Category Archives: Articles by others

Evidence of ancient abstract thinking, or just making shit up?

Articles by others, Law of Fives, Seeing is Believing

http://www.babelsdawn.com/babels_dawn/2009/01/abstract-thought-predates-homo-sapiens.html#more

 

This is a weird one: It’s pretty awesome that there might be evidence that abstract thought existed before language, and even before the so-called “modern” human… as far back as 2 million years.

 

However, when you take a step back, two things stand out to me: First, it’s been reasonably shown that some other kinds of pre-language primates have shown what could be considered abstract thinking.  So it wouldn’t be so unreasonable to think that ancient proto-humans would be able to have the ability, as well. 

 

Second, the author of the blog totally pulled a Law of Fives using Phi (the Golden Mean), starting with putting the oblong around a sketch of a stone axe, and the moving on to trying to fit one around his fist, with mixed results.

Humans are still nasty little monkeys.

Aneristic Delusion, Articles by others, Black Iron Prison, Fascism, Science, Seeing is Believing

http://scienceblogs.com/cognitivedaily/2009/01/would_we_still_obey_the_first.php#more

 

So, it looks like ABC found a way to re-do the Milgram Experiment minus the shaky ethics. 

 

Has the human race evolved a compassion gland after 40 years?  Perhaps the leaps in technology have taught humans that “just following orders” is a shitty excuse?  Maybe, just maybe, people will reject a sadistic “authority” and think for themselves?

 

Of course not.  Just like last time, about 70% of the test subjects would willingly electrocute another human because they were told to.

 

However, some other interesting things were learned:

 

·                                 The experimenters’ physical presence has a marked impact on his authority. As cited earlier, obedience dropped off sharply when orders were given by telephone. The experimenter could often induce a disobedient subject to go on by returning to the laboratory.

·                                 Conflicting authority severely paralyzes action. When two experimenters of equal status, both seated at the command desk, gave incompatible orders, no shocks were delivered past the point of their disagreement.

·                                 The rebellious action of others severely undermines authority. In one variation, three teachers (two actors and a real subject) administered a test and shocks. When the two actors disobeyed the experimenter and refused to go beyond a certain shock level, thirty-six of forty subjects joined their disobedient peers and refused as well.

“Perhaps only when rebels outnumber authority figures can disobedience readily spread.”

 

That last line sounds important. 

The Arctic Scramble

20 minutes in the future, Articles by others, current affairs, politics, resource scramble, Tactical Polyvalence, tensions, The Dismal Science, Tin-foil hats

While the eyes of conspiracy theorists are permamently fixed on the Middle East and Central Asia as the Last Great Battleground for easy access to oil, it looks like both NATO and Russia are capable of hiring slightly more intelligent people.

At least, those intelligent enough to realize that sitting under the Arctic circle are massive oil reserves, so far claimed by no-one.  And as the economic crisis continues to deepen, both are considering sending in military forces to show everyone who really owns the oil and gas hidden under the ice.

Russia is especially worried.  Their much inflated and hysterically claimed resurgence only came about due to stable political leadership, ie; Putin, along with the strategic use of Russian oil and gas reserves to improve the economy and rebuild its military power.  With the current economic crisis, consumption is down and oil prices have plummeted, putting Russia in a very precarious position.  Economic growth is not assured and Russia’s economy has not really diversified in recent years, arms sales aside.

NATO claims that global warming means sea routes previously closed would open again, and that military forces in the region could act as a stablizing factor to ensure possible rivalries don’t get out of hand.  And while this is true, we’d be fools to consider that the Russian interest in massive energy resources is not also a facor.

It is tempting to put a Cold War pun here, but I will refrain.  But I do wonder how China, Japan and other rising powers (such as India) would react to renewed tension in the Arctic circle.  Concentrating such a crisis away from Eastern Europe, the Far East or South Asia may have interesting repurcussions on previously stable alliances.

Keep an eye on this one.  It’s going to be a slow burner.

Hey kids! Try this at home!

Articles by others, Black Iron Prison, Science, Seeing is Believing

This might be old news for some of you mind hackers, but there are ways of proving that your brain and body filter out external “reality” and add their own interpretations.  And you don’t even need fancy drugs, or a laboratory.  Next time you’re trying to argue the Black Iron Prison position, suggest a few of these experiments:

 

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/graphics/011109_hacking_your_brain/

 

Ok, so they aren’t earth shattering.  But at the very least, they demonstrate that we are constantly creating our own personal universe inside our heads.  It’s good to know that it’s at least possible to consciously manage some of our perceived pain.  And it should be pointed out that the Purkinje Lights effect is not only the basis for Gysin’s Dream Machine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreamachine), but it’s been suggested that Nostradamus used the same techniques to create his visions.

Death from above just got a whole lot more silent

Articles by others, Surveillance, Technology, war

Via grinding.be

Georgia-based researchers have announced plans to eliminate one of the last remaining weaknesses of the deadly robotic aerial kill flotillas now poised to end humanity’s dominance over planet Earth. The airborne machine spies and automated assassins are now to receive whisper mode, and prowl the skies in eerie silence.

But I’m sure this technology will never fall into the wrong hands or be abused.

Nazi blogosphere vs Facts (DJ Cain and MC Encyclopedia of World Fascism remix)

Art, Articles by others, blogs, conspiracy, current affairs, Fascism, Humour, Indecision 08, Internet - a series of tubes, music, politics, Tin-foil hats, Trolling, wingnuts, writing, Youtube

Yo back up now and give a brother room
The fuse is lit and Im about to go boom
Mercy mercy mercy me
My life is a cage but on stage Im free

I’ve asked this question before: Suppose the natives in some Western European countries actually start to seriously resisting the organized destruction of their countries, halt mass immigration and reverse Multiculturalism. How will American authorities and media react to this?

Frankly, I wouldn’t be too surprised if they turn out to be actively hostile to native Europeans. That was the case with Clinton and with Bush, who after all supported the continued Islamization of Europe through Turkish membership of the European Union. It will be even worse with Obama, an anti-white Marxist.

As we know, a “Nazi” these days is not one of the many Muslims and their Leftist cheerleaders who shout “Death to Jews! in the streets of Europe; it’s any white person who doesn’t lie down and die on command. If we don’t lie down and die, we must be Nazis. We are after all Europeans.

Gates of Vienna

Fascists in Europe have seen this more recent immigration as a threat to the cultural homogeneity and national traditions of their countries. They have often exploited increases in the numbers of Muslims to claim that they are defending Christianity against Islam. Opposition to immigration has been one of the common threads within various fascist movements, and it is arguable that it plays the same role for such movements today as anti-Semitism did for inter-war Nazism and its imitators.

The Encyclopedia of World Fascism, page 367

JERUSALEM — Even as Barack Obama becomes the 44th president of the United States, anti-Israel professor Rashid Khalidi, whose ties to Obama stirred controversy during the campaign, has stated he could currently communicate with the incoming commander in chief, WND has learned.

Amid concern within the pro-Israel Jewish community, Obama repeatedly had denied he was influenced by Khalidi.

In an interview with the radical Democracy Now! news network last week, Khalidi expressed hope Obama would alter U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, talking to “all sides” of the Israeli-Palestinian arena. He also criticized Israel for killing civilians in the Gaza Strip the past few weeks and for leading what he termed a “propaganda campaign” to de-legitimize the Hamas terrorist organization.

World Net Daily

In practice, the term cosmopolitan was applied by interwar fascists chiefly to Marxists, Freemasons, and Jews. In Nazi thinking, Marxism and Freemasonry were themselves part of an international Jewish conspiracy, so that “cosmopolitan” often meant “Jewish.”

The Encyclopedia of World Fascism, page 188

Continue reading Nazi blogosphere vs Facts (DJ Cain and MC Encyclopedia of World Fascism remix) →

Bailiffs: 1 Citizens: 0

Articles by others, Law and Disorder

As our British readers may recall, the law has been changed recently so that bailiffs are allowed to kick down doors and people in order to get the money owed.

Well, this law has already claimed its first victim.  Via the BBC:

Andy Miller, 78, a retired pub landlord and father who had recently returned from hospital after a stroke, collapsed and died from a heart attack whilst being forced to a cashpoint by baliffs ‘under duress’.

The father-of-five collapsed last week on his way to a cash machine in Accrington, while the bailiff parked and waited for the money.

The death is not being treated as suspicious.

Indeed, its not suspicious.  Its entirely clear why he died.  Expect more of this in months to come.

I’m in ur conspiracy theoriez, doin performance art

Art, Articles by others, bizarre, conspiracy, counterculture, Culture-jamming, Discordianism, download, Lulz, Operation:Mindfuck, Situationism, Tin-foil hats

Link

The very idea of a 911-TV-Fakery researcher faking their own suicide as a performance art piece is incredibly synchronistic for me given the last year and half’s experience of investigating the mysterious double suicide of conspiratorially minded artists Theresa Duncan and Jeremy Blake. In that case several folks at the Rigorous Intuition and Dreams End websites and forums were talking about the wild and weird world of Situationist performance art and related artistic movements, some of which seem to involve a lot of parapolitical intrigue that sometimes includes hoaxing, culture-jamming and even the faking of people’s murder or suicide, aka pseudocide. Other discussions centered on the idea of both real-world and online group-stalking and gaslighting of people driving them to perhaps commit suicide. In my interview last year with parapolitical activist, writer and researcher Len Bracken (author of the biography on Situationist movement leader Guy Debord – Revolutionary) I brought up the possible confluence of some of the wilder personalities within the 911 Truth Movement (folks who seem more like performance artists than activists and researchers) and the Situationist and Discordian communities.

Also, a link to the mentioned interview can be found here.

I’m sure there are international laws against this kind of thing

Articles by others, bizarre, media culture

The New York Times, in their neverending crusade against common sense and fact based reporting, has decided, in their infinite wisdom, to give a column to Bono.  Yes, that Bono.  And already, his first article is turning out to be a failure of near epic proportions.  Its like Thomas Friedman, on acid.  Bad acid.

Fortunately, you can read the condensed version of all future articles at the following link (hat tip to Jean-Lustine d’Hadamard).