The Spread of Goodness

Originally posted at The Frontal Cortex on March 9th, 2010:

The Spread of Goodness

In recent years, it's become clear that much of our individual behavior
depends on the dynamics of our social network. It doesn't matter if we're
talking about obesity or happiness: they all flow through other people, like a
virus or a meme. Last year, I profiled James Fowler and Nicholas Christakis in
Wired, who have conducted several fascinating studies that demonstrate the power
of social networks:

There's something strange about watching life unfold as a social network.
It's easy to forget that every link is a human relationship and every circle
a waistline. The messy melodrama of life--all the failed diets and fading
friendships--becomes a sterile cartoon.

But that's exactly the point. All that drama obscures a profound truth about human society. By studying Framingham as an interconnected network rather than a mass of individuals, Christakis and Fowler made a remarkable discovery: Obesity spread like a virus. Weight gain had a stunning infection rate. If one person became obese, the likelihood that his friend would follow suit increased by 171 percent. (This means that the network is far more predictive of obesity than the presence of genes associated with the condition.) By the time the animation is finished, the screen is full of swollen yellow beads, like blobs of fat on the surface of chicken soup.

The data exposed not only the contagious nature of obesity but the power of social networks to influence individual behavior. This effect extends over great distances--a fact revealed by tracking original subjects who moved away from Framingham. "Your friends who live far away have just as big an impact on your behavior as friends who live next door," Fowler says. "Think about it this way: Even if you see a friend only once a year, that friend will still change your sense of what's appropriate. And that new norm will influence what you do." An obese sibling hundreds of miles away can cause us to eat more. The individual is a romantic myth; indeed, no man is an island.

In their latest paper, published this week in PNAS, Christakis and Fowler
re-analyzed an earlier set of experiments led by Ernst Fehr and Simon Gachter,
which investigated "altruistic punishment," or why we're willing to punish
others even at a cost to ourselves.

Christakis and Fowler demonstrate that, when one of the students gave money to help someone else - they were cooperating - the recipients of that cash then became more likely to give their own money away in the next round. (Every unit of money shared in round 1 led to an extra 0.19 units being shared in round 2, and 0.05 units in round 3.) This leads, of course, to a cascade of generosity, in which the itch to cooperate spreads first to three people and then to the nine people that those three
people interact with, and then to the remaining individuals in subsequent waves
of the experiment.

The paper itself is filled with optimistic sentences, but it's worth pointing out that 1) selfishness is also contagious and 2) there's a big difference between lab experiments played with strangers and the messy social networks of real life. That said, altruistic cascades like this make me happy:

We report a chain of 10 kidney transplantations, initiated in July
2007 by a single altruistic donor (i.e., a donor without a designated
recipient) and coordinated over a period of 8 months by two large
paired-donation registries. These transplantations involved six
transplantation centers in five states. In the case of five of the
transplantations, the donors and their coregistered recipients underwent
surgery simultaneously. In the other five cases, "bridge donors" continued the chain as many as 5 months after the coregistered
recipients in their own pairs had received transplants. This report of a chain of paired kidney donations, in which the transplantations were not necessarily performed simultaneously, illustrates the potential of this strategy.

Update: I've gotten a few emails wondering what this means for free will.
After all, if our decisions are so determined by the decisions of others, then
where is there space for human autonomy? My first reaction is that the new
science of social networks still leaves plenty of elbow room for individual
decisions. We're talking about risk factors and tendencies and statistical
correlations. Just because we're influenced by others doesn't mean we can't
reject those influences. I asked James Fowler a related question last year and
this was his eloquent response:

Everyone always tells me that this research is so depressing and
that it means we don't have free will. But I think they're forgetting to
look at the flipside. Because of social networks, your actions aren't just
having an impact on what you do, or on what your friends do, but on
thousands of other people too. So if I go home and I make an effort to be in a good mood, I'm not just making my wife happy, or my children happy. I'm also making the friends of my children happy.
My choices have a ripple effect.

There are some profound implications in social discourse there... People who spread hate and anger really do effect others. Even if they pretend they don't.

Great Lakes -- How the Earth was Made

This is so cool...

Informed Debate on Health Reform. Tea Bagger vs. Liberal Congressman

Funny, but is she has a driver's license, she has to have insurance to drive...

Living in Today's Bubble...

I'm reading at an atheist blog. It's a post about why athletes aren't going to take the "concern trolling advice" (that boils down to sit down and shut up) so many Christians give atheists.

Someone quotes Martin Luther King's famous observation:

"The great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the outright bigot, but the moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises us to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will."

I love that quote. Because it's so very true. The coward will keep you in chains because he wants safety. It's the whole psychological basis behind the Republican War on America.

Then comes the young person, lacking any comprehensive understanding of America in the early 1960's:

"...who paternalistically believes in setting the timetable for another's freedom..."

That was so damn easy. For shame, MLK.

Posted by: jemand March 26, 2010 at 02:44 PM

And like a fat trout, rising to a spring fly I respond:

Are you serious? For shame, MLK?

Dude, a woman could not get birth control without the consent of her husband when MLK made that comment! [Check out Griswold v Connecticut (381 US 479) and comprehend.] So, please, don't take quotes nearly 50-years old and expect them to meet your definition of PC because the world changed.

That a woman has the right to not be turned into a baby factory by being spousally-raped and impregnated by her husband at will is something that women in the generation prior to mine didn't have until the early-to-mid 1960's in "Father Knows Best" America. And while it's true that most men didn't behave in that fashion; a woman, as the property of her husband, didn't have a lot to say about it if it did happen...

We also see this paternalistic attitude in the anti-abortion movement. A large cadre of (predominantly) old white men making laws about young women, as if those women are too stupid to figure it out on their own and/or with the help of their doctor.

Atheists, in this country, are persecuted and belittled by the majority. But they do not "cause" the problem. It's the unwillingness of the majority, like in Civil Rights, to treat others as their equals.

And I don't have to use atheists as an example of a persecuted minority in America. Wiccans have it as bad, if not worse, due to many Christians believing they worship Satan.

And while many people think that we should "be quiet" and "go softly," I (not so respectively) disagree. Social change doesn't happen with "politeness" and maybe a "letter to the editor..." It happens through upheaval that, primarily, changes the young who then change society through example and deed. The old fossils (typically relegated to the sidelines by statute/case law) die off, and eventually we are left with a large majority of those that are, at worst, neutral to the new societal norm.

Vatican Had Halted Trial for Accused Priest

More exposure on Ratzinger's Criminal-Conspiracy activities. And a great blog post here.

Is Satan a Catholic?

Another Pat Condell rant... This one about the child raping Catholic Church.

Jim Jefferies On Religion Horrible Blasphemy Panda

Hysterical. But not completely work safe...

Bricks and Osama

The wingnuts, in their irony, are retreating to terrorist lite. This brick, thrown into a Democratic Party office in Rochester, New York has a note attached: "Extremism in defense of Liberty is no vice."

I wonder if the man who threw that brick realizes that he's the spiritual brother of Osama Bin Laden. Bin Laden, terrorist that he is, does not perceive himself as some terrible outlaw. That much is clear from his tapes. Yet, I think, the old joke, first attributed to Winston Churchill, expresses the continuity of principle that links these two men:

Churchill: Madam, would you sleep with me for five million pounds?
Socialite: My goodness, Mr. Churchill… Well, I suppose… we would have to discuss terms, of course…
Churchill: Would you sleep with me for five pounds?
Socialite: Mr. Churchill, what kind of woman do you think I am?!
Churchill: Madam, we’ve already established that. Now we are haggling about the price.

Bin Laden, from all I have read and seen, seems to perceive himself as a Muslim freedom fighter trying to throw off the yoke of American Imperialism in the mid-east. His actions, while spectacular and more effective than the brick thrower are, on the continuity of belief, the same. That is, he believes his actions (however immoral others may find them) are justified in the name of freedom and defense of his liberty from the government of the United States. Just like the brick-thrower who refusing to consent to being governed via the process of the ballot box and the results of his democratically elected government.

Ironically, Bin Laden has the more intellectually sustainable position. He, as an Arab, is not given a say in the government of the United States and his roles are, consequently, limited to "victim" or "freedom fighter." Whereas our brick-thrower could engage in the political process and make a change.

Shagged by a rare parrot - Last Chance To See - BBC Two

Lolz!

I see the Brown Shirts are out...

Early on the morning of March 19, someone threw a brick through the window of Rep. Louise Slaughter's office in Niagara Falls, New York, doing $350 of damage, the Buffalo News reported. Slaughter (D-NY) briefly attracted the ire of conservatives over the "Slaughter Solution," a procedural maneuver that was considered (but, ultimately, not used) to pass health reform.

Also in Slaughter's district, a brick was thrown through the glass doors of the Monroe County Democratic Committee office in Rochester, NY, over the weekend, the Democrat and Chronicle reported. A note attached to the brick bore the Barry Goldwater quote, "Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice," a spokesman for the committee told the newspaper.

In the early hours of the morning on Monday just after the House health care vote, someone smashed the glass front door of the Tucson office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), the Arizona Daily Star reported. "The perpetrator likely had to hop the gated fence to get access to the door, since it's not viewable from the parking lot," the paper reported.

On Friday night or Saturday morning, a brick bearing unspecified "anti-Obama and anti-health care messages" was thrown through a floor-to-ceiling window at the Sedgwick County Democratic Party headquarters in Wichita, Kansas, CNN and the Kansas City Start reported.

After the passage of the bill Sunday night, a "fist-sized" rock was thrown at a window at the Hamilton County Democratic Party in Cincinnati, in the district of Rep. Steve Driehaus (D-OH), the Enquirer reports.

Losers.

All New!

Toyota Simulator.

Waterloo and Stats!

So the Republicans and their enablers are saying that the majority of Americans didn't want health care reform which is why they were "justified" in voting against the bill just signed into law. They are, mostly, citing the CNN poll from yesterday (or maybe the day before), which asked:

As you may know, the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate are trying to pass final legislation that would make major changes in the country’s health care system. Based on what you have read or heard about that legislation, do you generally favor it or generally oppose it?

Mar 19-21 2010

Favor 39%
Oppose 59%
No opinion 2%

What the data said:

NOT LIBERAL ENOUGH: 13%
FAVORED THE REFORM: 39%

In other words, 52% of America favored health care reform. And 46% opposed it with 2% uncommitted. Of the 52% of Americans who supported health care reform, a significant proportion opposed this bill because they were rather "all or nothing" about it. Even though, for the most part, big social programs tend to get upgraded over time.

But, of course, CNN and other apologists/enablers for the Republicans aren't going to report that the MAJORITY of Americans wanted Health Care reform. That would be too honest. Instead, they're going to do their best to hammer the Democrats into submission.

Romneycare Passes...

Not everyone is happy:

Former Republican House speaker Newt Gingrich said Obama and the Democrats will regret their decision to push for comprehensive reform. Calling the bill "the most radical social experiment . . . in modern times," Gingrich said: "They will have destroyed their party much as Lyndon Johnson shattered the Democratic Party for 40 years" with the enactment of civil rights legislation in the 1960s.

I don't think they will... I think they will be happy, just like the vast majority of Medicare recipients are happy, despite the fear-mongering regarding the inevitable slide into Socialism it would promulgate:

If you don’t, this program I promise you, will pass just as surely as the sun will come up tomorrow and behind it will come other federal programs that will invade every area of freedom as we have known it in this country until one day as Normal Thomas said we will wake to find that we have socialism, and if you don’t do this and I don’t do this, one of these days we are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children, what it once was like in America when men were free. -- Ronald Reagan on the dangers of Medicare, circa 1961.

The whole Reagan speech is here:



They were wrong then, they are wrong now. Because unlike being forced to stop being bigots and racists, there are actual, tangible benefits, direct or indirect, for most people under this law.

I keep reading...

...how America doesn't want Obama Care and it's his, and the Democratic Party's Waterloo. I'm not really buying it:

QUESTION: Does the fact that every Republican Member of Congress opposes the current health care proposals make you more likely to support the legislation, less likely, or doesn’t that make much difference either way?

More likely to support legislation: 27%
Less likely to support legislation: 20%
No difference: 51%

What this really means -- Republicans are stupid, heartless and out-of-touch. Unfortunately, so are one-in-five Americans. In any case, it's a net win for the Democrats and the President.

QUESTION: Does the fact that President Obama supports the current health care proposals make you more likely to support the legislation, less likely, or doesn’t that make much difference either way?

More likely to support legislation: 36%
Less likely to support legislation: 21%
No difference: 42%

Once again, one-in-five Americans surveyed as ass-wipes. Nothing new there. But even with all his other failings, a lot of people are still swayed by Obama.

The latest poll by the non-partisan Kaiser Family Foundation found 46 percent of Americans support the healthcare bill and 42 percent oppose it.

The Democratic base appears to have rallied behind the legislation, which seeks to increase coverage to more than 30 million uninsured Americans. Three quarters of Democrats now support the bill, up from 70 percent last month. Republican opposition has hardened, going from 74 percent in February to 80 percent in the most recent poll, taken March 10.

Yeah, because that 20% of America is just stupid... And the rest of these people have no clue to the benefits of the new program, or to what their interests really are...

Best Daily Show Ever

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Conservative Libertarian
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Reform

Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral - Irish Lullabye

He does a good job.

The Irish Rovers - The Unicorn Song

Enjoy

Conspiracy...

Not just for the Catholic Chuch:

A civil trial that opened Wednesday in Portland will show that the Boy Scouts of America knew it had child molesters in its leadership for decades but kept the problem quiet, according to an attorney for one of the victims.

The case, expected to attract national attention, centers on a Portland man who confessed to Scout leaders that he had molested 17 Scouts but was allowed to continue joining boys in Scouting activities.

...

The case that opened Wednesday in Multnomah County Circuit Court was brought by Kelly Clark, a Portland attorney who specializes in child sex abuse cases, and involves a former assistant Scoutmaster named Timur Dykes. The lawsuit, brought by a victim of Dykes listed in court documents by the pseudonym Jack Doe, seeks at least $14 million from the Boy Scouts of America and the Cascade Pacific Council in Oregon.

The Scouts, Clark said in opening statements, knew it had pedophiles in its organization yet allowed Dykes and others to continue to associate with its members. He held up file folder after file folder from Boy Scout headquarters that he said proves the organization knew of at least 1,000 suspected child molesters from 1965 to 1985.

"Those decisions led naturally, predictably and foreseeably to the abuse of boys like" my client, he said.

Wow. Repeat, serial pedophiles are okay, but they won't let gays or atheists into their organization because they're a "Christian" organization...

Religion, where hate and hypocrisy is the game...

Sue says...

I find the blatant hostility shown towards God and Jesus Christ defies belief when all either of them (God and Jesus) want is for mankind to have peace on Earth.

Sue has never read the bible. First, God sets up men to fail through his little "gotcha" game in the Garden of Eden. From there it goes down hill for mankind quite rapidly. Even ignoring the phony apocalyptic mass-murder of Noah's Ark story, it's still pretty darn gruesome:

For example, God kills 70,000 innocent people because David ordered a census of the people (1 Chronicles 21). God also orders the destruction of 60 cities so that the Israelites can live there. He orders the killing of all the men, women, and children of each city, and the looting of all of value (Deuteronomy 3).

He orders another attack and the killing of “all the living creatures of the city: men and women, young, and old, as well as oxen sheep, and asses” (Joshua 6).

In Judges 21, He orders the murder of all the people of Jabesh-gilead, except for the virgin girls who were taken to be forcibly raped and married. When they wanted more virgins, God told them to hide alongside the road and when they saw a girl they liked, kidnap her and forcibly rape her and make her your wife!

Just about every other page in the Old Testament has God killing somebody!

In 2 Kings 10:18-27, God orders the murder of all the worshipers of a different god in their very own church! In total God kills 371,186 people directly and orders another 1,862,265 people murdered.

The God of the Bible also allows slavery, including selling your own daughter as a sex slave (Exodus 21:1-11), child abuse (Judges 11:29-40 and Isaiah 13:16), and bashing babies against rocks (Hosea 13:16 & Psalms 137:9).

And this was in the bronze and iron ages... Imagine if God had advanced technology. Like tanks, guns, bombs, poison gas, effective transportation and food storage (logistics) and a manufacturing base... Imagine the carange then...

A second issue is the splitting off of this gruesome conduct. Sorry Christians, you MUST RESPECT THE OLD TESTAMENT and OBEY ITS LAWS. JESUS HIMSELF SAID SO:

“For truly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass the law until all is accomplished. Whoever then relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but he who does them and teaches them shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:18-19 RSV)

This passage, btw, also makes Paul a liar. Paul said that the dietary laws were null and void. But Jesus says NO RELAXING OF THE LAW. One of hundreds of scriptural conflicts Christians ignore.

But wait, there's more:

"It is easier for Heaven and Earth to pass away than for the smallest part of the letter of the law to become invalid." (Luke 16:17 NAB)

"Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest part or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place." (Matthew 5:17 NAB)

"Know this first of all, that there is no prophecy of scripture that is a matter of personal interpretation, for no prophecy ever came through human will; but rather human beings moved by the holy Spirit spoke under the influence of God." (2 Peter 20-21 NAB)

“Did not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you keepeth the law" (John7:19...)

and “For the law was given by Moses,..." (John 1:17)...

“...the scripture cannot be broken.” --Jesus Christ, John 10:35

Then we have all the "sword" stuff:

"Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household. He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it." (Matthew 10:34-39 NASB)

" 49 I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled! 50 But I have a baptism* to undergo, and how distressed I am until it is accomplished! 51 Do you suppose that I came to grant peace on earth? I tell you, no, but rather division; 52 for from now on five members in one household will be divided, three against two and two against three. 53 They will be divided, father* against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law. (Luke 12:49-53)

"If anyone comes to Me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple." (Luke 14:26)

"But now, whoever has a money belt is to take it along, likewise also a bag, and whoever has no sword is to sell his coat and buy one." (Luke 22:36 NASB)

Seriously, does this look like a couple of peaceniks? I ask you, does this look like Jesus and God are a couple nice guys you'd like to have a beer with? Who are all "lovey and peace?"

No. Which is why what Jesus and God really said isn't taught in Church. Which gets me to the irony of Fred Phelps and his flock of hate.

Fred Phelps, misanthropic and disgusting as he his, isn't an aberration from the standpoint of obeying the Bible. Rather he's a purist who, as he claims, is one of the few in America to actually follow the bible while the rest are heretics doomed to burn in hell.

The true aberrations, and I have to agree with Phelps from a fundamentalist interpretation of the Holy Bible, are the cafeteria Christians who've thrown out virtually all of the bible and take what they want to reinforce their preconceived beliefs and prejudices. That is, their God has evolved to keep up with a more modern set of cultural norm. Whereas Phelps... He's a rock-hard purist.

Deus Ex 3 Human Revolution GDC Teaser Trailer from GDC 2010. HD

Oh yeah!

Mercury dies...

Three more test cases, the very best offered by the anti-vaxxer crowd, have been decided. This excerpt is from the opinion in Dwyer:

In essence, petitioners propose effects from mercury in TCVs that do not resemble mercury’s known effects on the brain, either behaviorally or at the cellular level. To prevail, they must show that the exquisitely small amounts of mercury in TCVs that reach the brain can produce devastating effects that far larger amounts experienced prenatally or postnatally from other sources do not. In order to account for this dichotomy, they posit a group of children hypersensitive to mercury’s effects, but the only evidence that these children are unusually sensitive is the fact of their ASD itself. In an effort to render irrelevant the numerous epidemiological studies of ASD and TCVs that show no connection between the two, they contend that their children have a form of ASD involving regression that differs from all other forms biologically and behaviorally. World-class experts in the field testified that the distinctions they drew between forms of ASD were artificial, and that they had never heard of the “clearly regressive” form of autism about which petitioners’ epidemiologist testified. Finally, the causal mechanism petitioners proposed would produce, not ASD, but neuronal death, and eventually patient death as well. The witnesses setting forth this improbable sequence of cause and effect were outclassed in every respect by the impressive assembly of true experts in their respective fields who testified on behalf of respondent. Therefore, I hold that petitioners have failed to establish their entitlement to compensation, and their petition is denied.

I realize, of course, this won't stop the hard-core anti-vaxxers. But it should take some wind out of their sails. And their bogus "science" which is anything but science.

Respect is earned

One of the most difficult things I've had to deal with in Internet/social debating is that religion "deserves" respect while atheists are, well, deluded, hateful, evil people...

And yet, once again, another group of researchers have found that, in fact, atheists/agnostics are morally superior (if your consider racial tolerance to be superior to bigotry and racism) to the religious:

Why Don’t We Practice What We Preach? A Meta-Analytic Review of Religious Racism

Deborah L. Hall
Duke University, Durham, NC

David C. Matz
Augsburg College, Minneapolis, MN

Wendy Wood
University of Southern California, Los Angeles

A meta-analytic review of past research evaluated the link between religiosity and racism in the United States since the Civil Rights Act. Religious racism partly reflects intergroup dynamics. That is, a strong religious in-group identity was associated with derogation of racial out-groups. Other races might be treated as out-groups because religion is practiced largely within race, because training in a religious in-group identity promotes general ethnocentrism, and because different others appear to be in competition for resources. In addition, religious racism is tied to basic life values of social conformity and respect for tradition. In support, individuals who were religious for reasons of conformity and tradition expressed racism that declined in recent years with the decreased societal acceptance of overt racial discrimination. The authors failed to find that racial tolerance arises from humanitarian values, consistent with the idea that religious humanitarianism is largely expressed to in-group members. Only religious agnostics were racially tolerant.

I am, of course, not surprised. Racism and intolerance were practiced "as a matter of course, it's God's will" in my ex-religion until the mid-1970's. Then there was a big revelation that God changed his mind (post Civil Rights Act) and blacks were perfectly okay now...

Et Tu Pope

So, he has something to say about morality?

The Pope was drawn directly into the Roman Catholic sex abuse scandal last night as news emerged of his part in a decision to send a paedophile priest for therapy. The cleric went on to reoffend and was convicted of child abuse but continues to work as a priest in Upper Bavaria.

The priest was sent from Essen to Munich for therapy in 1980 when he was accused of forcing an 11-year-old boy to perform oral sex. The archdiocese confirmed that the Pope, who was then a cardinal, had approved a decision to accommodate the priest in a rectory while the therapy took place.

The priest, identified only as H, was subsequently convicted of sexually abusing minors after he was moved to pastoral work in nearby Grafing. In 1986 he was given an 18-month suspended jail sentence and fined DM 4,000 (£1,800 today). There have been no formal charges against him since.

NYPD quota: arresting innocent people

No surprise here.

Wow...

BARTOW, Florida — Authorities say a 55-year-old woman died alone in a bedroom of her central Florida home after locking herself in the room for several weeks for a lengthy religious fast.

Evelyn Boyd told her husband, a preacher at a Pentecostal church in the city of Bartow, not to disturb her when she locked herself in the room Feb. 7 to fast and pray with only water to drink. Family members forced open the door March 5 and found her dead.

Sheriff Grady Judd told the St. Petersburg Times that deputies don't expect to file charges, though the investigation continues. A precise cause of death has not been determined.

The woman's husband, John Boyd, told the paper he didn't check on his wife because she felt she was doing what God called her to do and he wanted to respect her privacy.

Wow. Just wow...

Sure beats Mabinogi...

Nice to get in on something at the beginning. Especially when it's done right:

Readers have voted and Fallen Earth has been named Best Online Game at Game Industry News' Game of the Year awards!

Fallen Earth was also voted a first runner-up for Best New MMO Release of 2009 at Beckett Massive Online Gamer’s 2009 Reader’s Choice Awards!

No shit, Sherlock...

Super Libertarian Wanker Jeffrey Miron notes:

TSA Makes Amtrak Safer. Really.
by Jeffrey Miron on March 9th, 2010

Yesterday I took the train from Boston to New Brunswick for my talk at Rutgers on drug legalization.

So I learned that TSA now requires all bags on trains to have an indentification tag. Otherwise, security will confiscate them if left unattended.

This makes perfect sense. Terrorists could never figure out that if they wanted to leave a “suitcase bomb” on a train, they should include a tag so that security will ignore it.

It's not about making us safer. In fact, most of these policies are put in to cover the asses of the bureaucrats and to make people think that they're doing something...

This is not, by-the-way, the fault of the government or bureaucrats. It's the fault of the people. Which probably includes the wanker, if not in this area, then in others he readily sponges up without thinking -- education, roads, and the inescapable fact that the government subsidized Amtrak he is riding for less than market value is a SOCIALIST rail program...

Things I wish I said...

Regarding the discussion of a copyright bill in the UK House of Commons and the ever present "only criminals would oppose this, honest people have no fear" card:

It's not going far enough. They should record and analyse every phone conversation, text message and all internet data. Then we should be forced to have cameras in our homes, our bedrooms, our bathrooms. Next phase is to have a brain monitor implanted that sends all thoughts back to a server to be analysed. Anyone thinking naughty thoughts about the record industry / movie industry / oil companies / government would then be sent a "terminate" signal, shutting down their nervous system, and their bank balance split 4 ways between them to cover the cost of system upgrades.

If anyone thinks this is a bad idea they're obviously criminals.

I really wish I'd said that...

Every Breath You Take -- The Police

Still a great (stalkerish) song after all these years...

State approval for bona fide medical care...

It reminds me, in many ways, of the Terri Schiavo dust-up... Not nearly the same egregious level of misanthropic behavior on the part of the "advocate"... But in the same "letter of the law, holy-roller" vein:

Court approves sterilisation of girl March 9, 2010

The Family Court has approved the sterilisation of an 11-year-old girl.

Family Court judge Paul Cronin found that the performance of a hysterectomy on the child, identified only as Angela, was "in the child's best interests".

Angela has Rett syndrome, making her profoundly disabled and unable to talk or use sign language.

The court, sitting in Brisbane, heard that Angela acted in a similar way to a three-month-old baby.

She has to be fed and cared for and has no bladder control.

Since she was born, Angela - whose parents married in South America and came to Australia in 1991 - has had epileptic seizures but they are now under control through medication.

However, while the epilepsy is controlled, seizures can occur when she has a heavy menstrual period, which has been happening since she was nine.

These seizures are potentially fatal to the child (the US has 50,000 epileptic seizure deaths a year). So, as the Court found, it is in her best interest to avoid the potential of death by having a hysterectomy.

The family was told by experts in March last year the recommended treatment would be a hysterectomy, the court heard.

But, acting on legal advice, Queensland Health said that, because of the irreversible nature of the procedure, it could not be conducted without a court order.

Justice Cronin said in his judgment, released publicly today, the procedure was "urgent and necessary".

"Angela is never going to have the benefits of a normal teenage and adult life," the judgment read.

"A fundamental consideration is ... the risks to Angela's life as well as her general health."

Mark Pattison, from the National Council on Intellectual Disability, said the decision - which followed a High Court ruling in 1992 - showed the system was working.

Mr Pattison said the High Court found the Family Court was the best jurisdiction to determine such matters.

"It went into a jurisdiction that has some sensitivity to family matters, and from our point of view it was a very good place to put it," Mr Pattison said.

"You have an independent umpire, they consulted with the family and the obstetrician and made the best decision."

The Court, which frankly shouldn't even be in this mess, but for meddling busy-bodies who make everyone afraid, makes the right decision. And, wouldn't you know, some jackass has to stick his ignorant nose into it:

But researcher Leanne Dowse, from the University of NSW, said the decision appeared to breach international human rights conventions.

"Australia became a signatory to the UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities in July 2008," Dr Dowse told ABC Radio.

"That convention says that individuals with a disability have a right to respect for his or her physical integrity.

"That sort of idea means that the first position is to protect an individual from these sorts of things."

So, better to let the child suffer an elevated risk of dying than to give the child a hysterectomy. Especially troubling is the blind, Pavlovian reaction that spawned this opinion. The child has the brain of an infant. Is this person completely unaware that infants are not exactly aware in any meaningful way...

But Mr Pattison said the overriding human right in the case was the "dignity of the person".

He said it would not have been an easy process for the family.

"These families have been through a lot, and done all they can, and throw their hands up and say 'What more can I do?'" he said.

"I think people should give them a bit of a break."

I'm glad someone said it.

Wizardy 8...

They don't make them like this anymore... It would take about 70-to-100 hours to complete this game. Now, you're lucky to get 35 in something like Dragon Age...

And, for a game released almost a decade ago, it still looks good:



Sometimes I think about re-installing it... Playing it for old-times sake...

Like I did with Deus Ex, Fallout II, Star Control II and a few others...

Christian Anonymity...

...or how they act when they're not acting pious in public...

Jerry Coyne, who runs the blog:Why Evolution is True, recently ran some articles on the christian homeschoolers who don't teach their kids the Theory of Evolution and the textbook market that has sprung up to serve their desire to hide reality from their children.

A not so atypical e-mail:

Hey Jerry Coyne fuck you. You evolution faggot. Darwinism and evolution are the biggest pile of shit lies ever made on the face of GODS green earth. People in the 1800’s thought Darwin was a dumb ass fucking lunatic. Home school books are lying to children? On no you son of a bitch you and all these liberal piece of shit scum bag evolutionists are lying to children and every public school in the world. . . So go fuck your self or an ape and evolve some grotesque ape kids you loser fuck. I beat the shit out of people like you, you cock smoking douche nozzle.

As I've mentioned before, am a CPA in Nashville, Tennessee -- the home of the Christian Music Industry. Like many CPAs, I used to have a fairly large presence with some small record labels, some stars, some major groups, some CMI executives... Now I'm down to one band and a couple of small labels that I just couldn't possibly give a crap about...

My experience has been that the industry is, uniformly, hypocritical and money grubbing. Sure, the stars all talk about doing it for the love of Jesus and spreading love and joy to the people, but it's clearly about the love of money.

The two greatest offenses that set my teeth on edge, are, first, they don't pay their bills and call Jesus as their get-out-of-deadbeat card. That is, they won't pay a bill and will tell you, flat to your face, that Jesus said to not pay it, or to pay less... Considering how many times it happens, and Jesus tells them this (in my direct experience) when the artist buys a new Mercedes, goes on a Caribbean vacation, world cruse, buys a new mansion, has to pay hush-money to the mistress or blows $65,000 on clothes for the year... I find it impossible to believe that Jesus is micro-managing their finances and sticking it to vendors, sidemen, etc., is the course of action Jesus recommended.

Second, for all their "the band is my family in the Lord" they treat their band members like crap. First, by underpaying them. Second, by pretending that the sidemen are "independent contractors," which puts an extra 7.65% tax on their earnings (the employer side of employment taxes). My ass if they're "independent contractors," no reputable band in any other part of the music industry treats its hired sidemen as "independent contractors" in this day and age. Only the dirtballs in the Christian Music Industry...

Anyway, when I see/hear a Christian being all Mr./Ms. Piety... I know he/she has a secret self. Like the asshole above... Who is, very much, part and parcel of the vile, right-wing/evangelical section of Christianity.

Which Sci-Fi Writer are You?

I am: Gregory Benford A master literary stylist who is also a working scientist.

Which science fiction writer are you?

Which is ironic because I just dug "Heart of the Comet" out of one of my "too many books for the shelves" boxes and re-read it...

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass - RGM version

Wow, this is so cool...

The Natural and Logical Results of Accommodationism

The chief scientist in Israel's education ministry has sparked a controversy by questioning both evolution and global warming and proposing that curricula undergo religious censorship:

The chief scientist in Israel's ministry of education, Gavriel Avital, "sparked a furor" by questioning the reliability of evolution and global warming, leading to calls for his dismissal, according to Haaretz (February 21, 2010). "If textbooks state explicitly that human beings' origins are to be found with monkeys, I would want students to pursue and grapple with other opinions. There are many people who don't believe the evolutionary account is correct," he was quoted as saying. "There are those for whom evolution is a religion and are unwilling to hear about anything else. Part of my responsibility, in light of my position with the Education Ministry, is to examine textbooks and curricula."

Hava Yablonka of Tel Aviv University told Haaretz that Avital's statements were tantamount "to saying that space should be given in textbooks to the view that the earth is flat and the sun revolves around it. It's astonishing that the chief scientist of a government ministry can say such bizarre things." Similarly, Lia Ettinger, a biologist at the Heschel Center for Environmental Learning and Leadership in Tel Aviv, called for Avital's resignation, commenting, "It's clear that given the nature of science, there is never complete consensus, and that disputes bring us closer to the truth. But this has nothing to do with the things Avital said. If these are his positions, he cannot promote the kind of education necessary for the environment and sustainable ecology."

How can you compromise with Bronze Age religious beliefs and have science? Religion, in and of itself, offers nothing but pablum and tripe while being used to exploit and control those under its thumb through hatred, tribalism, shame, self-hate and other forms of coercion and control.

And more on the ACORN tapes...

The video that unleashed a firestorm of criticism on the activist group ACORN was a "heavily edited" splice job that only made it appear as though the organization's workers were advising a pimp and prostitute on how to get a mortgage, sources said yesterday.

The findings by the Brooklyn DA, following a 5½-month probe into the video, secretly recorded by conservative provocateurs James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles, means that no charges will be filed.

Many of the seemingly crime-encouraging answers were taken out of context so as to appear more sinister, sources said.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/brooklyn/acorn_set_up_by_vidiots_da_x16IroTf4AsXCI19nttFLL#ixzz0h2r5noqG

Morons... Not only were the tapes disproved, but they are evidence of illegal wiretapping in at least two jurisdictions...

For Fear of a Queer...

...getting health insurance:

Employees at Catholic Charities were told Monday that the social services organization is changing its health coverage to avoid offering benefits to same-sex partners of its workers -- the latest fallout from a bitter debate between District officials trying to legalize same-sex marriage and the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington.

Starting Tuesday, Catholic Charities will not offer benefits to spouses of new employees or to spouses of current employees who are not already enrolled in the plan. A letter describing the change in health benefits was e-mailed to employees Monday, two days before same-sex marriage will become legal in the District.

Yet they'll engage in a world-wide conspiracy to protect peodophiles...:

Texan lawyer Daniel Shea uncovered the document as part of his work for victims of abuse from Catholic priests in the US. He has handed it over to US authorities, urging them to launch a federal investigation into the clergy's alleged cover-up of sexual abuse.

He said: 'These instructions went out to every bishop around the globe and would certainly have applied in Britain. It proves there was an international conspiracy by the Church to hush up sexual abuse issues. It is a devious attempt to conceal criminal conduct and is a blueprint for deception and concealment.'

Anyone who argues that religion is a "positive force" for "good..." They really need to think long, deep and hard about the subject. For some, there may be some net positive benefit. But when you look at the entire operation... I don't think so. I think it's a net loss -- socially, morally and economically -- for the human race.

If you didn't have the FDA...

...these would still be sold/over-prescribed/prescribed in unwarranted dangerous situations...

Mortality and morbidity in patients receiving encainide, flecainide, or placebo. The Cardiac Arrhythmia Suppression Trial.

Echt DS, Liebson PR, Mitchell LB, Peters RW, Obias-Manno D, Barker AH, Arensberg D, Baker A, Friedman L, Greene HL, et al.

BACKGROUND AND METHODS. In the Cardiac Arrhythmia Suppression Trial, designed to test the hypothesis that suppression of ventricular ectopy after a myocardial infarction reduces the incidence of sudden death, patients in whom ventricular ectopy could be suppressed with encainide, flecainide, or moricizine were randomly assigned to receive either active drug or placebo. The use of encainide and flecainide was discontinued because of excess mortality. We examined the mortality and morbidity after randomization to encainide or flecainide or their respective placebo. RESULTS. Of 1498 patients, 857 were assigned to receive encainide or its placebo (432 to active drug and 425 to placebo) and 641 were assigned to receive flecainide or its placebo (323 to active drug and 318 to placebo). After a mean follow-up of 10 months, 89 patients had died: 59 of arrhythmia (43 receiving drug vs. 16 receiving placebo; P = 0.0004), 22 of nonarrhythmic cardiac causes (17 receiving drug vs. 5 receiving placebo; P = 0.01), and 8 of noncardiac causes (3 receiving drug vs. 5 receiving placebo). Almost all cardiac deaths not due to arrhythmia were attributed to acute myocardial infarction with shock (11 patients receiving drug and 3 receiving placebo) or to chronic congestive heart failure (4 receiving drug and 2 receiving placebo). There were no differences between the patients receiving active drug and those receiving placebo in the incidence of nonlethal disqualifying ventricular tachycardia, proarrhythmia, syncope, need for a permanent pacemaker, congestive heart failure, recurrent myocardial infarction, angina, or need for coronary-artery bypass grafting or angioplasty.

CONCLUSIONS. There was an excess of deaths due to arrhythmia and deaths due to shock after acute recurrent myocardial infarction in patients treated with encainide or flecainide. Nonlethal events, however, were equally distributed between the active-drug and placebo groups. The mechanisms underlying the excess mortality during treatment with encainide or flecainide remain unknown.

Because a drug company, knowing that it has a defective product, will not take it off the market unless forced. Like Vioxx and thousands of other dangerous drugs and devices.

But, because "big pharma" is regulated and its products constantly scrutinized... Dangerous drugs that get through the process do get recalled or heavily limited in their application.

My thing is... What about all that "homeopathy" and "alternative" medicine?

Homeopathy is "safe" as it's so diluted that it's, statistically, probably just water. So, except for the gullible fools being helped by the placebo effect, it's harmless in its application. And, anyone dumb enough to go off "traditional" medicine in a desperate attempt to get cured by some idiotic homeopathic "medicine"... Well, I'm sure it's going to improve the gene pool in the long run, so it's hard to be too upset...

But other forms of alternative medicine can be down-right dangerous, like this...:

A Missouri woman has filed an unusual case of malpractice against a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), alleging Zhengang Guo fell below the standard of care by prescribing Chinese herbs that caused her to suffer kidney failure.

Delores Drury's case challenges the notion that Chinese herbs are free of the harmful side effects often associated with prescription drugs. After being treated for a variety of ailments by Patrick Kennedy, a St. Louis-area chiropractor who ordered herbs from Guo, she allegedly developed a kidney condition known as “Chinese herb nephropathy” (CHN).

“Defendants knew, or by using ordinary care, should have known that said Chinese herbs caused unreasonably dangerous risks and serious side effects of which the general public would not be aware,” Drury alleges in a complaint filed Dec. 31 in Cook County (Ill.) Circuit Court.

Guo is a seventh-generation Chinese medicine doctor and the founder of Life Rising, which operates clinics in Chicago. According to Drury, the herbs he prescribed for her contained aristolochic acid, a naturally occuring toxin which some researchers have linked to CHN.

“Plaintiff's Chinese herb nephropathy, kidney disease, and renal failure occurred as a result of her ingestion of the Chinese herbs” prescribed by Guo, the suit says.

People think this is medicine. But it's not. And seven generations? Holy crap! At 20-years a generation, this "medicine" has been causing kidney failure for 140 years!

And there are other "natural medicines/supplements" that are dangerous as hell. Oyster shells and bone meal "calcium" supplements contain lead, cadmium and mercury. Lots of the "fish oil" supplements contain high levels of mercury, and you can't tell which ones do without testing. Shark cartilage, used in alternative (and Chinese) medicine, frequently contains unsafe levels of mercury.

Many medicinal herbs are toxic to the liver: borage, comfrey, germander and coltsfoot. Others are toxic to other organs.

Mistletoe was, for a long time, a big up-and-comer in "cancer treatments." Problem is that mistletoe, like laetrile, is toxic AND it was never actually studied. Now that it's been studied, it's been found to make cancers worse, not better. Yet Vidarkliniken still runs a cancer treatment center (it's a pretty thing) that apparently doesn't do a damn thing but kill it's patients faster...

And, of course, if you speak out about this dangerous quackery... The poor "victims" of your "big pharma" brainwashing-conspiracy are compared to poor Galileo. Ironically, they are wrong and Galileo was right. Galileo had the HARD DATA showing he was right.

The quacks have nothing... Which makes a comparison to Galileo rather... Stupid... You can only be Galileo if you are right.

"Three Little Maids From School Are We"

Enjoy!

Just SHUT UP!

Just shut up and go away. Please. Your ideas and cause are stupid, as are you and your doctors:

After years of speaking publicly about her belief that MMR shots (immunization for measles, mumps, and rubella) caused her son to suffer from autism, Jenny McCarthy now faces the reality that her 7-year-old son Evan — who no longer shows any signs of autism — may likely have lived with completely different illness.

A new article in Time magazine — which Jenny was interviewed for — suggests Evan suffers from Landau-Kleffner syndrome, “a rare childhood neurological disorder that can also result in speech impairment and possible long-term neurological damage.”

Many applaud Jenny, who has never stopped fighting to help her son since his autism diagnosis in 2005. Others, like the Center of Disease Control, say her claims about immunizations make her “a menace to public health.”

Jenny talks about her son’s progress saying, “Evan couldn’t talk — now he talks. Evan couldn’t make eye contact — now he makes eye contact. Evan was anti-social — now he makes friends. It was amazing to watch … when something didn’t work for Evan, I didn’t stop. I stopped that treatment, but I didn’t stop.”

And she is also reversing her initial position that the MMR shots caused Evan’s autism. Jenny now says she wants vaccinations better researched — rather than getting rid of them altogether, as she previously promoted. And though her son may never have had autism, Jenny insists, “I’ll continue to be the voice” of the disorder.

Do you think she'll ever say she's sorry for this: Jenny McCarthy's Body Count.

Vaccines are not perfectly safe. A rare few of the older ones were less safe than the disease. That is, in a modern society with good notifications, antibiotics, tec., in a population of about fifteen million children, an epidemic might infect about four-hundred thousand (this population had a vaccination rate of just 20%, meaning it was (essentially) worthless in preventing a pandemic).

That's an infectious rate of 3% of the population. Of those four-hundred thousand cases, one-fourth of one-percent would be fatal. About 900 fatalities in all.

OTOH, the pertussis vaccination of the day was fatal in, according to the UCLA study I read, 1 in 2500. That's just 4/100ths of a percent. Much smaller. Except, of course, the population is 100% exposed to the vaccination. That's 6,000 deaths.

Now, of course, things have changed about the vaccination. It's much, much safer. Safe enough that I had my daughter vaccinated because the trade-off became pretty close to equal.

Yo! Mack Daddy!

ACORN didn't commit a crime...

On Sept. 15, 2009, my office began an investigation into possible criminality on the part of three ACORN employees. The three had been secretly videotaped by two people posing as a pimp and prostitute, who came to ACORN’S Brooklyn office, seeking advice about how to purchase a house with money generated by their ‘business.’ The ‘couple’ later made the recording public. That investigation is now concluded and no criminality has been found.

You did... So, now who's the media putz? Even if you get off your attempted wire-tapping charges, it'll cost you tens-of-thousands of dollars... In the mean time... lolz...