No better example

Jeffrey Sachs, known for his profoundly unscientific beliefs in Global Warming and the ability to end world poverty, has written his final and Faraway column for Scientific American. And in it, he puts digs himself into logical hole of epic proportions:

This goal was not even remotely achieved. Indeed, it was barely even noticed by Americans: The U.S signed the convention in 1992 but never ratified it.Ratification feel victim to the uniquely American delusion that virtually all of nature should be subdivided into parcels of private property, within which owners should have their own way.

What a pathetic, petty, little diatribe. Mr. Sachs, you desperately need to have a reality check. Private property as the American delusion? Try the American dream.
Poor Jeff simply doesn't understand what the previous century has demonstrated countless amount of times. Public property and its means of production is a trainwreck of an idea from an efficiency standpoint, a horror in the mass slaughters it has engaged in, and in the suppression of true manhood.
The most telling bit of his entire article however, is that it provides the perfect proof of the link between the Environmental Movement and Totalitarianism. Private property is the only -- the ONLY -- defense mechanism the people have against a ruthless totalitarian government that the twentieth century produced in no short order.
Sachs' rants would be amusing, if it weren't for the fact that so many people taking his musings seriously. I would say powned, but that may not even suffice to describe Sachs' intellectual downfall sufficiently.
In the beginning of the 1st Century, Jesus Christ had to suffer with many deluded fools. He did not treat them lightly, He chastised them, nor did He tolerate them. He repeatedly criticized the "wise" men of the world for their arrogant incompetence and misunderstandings. Our time is no different, and although we have 2000 more years of history upon which to draw, there is still as much folly running rampant in the intellectual air that we breath. For proof of this, one need look further than Jeffrey Sachs and others like him. And like our Lord and Savior, we should not tolerate it.

The perfect Curriculum

It being the first day of school, I found myself thinking about what the most important aspects of education are, and how to obtain a solid knowledge base revolving around those aspects.
Now then, it is no secret that I loathe being lectured to; I asked my mother to pull me out of the school system when I was still in second grade because of the inevitable boredom that it wrought. Looking back at 17, I have to say that I do not regret that transition. Moreover, my conviction that one can obtain a superior education by self-learning is as strong as it has ever been. It was always obvious on a theoretical level, but now, at least for myself, it has proven to be empirically undeniable. What these years of self-education has also taught me is that while textbooks are necessary for some subjects, such as math and science, they are demonstrably not as useful has many books and blogs written by ordinary authors. One can reliably obtain the appropriate knowledge of politics, economics, social behavior, game theory, polemic argumentation, and all the big ideas that moved the world by reading Dale Carnegie, Vox Day, Roissy, and the Mises Intstitute.
Much this knowledge, useful knowledge, is seldom taught in the school system, public or private -- I very much doubt that one could go to a local high school, or even college, and find someone that knows what either Social Game Theory or Austrian economics are.
The problem with writing is easily solved: open a blog just like this one. Write about the books you read. And because you not drooling on your desk listening to a teacher for 7 hours a day, you will have sufficient time to read plenty of books.
People are starting to recognize the benefits. The ongoing Homeschool revolution, and the superior tests scores by homeschoolers, are merely providing empirical support from what was always obvious on a theoretical level. And that is to put the responsibility of your education into your own - and your parents'- hands.

The childish problem of evil

You know that there is not a single valid atheist argument out there when you hear infidels regurgitating the silly and irrelevant problem of evil, especially when they apply it to the Christian God.

But when we look at the world around us, we find prevalent instances of apparently gratuitous evil—pointless evils from which no greater good seems to result. According to proponents, the existence of apparently gratuitous evil provides strong evidence that God (as traditionally defined) does not exist (e.g., William Rowe)

By far, the problem of evil is the most ignorant, childish, and irrelevant argument against the Christians religion. And while many theologians have concocted their various complex theodicies on how the evil that exists in this world in all part of God's plan, the answer is actually much more simple. Christianity requires the existence of evil, it is predicated on it, for both logical and documentary reasons. Without evil, Man is not fallen, there is no need for a Savior, and the Christian worldview would be demolished. For if there is one single person, man or women, that leads a life devoid of evil, then you can dismiss Christianity once and for all.
Moreover, this avoids the Biblically-supported doctrine that the significant ruler of this world, at least for the time being, is a malicious being seeking the damnation of every soul. The Bible refers to him has lucifer, or satan. When God created the earth, He gave the race of Man dominion over it. But Man foolishly gave it away when Adam and Eve gave into the temptation to eat the apple, because they "wanted to be like gods". This in turn, allowed satan to usurp Man's dominion over this world into his own hands. This explains why Paul refers to him as “the god of this age” and how satan was able to tempt Jesus Christ by giving him the entire world if He were only to worship him.
It is clear that while the so-called problem of evil is convincing to the atheist who seeks to rationalize his disbelief, it is not so convincing to anyone who has even a basic understanding of the Bible and the orthodox interpretations of it.

Some thoughts this Summer

Its been a little quiet here at the alpha anomaly lately as I spent two weeks up in Canada and New York in July. That, and admittedly, my writing faculties have been suffering a stroke of laziness that sweeps through once and a while. What I have not been lazy in, however, is my reading. My reading has picked up this summer, and I am going at the fastest reading rate in my all of my 17 years of existence. I am currently reading A Canticle for Leibowitz, one heck of a book by the way, one in which I will surely be writing a book review once I finish it in its entirety. Additionally, I have been contemplating an idea that I could use to write my first novel. It is my intention to place the setting in a dark age, where leftist ideology has dominated all aspects of life, the engines that drive the world are absent, and where the knowledge of those engines have been completely stamped out. Its not total ignorance of the people, its just all Marx, Freud, Darwin, and Keynes. There is no freedom of thought or speech, and there are none that know the secrets of capitalism and the scientific method. Until one day....
Well, lets just say that I don't have the story completely mapped out, but I hope to add some interesting aspects to it that I hope will make it somewhat original .

The problem with Washington

Many have expressed their dismay with regards to the behavior of the politicians in Washington. This of course is a perfectly justifiable position; most politicians are frauds, their inability to understand basic principles of economics and human nature is laughable, and they seldom act within the general public interest.
There are several reasons why the folks at Washington are such a hapless bunch. First, most politicians are not the selfless, humble servants determined to advance the common welfare of the people that they make themselves out to be, but rather egotistical individuals that are motivated by extreme personal ambition. They are motivated by Power and Position, and of course, the perks that come with it. However, since we live in a democracy, or more specifically, a quasi- representative democratic republic, one must make a good public impression if one wishes to maintain their position. This invariably leads to actions that seek to rack up numbers in the voting polls. This explains the contradictory and hypocritical actions of politicians, which of course, was obvious to anyone who has half the wit to figure out that not everyone tells the truth, and that there is sometimes a monster behind that sweet talking young demagogue .
Second, is that they are human beings, and are just as corrupted by power as anyone else, arguably even more so. Since most of them do not view the people as individual human beings, but rather as a mass sea of faces, they tend to put their personal interests ahead of the people. They ease their consciousness that tells them they are in the wrong by concocting rationalizations for their corrupt behavior. Many academic disciplines are literally ruined because politicians only hear the theories that their ears want to hear.
The reason why Keynes general economic theory became such a widely held paradigm was not because of its intellectual veracity, but because it informed the politicians that their wasteful government programs and corrupt behavior was not only harmless, but beneficial to the economy. The general acceptance of the Global Warming fraud had a similar story.
The third reason is that politicians, like most everyone else, fall into functional idiocy. They may have P.H.D's from all the elite schools, but if they haven't bothered to use their intelligence to analyze many of their assumptions, then you will find even the most "educated" minds believing what the thinking man knows to be fairytales.
I don't believe that this explains all of the mysteries and idiosycracies of the Washington elite, but I hope that it will clear up some confusions with regards to the egregious blunders made by the people that run this country.
P.S It may appear by my terminology that I am lumping up every single politician together, even though this is not my intention. I recognize that are many good politicians, however the problem is that most of them demonstrably are not, these are the ones I was critiquing in my post.

To find the right balance

There are two primary methods of argumentation; one is to make use of the observable and empirical facts, which is called empiricism, the other is to solely rely on ontological reasoning and a priori logic, which is what I will call Medieval logic, because that was the method that the philosophers and theologians of the Medieval ages used. To give an example of each of these methods being utilized, I will present a hypothesis and will support it with just empiricism and then with just ontological reasoning.
My Hypothesis is this: Creating the Federal Reserve, contrary to its initial purposes, has created more monetary instability and inflation than would otherwise be the case if it were never established. Now then, if I were to take an empirical approach in demonstrating my case, I would make use of the facts and inflation statistics since its establishment in 1913, which show tremendous inflation and several boom-bust cycles, then I would juxtapose that data with what happened at a time where there was no central bank. If the observable facts show that there was more inflation with a central bank than there was with a gold standard, for example, then my argument is sound from an empirical approach.
But if I were to try to prove my hypothesis through logical means, then I would say that that is exactly what a central bank does, it prints money, and that if money is not connected to gold or silver or whatever, then inflation is bound to happen.
As it happens, both approaches lead to the same conclusion. But sometimes it is not always that simple. To give a recent example, conservatives rightly concluded the Obama stimulus package failed because it didn't bring unemployment down to its intended levels. Paul Krugman, however, has not let the observable facts get in the way with his philosophical pre-conceptions, as he has invariably stated that the stimulus package was "too small" and wasn't "applied properly," which is why it didn't work. This is why Murray Rothbard has argued that only logic can reliably test an economic theory, which explains the Austrian distaste for empiricism and emphasis on arguing by first principles and fundamental axioms (more on that later).
But sometimes just relying on philosophical reasoning can also lead to wrong conclusions. This is especially true with regards to human behavior. Because human action is seldom rational, and thus not easily predictable, taking a logical approach is bound to produce wildly inaccurate results.
For these reasons, it is shaky to solely base an argument on one or the other. And that the most effective argument is the one that utilizes both methods.
A perfect example is the case against Socialism. In 1922, Ludwig von Mises published a paper in which he argued that Socialism precluded rational economic calculation. Capitalism solves this through a price point, which is determined by supply and demand. But where the government owns the means of production, there can be no price point, and thus no room for economic calculation. This was a sound philosophical thesis, but it was only when the mass of observable failures in the countries where Socialism was enacted was the theory largely abandoned.
So while it is true that the proper balance between philosophical reasoning and empiricism differs from field to field, it is almost surely wise to be makes of both methods; to cite the relevant facts and then explain logically why this should be the case.

Find a better lexicon

During my various internet skirmishes, I have had the great fortune of finding some very talented and rigorous writers. But they are rare, as I have also come across more writers that really need to sharpen their debating skills. Or, more specifically, there ability to use the right words in the proper context. Consider the following statement by a Nobel Prize winner, Paul Krugman:

First, Hayek was as bad on the Depression as I thought. The claim that “many of the troubles of the world at the present time are due to imprudent borrowing and spending on the part of the public authorities” — in 1932! — is bizarre.

Mr. Krugman, you desperately need to find a better word than *bad*. There are two possible explanations for why he is unable to come up with a better term.
1. His vocabulary just doesn't stretch that far. He uses the word *bad* because there is no other word contained in his cranium. Kind of like that 4th grader that I ran into yesterday.
2. Krugman uses the word *bad* because he wants to convey the weakness of Hayek's theory about the Great Depression, but doesn't know WHY or HOW it is weak, so he unspecifically says that it is bad.

Now then, for all the flack that I would like to give Krugman for how willfully obtuse he is , there is plenty of evidence that he has a vocabulary that surpasses a fourth grader. So the second explanation seems to be the likely one, and that he really has no idea how to correctly describe the flaws in Hayek's argument because he doesn't he can't identify them.
Let me elaborate further; if I were to describe an opponents argument, I wouldn't simply say it is *bad*, I would use terms that specifically relate to why exactly the argument is wrong. For example, I would describe the secular argument that the founding fathers were mostly influenced by the enlightenment as demonstrably false that relies on many factual inaccuracies, because that is why argument is bad. Additionally, I would describe the Euthyphro dilemma as logically invalid, Keynesian economics to be intrinsically flawed, and Marx's labor theory of value as outdated.
All of these terms have different meanings; they are not different words to describe the same thing. It is readily apparent that the reason Krugman says that Hayek's hypothesis is bad is because he doesn't know why it is bad. Is it empirically false? Contradictory? Specious? Outdated? Circular?
In the same vein, P.Z Myers, in a recent email exchange I had with him, calls Vox Day's book The Irrational Atheist *awful*. So P.Z, in what way is the book awful? To this P.Z has nothing to say because he doesn't know. The problem is not that he can't back up his assertions, it is that he cannot even properly characterize an argument beyond simply calling it *awful*. Dear Paul and P.Z, you guys truly need to step up your lexicon and intellectual rigor if you really want to be taken seriously; because dismissing an argument as *bad* or *awful* simply will not fly. The only purpose that that serves is to demonstrate your complete inability to discern the mistakes of you opponents as well as discrediting your intellectual honesty because it shows how you dismiss arguments that you don't like out of hand.
I ask you, dear skeptical reader, would you really takes theses writers' poorly constructed cliches at face value? I cannot say that this is a universal law, but it has proven to be a rather useful B.S filter when examining an authors writing ability.

How to argue like a champion

In my experience with internet and blogospheric debate, I have picked up some rather useful advice in constructing a coherent and convincing argument. I hope you will receive these tips of wisdom in the manner that I humbly present them.

1. Always share with others your personal stories and preferences, they don't even have to relate to the specific case you are making, because everyone is so interested in what you happen to think about the matter. You define reality, not observe it.

2. To add on to that, do make sure that you provide personal anecdotes in lieu of actual statistical data. Because a micro exception always trumps the macro rule.

3. Once you have demonstrated that a certain authority is in accordance with your views, openly declare the debate to be settled because the authorities are never, ever, wrong. Their pratfall performance regarding the issues of global warming, Socialism, Keynesianism, and String theory notwithstanding.

4. When examining the arguments of your opponent, the best way to refute him is by looking at his motives. If there are any signs that he may have any biases, promptly proclaim that his arguments don't merit discussion because he is [insert derogatory term here]

5. Openly declare that you will present a rebuttal to a certain book/article/speech before you actually dive into it and know what it actually says. You know, because you're so open-minded that regardless of what happens to be in those articles of information, you won't change your mind.

6. Regard any accusation of racism or sexism as an immediate victory on your part. Because any view conflicting with the egalitarian aspects of mankind is evil of the worst sort.

7. If somebody makes a factual inaccuracy that is only tangentially related to the argument and not the foundation of it, concentrate solely on that inaccuracy while completely ignoring the larger and more important part of the argument that is actually relevant to its validity. Example: "Our national debt is 12 trillion, we need to stop government spending." Rebuttal: "No! Our national debt is 11 trillion, therefore we need to keep spending!"

There you go. With those precious gems of wisdom, you will forever be an unbeatable debate champion.

Fearless violaters of logic

Lest you have any doubts about the total economic ignorance that pervades the internet, this should remove any doubts. Consider the following comments that were made by several brilliant men on a certain internet thread.

Still, it's pretty hard to argue with the fact that a wartime command economy putting people back to work like crazy was one of the most instructive case for keynesianism.

I'm a liberal and I'm fairly certain WWII is what got us out of the Depression. Because a whole bunch of jobs opened up all of a sudden, and the unemployed and the technically-not-unemployed ( or did labor stats back then include 'sick of expending effort looking for jobs that either aren't out there or won't hire me'?) became the employed. If we could duplicate that without putting a bunch of people in uniform to go shoot people, we might be getting somewhere.

"The war" was massive government spending, public employment, and even industrial control boards, hardly an indictment of government interventionism.

There you have it, words of wisdom from the intellectually super powered. Now all we have to do is get everyone to dig holes and then fill them up again and we'll get ourselves out of our present economic predicament! I don't have a PHD in economics or anything, but something tells me that that is not how a real economy actually functions.

What these illiterate morons have trouble grasping is that employment is not synonymous with wealth. The two are not totally unrelated, but they are far from the same. Employing millions of people to fire darts at a target purposelessly doesn't improve the economy, it impoverishes it. Government stimulus -- war is a so called stimulus -- is a parasite that diverts resources and human capital away from productive sectors to useless ones. War is an extreme form of parasitism, it only builds to destroy.

Ironically, however, is that even though their reasoning is laughably baseless, their conclusion regarding the historical remedy of the Great Depression is nevertheless sound.

WW2 really did get the U.s economy going, though for an entirely different reason than these clowns would have it. It wasn't the fact that the government employed millions of people during the war time that stimulated the U.S economy, it was the fact that we wiped out the industrial base of Europe and Japan. Our manufacturing industry grew exponentially during the post-war years because we rebuilt Europe's infrastructure for them.

Now that wasn't so hard, was it?

The Fallacy of Christian Socialism

The idea that production can be solely owned and run by the public apparatus, i.e Socialism, has been refuted time and time again both by its numerous historical failures and its inherent logical contradictions. There is, however, another fall-back position that many desperate Socialists have retreated to, the idea that Socialism is a moral imperative under the precepts of Christianity. It is claimed that because Jesus commanded us to care for the poor, programs such as welfare are mandated under the Judeo-Christian ethic.

There are several problems with this. First, legality is not morality; issuing a moral command is not tantamount to advocating a legal demand for it. For example, saying that it is wrong to smoke is not synonymous with urging a legal ban on ciggaretes. In a similar manner, exhorting one to help like the good Samaritan is not the same thing as demanding that everyone do so lest they be arrested by the police.

But even if we grant this intellectual cri de coeur the benefit of veracity, the problem still remains because Socialism demonstrably does not help the poor better than its antithesis: Capitalism. The poor enjoy a tremendously higher standard in Capitalist societies than those in Centrally planned ones. Moreover, because under the Judeo-Christian ethic Man is also obliged to work hard to give glory to God. And there is no other system that fosters such a work ethic than Capitalism.

Christian Socialism is an absurdity, its emphasis over moral imperatives instead of reason and logic is the only way that it stands, however infirmly, on its feet. But even from a moral standpoint it is a monstrosity. If a Christian truly desires to fulfill his ethical duties to his Lord and Savior, then I suggest he use his God-given intelligence by rejecting that one train-wreck of an idea that is Socialism.

The Relevance of George Orwell

George Orwell, known for his anti-totalitarian novels 1984 and Animal Farm, has been deservedly regarded as a prophet of our times for describing with striking realism the horrors that an overly expansive government can be responsible for. His reputation as a prophet is not ill-founded. The twentieth century totalitarian regimes demonstrated that his conjectures are not simply a fictitious figment of the imagination, but an empirical reality. This is incontrovertible. But because words such as fascism and totalitarianism are often confused with just murderous governments of the past, and not its fundamental nature, most people fail to understand why Totalitarianism holds such an appeal. So appealing is the Totalitarian temptation that even in the predominantly capitalist West we see unmistakable signs of it.
To give an example, George Orwell described the world in which 1984 took place in as a global struggle between 3 superpowers, Eurasia, Oceania, and Eastasia. They warred with each other with the cryptic purpose of keeping each other in a permanent slump, where they produce the machine without raising the standard of living. This allowed the State to keep its citizens in an everlasting state of slavery and serfdom, keeping them dependent. There was no military purpose for the war; the only effect it had was to keep the people in an ever-patriotic state and gave the State and excuse to control them.
Fortunately, such a despicable idea has not pervaded the thoughts of our elected officials, but there is something that is almost as contemptible which runs rampart within our intellectual circles: that war is an inherent stimulant to the economy because employment is synonymous with wealth. This is typical Keynesian -- which is the model that guides most mainstream economists. Another similarity between Orwell's fiction and the West can be seen with the application of omnipresent monitor technology. In 1984, Orwell posited telegrams everywhere in the land that censored people for thought crimes and any suspicious behavior. But now not only are many hate crimes against the government banned, but in England there are actually cameras being placed almost everywhere, just like in 1984.
Orwell also talks about the concept of double speak or double think, where one can say something out of one side of his mouth and something contradictory out of the other. This sort of behavior is reminiscent of the relativism movement, where objective truth is abandoned in favor of subjective feelings.
And if one still harbors any doubts about Orwell's relevance, then his depiction of the revolutionary movement in Animal Farm should kill it off for good.
After the farm animals took over the farm from their human owner they set up 7 specific rules of abidance:

Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes up four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal
All animals are equal.

Over the course the story these commandments eventually mutated into:

No animal shall sleep in a bed with sheets.
No animal shall drink alcohol to excess.
No animal shall kill any other animal without cause.
All animals are equal. But some are more equal than others.

One only has to know about the constant revisions that the U.S Constitution has undergone and the various pleas for further revision to realize how much of a parody this is.
But what is a more brilliant theme, however, is how Orwell depicts the revolutionary process. The animals overthrow a seemingly brutal dictator - the human. And then a leader of the revolution takes over and establishes an even crueler tyranny, a theme taken straight out of the historic horrors of the French Revolution to be sure.

So finely did Orwell depict the totalitarian tendencies of human nature, and so cruel have they been manifested, that it is unfortunate in how we have continually neglected to learn the lessons explicated by this great author.

Dale Carnegie on public speaking part 1

Dale Carnegie is best known for his mega-selling book How to win friends and influence people, but that was not the only book he has written worthy of note. Over the past few weeks I have been perusing through his How to develop self-confidence and influence people by public speaking, and I have decided that it was worth blogging about. In the first chapter, he enumerates four things in helping one speak in public:

First, Start with a strong and persistent desire to get better.
Second, Know thoroughly what you are going to talk about.
Third, Act confident.
Fourth, Practice! Practice! Practice!

All of these are good tips. I would place special emphasis on preparation myself. I remember my Grandad telling me that if you want to speak well, learn the subject of your talk better than anyone else in the room. This will also will be a tremendous confidence enhancer; regardless of how well you can speak extemporaneously, if you don't know the first thing about the subject your are speaking about then your speech is going to look like Obama's sans his teleprompter.
How should one prepare? Carnegie has this to say:

Does the preparation of a speech mean the getting together of some faultless phrases written down or memorized? No. Does it mean the assembling of a few casual thoughts that really convey very little to you personally? Not at all. It means the assembling of your thoughts, your ideas, your convictions, your urges....Do not sit down and try to manufacture a speech in thirty minutes. A speech can't be cooked to order like a steak. A speech must grow. Select you topic early in the week, think over it during odd moments, brood over it, sleep over it, dream over it, discuss it with your friends. Make it a topic of conversation. Ask yourself all possible questions concerning it.

This is precisely the opposite of what novel speakers do; they sit down, write up a speech, rehearse it, and either memorize the speech or read out loud from a script when delivering it. NEVER do that. Don't even have notes. It is an absolute nightmare to sit and listen to a speech that is read out loud, or even memorized and recited word for word.
I suggest you prepare your speech by writing the main points on a piece of paper, then pontificate your speech in your head or out loud throughout the day while you are doing whatever it is you are doing. You'll be surprise how effective this is.

More economic claptrap

Benanke is talking nonsense, again:

The U.S. economy should continue to grow this year and next, but the pace won't be strong enough to fix the job market and cut a huge budget deficit, the Federal Reserve chief said Wednesday.

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke told the House Budget Committee on Wednesday that a continued increase in consumer spending and business investment should make up for a fading government stimulus in lifting the economy....

He said the U.S. budget deficit should narrow over the next few years as the economy and financial markets continue to recover. But without further policy actions that won't be enough, Mr. Bernanke warned, because the economy's recovery is expected to remain moderate.

The Fed chairman said the recovery won't be fast enough to put 8 million people back to work in a short period. He also cautioned the housing market remains soft

This is hilarious. First, in the years preceding the 2008 crises, he insisted that the fundamentals of the economy were "strong." Then, ever since 2009 he has repeatedly said that worst of the current crises was over and 2010 will mark a year of remarkable recovery. Now that 2010 has obviously not been a year of recovery, he is saying that it will undoubtedly grow but just slowly. What is the most telling, however, is how he insists this despite the fact that the U.S is in an unprecedented debt crises.

I contend that not only is Bernanke wrong this time, but wildly incorrect, the rest of 2010 and 2011 will not be a period of recovery. It will instead be a period of severe hardship. I suspect that the contraction that we will witness will be of similar proportions as the Great Depression in 1929-1933.

I would be remiss, however, if I neglected to commend him for at least coming to the obvious conclusion that the U.S. budget deficits aren't sustainable.

The Right, the Left, and Economics

From the Wall Street Journal. In which I am not surprised:

Zogby researcher Zeljka Buturovic and I considered the 4,835 respondents' (all American adults) answers to eight survey questions about basic economics. We also asked the respondents about their political leanings: progressive/very liberal; liberal; moderate; conservative; very conservative; and libertarian.....In this case, percentage of conservatives answering incorrectly was 22.3%, very conservatives 17.6% and libertarians 15.7%. But the percentage of progressive/very liberals answering incorrectly was 67.6% and liberals 60.1%. The pattern was not an anomaly.

One of the things that I realized when I began studying sound economics was how useful it was when refuting left-wing ideology. Because the reality is, left-liberalism is not based on reason or evidence, but mere emotional plea. The reason why so many leftists are willfully ignorant of economics is because if they had a reasonable knowledge of the subject, they wouldn't be leftists in the first place. And as the current recession that started in 2008 has demonstrated in real time, even leftists with seemingly impressive academic credentials in economics were confounded by the events that unfolded simply because they were inexplicable within their left economic framework known as Neo-Keynesianism.
But I think there is another element to this as well. And that is that Leftists-liberals simply cannot think logically. It is a rarity indeed when one hears a left-liberal politician actually present a coherent argument - and whenever one does it is usually based on a demonstrably incorrect fact or assumption. Also, if one looks at the questions of the survey, most of them are completely logical and could be answered answered correctly by someone who has never even cracked Econ 101. Either way, this study is an absolute darning piece of evidence against the leftist dogma that the democratic party is the party of intellect and sophistication.

The Morality of Music

I was reflecting on the morality of music while I vacillated over what genre of music I should listen to; I was thinking either in-your-face-punk metal or soothing country.
I felt like getting mad so I was naturally tempted to listen to the metal. But I knew that getting mad would not be good for me at the moment, so I finally decided to go for the country.
It was at this moment that I finally realized what was the key aspect that determined the morality, or immorality, of music. It seems that music is in itself an amoral dynamic, but it nonetheless influences the thoughts, feelings, and even actions of the individual listening to it. So the answer seems to be that of edification, how does the music affect the listener? But because the morality of a certain piece of music cannot be objectively measured since it is dependent upon the listener, it is an entirely subjective matter, because what might influence one person positively might influence another negatively. What follows then, is that the music which edifies is good, and the music that negatively influences is wrong.
But I am afraid this is a tragic oversimplification. It was one of Bach's most cherished convictions that every type of music, even secular, gives glory to God, because it is a way that the musician expresses the talents that God has given him.
I do not pretend to have all the answers, and my conjectures are tentative and liable to any sort of correction. But I am most certain that music, of almost every type, can have a positive impact on your mental health. It seems to be one of the two known universal languages, mathematics being the other.

The War in Heaven: A Review

I finished The War in Heaven by Theodore Beale yesterday. I was intrigued into reading the novel not only because it was written by one of my favorite authors, but also because it was inspired by the spiritual warfare theology popularized by Gregory Boyd, the pastor of Woodland Hills Church in Minnesota. Boyd's warfare theology is based on the biblical passages that make the implication of Satan's significant influence in this world, and that the fight between Good and Evil occurs both on the natural and the supernatural levels. And that there are many supernatural beings, good and evil, that influence many of our moral decisions.
I was intrigued by this theology, which was why I wanted to get my hands on Theodore Beale's book.
The books starts off with the forces of evil planning on storming the gates of heaven, but they need one more thing: the immortal powers hidden within a teenage boy Christopher. The evil forces gain control of Christopher by appealing to his vanity and he becomes a great power of evil that is critical to Lucifer's plan to take over heaven. Simultaneously, Christopher's two sisters, Holli and Jami, go in the opposite direction, fighting alongside the angels and archons of God.
What follows is all-out spiritual warfare, which made for an extremely entertaining read. Beale also fills the book with illuminating facts about the nature of evil and temptation.
The War in Heaven is an overtly Christian novel with a Christian worldview. Its Christian theme is far more evident to the reader than either Narnia or Lord of the Rings.
But I must warn you, however, that, especially at the beginning, the novel is pretty dark, as it could quite reasonably be categorized as "dark fantasy." But amidst all the despair, there is some light in the story, as God's sovereignty is amply demonstrated by the way that Kherev Elohai, or Jesus Christ, effortlessly destroys even the most powerful of evil beings.
I found it interesting how Beale depicts Lucifer as an extremely handsome and beautiful character instead of an ugly and despicable one. In the author's note, Beale explains how evil can be attractive, even beautiful; and it is because of that that sin is always tempting and seductive.
Overall Beale should be commended for combining an eminently readable story with keen insights into the nature of good and evil. 8.5/10

Why I am against the Welfare State

I will be making my case against socialism proper in a later post, but for the time being, I will rest content in concentrating on a single aspect of socialist economics: Redistribution, otherwise known as spreading the wealth around.
While it is still promoted by the politicians who wish to rack up as many votes as possible, the idea of the welfare state is no longer a tenable position in the eyes of rational economists. And for a good reason; slowly but inexorably, the economic and technological sciences have rendered the entire foundation of redistributive economics outdated and intrinsically flawed.
It is has long been known that the process of expropriating wealth from one group and giving it another is strikingly inefficient. It has been said that as high as 50 percent of the money being distributed falls into the hands of bureaucrats - and thus being sucked out of the private sector. What this has lead many to conclude, unfortunately, is not that welfare is a program with numerous structural flaws inherent in the system and thus should be abolished, but rather that its current form simply needs revising.
All revisions that improve the efficiency of the redistributive process should be lauded, but there is a limit to how efficient one can make it. And there is no evidence that welfare can be a viable and efficient program and plenty of evidence to the contrary.
With that being said, the fact that welfare programs allocate wealth from the private-capital-creating sector to the public-parasitical sector is not the only reason to doubt the efficacy of redistributionism. The core problem with it and the reason why economists find it to be so untenable is that it diverts wealth from the rich, who demonstrably know how to manage and invest their money, to the poor, who demonstrably do not. This is not an argument from unfairness, but rather it is simply an extrapolation inferred from an observation as well as an economic fact that it is savings and investment - which create capital - that are the hallmark of a strong economy. By diverting wealth from the people who know how to invest in capital wisely to those who don't is a severe hindrance to the economy.
It is one of the most profoundly ignorant myths that the poor are hurt by the rich. In fact, in a capitalist society where one has to appeal to the consumer's interest to be successful, it is precisely the opposite. It is because Bill Gates founded Microsoft that poor people can enjoy the software he created; it is because a large company is lucrative and isn't taxed to death that it is able to pay its workers better.
But the biggest crime of the Welfare State is that it completely redefines the scope and purpose of the government. Once the government is committed to ensure the financial well-being of every citizen it is no longer a small and limited entity, but a Nanny state.
Conclusion: Welfare is not viable from an economic perspective, its primary appeal, that it helps the poor, is based on a demonstrably false understanding of economics and is the result of ignoring the undeniable fact that the poor in this country are far better off than even the relatively well-do-to in other countries where capitalism not been tested. Capitalism and the work ethic that it fosters has done far more for the poor than any welfare program ever has, it always will.

The illogic of Feminism

In my experience, debates about abortion are mostly littered with the same, ineffectual arguments about whether a 1 pound "fetus" is a human being or not, and whether God considers that fetus to be sacred. One can see how these arguments are ineffective by observing the simple fact that the two sides simply do not share the same assumptions -- it is not exactly the best way to hone your debating skills by basing your entire argument on what your opponent considers to be the equivalent of the collective wit and wisdom of the tooth fairy. What most feminists do not realize, however, is that it is not what one side believes about the theological doctrines about a soul or the sacredness of human life that will eventually demolish their hypothesis, but the logical absurdity of their position: that it is a women's inalienable right to abort a pre-mature baby.
As recent scientific studies in the area of genetics have shown, it will soon become a reality that one can actually customize the genetic material of a pre-born fetus. But if it is an absolute right for a woman to kill a fetus, then they should similarly embrace the idea of a women being able to customize the fetus in any way, be it for good or evil, because we are reliably informed that it is a women's right to do whatever she would like with her body.
But it is readily apparent that feminists will find this to be repulsive, for we are already seeing them frifle at the mouth whenever a Chinese or an Indian aborts a child simply because it is a girl -- which is why there are millions of excess males in China and India. But if it is a sacred right to abort, then it why should it matter what the reasons are for the specific abortion?
There are no arguments for the pro-choice position that stand up to science and reason, they are all specious in one way or another. Feminism is a complete failure, and anyone who seriously wishes to entertain the idea of a free society has a moral and civic duty to dismiss it for the terrible idea that it is.

Should everybody have equal opportunity?

Should everybody have equal opportunity?

I found myself contemplating this question after inadvertently stumbling across the apparent dichotomy between the two senses of equality: equality in opportunity and equality in success. The former is a belief that no one should be born with an unfair advantage, the latter is a dogmatic creed that holds that everybody's success should be put in parity with each other.
But before we move on, it must be noted that it is eminently clear to anyone sufficiently grounded in reality that equality does not, will not, and cannot exist in any material sense; everyone is different, no human being is equal in ability and action than anyone else. Mind you, this does not mean that anyone is intrinsically superior to another, but simply that no two individuals are equal.
Going back to the question of whether people should have equal opportunity or not, it seems to me that individuals manifestly do not have the same opportunities as each other, a poor kid will most likely have less opportunities than a rich kid, for example. The problem arises whenever an intervening entity, such as the government, elects to disrupt the natural tendencies of reality by directly eliminating the inequality of opportunity that necessarily exists as a part of the human condition. This usually involves programs such as welfare, the progressive tax, affirmative action, and anti-discrimination laws. But because it is based on a manifestly nonexistent concept, state-imposed equality is a failure that is doomed from the start. And in the process, it systematically eradicates all of human liberty.
So the answer is no, people should not have equal opportunity because it is an empirical absurdity, the only way it could conceivably exist is through the actions of an unlimited State that controls every human action. Equality of opportunity should only exist in the sense that the State should have no right to violate the individual's right to life, liberty, and property.

What is so special about Christianity?

1340Jacob asks a humble question:

Could you do a video validating christianity over every other religion, only using peer-reviewed material or at least papers and books with a reference page (so the bible is out)? I am just curious if you can come up with a logical and compelling argument, no need to be a 100% persuasive, just don't sound like a complete fool.


I will present my case for Christianity in bits and pieces all throughout the summer as it is a subject that demands much more consideration than a single youtube video. I will make that video, but I will be blogging about it much more substantively.
It is my contention that Christianity provides the best explanation for the observable world and that it is the most accurate historical and predictive model that Man currently possesses. My case will be far more than a simple re-hash of Christian Apologetics, as the people who know me have come to understand, my arguments are seldom the expected ones, which is probably why they are so effective in debate with people who are only equipped to deal with cliched ones in a perfunctory way.