On the
latest episode
of The Non-Prophets, the guys got into an extended discussion about
morality. That discussion should be required listening for anyone with
any questions about how you can be moral without absolute rules
imposed from without, or whether situational ethics automatically
means it’s okay to commit genocide.
But what interested me more was a connection I noticed to fiat
currency.
In
this episode
of the John Cleese podcast, he takes on a pet peeve of mine, and
explains with graphs and charts exactly why it’s wrong to say “I could
care less”.
Oh, and for those who didn’t know that John Cleese has a podcast:
John Cleese has a
podcast.
Since some cdesign proponentsists were getting all excited about the
release of
Expelled
on DVD, I looked it up at Box Office Mojo and found:
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed:
released Apr. 18, 2008, total lifetime domestic gross: $7,720,487.
Religulous:
released Oct. 1, 2008, total lifetime domestic gross: $10,599,000
(estimate).
Tonight, a few of us got together at an airport hotel bar to socialize, watch the debate, and have some beers. At some point we were joined by a business traveler, with whom we had a nice conversation slash bull session about a wide array of topics.
One thing that struck me was that every so often, he’d say something none of us agreed with, like “Wouldn’t it be better to just stop following the news for six months?
Wouldn’t you be much more relaxed?” We’d argue with that, and he’d put up his hands and say “Look, I’m just throwing it out there.” That struck me as odd, but I was too distracted at the time to offer a proper reply. What I should have told him was:
“Don’t apologize. What you’re doing is forcing me to examine my beliefs, and see whether they’re well supported. If there are sound reasons for believing what I do, I ought to be able to find them. And if you uncover a flaw in my reasoning, then you’re doing me a favor; I can stop believing something that isn’t true.” Read More
I just got back from an advance screening of Bill Maher’s new film,
Religulous,
(via the
Beltway Atheists, who
get a shout-out for it).
If you’ve seen the trailer, you know what to expect: Bill Maher
travels around the world, interviewing people about religion, and
basically letting them show how ridiculous their beliefs are. And
that’s basically it, plus some film clips thrown in for comic effect,
and some lines that you’d expect to hear on Real Time or
in his stand-up routine, rather than in a serious documentary.
The film does slow down in the last third, but not enough (IMHO) to
drag, and ends on a down note. In the meantime, it does manage to
raise some important questions about religion, though probably not the
ones one might expect.
Spoilers and ranting below the fold.
By newly-enacted federal law, everyone on the blagotubes has to write
a post about the ongoing financial meltdown before civilization (and
the Internet) collapses, so here’s mine. Of course, since I wouldn’t
know a 401(k) from a 386zx, take my uninformed ramblings with a big
rock of salt.
I’ve compared
free market capitalism to natural selection
before. They’re both powerful forces that work surprisingly well and
often come up with unexpected solutions to problems. I can
metaphorically (and in many neighborhoods, literally) stand on a city
street waving a $20 bill and shout “I’m bored/thirsty/lost!” and
someone will come along and fix that problem for me, whether by
offering me a Coke, a taxi ride, or acts that would make Larry Flynt
blush.
It works because it matches up people who want something (stuff) with
people who want something else (money), and rewarding those who do it
best. But what happens when the interests of the people who want stuff
and those of the people who want money aren’t aligned?
PDAs have solved or simplified a lot of the problems I used to have
before I started carrying around a backup brain. But there’s one type
of reminder that they still can’t deal with: “do X under when Y
happens”. E.g., “Return Paul’s book next time I see him” or “Look up
Janice if I’m ever in London.”
The Daily Show’s already mostly made the same point, so I may as well put out here something that’s been rattling around my brain for a while.
It’s one thing to act like an elitist bastard, but quite another to
speak or write like one. You can walk the walk, but can you talk the
talk? Here are some rules to help make sure you don’t lose bastard
cred.
Found while looking up something else1:
misogallic adj. characterized by hatred of the French.
1: In case you were
wondering, the thing I was looking for was another word for
“homophobe”, since homophobes sometimes say that the word doesn’t
apply to them, because they’re not afraid of homosexuals. I haven’t
found anything better, so may I suggest “misohome”?