OK, smart folks, then what *is* the sensible way to go? I have my
platform ready:
Stop the wars, convert them into game-theoretic diplomacy such as
pointing out how important Afghanistan is to Europe, India and China,
and how important Iraq is to its wealthy arab neighbors and Europe.
Stop the Palestine/Israel wars by not supporting either side. Cut off
all aid and arms to either.
Terrorism: ignore it. If we do well at removing ourselves from the
wars and interventions into other country's problems, we're likely to
reduce threats. Remove the current overly strict airline security.
But do be serious about responding to true attacks like Afghanistan,
just remove the threat, and leave. Create the message: Don't mess
with us and we'll get out of your life.
With the money thus saved, hack away at the deficit while providing a
minimal step toward health care:
1) Require universal health care insurance.
2) Remove preconditions.
3) Subsidize those who cannot afford the base rate.
4) limit malpractice litigation.
(Deficit reduction seems to have been important in past innovation
resurgence, and is just sane. I doubt much of our debt is helping the
poor, homeless and unemployed .. it likely is just paying fat cats.)
In terms of military, bring back the draft and broaden military duty
to include civic programs .. a peace corps approach. Seriously take
care of the vets, they are ignored as soon as they return. Make sure
the medical plans are available, along with an improved GI bill for
education.
While we're at it, stop the other war, that on drugs. Legalize drugs,
under state control, and tax the hell out of them. Empty the prisons
of convicted drug users. Use the tax to pay for the initial health
plan.
Fiber to the home, immediately. Provide distance-learning public
education made up of freely available courseware such as MITs and
Britain's Open University. (Steve and I are amazed how good UNM's VOD
system, for example, as we take CS500 from Cris Moore.)
On the energy front: nuclear. Based on really modern thorium reactor
technology, or similar. Don't give up on "green" but deploy in small
distributed plants, not huge mountain eating wind farms. UK is
already doing this for new industrial plants: they have to be 20% self
sustaining.
Finally, build the most amazing public transportation system ever
dreamed of, similar to Kennedy's moon shot.
Basically build a world we can be proud of. And stop whining.
-- Owen
On Feb 14, 2010, at 12:18 PM, Douglas Roberts wrote:
Stupid of me to misread the table like that.
;-}
On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 12:11 PM, Russ Abbott
<[email protected]> wrote:
The table on the Wikipedia page says we're at 98, not 93. It's
apparently taken from here, which seems to have more entries.
-- Russ Abbott
_____________________________________________
Professor, Computer Science
California State University, Los Angeles
Cell phone: 310-621-3805
o Check out my blog at http://russabbott.blogspot.com/
On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 10:42 AM, Douglas Roberts <[email protected]
> wrote:
There are times when I do feel the need to turn to my Psittaciformes
for some genuinely deep, intelligent, considered discourse. I'm
sure that will come as no great surprise to you, Nick.
I'd like to bludgeon home one more bit of fact that IMO supports and
justifies my low opinion of the aggregate level if intelligence in
this country: fully 47% of our fine US population voted for a
presidential ticket that had Sarah Palin down for Vice President.
I'd also like to throw out another troubling observation: Whenever
the intellectual elite launch yet another discourse on one troubled
aspect of our country or another -- health care, economic reform,
the educational system, the political system -- they always go all
academic on us. We get deep, thoughty intricate, theoretical
symposia which never touch on the core issue.
What is the core issue? The fact that the average IQ in the United
states is just a notch above 90. 93, according to this reference,
and I've seen others that support it. What I have not seen is what
the distribution of IQs for the US is, so I don't know how fat the
left hand side tails are, but I suspect the worse.
Now, I suspect that the bulk of the FRIAM readership is, or at least
consider themselves to be several points above the US standard. So
given that, why have we never seen a discussion oriented around how
to lead a nation of dullards into a better social structure?
I would argue, should such a discussion ever get beyond the topic of
political correctness, that we have arrived at exactly the optimal
solution. From the perspective of the power elite, of course. The
rich, powerful corporations like Bechtel, BWXT, the Washington
Group, Grumman, Lockheed to name but a few of the military
industrial ones. United Health Care, Blue Cross, Cygna, etc. from
the health care sector. Likewise, the view as seen by the
politicians whom those very same corporate entities have purchased
is clearly pretty rosy.
From where these guys sit, it's the perfect way to run a country.
The academics can blather all they want about theoretical optimizing
solutions to whatever they claim are the pressing societal problems,
because meanwhile the bulk of the populace are enchanted with Sarah
Palin, the Party of No!, Rush, Pat Robertson, and their ilk, and
the status remains Quo. Plus or minus a few nuances, George Orwell
got it right.
Then, there's the issue of cultural stupidity, which may or may not
be related to IQ. These are the ones that Pamela refers to as
unable to think their way past slogans they've been taught. This is
a rich field for research, publications, speaking engagements, but
one which most academics seem blissfully unaware.
--Doug
On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 10:44 AM, Nicholas Thompson <[email protected]
> wrote:
Doug,
Parroting doug ===>We truly are a nation of idiots. We deserve Rush
Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, and Pat Robertson <=== end parroting Doug
I don't think one has to be stupid to engage in Dialogues of the
Deaf. We do that sort of thing quite well in FRIAM, from time to
time, and we are, ex hypothesi, VERY smart.
Somewhere along the way, We lost our faith that there is a Truth Of
The Matter. In the fifties, you had to believe that you were
right, when you said something. Nowadays, you just have to believe
you are plausible. (I blame the post-modernists myself ... but now
this message is becoming an example of itself.)
That having been said, are the Tea-Totallers any worse than the
people who put McCarthy into office in the 50's?
Nick
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([email protected])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
http://www.cusf.org [City University of Santa Fe]
----- Original Message -----
From: Douglas Roberts
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Sent: 2/14/2010 9:05:07 AM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Sources of Innovation
Pamela,
I think the healthcare issue goes way beyond just the usual
corporate profit protection, pay for play political game. Look at
how polarized the nation has become over just this issue alone.
Look at how many people don't believe that the healthcare issue is
really about healthcare insurance industry profit protection.
We truly are a nation of idiots. We deserve Rush Limbaugh, Sarah
Palin, and Pat Robertson.
Model that, if you like. The agents in the individual based
simulation won't need much sophistication.
--Doug
On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 8:00 AM, Pamela McCorduck <[email protected]>
wrote:
When Kennedy envisioned going to the moon, no lobby existed to fight
ferociously for the sole right to take the profits from going to the
moon, and the sole right to decide who gets to go.
If you read the not-very-deep subtext in this fight, you will see
that it's not about giving better healthcare to Americans (which we
desperately need) but about protecting the enormous profits of the
healthcare insurance industry. It's dressed up in "right to choose,"
and "privacy between doctor and patient," and "keep the government
out of medical care," but it's really about profit protection. From
several different and reliable sources (one of them a congressional
candidate) I have heard that since early last summer, the insurance
and pharmaceuticals industries have been spending over $1 million
per day on lobbying. It continues. You can do the arithmetic.
The media regularly reports on how much better, cheaper, and more
effective medical plans are all around the developed world. It
doesn't penetrate $1 million-plus per day.
On Feb 13, 2010, at 3:55 PM, Jochen Fromm wrote:
Where does all this whining about health care
come from? Everyone in Germany has a health
insurance, it is obligatory. There is general
agreement here that the European (and esp.
the German) health care system is better
and more social than the one in the US.
The USA obviously needs a better health care
system. Where is the American optimism and
the "i believe we can do it" spirit? I've heard
that optimism and positive thinking is a typical
American attitude.
America is lacking a vision, something like
Kennedy's vision to bring a man to the moon
and back. Military and NASA won't do it
this time. A vision or a common dream which
would foster technological innovation. Schmidt
mentioned "renewable energy" and green
technology. What about a clean L.A. with
fresh air? A large scale scientific initiative
to create the first AI would be another one.
America would have the resources to do it, it
has the companies with the largest data centers.
It should be proud of Google, Microsoft,
Amazon, and Apple. It is difficult to understand
why it disputes about health care so long.
-J.
----- Original Message ----- From: Roger Critchlow
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Sent: Saturday, February 13, 2010 6:54 PM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Sources of Innovation
[...] We're too busy defending ourselves from hedge fund vampires
and health care ghouls to worry about growth. Say what you will
about the undead, they steal their profits fair and square and
invest them in the rule of law.
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
