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Why the Truth Still Matters

Fri, 15 Jun 2012 00:00:00 -0700

FactCheck - By Brooks Jackson - Jun. 15 (Opinion) - Let’s face it, voters love to hear falsehoods. Mitt Romney proclaims that President Obama’s health care law is a “federal takeover of the U.S. health care system,” and his supporters approve. Obama’s people nodded in agreement when the president said “if you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan.” But both claims are false. The truth about Romney’s claim is that the federal government accounted for 43.6 percent of all U.S. health care spending in 2009, before the law was signed, and government actuaries predict that in 2015, when the law is fully effective, that will rise to 47.4 percent. What’s more, much or most of that 3.8 percentage point increase would have happened anyway as the postwar baby boom generation reaches age 65 and goes on Medicare. So the law is no “takeover.” Rather, it’s a modest, incremental change in the existing system.

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Partisan Polarization Surges in Bush, Obama Years

Sun, 10 Jun 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Pew Research Center - Jun. 10 (Special Report) - As Americans head to the polls this November, their values and basic beliefs are more polarized along partisan lines than at any point in the past 25 years. Unlike in 1987, when this series of surveys began, the values gap between Republicans and Democrats is now greater than gender, age, race or class divides. Overall, there has been much more stability than change across the 48 political values measures that the Pew Research Center has tracked since 1987. But the average partisan gap has nearly doubled over this 25-year period – from 10 percentage points in 1987 to 18 percentage points in the new study.

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Did Republicans deliberately crash the US economy?

Sat, 09 Jun 2012 00:00:00 -0700

The Guardian - By Michael Cohen - Jun. 09 (Opinion) - Be it ideology or strategem, the GOP has blocked pro-growth policy and backed job-killing austerity – all while blaming Obama So why does the US economy stink? Why has job creation in America slowed to a crawl? Why, after several months of economic hope, are things suddenly turning sour? The culprits might seem obvious – uncertainty in Europe, an uneven economic recovery, fiscal and monetary policymakers immobilized and incapable of acting. But increasingly, Democrats are making the argument that the real culprit for the country's economic woes lies in a more discrete location: with the Republican Party. In recent days, Democrats have started coming out and saying publicly what many have been mumbling privately for years – Republicans are so intent on defeating President Obama for re-election that they are purposely sabotaging the country's economic recovery. These charges are now being levied by Democrats such as Senate majority leader Harry Reid and Obama's key political adviser, David Axelrod.

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Why you vote the way you do

Fri, 25 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

The Week - By Jonathan Haidt - May. 25 (Opinion) - Here's a simple definition of ideology: "a set of beliefs about the proper order of society and how it can be achieved." And here's the most basic of all ideological questions: Should we preserve the present order or change it? Political theorists long assumed that people chose ideologies to further their self-interest. The rich and powerful want to preserve and conserve; the workers want to change things. But that link has been largely broken in modern times, when the rich go both ways (industrialists mostly right, tech billionaires mostly left), and so do the poor (rural poor mostly right, urban poor mostly left). So for most of the late 20th century, political scientists embraced blank-slate theories in which people soaked up the ideology of their parents.

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Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem.

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Thomas E. Mann, Norman J. Ornstein - Apr. 29 (Opinion) - Rep. Allen West, a Florida Republican, was recently captured on video asserting that there are “78 to 81” Democrats in Congress who are members of the Communist Party. Of course, it’s not unusual for some renegade lawmaker from either side of the aisle to say something outrageous. What made West’s comment — right out of the McCarthyite playbook of the 1950s — so striking was the almost complete lack of condemnation from Republican congressional leaders or other major party figures, including the remaining presidential candidates. It’s not that the GOP leadership agrees with West; it is that such extreme remarks and views are now taken for granted.

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Winds of change brewing

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Sydney Morning Herald - By Jo Chandler - Mar. 31 (News Report) - Beddington argues, pragmatically, that while much is uncertain about the longer-term, the challenges of the next 20 years are clear: population growth (another billion people by 2025); urbanisation; and climate change as a consequence of the greenhouse

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Are Emotions Prophetic?

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Wired - By Jonah Lehrer - Mar. 04 (Special Report) - For thousands of years, human beings have looked down on their emotions. We’ve seen them as primitive passions, the unfortunate legacy of our animal past. When we do stupid things – say, eating too much cake, or sleeping with the wrong person, or taking out a subprime mortgage – we usually blame our short-sighted feelings. People commit crimes of passion. There are no crimes of rationality. This bias against feeling has led people to assume that reason is always best. When faced with a difficult dilemma, most of us believe that it’s best to carefully assess our options and spend a few moments consciously deliberating the information. Then, we should choose the alternative that best fits our preferences. This is how we maximize utility; rationality is our Promethean gift. But what if this is all backwards? What if our emotions know more than we know? What if our feelings are smarter than us?

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To predict elections, the stock market, or American Idol, go with your gut, study says

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Post - By Suzy Khimm - Mar. 04 (News Report) - A forthcoming article in the Journal of Consumer Research finds that trusting one’s intuition improves predictions of future outcomes from politics and the stock market to American Idol and the weather

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Christian pastor faces execution in Iran for refusing to renounce his faith

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Daily Mail - Sep. 29 (News) - Telegraph.co.ukChristian pastor faces execution in Iran for refusing to renounce his faithDaily MailBy Daily Mail Reporter A man who converted from Islam to Christianity is facing the death penalty in Iran for refusing to return to his former religion. Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, 34, of the Church of Iran, faces hanging after refusing a court order to ...Lawyer hopes Iran Christian pastor will be freedTelegraph.co.ukIran: Christian Convert May Still Be HangedSky NewsIran Prepares to Execute Christian PastorHuman EventsWashington Post -CNN (blog)all 274 news articles »

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The Republicans are now the anti-science party

Sun, 04 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Paul Krugman - Sep. 04 (Opinion) - Jon Huntsman Jr, a former Utah governor and ambassador to China, isn't a serious contender for the Republican presidential nomination. And that's too bad, because Mr Hunstman has been willing to say the unsayable about the Republican party in the United States, namely, that it is becoming the "anti-science party". This is an enormously important development. And it should terrify us. To see what Mr Huntsman means, consider recent statements by the two men who actually are serious contenders for the Republican nomination: Rick Perry and Mitt Romney.

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The Baloney Detection Kit

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

YouTube - By Michael Shermer - Jul. 06 (Opinion) - With a sea of information coming at us from all directions, how do we sift out the misinformation and bogus claims, and get to the truth? Michael Shermer of Skeptic Magazine lays out a "Baloney Detection Kit," ten questions we should ask when encountering a claim. The 10 Questions: 1. How reliable is the source of the claim? 2.Does the source make similar claims? 3. Have the claims been verified by somebody else? 4. Does this fit with the way the world works? 5. Has anyone tried to disprove the claim? 6. Where does the preponderance of evidence point? 7. Is the claimant playing by the rules of science? 8. Is the claimant providing positive evidence? 9. Does the new theory account for as many phenomena as the old theory? 10. Are personal beliefs driving the claim?

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Argument, Truth and the Social Side of Reasoning

Thu, 30 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Gary Gutting - Jun. 30 (Opinion) - In a recent discussion about reasoning, one point was overlooked: Knowledge of the truth is a social process. Philosophers rightly think of themselves as experts on reasoning. After all, it was a philosopher, Aristotle, who developed the science of logic. But psychologists have also had some interesting things to say about the subject. A fascinating paper by Dan Sperber and Hugo Mercier has recently generated a lot of discussion.

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The Non-Science That Explains What’s Wrong with Science Explaining Non-Belief in Science

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Easily Distracted - By Easily Distracted - Apr. 26 (Opinion) - It is not irrational or unreasonable to regard scientific claims which recommend or insist upon particular public policy initiatives with sharply pronounced skepticism across the board. Not because science itself requires a particular form of skepticism (though it does) but because such skepticism is evidence-based, derived from the history of the relationship between policy, the modern state, and science, a history which even non-experts have often viscerally experienced or witnessed.

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Overcoming political polarization… but not through facts

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

my heart's in accra - By Ethan Zuckerman - Apr. 25 (Opinion) - A recent New York Times poll suggests that Americans are in a dark mood. 70% of people think the country is moving in the wrong direction, a number not seen since the peak of the Great Recession two years ago. Their frustration may stem from higher gas p

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The Science of Why We Don't Believe Science

Mon, 18 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Mother Jones - By Chris Mooney - Apr. 18 (Special Report) - Through her, the aliens had given the precise date of an Earth-rending cataclysm: December 21, 1954. Some of Martin's followers quit their jobs and sold their property, expecting to be rescued by a flying saucer when the continent split asunder and a new

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Jewish prayers for Egypt's uprising

Tue, 01 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Aljazeera - By Michael Lerner - Feb. 01 (Opinion) - Many Jews from around the world support Egyptian self-determination because of Judaism's own historic past with Egypt.

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The American Debate: A death-row opponent: Be still, my heart

Sun, 12 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Philadelphia Inquirer - By Dick Polman - Dec. 12 (Opinion) - Ever since a self-described loser named Steven Hayes went on trial this autumn for the murders of a Connecticut doctor's wife and two daughters, my gut has been warring with my brain.

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Obama calls for religious tolerance

Fri, 10 Sep 2010 21:05:42 -0700

Los Angeles Times - By Christi Parsons - Sep. 10 (News) - On the eve of the Sept. 11 remembrance, President Obama spoke of his own Christianity on Friday while calling on Americans to turn away from religious divisions and join together as "one nation, under God." It was a rare personal reference from the president, coming in a news conference that sounded more like a homily to the nation before a somber anniversary.

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The Danger Of Science Denial

Mon, 12 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

TED - By Michael Specter - Apr. 12 (Speech) - Vaccine-autism claims, "Frankenfood" bans, the herbal cure craze: All point to the public's growing fear (and, often, outright denial) of science and reason, says Michael Specter. He warns the trend spells disaster for human progress.

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UN judge calls for prosecution of Pope Benedict

Sun, 11 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Raw Story - By Stephen C. Webster - Apr. 11 (Opinion) - Geoffrey Robertson, a renowned human rights lawyer and United Nations jurist, wants to see Pope Benedict put on trial for allegedly protecting predator priests. In a Guardian UK piece making its rounds this week in Catholic circles, Robertson demanded the pope be "put in the dock" so that the church might "feel the full weight [...]

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Files show future pope resisted defrocking priest - Yahoo! News

Sat, 10 Apr 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Associated Press - By Gillian Flaccus, Brooke Donald, Eric Gorski, John Mone, ,Raquel Maria Dillon,VictorL.Simpson - Apr. 10 (Investigative Report) - LOS ANGELES – The future Pope Benedict XVI resisted pleas to defrock a California priest with a record of sexually molesting children, citing concerns including "the good of the universal church," according to a 1985 letter bearing his signature.

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Ex-Scientology lawsuits reveal elite Sea Org group

Sun, 28 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0700

Associated Press - Mar. 28 (News) -

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Death Becomes Him

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Atlantic Monthly - By Bruce Falkner - Mar. 03 (Investigative Report) - Over the past decade, Ludwig Minelli has helped more than 1,000 people kill themselves and has turned Zurich into the undisputed world capital of assisted suicide. Minelli sees himself as a crusader for what he calls “the last human right”—and he believes that helping more and more people to die advances his cause. Even if you believe in an absolute right to die on your own terms, how far is too far in the quest to secure that right? By Bruce Falconer

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How Christian Were the Founders?

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0800

New York Times - By Russell Shorto - Feb. 12 (Special Report) - Conservative activists on the Texas Board of Education say that the authors of the Constitution intended the United States to be a Christian nation. And they want America’s history textbooks to say so, too.

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Freedom vs. the Public Option

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 00:00:00 -0800

TruthOut - By George Lakoff - Jan. 25 (Editorial) - Which would you prefer, consumer choice or freedom? Extended coverage or freedom? Bending the cost curve or freedom? John Boehner, House minority leader, speaking of health care, said recently, "This bill is the greatest threat to freedom that I have seen in the 19 years I have been here in Washington.... It's going to lead to a government takeover of our health care system, with tens of thousands of new bureaucrats right down the street, making these decisions [choose your doctor, buy your own health insurance] for you." read more

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