A very cute way to make students pay attention: “it is my intention to work into each of my lectures … one lie”.

John Timmer wants to know Why is the news media comfortable with lying about science?

Violinist Joshua Bell plays the DC Metro. Or, rather, he did in 2007. An old article, but I don’t think I’ve linked to it before.

it’s no accident that Hillary Clinton was once an avid Randian (recall her political career started with Barry Goldwater) because Rand is an important feminist. Rand’s portrayal of strong, independent, intelligent women is coming to be recognized as a landmark in fiction but in addition Rand’s attacks on self-sacrifice have special meaning in a culture that has long used the “caring ethic” to bind women to the service of others.

And also Shikha Dalmia:

Rand’s entire project involved liberating the individual from the yoke of collectivism and creating the social, moral, and political conditions in which he could live a fully actualized life. Each individual’s own happiness is his highest purpose, she said, and boldly declared selfishness to be a virtue—contrary to what various religious and non-religious (communist, fascist, communitarian) preachers of the ethics of self-sacrifice had been saying for ages.
For people like myself, laboring under the twin tyrannies of tradition and socialism when I first read Rand in my native India, this is heady, empowering stuff. It supplies you with the moral and intellectual ammunition to stand up to those claiming to own a piece of you—family, community, and state—and take control of your own destiny.

The point that both Dalmia and Tabarrok make is correct as far as it goes, but I think that viewing the “caring ethic” purely as a manifestation of altruism misses something important.

The article on Sudan states that “Women not only tolerate these situations, but regard them as parallel to norms and values of a good wife.”. But why have successive generations of women accepted such values? One possible answer is to say, essentially, that these women have been brainwashed by the patriarchy. While there is undoubtedly some truth to this, it fails to explain why the women in south Sudan have even more regressive views on gender roles than men do.

The article ends by quoting a woman who says “It’s my culture and my duty as a wife to submit to him. We have lived this way for many years, and I haven’t complained even once.”. I want to suggest that this should be read as a boast. The pursuit of virtue is motivated almost entirely by the desire to be well regarded by others — it is a rare person who will follow the dictates of abstract ethics when doing so causes them to be widely condemned by their peers. This particular set of values may look backwards to outsiders, but marrying a high-status man and being a “virtuous wife” is a highly effective way for Sudanese women to attain social status among other Sudanese men and women. Self-interest drives women to adopt the caring ethic.

Sadly, being a “virtuous wife” is also the only status competition available to most most Sudanese women. A major difficulty in opening new social paths for women is that doing so threatens the women who are successful in the established status competition. That is why people like Sabina Dario Lokolong are not embraced by women but instead receive vitriol from both genders.

Needless to say, these dynamics occur outside Sudan as well.

Insect eats time:

…and time eats insects.

I’d like to further point out that her argument does not depend on a materialist theory of mind. Buying into dualism doesn’t help make free will the least bit more tenable. The question of whether our minds are made solely of organic chemicals or made of something else (the “soul”) in addition to organic chemicals is irrelevant. In either case, a person’s actions are determined by the state of their mind.

There’s probably something deep to be said about this, but all I can think about right now is planning a Candyland themepark/casino. Fun for the whole family!

Hat tip to Erika.

Virginia Postrel writes about the psychology of bubbles.

And lastly, researchers read images off your visual cortex using MRI.

my emotional response does not seem to conform to the acceptable cultural script. Reporters call and ask “How painful was it?” and “Do you regret it now?” It wasn’t painful, I reply, I’m quite happy to have had the experience. Awkward silence.

She goes on to detail one particular reporter, Melissa Lafsky, who went so far as to insist that she, along with several other women who sold ova, were traumatized by the experience, whether they admit it or not. Howley snarkily notes that

Lafsky is bounding the range of acceptable emotional responses available to half the population. (Of course you were traumatized! Don’t you know how emotional women are?)

Needless to say, the acceptable cultural views on selling ova are completely sexist; no one expects men who donate sperm to feel traumatized.

…if you haven’t tried “Spotted Cow” you’re missing one of the best beers brewed in the nation. I’m sure it goes great with feloniously acquired turkey.

Sounds delicious.

(Yes, I am ashamed to say that this LOLcat is original. But publicly humiliating myself is a small price to pay for protecting feline consumer rights.)

Update: Oops, the “devious business practices” link was pointing to the wrong location. It’s now corrected, and points to the page selling the t-shirt. But seriously, don’t buy it. If you really want an Ubuntu t-shirt, do the sane thing and buy one that won’t automatically become obsolete.

My surprise find for today: “python-empathy: High-level library and user-interface for Telepathy”. I’m going to grab that and start making a telepathic interface to my blog right away! If you want to transcend primitive electromagnetic methods of reading my blog, just concentrate on that desire — once I pick up on your mental energies, I’ll simply will future posts directly into your mind.

My brother Stillman scored quite a bit better than I did. Terre Haute, Indiana (where he is a chemistry major at Rose-Hulman) has fewer people future zombies than does Albuquerque, and he knows far more about explosives than I do.

What are your chances of surviving a zombie apocalypse? (If it turns out that they aren’t good, I suggest picking up a copy of The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks.)