Three rules to keep in mind:
- Good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance.
- Fibbers’ forecasts are worthless.
- Audits are vital.
From Daniel Davies via Fabius Maximus
Continue readingThree rules to keep in mind:
From Daniel Davies via Fabius Maximus
Continue reading →““You’ve got to tell the world how to treat you. If the world tells you how you are going to be treated, you are in trouble.””
– James Baldwin to Margaret Mead.
Continue reading →“In disputes upon moral or scientific points, let your aim be to come at truth, not to conquer your opponent. So you never shall be at a loss in losing the argument, and gaining a new discovery.” – Arthur Martine, 1866 guide to the art of conversation
In this everyone-is-a-critic culture, Daniel Dennet asks, “Just how charitable are you supposed to be when criticizing the views of an opponent?”
He offers what he calls “the best antidote [for the] tendency to caricature one’s opponent”: a list of rules formulated decades ago by the legendary social psychologist and game theorist Anatol Rapoport, best-known for originating the famous tit-for-tat strategy of game theory. Dennett synthesizes the steps:
You should attempt to re-express your target’s position so clearly, vividly, and fairly that your target says, “Thanks, I wish I’d thought of putting it that way.
You should list any points of agreement (especially if they are not matters of general or widespread agreement).
You should mention anything you have learned from your target.
Only then are you permitted to say so much as a word of rebuttal or criticism.
From the incomparable Brain Pickings
See also the superb: A Code of Conduct for Effective Rational Discussion
"If the economic and social impacts of affirmative action have been mixed, its political impacts have been almost universally damaging. In a wide range of countries, political elites and special interests have consistently exploited affirmative action programs for their own gain."
“The frontrunner’s support is built less on bigotry, than on his confident projection of executive intelligence.”
The always excellent David Frum explains where Trump is getting his political energy from.
The simple “xenophobes, bigots and old white people” trope peddled by his opponents does not explain it.
Frum argues it is a combination of his satisfying the deep hunger in the Republican base for leaders with “executive intelligence” and because “Republicans have come to fear that their leaders have turned anti-native”.
This aligns with Scott Adams’ assessment that Trump’s strategy is all about presenting himself as the only adult in the room, the only person with a plan (no matter how nutty) and the experience to deliver on it (Frum’s “Executive Intelligence”). The good news is that we can all blame George W. Bush for this.
Read it here: Why Donald Trump Leads National Polls – The Atlantic