The whole point of free speech is not to make ideas exempt from criticism but to expose them to it.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Just because something's uncertain, doesn't mean we can't make a pretty good guess.


I'm thinking specifically about Pop Quiz#2 below, and by extension, about a lot of things going on these days... in politics, in religion vs evolution, in economics, the physical nature of the universe, Schrödinger's cat, dark matter, what the Constitution says and doesn't say, global warming, etc, etc.

What are you thinking?

Are you thinking?

Today's is kind of an open, anything goes topic.

So jump right in and give us a piece of your mind.

8 comments:

The Guy said...

Ahh, a nice open discussion. It's is like looking at the clouds, emptying your mind and letting yourself see what you can in the clouds (we all gotta be kids sometime).

I have had some interesting thoughts over the last week that I would love some input on.

I currently am reading the book "Prometheus Rising" by Robert Anton Wilson, and say what you will about him, he provides some interesting insight into the the processes of the mind. A lot of these ideas have since been proven. His basic idea is the concept of the mind as a computer consisting of both hardware and software which of course has "circuits" that go with it. Now he says that these circuits are common in every human. And range from the base emotional circuits to metaphysical circuits.

The reason why I bring this up is because yesterday, I was in an interesting situation. We were on the way to the rally to do some promotional stuff for an event that will be happening in Oct. And we got pulled over by the cops. I won't go into the story to much because that is not important. However, some interesting things came to mind during that event.

First: I experienced the initial flush of adrenaline and fear that occurs. However, because of the mindset I was in at the time, I immediately moved into an analytical mode and analyzed, (while it was happening) why I was feeling the way I did, and I saw that this was because of the ingrained fear of authority.

Second: The cops actually reinforced this. We had done nothing wrong really. They searched the car, and told the driver of the car that we barely got out of a ticket. The reason he stated was that one of our passengers was "confrontational". He was only confrontational in that he asked questions and had the Gall to look the cop in the eyes while they spoke.

Interesting situation and interesting insights yesterday.

Any input?

Bill Fleming said...

What would the ticket have been for, Bill?

The Guy said...

Failure to use turn signal.

Bill Fleming said...

...and they searched the car because?

The Guy said...

Just because... they asked, the driver conceded. Mainly because we knew if we didn't, they would call in the drug dogs, then we would waste a lot of time and we had limited amount of daylight for filming.

Bill Fleming said...

I think there is a common philosophy among many law enforcement people in our area that says the police want to make sure we are afraid of them.

That's how it's supposed to be.

I've heard it discussed as policy, actually.

I don't agree with the idea, but I think a lot of people do.

Kind of like were also supposed to be afraid of God and our parents.

Authoritarianism.

Opposite of Libertarianism.

That's the REAL political divide in our country.

Or so say those far better informed than I (George Lakoff, for example... among others.)

[aaron] said...

Luckily our handy Libertarian representative was along for the ride to make sure the cops knew we weren't consenting out of fear, but out of amusement in their desire to rummage through a year's worth of garbage in the back seat of my car.

[aaron] said...

I guess (as per your original topic), these cops guessed wrong... but they probably guessed right enough times to make it worth their while (at least in terms of instilling fear).