New Video Series Coming Soon
The authors of ThePokerClub blog are launching a new site, details coming soon. Look forward to exciting video-casts of cultural phenomena and a world-wide support network for practical and spiritual enterprise.
Another Indication of Growing Inequality in American Society
I usually don’t read The Onion, but I thought this was humorous.
Aaron
Are travel companies promoting Drug Tourism?
Aaron
Hello everybody, I apoligize for being absent from the Poker Club for the last little bit. I didn’t really want to admit this, but the last few days I have horded myself up in my basement watching the Goosebumps’s TV series. I know that it isn’t very healthy, however it is probabley better than going out and doing drugs (maybe?).
Anyhow, the other day I was searching the internet for some good trip ideas. Partially inspired by Paul Theroux’s The Old Patagonian Express , I began looking around at information on the Pan-American Highway. Now, I don’t plan on making that trip from Alaska to Chilie any time soon. However, I figured maybe there were other roadtrips around the States that may be more reasonable for me to venture out onto in the next few months. So, I poked around on the Lonely Planet website to garner some ideas, and I came across one that was, well, pretty “trippy”. Is anyone wanting to traverse the “Peyote Road“? Isn’t this peculiar for a travel website to promote? See what you think.
The physical journey is only one part of the Great Road Trip of Life – taking a trip inside is often more rewarding than hitting the higway out of town. In some Native American cultures, a regular roadtrip on the soul’s metaphysical highway is a vital part of cultural life. They call it ‘taking the Peyote Road’.
The Peyote Road is a roadtrip like no other. You can travel far without leaving your home and see sights that no video camera could capture. The soul-food is cheap and you don’t have to worry about fuel. And of all the roadtrips in the world, this one is probably closer than any other to Dorothy’s epic roadtrip towards Oz and enlightenment.
Alert: Islamo-Terrorism Awareness Week
Charlie
Guess I missed the lecture in Chapel Hill… Still, four and a half days left to celebrate!
TOMORROW, MONDAY OCT. 22
MURPHEY 116
7 PMArmy National Guard Captain Joel Arends to speak about Radical Jihadists, the War on Terror, and what American soldiers are doing to fight the pressing threat to western democracies.Joel Arends was named one of 50 Heroes in the War on Terror by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and has received the Bronze Star Medal in March of 2005. Lt. Arends and his team of 30 soldiers operated in and around Baghdad from February 2004- April 2005 working to catch terrorists, known bombing materials and confiscated jidhadist propaganda. One terrorist claimed to be a professor at UNC, although the specifics of this professor cannot be named, the terrorist was extremely well versed in UNC Basketball stats. To hear to more about this story and the war on terror from a veteran who has served in the field, you will not want to miss this lecture.
At least they were focusing on the important information.
My Inaugural Post
Aaron
Hello everyone out there. This is my first post on ThePokerClub. I appreciate Charlie and Sandeep for trusting me to write a little on their precious blog. To quote Nesta, “There is so much trouble in Jah (the, for our Babylonian readers) world”; more than any of us can ever comprehend, much less try to remedy ourselves.
Therefore, try to imagine ourselves with one last night to have fun. Tommorow morning, we will reluctantly wake up out of our beds and go to work on our futile (maybe not, who knows?) attempt to make the world a better place. I mean, we all have our own ideas of what a better world could be. A great majority of us have benevolent dispositions, but we will strike each other down in our efforts to create “our version” of an idealistic world. So, before I try to blog seriously about world issues, let this poem by Allen Ginsberg represent the essence of worldly non-seriousness; which is all that really matters in the end.
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And just in case you are interested, the BBC has a really good special radio broadcast on this poem. It interviews some interesting characters from the Beat Generation who give some interesting insight on this poem. That is , if anyone gives a damn anymore about the written word. http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/adventuresinpoetry/pip/b2ci4/
Britney Spears Needs Phytoremediation
Charlie
Researchers at the University of Washington have genetically altered poplar trees to pull toxins out of contaminated ground water, offering a cost-effective way of cleaning up environmental pollutants.
“Our work is in the beginning stages, but it holds great promise,” said Sharon Doty, an assistant professor of forest resources at the University of Washington, whose study appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Doty’s research is part of an emerging area of study known as phytoremediation, which aims to use trees, grasses and other plans to remove hazardous materials.
“Phytoremediation is basically a solar-powered pollutant-removal system,” said Doty in comments e-mailed to Reuters.
Listen up Greens! Genetic modification–that much loathed symbol of science-gone-wrong–will soon make our world a cleaner, healthier place for all creatures.
Such discoveries confirm that scientific innovation and human development should not be limited by the precautionary principle. Great possibilities await us in the future; miscalculations and mistakes will most certainly occur, but these are necessary steps on the road to prosperity. A nuanced understanding of human creative abilities and adaptive capacities provides a more appropriate paradigm through which we may contemplate this process of wondrous discovery.
Article via Digg.
The Rationalist Canon
Charlie
From Eliezer Yudkowski at OvercomingBias:
“This is why rationalists put such a heavy premium on the paradoxical-seeming claim that a belief is only really worthwhile if you could, in principle, be persuaded to believe otherwise… Some belief systems, in a rather obvious trick to reinforce themselves, say that certain beliefs are only really worthwhile if you believe them unconditionally - no matter what you see, no matter what you think. Your brain is supposed to end up in the same state regardless. Hence the phrase, “blind faith”. If what you believe doesn’t depend on what you see, you’ve been blinded as effectively as by poking out your eyeballs.”
If you haven’t yet perused OvercomingBias, its one of the most informative, and intellectually challenging, blogs in existence. The sheer volume of information is immense; any given post contains multiple links to related posts which in turn lead to other related topics, and so goes the information super-highway. You will become more self-aware, more conscious of your own biases and thought processes, the more you read this blog.
Perhaps, sometime in the future, Yudkowski, Hanson, and Co. will implement a more efficient (i.e. visually succinct) sytem of displaying information via topic, but for now, just browse an article of interest, be sure to follow the links, and you will soon find yourself deep within the way of Bayes.
Does the Dancer Spin Left or Right?
Charlie
A neat optical illusion. Confirmed: the PokerClub approaches meta-physics from all angles.
Can you guess who is who?
Via: Alex at MR.
Al Gore, Superstar
Charlie
PokerClub faithful, the news is in. High Priests of the New Faith, Nobel Prize Committe, Sages of Oslo, have annointed our new world leader. Let us rejoice and sing!
“In winning the Nobel Peace Prize, Gore completed an unusual trifecta of awards for the year. The movie “An Inconvenient Truth,” which highlighted his crusade, won Oscars for best documentary and best original song. Gore also won an Emmy for the interactive work of Current TV, a cable channel he helped found.”
Are you a Liberal !?!?
Charlie
Alex at MR posts an excellent article by European economists Alberto Alesina and Francesco Giavazzi. Their question: why the Political Left–the so-called modern ”liberals”–refuse market philosophies with startling gusto (foolishness?).
“Our point is that the goals that are traditionally held dear by the European [and America] left – like protection of the economically weakest and aversion to excessive inequality and un-earned rewards to insiders – should lead the left to adopt pro-market policies. What has often been the norm in Europe from the 60s until recently – heavy market regulation, protection of the status quo, an enormous public sector which rewards not the very poor but the most-connected and requires highly distortionary taxation, universities which often produce mediocrity in the name of egalitarianism (while the very rich get a good education anyway, somehow) –all end up decreasing efficiency and justice at the same time.”
The question–a topic I have been pondering for some time now–is highly nuanced and requires much study.
I am similarly frustrated with those who support “free market policies” but see themselves–and their philosophies–as ”conservative”. Often, when socializing with conservatives, I wonder aloud how we might elucidate the wisdom of restricted government and civil market society to those on the Progressive Left. Most usually, I’m met with hostility; they remind me that it is an impossibility for Leftists to begin sympathizing with a market oriented position. I do not agree.
Nevertheless, modern liberals continue their paradoxical oposition to the market. How can this be corrected? Is this a fear? A failure of logic? A refusal? Do they require centrally institutionalized altruism? How can we spread the positive message of decentralized liberty and market reliance to our Left leaning friends, family, colleagues?
Look for more in this vein under the new thread: “The Left and Liberalism”.
Ponder This!
Charlie
Given by writer Czeslaw Milosz as preface to his novel The Captive Mind:
When someone is honestly 55% right, that’s very good and there’s no use wrangling. And if someone is 60% right, it’s wonderful, it’s great luck, and let him thank God. But what’s to be said about 75% right? Wise people say this is suspicious. Well, and what about 100% right? Whoever says he’s 100% right is a fanatic, a thug, and the worst kind of rascal.
— An Old Jew of Galacia
In accordance with the above citation, topics for further discussion will include:
Quote of the Day
Sandeep
From An Economist in Paradise:
…the longer time a small island state has been colonised, the richer it now is. And there is a reason why some have had a longer colonial experience than others: wind patterns. Islands located near routes in the prevailing winds made useful stopovers and were more easily revisited and colonised.
Just another example of how economics marvelously unwraps unseen histories of human life.
The Past Isn’t Dead, It Isn’t Even Past…
Charlie
Yes to the Carolina Chocolate Drops! Buy their newest album, “Dona Got a Ramblin Mind”… and then Go see this band!
I caught them last weekend at the Flat Rock Music Festival.
Though the music calls upon an old time and place, the Drops radically challenge short-sighted, superficial conceptions of the American South’s remarkably varried ethno-cultural histories. With sentimental beauty, alternative histories emerge and flower; the Drops–overflowing with remarkable sonic imagination–capture the detailed nuances, tensions and celebrations of a land and people defined by conflict.
And yet, their music is enthusiastic, sophisticated, and tinged with hypermodern complexity. Turn-of-the-century country, blues, minstrel, ragtime, march, and bluegrass hold foundations, but the trio melds concert, gospel, soul, funk, jazz, and Afro-Latin influences in ecstatic symphony.
Hats off to the Chocolate Drops and old sage Faulkner.
More to the Market
Sandeep
In this post I questioned the assumption that a tax break is a significant motivation for charitable donations. This assumption, though worthy of examination, is quite perilous if we don’t keep in mind how much we don’t know. We have certain methods of reading signals, like prices. But it is impossible to know all the myriad motivations that create prices: the process of objectively back-tracking through history breaks down at individual decisions. Although we may retrieve and better understand data, setting in stone others’ motivations is impossible.
Yes, perilous: in this day, when it is not uncommon to find people who emotionally equate market with evil corporations, more must be done to communicate how unfathomably bountiful is the goods-basket that exists within the scope of the market. Non-profits, open-source projects, and aid organizations are all enterprises included in the concept of the market but are often associated with government. Tyler at MR always has good examples of currently-fringe aspects of the market in his “Markets in Everything” series. Taborrok, also at MR, has edited a book called Voluntary City, which I recommend highly, as it will elucidate your understanding of free exchange in society.
Not only is there more to the market than is conventionally thought, there is necessarily more to the market than any one person could conceptualize. That we don’t know things is a blessing. Human action exists now in immense prosperity not because of higher collective ‘knowing’, but because the range of choices for most humans is increasing rapidly. One reason we systematically undervalue the immense variety of human action because it’s hard for our minds to grasp others’ multifarious motivations. Once we sit back, relax, and ponder the tremendous magnitude of human experience that always evades the single mind, we understand everything’s gonna be alright precisely because there’s more to the market than we think.
Harmonious with Anarchy?
Sandeep
Are some spiritual belief-systems more compatible with anarchy?
Hinduism also points out that a difference of metaphysical doctrine need not prevent the development of an accepted basic code of conduct. The important thing about a man is his dharma [roughly, the personal basis of behaviour], not necessarily his religion.
That’s Kshiti Mohan Sen (Amartya Sen’s grandfather) in Hinduism.
You know, like a plant
Sandeep
For some reason I get RNC campaign emails, and the latest one is from W. himself, who seems to believe that politicians have supreme control over complex, emergent phenomena.
Republicans also have a solid record when it comes to growing this economy.
Economists have failed if most people take these words seriously.
Quote of the Day
Sandeep
Despite previously denouncing coercive and violent population control techniques, Jared Diamond still goes on to praise the Chinese government’s courage to “restrict the traditional freedom of individual reproductive choice…” It is this type of population control – coerced restrictions, forced abortion, infanticide – that apparently “contributes to [his] hope” and “may inspire modern First World citizens” to follow a similar path. Whether they recognise it or not, every advocate of anti-natal population programs must make a fateful choice. They must either opt for voluntarism, in which case their population targets will be meaningless. Or else they must opt for attempting to meet their population targets – in which case they must embrace coercive measures. There is no third way.
That’s Nicholas Eberstadt’s “Too many people?”
Oftentimes this is the case: either you choose liberty or cope with some element of coercion. What irritates me is when people embrace the dangerous idea that a little bit of coercion is innocuous in regard to the beneficence of the policy in consideration: that within our perfected minds we may rationally construct the various particulars upon which a superior society can stand strong.
Don’t fool yourself into believing that if you rack your brains and think really, really hard, the human experience will stupendously boil down to a few hard facts.
thepokerclub shall henceforth recognize
Charlie
Thanks to Wikipedia’s “On this Day” calendar, I found out today was Constitution and Citizenship Day!
As such, I thought a passage from Lysander Spooner would be most appropriate.
The Constitution has no inherent authority or obligation. It has no authority or obligation at all, unless as a contract between man and man. And it does not so much as even purport to be a contract between persons now existing. It purports, at most, to be only a contract between persons living eighty years ago. And it can be supposed to have been a contract then only between persons who had already come to years of discretion, so as to be competent to make reasonable and obligatory contracts. Furthermore, we know, historically, that only a small portion even of the people then existing were consulted on the subject, or asked, or permitted to express either their consent or dissent in any formal manner. Those persons, if any, who did give their consent formally, are all dead now. Most of them have been dead forty, fifty, sixty, or seventy years. And the constitution, so far as it was their contract, died with them. They had no natural power or right to make it obligatory upon their children. It is not only plainly impossible, in the nature of things, that they could bind their posterity, but they did not even attempt to bind them. That is to say, the instrument does not purport to be an agreement between any body but “the people” then existing; nor does it, either expressly or impliedly, assert any right, power, or disposition, on their part, to bind anybody but themselves.
Take note, thepokerclub shall henceforth recognize September 17th as Lysander Spooner Day.
First Paragraphs
Sandeep
I like to hand Charlie a book that I’m reading and observe his facial gestures–eyes widening, jaw slightly drooping–as he reads the first paragraph. I’m not a fan of coming to conclusions about a novel from the rear acclaim, and it usually ain’t the first paragraph that impresses me. Two days ago I picked up Orhan Pamuk’s The Black Book. I read the first paragraph about 10 times. Pamuk is amazing.
Rüya was lying facedown on the bed, lost to the sweet warm darkness beneath the billowing folds of the blue-checked quilt. The first sounds of a winter morning seeped in from outside: the rumble of a passing car, the clatter of an old bus, the rattle of the copper kettles that the salep maker shared with the pastry cook, the whistle of the parking attendant at the dolmuş stop. A cold leaden light filtered through the dark blue curtains. Languid with sleep, Galip gazed at his wife’s head: Rüya’s chin was nestling in the down pillow. The wonderous sights playing in her mind gave her an unearthly glow that pulled him toward her even as it suffused him with fear. Memory, Celal had once written in a column, is a garden. Rüya’s gardens . . . Galip thought. Don’t think, don’t think, it will make you jealous! But as he gazed at his wife’s forehead, he still let himself think.
“Why be boring?”
Various advice to graduate students in economics, most of which I find useful regarding life-in-general,from Pete Boettke:
Read the rest of this entry
