Crusader mentality

When I hear people make ridiculous and deliberately inflammatory statements, sometimes I have to resist the temptation to grab them by the shoulders and yell, "Will you listen to what you're saying?"

Not, of course, that it would be likely to do any good.  Although it may sound cynical, I think a lot of these people aren't reacting thoughtlessly and out of anger, which although it may not excuse rage-filled diatribes, certainly would make them understandable.  I think that a lot of these folks are saying and writing these things in a cold, calculated fashion, in order to make others angry, so as to incite their followers toward some political end.

Take, for example, the piece that ran yesterday in Top Right News, entitled "OUTRAGE: Obama Equates Christianity with ISIS at Prayer Breakfast."  Now, before we get to the commentary, let's see what the president said that got these people so stirred up:

Humanity has been grappling with these questions throughout human history.  Unless we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place.  Remember that during the Crusades and Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ.  And our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often were justified in the name of Christ.

Harmless enough statement, you'd think.  "Don't use your religion to justify atrocities; it's been done before.  It was wrong then when they did it, and it's wrong now when ISIS does it."  Hard to see how anyone would argue with that.

But Obama made two mistakes: (1) he mentioned Christians, and (2) he's Obama.  So naturally, the backlash was instantaneous and vitriolic.  Here's a bit of the response from Top Right News:

Muslims began the slave trade in Africa — and still enslave people today.  ISIS is enslaving Yazidi Christians in Iraq and Syria.  Slavery ended here in 1865, and it was a devout Christian, William Wilberforce who began the abolitionist movement that ended slavery in the UK and US.

So, what you're saying is, the evil Muslims forced the Americans own slaves?  The nice Christian Americans struggled against it, only keeping slaves because they had no choice (and probably treating them as members of the family the whole time)?  Until finally good ol' Wilberforce threw off that evil Islamic menace and got Lincoln to free the slaves?

How ignorant of history are you? To take only one example, read what was written by James Henry Thornwell, the leader of the South Carolina Presbyterian Churches, in 1861:

Is slavery, then, a sin?...  Now, we venture to assert that if men had drawn their conclusions upon this subject only from the Bible, it would no more have entered into any human head to denounce slavery as a sin than to denounce monarchy, aristocracy, or poverty.  The truth is, men have listened to what they falsely considered as primitive intuitions, or as necessary deductions from primitive cognitions, and then have gone to the Bible to confirm their crotchets of their vain philosophy.  They have gone there determined to find a particular result, and the consequence is that they leave with having made, instead of having interpreted, Scripture.  Slavery is no new thing.  It has not only existed for aged in the world but it has existed, under every dispensation of the covenant of grace, in the Church of God.

Slavery is condoned over and over in the bible -- even going so far as to say that slaves should obey their masters "in fear and trembling" (Ephesians 6:5).

But Top Right News isn't done yet; they claim that the Crusades were also the fault of the Muslims, that "the Crusades were a direct response to Islamic jihad," with the clear implication that the Crusaders were pure of heart and soul, only doing what was right to "free the Holy Land" from the Muslims.

Funny thing, then, that the Crusaders spent a good bit of time on the way to Jerusalem hacking at Christians who were less than orthodox, and also the Jews, who seemed to have a way of getting the short end of the stick from everyone.  Godfrey de Bouillon, one of the exemplars of the Crusader mentality, famously vowed that he "would not set out for the Crusade until he had avenged the crucifixion by spilling the blood of the Jews, declaring that he could not tolerate that even one man calling himself a Jew should continue to live."  All through what is now Germany the Crusaders slaughtered every heretic and Jew they could find, sometimes with the complicity of local bishops, and sometimes against their orders (the bishops of Cologne and Mainz paid de Bouillon 500 pieces of silver to persuade him to leave their towns alone, which de Bouillon did).

Murder of Jews during the First Crusade, from Bible Moralisée [image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

Look, I'm not saying that the Muslim caliphate that was ruling Jerusalem at the time was a bunch of nice guys.  But the Crusaders were, by and large, narrow-minded, violent, hyper-pious, obsessive, bigoted assholes.  Painting the Crusades as a justified "response to Islamic jihad" is idiotic.

Of course, the uncredited writer for Top Right News who wrote the piece about Obama's speech probably doesn't care about silly little things like "facts."  All (s)he cares about is turning the Rage Parade against Obama by whatever means necessary.  And as we've seen more than once, this is manifesting as a manufactured and imaginary persecution of Christians in the United States, despite the fact that 3/4 of Americans are self-professed Christians (including the president!), and Christians enjoy an unchallenged hegemony in every political office in the land.

The whole issue here really boils down to "not lying."  Whatever you believe politically, you gain nothing by (1) twisting the words of your opponent to mean something that they obviously didn't mean, and (2) inventing history to support your contention.  It may inflame your supporters, but to the rest of us, it looks more like you have no justification for your stance other than screed, ad hominem, and outright falsehoods.

Canadian alien invasion conspiracy

The conspiracies have been coming hard and fast lately.  I'm finding it hard to keep up with all of them.  We have all of the "false flag" operations (from the various school shootings to the death of actor Paul Walker), assorted weather phenomena that clearly are man-made (such as this week's polar vortex event), and miscellaneous accusations of Top Secret Scary Stuff (like what I dealt with in yesterday's post, which was the hidden agenda at CERN to use the Large Hadron Collider to resurrect the Egyptian god Osiris).

Which brings up an interesting question: if you're a conspiracy theorist, are you required by the bylaws to believe in all of them?  Or do you pick and choose?  Are there some ideas so idiotic that even Alex Jones would say, "Naw, that's just ridiculous"?

Because if the latter is true, I think I may have found the odds-on favorite.  Jim Garrow, an "Obama birther truther" and general wingnut, appeared on a radio show a few days ago hosted by Fox News contributor Erik Rush, and in an interview that should win some kind of award for sheer bizarreness, told us all about how President Obama is part of a secret plot.  He's upset by his decreasing approval ratings, and he's found a way to remedy the problem.  And that solution is to sell us out to aliens and Canadians.

No, I'm not making this up.  Here is a direct quote:

What we’re going to be seeing soon is the unveiling of the concept that we have, in fact, been contacted and have been in communication with people from other civilizations beyond earth, and that will be part of the great deception...  It’ll be a great fraud, the whole basis of this, it is a great hoax.  Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper have signed an agreement to assist one another militarily in the event of an insurrection.  Now we’re bringing in a new element, a group of people who could be armed and could be in a position to shoot American civilians who have never sworn allegiance to the Constitution.  I don’t know where that would fit with respect to the Chinese and Russian, who happen to be here under whatever guise, whether it be training or sharing of information, who knows what they might be in place.  But it opens up a pretty scary scenario.

Amazingly, Rush didn't immediately call in his assistants to have Garrow forcibly brought to a mental institution for evaluation.  He just said, "Wow."  And Rush's other guest, Tea Party commentator Nancy Smith, said, in a serious voice, "Personally I’ve already heard some other sources saying the very same thing that you’re saying."

Seriously?  We're being sold out to the Canadians?  Who are going to come over and shoot up the place?  You do know that you're referring to the single most courteous society on Earth, right?

But no.  Rush et al. just kind of sat there and acted as if what Garrow said was completely normal.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that in previous appearances on Rush's show, Garrow told us how he also believes that President Obama ordered the murders of Andrew Breitbart, Michael Hastings, and Tom Clancy because they'd all figured out that Obama is a Saudi operative and were about to blow his cover.  And that if that didn't work, he was going to give up the subtle approach, and just drop nuclear bombs on Charleston, South Carolina, except that three of his military leaders talked him out of it, so he fired them.

Man, that brings "no more Mr. Nice Guy" to a whole new level, doesn't it?

Seriously, folks, what does it take to stop people from listening?  Are there really individuals who are that gullible?  I'm pretty certain that Garrow himself is simply insane; but in order to keep appearing on Erik Rush's radio show -- which presumably has sponsors and listeners -- someone has to be paying attention, and believing this guy.

Which worries me.  Because these people vote.  And if people like Garrow keep getting spots on the public airwaves, it's providing an avenue for distributing their craziness, and simultaneously giving it a veneer of credibility.  I mean, we have enough ways to spread stupid ideas out there, what with how easy it is to simply click "Share" on social media, without radio talk show hosts giving paranoid loonies a forum.

But I guess I should look at the bright side; even if Garrow's right, I'd take my chances with the Canadians over people like Michele Bachmann and Louie Gohmert.  Even if they passed a law mandating that we switch from Big Macs and milk shakes to poutine and beer, the Canadians have a national health care system, they're the country that has the highest number of citizens with advanced degrees, and they're the world's largest producer of cheese.  So they must be doing something right.

So I say what the hell.  Let the Canadians take over.  They couldn't possibly screw things up any worse than we're already doing.

Using tragedy as leverage

Most of the time I'm able to keep some sense of humor about the crazy stuff that is the inspiration for the lion's share of my blog posts.  However maddening the illogic, however infuriating the ignoring of evidence, however baffling the stretching of credulity, I usually can find some way to put it all in perspective, to shake my head at the silliness and then move on.

But sometimes, I find something that galls me so deeply that I can't even find an angle from which I could poke fun and lighten it up.

That's the way I'm reacting to the conspiracy theories that have sprung up following the death of actor Paul Walker.

(Photograph courtesy of André Luis and the Wikimedia Commons)

Walker, best known for his roles in action flicks like Fast & Furious, died Saturday in a fiery one-car crash that also took the life of Walker's friend Roger Rodas.  Given Walker's penchant for fast cars and parties, it seemed like there was nothing more to it than a fatal recklessness -- an explanation supported by the discovery at the site of tire tread marks that seemed to indicate that the car had been doing doughnuts prior to the crash.

But that's not enough for the conspiracy theorists, is it?  No, of course not.  It never is, somehow.  It's not sufficient to let Walker's family, friends, and fans mourn his untimely death.  These vultures have to capitalize upon it, grab the notoriety and run with it, use it as leverage for promoting their bizarre, counterfactual view of the world.

In that way, they're a little like the Westboro Baptist Church, aren't they?  "The government is trying to kill us all" is just a little more PC than "God hates fags," that's all.

So, what are they claiming?  Well, take a look at this page on Before It's News, a site already well-known for promoting "truthers" of various stripes.  This time, it's "Paul Walker: Murdered for Digging Too Deep?" by Susan Duclos, which makes the claim that Walker was murdered by the government because he was about to blow the whistle...

... because he'd found out that the United States is secretly putting birth control drugs into food shipments destined for hurricane refugee camps in the Philippines.

Don't believe me?  Here's a direct quote:

Paul Walker and his friend were killed shortly after they discovered a conspiracy to supply victims of Typhon [sic] Haiyan with a prototype permanent birth control drug hidden in medicinal supplies and food aid. They had a damning recording and they were on their way to rendezvous with an ally who would have helped them get in touch with the right people. Turns out they were betrayed and someone rigged their car’s breaks [sic] to malfunction after a certain speed.

Now that the loose end has been tied up, and the recording destroyed, the people responsible have nothing to fear as this will become another “conspiracy theory” no one will take seriously.

You know, there is a reason, sometimes, when people don't take you seriously.  It's what happens when you propose insane idea after insane idea, each time claiming that this is the time you've found the smoking gun.  It's what happens when you predict electrical grid failures, government collapses, assassinations, mass arrests, and releases of bioengineered plagues, and none of it ever happens.

It's what happens when you prove, over and over, that you are nothing more than an unethical, loudmouthed, bullshit-spouting crank.

And yet, bafflingly, conspiracy theories are gaining traction.  Like the hydra, you strike one down, only to find nine more in its place.  Argue one follower away, and others jump into the fray.  Look, for example, at some of the comments on Duclos' piece:

It’s interesting that the big web searches are reporting the story, but not including any pictures nor video footage, when clearly their available. Furthermore, the weather conditions were fine, not a factor, the people driving the car were professional racers, yet they can’t even handle a turn- going from A to B? But what makes me the most suspicious is considering to damaged to the car…I’m sure the occupants where completely unrecognizable, yet they positively identified Paul Walker on the spot? How exactly? How’d they know that he personally in the car? With the fire and everything, his face, his ID would have been damaged beyond recognition…Yet the story came out within the hour of the accident, positively identifying him as there. My gut feeling is that he wasn’t in the car, I don’t know where he is, this doesn’t make sense… Geez, this horrible.

This crash has all the same features as that journalist who was murdered recently. the one who said he was working a a huge story and would have to lay low for a while …refresh my memory re. name. Now according to this story the motives are almost identical as well.

It was a ritual sacrifice….
Take todays train wreck as an example–
63 injured 3–6′s = 666
6+3 = 9
11 people injured = 9-11
Just as Paul Walker died at age 40 in a 9-11 Porsche
4 people killed in the train accident– Walker 40 + 4 = 44 = Obozo -He better be careful!
6 days ago, All over the news was “Brian is dead” from Family guy–Paul Walker played Brian in the Fast and Furious franchise..
None of this is a coincidence…Welcome to the Matrix!

If that's not disheartening enough, there's the alternative explanation on Truther News -- that Walker was killed by an "Obama drone strike."

I probably shouldn't let it get to me.  But for crying out loud, two guys died here.  It was an accident -- one of those stupid, reckless, tragic accidents that ended two lives forty years too early.  One of those things that happen because life is risky, and because humans, even famous and popular and handsome ones, sometimes do stupid things.

And that was all it was.  So conspiracy theorists, hear this: let their friends and family grieve, and stop spinning your stupid fucking webs of fantasy around Paul Walker's grave.

Obama-hotep

Toward more precise speech, I'm going to highlight today the difference between two words that are often used interchangeably: "doubtful" and "skeptical."

To be skeptical means to have an open mind; to approach a claim without bias (insofar as that is possible), and to evaluate it on the twin bases of evidence and logic.  A skeptical approach to (for example) ghosts would be to consider the available photographs, recordings, electromagnetic traces, and so on, and evaluate those based on looking at not only the possibility that they were produced by spirits, but other explanations as well.  We can't start from the conclusion that "these data must mean that ghosts exist;" we must weigh the likelihood of the evidence coming instead from human perceptual biases (e.g. pareidolia), equipment error, natural phenomena, or outright hoaxing.  To be a skeptic, therefore, simply means being an honest scientist.

To be doubtful, on the other hand, means to look at something and say, "Wow, this is unadulterated horse waste."

While I try to lean in the direction of the former as often as I can, I was pushed toward the latter by a website a friend sent me, with the provocative title, "Is Obama a Clone?"  I have observed a general trend, which is that any time someone headlines an article with a question, the answer is almost always "NO."  But I decided to be skeptical at least long enough to read the first paragraph, wherein I found that the author is not claiming that Obama is just a clone.  No, that would be silly.

The author is claiming that Obama is the clone of the Pharaoh Akhenaten.

For those of you who aren't Egyptophiles, let me give you a little bit of background.  Akhenaten was born Amenhotep, some time around 1370-ish B.C.E., and succeeded to the throne as Amenhotep IV in the early 1350s.  He had two wives -- hardly unusual in those days -- Kiya, and the famous Nefertiti.  But outside of his amorous pursuits, he made it clear right away that he wasn't going to do things the standard way.  He tried to abolish the old polytheistic pantheon (Ra, Horus, Anubis, Thoth, Isis, and the rest of the gang) and replace it with a more-or-less monotheistic worship of the god Aten (the sun).  He changed his name to Akhenaten, meaning "Aten is Effective," which is kind of unimpressive as a slogan for a god, don't you think?

Evidently, the Egyptian people by and large agreed with me, because when he died in 1336, his successor Smenkhkare ordered his buddies to go around and basically erase all traces that Akhenaten ever existed.  And the Ancient Egyptians complied with a vengeance.  They chiseled out depictions of him, cut out his name from inscriptions, reinstated the old religion, and basically tried to pretend that he never happened.

Except that now, apparently, we have him back, living in the White House.

See the resemblance?  No, neither do I.

So, let's see what the author has to say about this claim, and I'll let you determine if we should be "skeptical" or "doubtful:"

If you are interested in both advanced technology and alien-based technology, you will probably be interested in the video clip [on this website].  It originates from www. FreemanTV.com and is about Freeman’s theory of the cloning of the US First Family from an ancient Egyptian (Pharaoh) bloodline.  This brief video will most likely stretch your imagination...  However, cloning technology is not new; and Freeman’s theory is actually possible.  With your inquiring mind, you probably already know about the alien connection to Egypt.  If this theory is true, are Obama and his family are part “gods” (i.e., aliens)?  If so, that, then, begs the question:  What is the purpose for their presence in the US White House?

Anyway, after an introduction like that, I had to watch the video.   Here are a few highlight quotes, in case you don't want to waste a valuable three minutes of your life that you will never, ever get back:

• "Mummification preserves a cell for cloning.  All my life, I've known this, because I've studied ancient astronauts... even Time-Warner told me they could clone mummies."
• "It's very interesting, to see the title the Secret Service gave this family [the Obamas]: renegade."
• "And look at Michelle Obama's high school picture.  I didn't manipulate that photo one bit.  It's Queen Kiya."
• "So I'm going to leave you with this thought, that perhaps our leaders have cloned this ancient bloodline of mummies."

So.  Yeah.  I only have one thing to add, which is:  WA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA *collapses onto floor*

What blows me away about this guy is that he can actually say all of this with a completely straight face, which either means that he is (1) a hell of an actor, or (2) batshit insane.  Either way, I really do not understand how anyone spouting this stuff can actually attract an audience -- but if you listen to the clip, you will hear that he is evidently speaking in front of a group, because you can hear them ooh-ing and aah-ing appreciatively every time he makes a "point."  And furthermore, another guy thought it was a plausible enough idea to link the video clip on his blog.  So this leads us to the disturbing conclusion that we have not just one wacko guy spouting nonsense, but a whole bunch of people so breathtakingly ignorant of science that they believe what he's saying.

So, there you have it: a claim that moves us from the balanced and thoughtful territory of "skepticism" right out across the thin ice of "doubt" and off into the turbulent seas of "outright ridicule."  I try to resist going in that direction when possible, I honestly do.  But here, I couldn't help myself -- so I tossed aside my measured and scientific evaluation of data, and just went straight for "Nope, he's a wingnut."

That's how much of a "renegade" I am. 

There's this thing called "reality." You might want to check it out.

As a blogger who focuses continually on the crazy ideas people have, you'd think that after a while, I'd either (1) become cynical, (2) give up, or (3) devolve into what Robert Chazz Chute, the interviewer who chatted with me on the Cool People Podcasts, called "being a dick to dumb people."

I'd like to think that I avoid that trilemma most of the time.  But every once in a while, I run into something that makes me want to jump up and down and scream, "How in the hell can you believe this?  Are you a moron?  Or what?"  But I refrain from doing this, because usually I write in the early morning, and I don't want to wake up my wife.  Also, I own a nervous, neurotic border collie, who reacts to any stressful situations by peeing on the floor, so I'd like to avoid that if at all possible.

Just today, though, I ran into not one, but two stories that had that effect on me.

Now, note in each case, it's not the originator of the story that I want to yell at.  There are many loony people in the world, and it's well within their rights to publish their loony ideas online.  However, it is (in my opinion) beholden upon the rest of us to say, in as gentle a fashion as possible, "There, there, now.  Don't get yourself all worked up.  Just have a nice cup of cocoa and take a nap, and you'll feel better."

That is, of course, not what happened.  In each of these cases, the "comments" section filled up immediately with people who not only didn't argue with the person in question, they agreed.  They considered the wingnut's ideas logical.  They praised the courage of the originators for taking such a controversial stance.

Not one comment -- not one -- said, "Hey.  Reality.  It's over here.  You might want to give it a look."

Let's start with Starre Vartan, a writer for the Mother Nature Network, who wrote an opinion piece decrying public schools' abandonment of teaching children cursive.  Now, I myself am very much in favor of getting rid of cursive, largely because I never really managed well with cursive myself.  My cursive writing looks a little like the Elvish script from The Lord of the Rings, as written by an Elf with a severe disorder of the central nervous system.  I can't read my own cursive writing.  I don't know how anyone else would manage.

But Ms. Vartan is all up in arms over losing cursive.  Why, you might ask?  Is it because it's a valuable skill having to do with improving hand/eye coordination?  Is it because it's a fine old tradition that deserves to be continued?  Is it because, done properly, it is beautiful and artistic?

Nope.  None of the above.  Ms. Vartan believes that cursive is being abandoned...

... because there is some sort of a conspiracy to render children incapable of reading the Constitution.

She states, "It's near-impossible to read cursive if you can't write it," which certainly isn't true in my case, and honestly, is almost certainly untrue in general.  Generating script (productive language) and deciphering script (receptive language) aren't even done in the same parts of the brain, for cryin' in the sink; there's no reason to believe that even a person who has never written cursive in his life wouldn't be perfectly capable of being taught to read it.  As far as the governmental connection, she quotes Michael Sull: "There are so many children today who can't even read cursive writing, let alone write it.  They'll never be able to read anything that was written in the 19th century.  They won't be able to read the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, or anything written during the Civil War.  They're missing an entire portion of our country's history."

Because, of course, those documents don't exist in any other forms besides the cursive original.  Like, online, or in high school history texts, or anything.

Now, as I said, Ms. Vartan is perfectly within her rights to post her opinion, just as I do here in my blog.  But what I found appalling was that no one in the comments section even points out what were, to me, completely obvious broken links in the logical chain.  The comments virtually all began with phrases like, "What a good point!"  (There were two, in fact, that stated that the commenters had gone to school in Italy and Romania, respectively, and that they had learned cursive in grade school, and how much better the schools were there because of that.)

The second example came from none other than Alex Jones, who is so far gone on the wingnut spectrum that I am frankly stunned when he can say anything more coherent than "woogie woogie woogie pfththtptptptptptppt."  Jones has had a lot to say about Syria lately, most of which has contained the words "false flag" and has made no sense whatsoever, not that anyone should really find that surprising.  But he really outdid himself yesterday.  Here's what he said:

But it’s the globalists here running my life, that’s why they’re my front-and-center problem.  Because they are the biggest, most organized, eugenics-based, scientific dictatorship, trans-humanists at the top that plan the extinction of almost everybody and a new species to rise up or humans merged with machines.

That’s their religion, and no one’s discussing that.  Everyone is going to be deindustrialized, everyone is going to be put back into the Stone Age and controlled.  And Obama and the globalists and the robber barons, they’re going to fly around in their jetcopters and their Air Forces Ones and their red carpets, like gods above us.  And they’re going to get the life-extension technologies.

So the contention is that President Obama is in cahoots with various corporate leaders to kill most of us and return the rest of us to "the Stone Age," while they become immortal cyborgs who ride around on red carpets.

You know, it's an amazing day when someone can make the writings of L. Ron Hubbard appear sane.

And once again, how did people respond, on Jones' site InfoWars?  Here is a sampling (spelling and grammar are as written):

I've said it before and I'll say it again; How can we blame our government for supporting terrorists when WE are still supporting terrorists IN OUR GOVERNMENT??

I know people are afraid to believe, REFUSE to believe we've already been overthrown, but its true. There is no risk of it happening, it already has. We are wading through the changes one decade at a time. Changes happen slowly for a reason. Hitler did what he did overnight, and almost didnt fail.. Youre going to tell me people with the same ideas dont exist today? That your going to wake up and be in a completely different country one morning? They are going as slow as they have to to make it work, and I assure you all of their players are in place. There are thousands of people who do nothing with their lives but figure out how to implement a unified luciferian control over the globe. And MILLIONS who are indirectly doing work for said goal and dont even realize it.

These fckrs are planning more evil, something big too. Ya'll think they are just going to roll over and admit their defeat and wrongdoings? When most wake up, their pants will be around their ankles wondering WTF happened.

Alex Jones the Illuminati owned and run shill designed to discredit the Patriot Movement and keep it in the dark as to the real and obvious cause of their oppression.

Okay.  Give me a moment, here, to get my blood pressure back down.

There.  Somewhat better now.  In my calmer moments, I am willing to consider that the people who respond to stories like these do not represent a good sampling of the American public.  For one thing, most clear-thinking people probably wouldn't bother to take the time to register on a site so they can comment on a story that is obviously ridiculous; said clear-thinkers probably have better things to do, such as actually having jobs and families and lives.  Also, there's the possibility -- certain, I think, in Jones' case -- that dissenters, especially those like myself who would be likely to refer to Jones as a "raving whackjob," would be blocked from posting on the site in short order.

So I live in hope that what we're seeing in these comments is not a representative sampling of the opinions, and intelligence level, of the American citizenry.  And that hope will keep me posting here.  Cynicism is, after all, not a happy spot.  As my dad used to say: "I'd rather be an optimist who is wrong than a pessimist who is right."

Water-tight compartments in the brain

Today's topic is compartmentalization, a psychological phenomenon that is defined thus:

Compartmentalization is an unconscious psychological defense mechanism used to avoid cognitive dissonance, or the mental discomfort and anxiety caused by a person's having conflicting values, cognitions, emotions, beliefs, etc. within themselves.

Compartmentalization allows these conflicting ideas to co-exist by inhibiting direct or explicit acknowledgement and interaction between separate compartmentalized self states.  [Source]

While I'm sure that we all engage in this defense mechanism to one extent or another, in more extreme cases it does result in stances that (from the outside) look completely ludicrous.  It explains, for example, two of my former students, both brilliantly successful in my AP Biology class, both of whom were Young-Earth Creationists.  One of them, when I asked how she could accept the rest of science and reject evolutionary biology, answered -- without any apparent rancor -- that the rest of science was just fine, and she believed it to be true, but when science and Christianity conflict then the science has to be wrong, because she knew that the bible is true.  The other student seemed more conflicted about the whole thing, but ended up with basically the same solution.

One of these students, by the way, is now a medical doctor, and the other an environmental lawyer.

The whole subject of compartmentalization is on my mind today because of something that President Obama said this week with regard to climate change.  In a speech given at Georgetown University (excerpted and reviewed here), Obama stated that the United States needs to develop and implement a comprehensive plan to manage anthropogenic climate change, and outlined steps that he believes would accomplish what needs to be done.  About climate change deniers, he had the following to say: "I am willing to work with anybody…to combat this threat on behalf of our kids.  But I don't have much patience for anybody who argues the problem is not real.  We don't have time for a meeting of the Flat-Earth Society.  Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it’s not going to protect you from the coming storm."

Which is a pretty good line... but, unfortunately, generated a response from the Daniel Shenton, president of the Flat-Earth Society, who said that actually, he believes in anthropogenic climate change.

"I accept that climate change is a process which has been ongoing since beginning of detectable history, but there seems to be a definite correlation between the recent increase in world-wide temperatures and man’s entry into the industrial age," Shenton said, in an email to Salon.  "If it’s a coincidence, it’s quite a remarkable one. We may have experienced a temperature increase even without our use of fossil fuels since the Industrial Revolution, but I doubt it would be as dramatic as what we’re seeing now."

To which I can only respond: but you think the Earth is flat?  What the hell?

I mean, I've seen compartmentalized brains before, but Shenton may win the prize.

Not only does Shenton believe that the Earth is flat, but he believes that:

1)  Photographs from satellites are "digitally manipulated."  Why scientists are so desperate to convince people that the Earth is a sphere isn't certain, but they sure seem determined.  They're an evil bunch, those scientists.

2) The view of the Earth from space by the astronauts is explained by the fact that the space program is a lie, neatly tying up this nonsense with the Moon-landing-is-faked conspiracy theory nonsense.

3)  The seasons are caused because the Sun moves in circles over the North Pole (the center of the disk) and "shines down like a spotlight."  (Hey, don't yell at me.  I don't believe this stuff, I'm just telling you about it.)

4)  The Earth's gravity is created because the flat disk of the Earth is accelerating upwards at 9.8 m/s^2.  This acceleration, while it would create an apparent gravitational pull (consistent with Einstein's General Theory of Relativity), has as its cause a mysterious "aetheric wind."  Put a different way, they are making shit up.

 

Oh, but the rest of science is just fine, and we have no problem with accepting anthropogenic climate change.

I wish I was joking, here.  But these people, hard though this may be to believe, are completely serious.

The problem is, once you have your brain this compartmentalized, you become impossible to argue with.  Just like my long-ago student, anything that brings up an internal contradiction or logical flaw is immediately dismissed as simply wrong.  It's like the old joke, strikingly relevant here, about the man who thought that the Earth was a flat disk resting on the back of a giant turtle.

"What is the turtle standing on?" asked a friend.

"Another turtle," the man said.

"But what is that turtle standing on?" the friend persisted.

The man smiled.  "You can't catch me that way," he said.  "It's turtles all the way down."

I live in hope that one day, the water-tight compartments will begin to leak -- and that the resulting cognitive dissonance will require these folks to reevaluate their position.  But unfortunately, rationalism doesn't always win -- not with evolution, not with climate change, and not even with the Earth being an oblate spheroid.

The rising stars of politics

If you're a Democrat, I have good news for you: President Obama is going to win reelection in November.

I'm not saying this because of any sort of expertise in politics.  In fact, saying that I am ignorant about political science is a little like saying my dog is ignorant of differential calculus.  I find politics baffling and frustrating to the extent that when I read political editorials (seldom), I usually come away feeling like I've been trying to comprehend something that my brain simply isn't built for.

So, no, the above prognostication is not based upon any kind of sophisticated political punditry.  It is based upon something that is baffling for an entirely different reason: astrology.

Yes, the astrologers have weighed in on the presidential race, and what they have come up with is going to be cheering news to any Democrats who are dumb enough to believe in astrology.  Last weekend there was a conference of "top astrologers" in New Orleans, and a panel of them put their heads together and drew lots of abstruse-looking charts, and they were unanimous in concluding that Obama would win.

Nina Gryphon, a Chicago astrologer who also has a practice as a corporate lawyer, said her conclusion was based upon the timing of the Aries ingress, the moment that the Sun enters the constellation Aries.  "It's obvious," she said. "Obama stays where he is without a change in status."

Denver astrologer Chris Brennan agreed.  He said that both Obama and Romney "are entering into peak periods of eminence in the next few months."   However, his chart-drawing turned up a difference that he said will turn the tide in Obama's favor.  "Obama's peak period stays consistent throughout the election, whereas Romney's seems to falter a few weeks before the election."

Brennan did go on to say that even though the stars are of the opinion that Obama will win, they do contain a warning that things might not stay smooth for the incumbent.  "The ingress of Saturn into Scorpio may trouble him," Brennan said to reporters.  "It won't cost him the election, but it may indicate difficulties in the first half of his second term."

Brennan hedged a little, though, when asked how sure he was about his results.  There was one other factor that could play a role, he said; "We should all be aware of the Mercury retrograde that will occur on election day.  Most astrologers are pretty certain that this could cause problems similar to what happened in the 2000 election."  The retrograde, Brennan said, "seems to imply that there's something up in the air about the election until sometime later in the month."

Oh.  Okay.  Saturn ingressing into Scorpio and Mercury retrograde means trouble.  This last one I find particularly bizarre -- not that the whole idea of thinking that there's some significance to the apparent motion of planets relative to random groupings of stars that are actually nowhere near each other, and that this motion could possibly have any bearing on a political election, is exactly sensible.  But the retrograde motion of Mercury (and Venus) are just optical illusions -- caused by the fact that they move in closer circles around the Sun than the Earth does, so at times (because the Earth is "overtaking" them in orbit) they spend a short while appearing to move backwards.  They're not actually moving backwards -- it's a total trick of perspective, similar to the apparent backwards motion of a slower-moving car relative to a distant mountain as you pass it on the highway.  So now we've moved into the realm of attributing events on Earth to a motion of a planet that isn't even happening.

Not, of course, that any astrological claim is within hailing distance of scientific validity.  Astrology makes about as much sense as thinking that a person's future could be foretold by the random patterns of lines on their hands.  Oh, wait!  People believe that, too, don't they?

I mean, come on.  How could astrology possibly work?  And don't start babbling to me about forces and energies unless you have the equations from physics to back you up.  If you think astrology is science, explain to me how the science works.

I know I'm engaging in a futile exercise, here.  It's not like my feeble attempts are going to convince the die-hard astrologers -- they are too invested in it (both philosophically and financially) to be willing to give it up.  So I suppose I should go back to doing something marginally more likely to meet with success, like teaching my dog differential calculus.