or classism. I think it is very natural for territorial herd/pack/band animals to treat others of their own species which are not identifiable as of their group, as enemies. I wish we had transcended this by now, but it doesn't surprise me that we go to it. And I agree with Doug that we should be looking at this more carefully, and looking at it across the board. We should, for example, throw Political Correctness into the blender with Religious Fundamentalism before we pour it into the analyzers and spread it in the petri dishes. I think the deeper
