I've moved.

If you're coming here, you're coming to my old blog site, and I've got good news for you: I've moved. I am now soly hosted on the Intellectual Elite server: jim.intellectualelite.com. Feel free to stop by my new site.

Cognitive dissonance

With LaTex behind me I now have more time to focus less on publishing papers and more on current events. Unfortunately with it not being an election year, I don't see people violently debating topics as they no doubt will two years from now. Not that I look down on these "seasonal" debtors (quite to the contrary I support any debate periodic or otherwise), but it leaves me without much to talk about. I did, however, stumble across an old article written by a friend of mine. 12 Reasons Same-Sex Marriage Will Ruin Society [1]. In addition to the title, the entire piece is a well written piece of satire. But it does raise the interesting question of: why not? Why not let to men marry (or two women)? We have no laws against their having monogamous sexual relations with one another, why deprive them of marriage?

There could be financial considerations (remember marriage is also a civil union), but what possibly could someone gain financially from marrying a man instead of a woman (or vise versa)? I suppose there might be religious considerations, however marriage ceased to be soly a religious institution back in ancient Rome. As long as the happy couple can find a religion to marry them, who are we to stop them? And not all marriages have any religion associated with them any way. A friend of mine got married in a court house four months ago. No prayers, no blessings, no priests (or rabies or other religious figure). As a community homosexuals seem to want this, so why not give it to them? What do we lose as a society? Isn't America the land open to all practices?

Actually it isn't, or at least, it hasn't been. From slaves to women to Muslims, America has historically been notorious for not being very accepting. This seems to be rather odd for a country who's motto was: "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," but it certainly isn't unique. In fact, this sort of degradation of minorities and subcultures appears all over the world. From the Chinese response to Falun Gong, to the Islamic wars on Israel, to the oppression of Jew throughout Europe, humanity as a whole has a way of vilianizing those that aren't like them; and while we may like to think that we have risen above such a seemingly barbaric practice, the fact is, it is ingrained in our nature as part of a concept called Cognitive Dissonance.

I do not attempt to explain all racial/ethnic prejudice with this concept (as there are many reasons for both), however, it is important to understand if we want to understand why normally perfectly rational people behave in an irrational manner (such as denying marriage to homosexuals, something which wouldn't even effect them). I also do not attempt to explain those whom have a religious objection to same sex marriage. Although the bible has been used to justify horrible things before, separating marriage from religion is not an easy thing in our culture and as such, opinions of a religious nature may or may not have merit. Instead, I only seek to spread a little understanding as to why people behave the way they do.

"Cognitive dissonance is a psychological phenomenon which refers to the discomfort felt at a discrepancy between what you already know or believe, and new information or interpretation. ...if someone is called upon to learn something which contradicts what they already think they know — particularly if they are committed to that prior knowledge — they are likely to resist the new learning[2]." Or in lay men's terms, we avoid things that prove us wrong, worthless, or we just plain dislike. If I believe that all men have green hair, I am much more likely to be taken in by someone with a green dye job and less likely by someone with an orange dye job. This is because the green conforms to my expectations, thus I do not try to find fault with it, where as the orange does not, making me much more likely to try to find fault with it. While this is paradoxical in nature (how can we have learned the initial view points if we think ourselves infallible) it is also necessary so as to reduce anxiety brought on by realizing misconceptions. If I suddenly stop believing that Jews are evil and bent on taking over the world, my entire library of knowledge must also be taken into question which would render me unable to function. To counter this, I stick to my beliefs (regardless of their validity).

Want proof? Here is an experiment you can probably conduct on your own. Get a bunch of kids together and have them do some sort of menial labor (cleaning for example). Pay half of them 10 cents and half of them 10 dollars. Now ask each one to lie to the next one and tell that next one that they enjoyed the task (which is why it is important that the task be dull and menial). Which do you think will lie more readily? If we believe in cognitive dissonance the answer is those paid less, as because they are paid so little they must unconsciously justify their actions to themselves and thus believe the task was more enjoyable than it was. This is because they know 10 cents isn't a lot of money for such a horrible task and thus they must have enjoyed it or risk upsetting their collection of knowledge to date. So what does this have to do with gays getting married?

We vilify homosexuals because if we start considering them one of us, we must then consider the possibility of being one of them. As they are looked down upon to begin with this would mean considering ourselves lesser than the majority of society (which some people actually do do , and thus think themselves homosexual when they are not, but normally they realize this and have to come to terms with their own heterosexuality). As this contradicts the information we have already been fed (that we are part of that majority), we reject this possibility and the homosexual community as a whole. Cognitive dissonance sets in. We may justify actions caused by cognitive dissonance through a verity of manners (which would be cognitive dissonance caused by understanding cognitive dissonance), but this only confirms the theories. Haven't you, while reading this, said to yourself "oh I see how this effects some people, but not me. I never have cognitive dissonance." ? What more proof do you need?

Taken in part from: What World We Live In, by Jim Tzenes.

"That's not a lie, its bullshit."

Most of us spend our whole lives talking about bullshit without ever really knowing what it is. Well, atleast I didn't untill just last week. I was sitting at the dinner table eating thanks giving leftovers and discussing everyone's favorite topic: the Iraqi War, when I was informed that the supposed weapons of mass distruction were not a lie by the administraition, but rather bullshit. This puzzled me as I had always thought of the two as being intrinsically linked. They aren't.

If you get a chance, I highly recomend you read Harry Frankfurt's book On Bullshit. For the more erudite it will probably do a much better job of explaining the difference than I can. However, Frankfurt can be a hard read, so I will do my best to summerize it here for you.

To understand the difference between bullshit and a lie, it becomes necessary to understand what a lie is first. Without going into too much detail, a lie is a cunning attempt to convince the other person that something which the liar knows to be false, is infact true. The importance here is the deliberate attempt to deviate from the truth. The liar commits two sins here. Firstly, they convince you that something that isn't true is; and secondly, that something which is true isn't. This specific deviation from the truth is the ultimate goal of the liar.

Bullshit on the otherhand is something far more devious. To start, the bullshitter has no concern as to what is infact true. The bullshitter's objective is deception, just as the liar's, however he is unconcerned with the truth. Where the liar must convince you that the lie is true, and the truth is a lie, the bullshitter only convinces you that the bullshit is true. He is unconcerned as to what the actual truth is. He may even be right, but the fact that he does not know whether or not his stance is infact true is the essence of bullshit. But let me give you an example.

Suppose I choose to comment on a subject on these boards that I have a basic understanding of without doing any research into the matter. Let's say for example I advocate "Gun Proliferation for the Reduction of Crime" (something I don't in reality advocate) during a debate on gun control. Without actually doing research to find out if it is an effect method or not, what I've done is made a statement that is essentially bullshit. It may be true, it may not, however, as I've made no attempt to find out, my statement has no regard for the truth and instead exists only to further the cause for which I support (in this hypothetical scenario it would be looser gun control laws). While my argument is a possibility, it is essentially bullshit, because I don't care if its true or not, I'm only trying to further my cause.

If you look at politics in general, it doesn't take long to realize that most of it is bullshit. Lets look at the example of the justification of the war in Iraq. Assume for a second that the real goal was the removal of Saddam from power (I know its a strech for you bleeding heart liberals, but its only a hypothetical, and don't use this as a forum to vent your "blood for oil" campagain) something the current adminastration has said many times (so its not beyond reason that it might have been). The actual justification which was used to enter the war was "weapons of mass distruction." Now, Saddam himself insisted that he had them and even went to the extent of publicly buying missles to deliver them. What emmerged was an atmosphere in which it began to be plausible that Saddam might have had them. Of course there is no way to prove he didn't have them (short of invading the country), so when Bush got up there and said "he quite possibly could have weapons of mass distruction," this wasn't a lie as much as it was bullshit. Everyone assumed he had them (and for we knew did), but there wasn't any hard evidence.

This doesn't mean bullshit is by any means a justifible communication tool for the government to employ, however it means Bush is not a monster, just another sinner like the rest of us. Afterall, who among us hasn't had to "bullshit" an essay or presentation when we were younger for school.

Taken in part from "Bullshit" by Harry Frankfurt, Conversations on the Intellectual Elite forum and conversations within the Tzenes family.

My Op Ed Piece.

If you're flying from New York any time in the foreseeable future, avoid the American Airlines terminal at JFK. The brand new terminal, despite being quite beautiful and the billion dollars American Airlines spent on it, is a modern disaster of management. It is as if American is trying to make life miserable for its customers. To begin with the airline has very few security check points, making getting through security a long an arguous task. To compliment this, the airline has provided nice card tables for you to put your stuff on. But don't worry; you'll probably spend just as much time waiting to get your ticket as waiting through security. Instead of installing the new kiosks that other airlines like United have adopted, American has opted to go with the old style customer interaction which is almost three times as long. It is almost as if American Airlines is single handedly trying to bring back 80s style airlines. I do however recommend United Airlines as they have a very modern outlook. Of course United is in bankruptcy, along with most of the industry.

But how could an airline like American make such a colossal mistake? How come the airline that is doing is right is the one in bankruptcy? Let’s turn back the clock to the mid nineties.

Back in the 90s Northwest Airlines and Continental decided to merge. In 2000 United moved to acquire US Airways. Both deals were blocked. American Airlines however, did manage to buy out TWA in the same year. Had all three deals gone through it would have left three major airlines. Unfortunately Congress decided to block two of them, leaving us with a large spattering of different airline companies. You may ask, what is the advantage to such a consolidation, after all, it is engrained in American youth that competition is what's good for everyone. Consider this though; competition leads to lower prices, so consolidation would lead to higher prices, which is exactly the kind of thing a company in bankruptcy wants. Theoretically the heads of the 6 major airlines (Delta is the only one I didn't mention) could get together and put aside their animosity to raise prices and save the crippled industry. That is if there weren't laws against such a thing. Which hasn't stopped other industries from adopting such a practice, so why not airlines? The answer, is the flaw in capitalism that Jesse first pointed out in his post: Capitalism is not Patriotic. Simply put, the heads of these companies have too much to risk.

We often think of companies as their own autonomous bodies which act in their self interest and perpetuate the capitalist agenda. This just blatantly isn't true. Instead companies are run by men. Greedy men, who are more concerned with looking out what is best for them rather than what is best for the company (or country in Jesse's example). What's best for the individual isn't what is best for the company. These executives make their millions whether they are in bankruptcy or not (sometimes more when they're in), and there is no reason for them to risk these gains for the benefit of the company or the industry at large. What is worse, attempts to regulate both the company and industry are what has gotten us into this mess in the first place. First the regulation that prevented the large buy outs in the late 90s, and then the forcing of competitive behavior.

So the question becomes: If we can't trust laissez faire capitalism, and we do more harm than good by regulating it, what place does capitalism have in the modern world?

taken from an Op Ed piece written by Jim Tzenes to the New Yorker

A retort. A short.

To break the third wall for a second: If you haven't noticed I've been mixing in serious posts with less serious one. I've designated the two through the symbolic marker Short. If you see that word in the title, try not to take the content too seriously, as I don't. Also lately I've been trying to comment on more ‘blogs both liberal and conservative. I've always seen it as my prerogative to play devil's advocate and argue liberalism to the conservatives and vice versa, but both of you feel free to argue with each other too.

This story takes place two years ago when the college I was in made me take an engineering design course. This course was centered on small groups of engineers (like myself) designing a product. Unfortunately the course was far more concerned with the technical aspects such as, reports and documentation, rather than the actual finished product. So to make up for this lack of emphasis on the designs which we made, the esteemed professors decided to have a competition where our products would be compared and then sold off to the RIC (which is a hospital in Chicago for the disabled). Our assignment had been to design a book holder for quadriplegics. People who couldn't hold the book open themselves.

I had been assigned to a crack team of engineers, who had done a great job on the documentation and left actually building the thing to me. I'm actually fairly proud of how it came out, considering I wrote the blueprints after it was finished (a method I highly suggest), but it wasn't great or anything. In fact, no one’s was. We'd been given ten weeks to do something we had no experience in, so the results were less than stunning. So there I was sitting in front of the odd look book holder that I would be presenting, and a half assed poster which had a single picture, when some members from another group strolled up. It took me a few minutes to realize that they had been going from one group to another "sizing up the competition."

I cannot begin to explain how incredibly stupid I thought this was, but after they demanded a demonstration I decided to tell them. "Are you joking me? Who cares whether it can hold open a textbook or not? Its not like a text book needs to be held open, anything that heavy will hold itself open by weight alone. But more importantly why do you care? This is a stupid project we've all been forced into so the school can pass us off as if we are engineers without actually haven't to go through the bother of training us first. Do you really care whether or not your design is considered the best? Do you think winning this thing is going to get you some prestigious job somewhere? Make your career? You're designing a book holder for people who are stuck in a hospital all day because they can't move around on their own. Is this your way of pretending to care? If you actually gave a shit about them you'd go down there and spend time with them. I'm sure they'd much prefer some actual human interaction to some crappy book holder prototype. Let me ask you this, when you went down there for initial testing, did you ask any of them how they were doing? Did you pretend to care about their lives then? You're the one using greed as a poor substitute for moral fiber, and you have the gall to question me about my commitment? Don't worry though I'm sure no one here will mistake your Hypocrisy for actual Engineering."

Or at least that's what I should have said.

Taken from the life of Jim Tzenes