Behavioral Economics and Politics

This Harvard Magazine overview of the field of behavioral economics is interesting in itself, but even more so when you realize the extent to which these findings are being manipulated and managed by political and corporate overlords to shape the population in the image of their perfect consumer/constituent.

This Tomorrow's Professor posting describes some of the "first impression" analysis that we do as experts, the subtle ways in which we can be manipulated, and the importance of training our incredibly agile minds.

As important as first impressions are, though, real debate -- not canned pseudo-presidential press appearances or forensic exercises or blogwars -- by the people who are affected by policy is incredibly effective at cutting through "conventional wisdom" and reaching solutions that actually work with the community because they come from the community. It's not perfect, but it's a damn sight more democratic and wise than what we've got now.

I used to have a button -- from my F/SF Con days -- that said "Can you tell the difference between fallacious logic and cunning linguistics?"

New Sadducees

The Torah portion this week is one of the true dividing lines in modern Judaism: Liberal Jews like myself interpret this portion historically and metaphorically; Orthodox Jews sit somewhere in the middle; Torah literalists, eschatologists and other "ultra" types want to recreate the Temple and the taboos of pre-Rabbinic practice

Parshas Chukkas begins with the laws of the Parah Adumah, the Red Heifer. Any Jew who has had contact with a corpse, even indirect contact such as walking in a cemetery or being under the same roof as a corpse, becomes ritually impure (“tamei”). The only way to remove his tum’ah is through sprinkling him with the Parah Adumah ashes.

Nowadays, with the absence of the Red Heifer ashes, we are all regarded as ritually impure, since in the course of day-to-day life avoiding all contact with a corpse is not feasible. (Consider that entering a hospital creates a likely situation of “being under one roof with a corpse,” and even walking outside leaves open the possibility of “walking over an [unknown] grave”.)

Rambam (peirush ha-Mishnayos; Parah 3:3) asks: Seeing as obtaining Parah Adumah ashes requires the services of an “ish tahor” — one who is already pure — how will it be possible to re-establish the mitzvah of Parah Adumah in the future (when Moshiach comes)? It seems, he answers, that we will have to seclude two small infants from society, and ensure they never leave the premises of a ritually-pure home built especially for them until they reach the age that they are able to supervise the making of a new set of Parah Adumah ashes. This is an acceptable way of obtaining the ashes.

He concludes as follows:

For there is no [practical] difference between one who was never tamei to a corpse, and one who was tamei his whole life and was purified [through the Parah Adumah process], except that one who has become purified [after being tamei] is on a higher level of purity than one who was never tamei to begin with, since [the Torah] calls him ‘tahor,’ [but still, both are acceptable to create the new ashes].

In a nutshell, Rambam observes that the Torah ascribes greater purity to one who was tamei and rendered pure through the Parah Adumah ashes [in that the Torah calls him “tahor” — pure], than it does to one who is inherently tahor, never having been in contact with a corpse. An insightful observation — but why? How is it possible that one who was once tamei is on a higher level of purity than one who was never tamei to begin with?

The answer to that is a Jewish version -- yeah, that came from Judaism, too -- of the Prodigal Son principle.

With the establishment of the State of Israel, this was probably inevitable. The return from Diaspora in the Persian/Roman age produced a great diversity of responses to the loss of the First Temple and creation of the Second: Sadducees were the Temple Priests, Torah literalists and political collaborators to protect their position (and remind me very much of the ulta-orthodox position in Israel today); Pharisees and Scribes were the Diasporic teachers, creators of the Synagogue tradition and the Oral Law preserved in Talmud and Mishnah (they also absorbed the messianic tradition from Persia), adaptors and ethical thinkers whose legacy is carried on in both the moderate Orthodox and Liberal traditions; Essenes and other eschatologists were Torah literalists with a messianic bent (kind of remind me of Christian Zionists, actually) who rejected the corrupted politics of the Sadducees; Zealots, the first Zionists, who rejected political collaboration in favor of an independent Jewish nation but who had no particular religious affiliation; assimilationists, of course, have existed in every age, and in every age the literalists have failed to distinguish between modernizers and rejectors of the tradition.

Ultimately, the loss of the Second Temple -- due in no small part to political infighting -- led to the ascendancy of the Rabbinic tradition. Now, perhaps ironically, there are probably as many "rebuild the temple" literalists living in the US as there are in Israel (note the first link above), and, aside from another (God forbid) catastrophic event, I don't see what will prevent these factions from becoming entrenched positions.

Satire and all

The Carnival of Satire has some great stuff. I'm particularly fond of the Strange Statue Gallery (fair warning: Being art, there's nudity, and being modern and satirical, there's crudity).

These "laptops with secret information lost" stories are really funny when they happen to someone else, we find out about them in time, and nobody actually gets hurt....

Skeptical Soda is the theme of the latest Skeptics Circle, another -- if there were an award for most creative hosting, Skeptics Circle would have a lock -- incredibly creative presentation of really good material.

More things to think about

Carnival of Feminists seems to have mostly recovered from the comic critique fixation and moved on in some nice directions.

Prisons just got Constitutional protection from inmate lawsuits, which Eric Muller's guest blogger says is even worse, human rights-wise, than any of their other recent decisions. I'm inclined to agree.

I love Brian Ulrich, with his plague on both houses analysis of the Israel-Palestine problem.

Osama bin Laden likes George W. Bush.... I didn't say it, the CIA did. And the CIA is done looking for him, which suggests that the feeling's mutual.

Why are we barking up new trees, when we're still cleaning up after Reagan and Bush I, and we can't even convince North Korea to stop testing duds.

And Orac needs links if he's gonna make the big time. Links from bigger bloggers than me, that is....

Liberals and other Patriotic Sorts

The Carnival of the Liberals is a solid roundup of stuff, though the topics are quite predictable. If you haven't been following the political blogs at all lately, it's a good catch-up edition. If you have, there's usually at least one new blog or thought there....

British Police Bloggers haven't yet, it seems, run into the humorless chain of command problems of US police bloggers.

Speaking of Justice, I still haven't figured out what to say about China's "Bus of Death", mobile execution facility. Speechlessness seem appropriate, somehow.

Conversely, I have too many things to say about Tim Burke's thoughts on politics and liberty to know where to start. A bit at a time, perhaps.

Jonathan Wilson has produced a short guide to tendentious history which, in spite of the easiness of the target, is a wonderful piece.

Finally, contrasting adaptations: Orac tackles racialist nonsense and Ozarque compares bad news to the ever-present tick.

See also: Laughing at Neo-nazis, an incredible rainbow, Beer Spearing, Living with HIV/AIDS Blog Carnival, Lazy Cluelessness, and Legal antics.

Forever in peace may it wave....

Flag myths and July 4th myths aside, it's a celebration of worthy ideas and ideals. That we fall short of them at times does not change fact that I'd rather be alive here and now than any other time or place in history I can think of.

Colors and Flavors

Colors

Dinner

Old Favorites and New Candidates

Kid's Comedy Carnival is short but funny stuff this week.

And the First Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans is surprisingly rich for a first edition. It runs the gamut from RPGs to fanfic to movie criticism and literary canon disputation. It looks like it'll be a monthly.

Oh, and it turns out that White House and conservative outrage over the banking monitor publicity is artificial. Yeah, they're using national security to score rhetorical points again. (and again, this time with a threat of vigilantism). Language and Politics is relevant... so's mathematics.

via Orac, I found the Advertising Slogan Generator:

Get In My Ahistoricality.

History Carnival, and other thoughts

Manan Ahmed, aka Sepoy, has put a wealth of material together in a surprisingly coherent -- and ocassionally brilliant -- History Carnival.

Pop Quiz: A magazine contacts you because they want to take a picture of your child, then puts it on the cover of a story about how to avoid having children like yours. How do you feel? [via] Update.

I knew something about the Japanese PM's visit to Graceland was bugging me -- I thought it was sort of kitschy, the kind of thing you do after you've left office -- but Todd Crowell points out that no Japanese PM has ever addressed Congress, which is what most heads of state do when they visit....

I have very complicated feelings and thoughts about Israel's history and current repetoire of national defense. I find myself unable to join the chorus of "Israel's going too far" (e.g.) this time. Brian Ulrich comes a lot closer to my own reactions. We knew that it was going to be rocky when Hamas won the election, but the "power will make them more responsible" dream is dead. Think of an analogy: how would the US respond if a group affiliated with the ruling party of a country -- unrepudiated, integrated into power, well-equipped and popular -- carried out guerrilla (to be nice) or terror attacks? Let's see, last time that happened... oh, yeah.

Happy Canada Day!

I found some interesting thoughts on the Canada-US relationship, and meditations on Canadian nationhood.