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Bureaucracy file [Directory] Academic
theft read more ============================================================================================= In a message dated 98?05?26 18:39:35 EDT, K K writes to IPP: We all have a dark
side. I am one of the most compassionate, peaceful people I know, but
no one knows what will happen when you are driven by circumstances to
your personal limit. I reached that point last year, when a person I
considered a friend reneged on a promise, resulting in me working full?time
for an entire semester for no money and no credit. His desire to keep
me on as a free research tech nearly destroyed my graduate career, and
when I complained I was accused of trying to steal his work and sabotaging
his involvement. I was shocked, and deeply hurt by this. WOW. BRAIN
THEFT IN THE ACADEMIC COMMUNITY??ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO THIEVING
IDEAS AND WORK FROM GRAD STUDENTS??IS APPALLING. For several months
afterwards, I think I could have killed him easily with no regrets.
Thankfully I have strongly built?in mental anti?violence locks. But
the depth of my anger and desire for retaliation during that period
still surprises me. I've seen a couple of similar things in linguistics about claims that had not reach the publics attention. Once an accepted paper was withdrawn from publication by its author (Geoffrey K. Pullum) because of a comment that a begining graduate student (Caroline Coleman) made pointing out a flaw. He could have waited before investigating (which involved reading an unpublished dissertation which Caroline may be been the only person in North America to be aware of at the time.) But he actually had the paper withdrawn. The disseration challenged an acted factoid about the passive construction in Achenese which Pullum was providing a theory for. >> Jeffrey??This is doubly admirable because of the huge amount grad students contribute to the work published under the name of their "mentors," and the extent to which in all honesty those papers actually written by grad students for those above them on the hierarchical ladder should *always* be published under the grad student's name, perhaps with the name of the mentor included to: 1) recognize any contribution or guidance he or she has given; 2) to aid the student in getting a piece of sound or original work past the sniffy sorts who peer?review papers and are shown by statistics to turn down those written by people whose names they don't know and hence disdain. (I'm referring to the various studies in which published papers by major name investigators were resubmitted under names "no one had ever heard of" and were rejected peremptorily. A classic case of chimp group perception, sometimes known as monkey see monkey do, combined with the mammalian tendency to shower attention on the leader and disdain or abuse subordinates.) It's nice to hear that not all of those of us who are supposed to be expert in the evolutionary origins of behavior still act like animals. Howard
In a message dated 98?06?16 07:43:28 EDT, Jim writes: Science is more wonderful than anything else (almost) I know; possibly because it has its own share of scoundrels concentrated at the top (some of whom are detectable by unusual volume of publication ... see recent articles in Science on web detectives and catching plagiarists) and who would not be at the top if they were not scoundrels periodically. >> Very, very true,
as Martha Sherwood noted in an essay a while back on theft of work from
undergrads. However let's applaud the rare heroes among us. Roughly
eleven months ago, the researchers who had come to the conclusion that
environmental pollutants??man?made chemicals??exacerbate the effects
of estrogen, thus causing damage to male, female, human, and animal
wrote a letter to _Science_ showing the kind of courage the scientific
ethos dictates but the humans who allegedly work within that ethos seldom
achieve. They announced that they had not been able to replicate their
study, nor had any of those who'd followed up on their initial findings.
Hence they were repudiating a conclusion which, by now, has become part
of the permanent trove of factoids planted in the European and American
mind by a mass media which (bless it) continues to cover science more
than flying saucer fantasies and creationist shennanigans. Alas, this
is the only such act of bravery I can remember seeing in the four decades
I've been involved in science. (Admittedly, my memory is a sieve.) Howard
?????????? P.S. Neil Greenberg's
work indicates strongly that selective attention is gated by elements
of the reptilian brain??the striatum??which are strongly affected by
the hormones of hierarchy. It is precisely this kind of gated or selective
attention which probably produces "attention structures,"
the hierarchical perceptual towers in which all subordinates keep their
eyes on the alpha and kick around the gammas to compensate for their
hormonal subjugation. The decisions of peer-review committees appear
to be determined by these animal-originated gating devices. K. Barry Sharpless (Scripps Institute) and co?workers recently published a paper detailing significant experimental evidence refuting the mechanism he favored for Asymmetric Dihydroxylation (a catalytic cemical reaction) and supporting the mechanism of his intellectual rival E. J. Corey (Havard University). Given that these two influential chemists had been wrangling over the details of this reaction for over 10 years, it was quite suprising. Notably, this paper was published in collaboration with another professor tenured at a different university and the experiments were based directly upon a new analytical technique pioneered by this third party research group. One can only speculate as to how soon (if ever) the results would have seen the light of day had the proceedure been developed and conducted "in?house" by the Sharpless group. My point is not to mitigate the scientific integrity of Professor Sharpless, but to observe that this integrity was probably significantly potentiated by having his experiements conducted in collaboration with another group over which he had only indirect influence. I suspect that the above example is similar. In general, rational people behave well when they believe they are being observed. Still, it takes a certian fortitude to repudiate one's own work, as opposed to simply "forgetting" that the error had ever been published. Reed
Subj: Gator Sex and Complexity Date: 98?06?14 01:12:29 EDT From: J.B. It's easy for social learning fans to notice that alligator sex can be determined by how warm the egg is before it hatches. Warm eggs become boys, cool ones girls. And what's true in principle for gator gonads must also be true for our manners. However, Complexity
Theory (Kauffman, 1991, 1995) suggests that one? or two?gene effects,
acting without crosstalk, will be unstable and more sensitive to environmental
changes. The less the crosstalk, the more brittle the outcome. More
than 3 shared interactions, in contrast, produces great stability of
output. Multiple genes ?? working in synchrony ?? allow more consistent
features, fewer digital ones, and a richer mix in which intensity of
a trait's expression varies more often than the frequency of the trait
itself. Human traits could be more resilient than gator sex ratios. A central rule of large-scale organization goes like this: the greater the spryness of a massive enterprise, the more internal communication it takes to support the teamwork of the parts. For example, in all but the simplest plants and animals only 5% of DNA is dedicated to DNA's "real job," manufacturing proteins. The remaining 95% is preoccupied with organization and administration, supervising the maintenance of bodily procedures, or even merely interpreting the corporate rule book "printed" in a string of genes. In an effective learning machine, the connections between internal elements far outnumber windows to the outside world. Take the cerebral cortex, roughly 80% of whose nerves connect with each other, not with sensory input from the eyes or ears. No wonder in human society individuals spend most of their time communicating with each other, not exploring beasts and plants which could make an untraditional dish. This cabling for "bureaucratic maintenance" has a far greater impact on what we "see" and "hear" than most psychological researchers suspect. Subj: Gator Sex and Complexity Date: 98?06?14 01:12:29 EDT From: JB It's easy for social learning fans to notice that alligator sex can be determined by how warm the egg is before it hatches. Warm eggs become boys, cool ones girls. And what's true in principle for gator gonads must also be true for our manners. However, Complexity
Theory (Kauffman, 1991, 1995) suggests that one? or two?gene effects,
acting without crosstalk, will be unstable and more sensitive to environmental
changes. The less the crosstalk, the more brittle the outcome. More
than 3 shared interactions, in contrast, produces great stability of
output. Multiple genes ?? working in synchrony ?? allow more consistent
features, fewer digital ones, and a richer mix in which intensity of
a trait's expression varies more often than the frequency of the trait
itself. Human traits could be more resilient than gator sex ratios.
________ In a message dated 98-06-19 16:52:22 EDT, RK writes: Subj: Drugs and Stress Date: 98-06-19 16:52:22 EDT From: (Reed G. Konsler) Sender: owner-paleopsych To: paleopsych Martha Sherwood: > I wasn't convinced the writer's depression "just came out of the blue." > When one has been making a sustained creative effort on something and > finally completes it, there is something of a letdown, even if the result > is successful. IN MY EXPERIENCE AS A WRITER, MARTHA HAS A POINT. IT'S A KIND OF POST-PARTUM DEPRESSION. FOR A LONG PERIOD OF TIME, ONE HAS BEEN WORKING WITH A GOAL WHICH HAS STRUCTURED ONE'S DAILY LIFE AND GIVEN IT PURPOSE. WHEN A WORK IS CONCLUDED, THAT STRUCTURE AND SENSE OF A REASON TO BE DISAPPEARS ABRUPTLY AND BEWILDERINGLY. THE RESULT: DEPRESSION, A SENSE OF DIRECTIONLESSNESS, USELESSNESS, AND CONFUSION. IT'S AS IF WHAT MAKES ONE A PERSON HAS DISAPPEARED OVERNIGHT LIKE THE AIR FROM A LEAKY BALLOON. COMPLEX DYNAMICAL THEORY OF SOCIALITY SAYS THAT WITHOUT A SENSE OF PURPOSE, ONE IS STRIPPED OF A FEELING OF NECESSITY TO THE LARGER GROUP, AND IS LOPPED LIKE A WEED BY THOSE INTERNAL CULLING MECHANISMS--THE UTILITY SORTERS. THESE PRODUCE A NEURO-HORMONAL SHIFT FROM SYMPATHETIC TO PARASYMPATHETIC DOMINANCE, A DEPLETION OF AMINERGIC ENERGIZERS, A SHUTDOWN OF THE PERCEPTUAL ACUITY WHICH NEIL GREENBERG'S WORK TENDS TO INDICATE IS REGULATED BY THE DOPAMINERGIC STRIATUM, AND A DIVE IN THE VIGILANCE OF THE IMMUNE SYSTEM. NOT TO MENTION EMOTIONAL STRESS. ANOTHER FACTOR AT WORK IS THE LOSS OF CONTROL. THE LANDSCAPE OF A DAILY, PURPOSEFUL PATTERN DISAPPEARS. THE OLD HYPOTHALAMIC THEORY OF SELF SAYS ONE NEEDS A SENSE OF FIRM PLACEMENT IN A MENTAL LANDSCAPE...SPECIFICALLY THAT CENTERED IN OUR EARLY MAMMALIAN TERRITORY MAPPER, THE HYPOTHALAMUS. OUR INTERIOR MAP IS KEY TO OUR SENSE OF SELF, OUR SENSE OF CONTROL, AND OUR SENSE OF PERSONAL ORIENTATION. ITS MOMENTARY ERADICATION MAY PRODUCE THAT FEELING OF DISAPPEARANCE OF SELF I MENTIONED. HOWEVER THIS HAPPENS TO PEOPLE IN MANY LINES OF WORK, NOT JUST IN THE CREATIVE OR INTELLECTUAL PROFESSIONS. IT OCCURS UPON THE COMPLETION OF A PROJECT, OR EVEN ON A SHIFT FROM INTENSE, DEMANDING WORK TO A PERIOD OF SLACK. WHEN I MAINTAINED A STAFF OF FIFTEEN, MY RECEPTIONIST TOLD ME THAT WHEN THE PRESSURE LET UP ON HER TASKS, SHE FELT DEPRESSED AND OFTEN GOT COLDS. SLUGGISH PERIODS IN OUR WORK PRODUCED MILD COLDS IN ME AS WELL. THESE ARE SIGNS OF THE IMMUNE SLUMP WHICH IS A PART OF THE SYNDROME I'M DESCRIBING AND ON WHICH I THINK MARTHA HAS TOUCHED. BY THE WAY, ALL THIS FITS WITH MIKE WALLER'S COMPARATOR THEORIES AND WITH THE INTERIOR SOCIOMETER LITERATURE I CITED YESTERDAY. GOING BACK TO THE COMPLEX ADAPTIVE SYSTEM THEORY OF SOCIETY AS A LEARNING MACHINE, WRITERS' POST PARTEM BLUES, IF THE ELABORATION ABOVE IS CORRECT, IS SIMPLY OUR WAY OF SHUTTING DOWN, LOSING THE LUSTER WHICH ATTRACTS OTHERS TO US, CEASING TO CALL ON SYSTEM RESOURCES, AND UNDERGOING THE OTHER ALTERATIONS WHICH RENDUR US MODULES IN A NEURAL NET. ONCE WE FIND A NEW PROJECT WHICH SOCIAL CUES TELL US IS IN DEMAND, WE'LL GO BACK TO THE PLEASURES AND PAINS OF OVERDRIVE AGAIN. The extent of the letdown seems to be proportional to the > intensity of the creative experience.. There may have been other factors > that the mental health professionals who were treating the writer failed to > take into account. I have been amazed in my conversations with > psychologists at how they will breeze off things which to me are important > and devastating. I've never met a psychologist who was really able to see > the patient's point of view, though I'm sure there must be some out there. I FIND THIS TRUE OF MOST MEDICAL PRACTITIONERS, ALAS. THEY HAVE VERY LITTLE EMPATHETIC UNDERSTANDING. This is my experience, also. Mental health professionals don't seem to do a very good job healing the very sick and don't seem to do a good job helping the very creative, either. In general, like all professionals, the really good, humane, helpful ones tend to be on the margins of the institutional structure. YUP. I've found that, in universities, programs which are run as part of "student/faculty services" are abysmal unless you are a tenured professor (and this I know only as hearsay) in which case they are adequate (University of Michigan) or pretty stellar (Harvard). But, from personal experience, if you are a student and even think the word "depression" within range of "health services" building a bottle of pills materializes in your hand. I'm not against anti-depressants. But OH MY GOD they are OVERPRESCRIBED. My sister decided to major in psychology as an undergraduate. When I asked her why she said:"Well, I was sitting around with the girls on my hall in the dorm... ...and someone started talking about Prozac. Everybody started talking about it...how many girls, of the 32, do you think were on something?" I guessed, knowing the number was supposed to be outrageously high, 5 or 10. Of 32 incomming freshman women at the University of Michigan, twenty, almost TWO THIRDS claimed to be on antidepressants, all beginning their regimen in HIGH SCHOOL. My sister found her roommate, one of the twenty, after her second suicide attempt that year. "I guess psychology just seemed relevant" I PERFORMED AN INTERESTING COUNSELING SESSION WITH MY GENERAL PRACTITIONER A FEW MONTHS AGO. FOR TWELVE YEARS I'VE BEEN WATCHIHG HIM GO THROUGH AN INTENSE PERSONAL RELIGIOUS AND EMOTIONAL CRISIS AND AT THE SAME TIME DECREASE THE QUALITY OF CARE HE PROVIDES. AS HE SAT IN MY ROOM, I TRIED TO UNDERSTAND THE WHY BEHIND IT AND RAN OFF A SUSPICION TO HIM--THAT THE CURRENT STRUCTURE OF THE MENTAL HEALTH CARE SYSTEM HAD ROBBED HIM OF HIS ABILITY TO ACTUALLY CARE FOR HIS PATIENTS. HE DEPENDS ON HMOS FOR REPAYMENT. THEY DEMAND THAT HE GET RID OF PATIENTS IN THE CHEAPEST AND QUICKEST MANNER POSSIBLE. THIS MEANS NO LENGTHY TREATMENTS LIKE ADVISING DEPTH PSYCHOTHERAPY. NO LONG PERIODS OF DETECTIVE WORK TO FIGURE OUT WHAT IDIOSYNCRATIC PROBLEM MIGHT BE PRODUCING A PATIENT'S SYMPTOMS. SINCE WE ALL HAVE IDIOSYNCRATIC BODIES, THIS RULES OUT MEDICAL CARE A GOOD PART OF THE TIME. THE PROFESSIONAL BOOKS ON 'NORMAL' MEDICINE ARE FAR SHORTER THAN THOSE ON TERATOGOLOGICAL MEDICINE--THE TREATMENT OF ABNORMAL CASES [TERRATOGOLOGICAL IS A TERM DERIVED FROM _TERAS_, GREEK FOR MONSTER]. SINCE EACH OF US DEVIATES FROM THE NORM, EACH OF US HAS A BIT OF "MONSTER" IN US. THE NEW SYSTEM HAS YANKED MY GP FROM HIS OLD MAP AND PLACE HIM IN TERRITORY WHICH IS NOT ONLY BEWILDERING BUT MORALLY ABHORRENT TO HIM. AND YET HE MUST SURVIVE IN IT BY SEALING HIMSELF EMOTIONALLY AGAINST HIS PATIENTS' REAL NEEDS. SO HE, LIKE THE WRITER AT THE END OF A BOOK OR ARTICLE, IS IN A HIPPOCAMPAL/TOPOGRAPHIC WILDERNESS, ONE WHICH HAS SHATTERED HIS PREVIOUS SENSE OF SELF AND FORCED HIM TO RECONSTRUCT IT IN A MANNER NOT ONLY DIFFICULT FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF LEARING TO LIVE WITHIN A NEW AND HIGHLY COMPLEX SET OF RULES, BUT ONE WHICH GOES AGAINST ALL HIS RELIGIOUS BELIEFS. AFTER AN HOUR OF GIVING HIM THIS HYPOTHETICAL GUESSWORK, HE ASKED IF I'D PLEASE GO PRO AS A PSYCHOTHERAPIST. NOT A CHANCE. I NEED MY TIME FOR MY SCIENTIFIC WORK. BESIDES, PSYOTHERAPEUTIC PRACTITIONERS ARE ALSO TAUGHT TO IGNORE YOUR UNIQUE PERSONALITY, EMOTIONS, PECULIARITIES, SELF, AND SOUL, AND INSTEAD TO TOSS A PRESCRIPTION AT YOU AND GET YOU THE HECK OUT OF THEIR OFFICE. OR TO DENY YOU TREATMENT ALTOGETHER IF YOU DON'T FALL INTO A CATEGORY APPROVED BY THE EXTREMELY MYOPIC HMO GUIDEBOOKS WHICH DETERMINE WHAT IS COVERED AND WHAT ISN'T. THUS HAS MARTHA'S ANALYSIS OF THE ABUSE BUILT INTO BUREAUCRACY (WHICH I WISH SHE'D POST TO THE GROUP AS A WHOLE SOMETIME--IT'S BRILLIANT) COME TO BIG BROTHER YET ANOTHER AREA OF OUR LIVES. FRANZ KAFKA, WHERE ARE YOU WHEN WE NEED YOU? WHOOPS, SEEMS YOUR GHOST IS AT MY VERY ELBOW. During my second year of graduate school I walked in off the street, claimed to be very depressed (I was) and frightend (I was). I spoke to a old white guy for less than half an hour, long enough to confirm that no close realtives had died, and left with a prescription for 3 months of anti-depressants at 75% the maximum recommended dosage. After reading the Physician's Desk Reference and Merck Index entries on my new prize I elected not to take them. It was only about 3 months later that I had regained enough self-confidence to be offended. At the time I was almost helpless. A perfect subject for my Doctor's study. No, I don't mean that in any VERY paranoid way. It's simply a fact. The drug I was prescribed had just come onto the market and the Doctor I saw was giving it as part of a study becuase, while it had passed clinical trials, it was still more or less unknown. SEE BARBARA CREATURO'S BOOK ON CANCER. BARBARA, AN EDITOR AT COSMOPOLITAN AND A VERY CLOSE FRIEND, CAME DOWN WITH OVARIAN CANCER, RESEARCHED THE SYSTEM SHE WAS UP AGAINST, DISCOVERED HOW FREQUENTLY THOSE WHO BELIEVE THEY ARE BEING GIVEN TREATMENT ARE, IN FACT, IN TRIALS AND ARE BEING PRESCRIBED A PLACEBO. MADE HER FURIOUS. AS A SCIENTIST, I *NEED* THE KNOWLEDGE THAT COMES FROM DOUBLE-BLIND EXPERIMENTS. HOWEVER A HUMAN IN NEED OF CARE SHOULD GET IT, PERIOD. BARBARA DIED THREE YEARS AFTER HER DIAGNOSIS. HER BOOK WAS PUBLISHED ROUGHLY A MONTH AFTER HER DEATH. SINCE SHE WASN'T ALIVE TO PROMOTE IN, IT WENT NOWHERE (ANOTHER DISTURBING SYSTEM.) ANOTHER ACQUAINTANCE, JOYCE WADLER, LIVED THROUGH HER BREAST CANCER AND WROTE HER BOOK. SINCE SHE COULD PROMOTE IT, IT GOT THROUGH TO US NORMAL HUMANS. ALAS, BARBARA CREATURO'S WARNINGS DID NOT. THE STAGE OF TRIAL PROCESS YOU WERE IN, REED, WHERE THERE'S STRONG INDICATION THAT A DRUG MAY WORK BUT ITS SIDE EFFECTS ARE NOT YET KNOWN, IS A DIFFERENT STORY. THOSE WHO ARE SERIOUSLY ILL DO EVERYTHNG IN THEIR POWER TO GET THEMSELVES INTO SUCH TRIALS OR TO OBTAIN THE DRUGS IN SPITE OF ANOTHER FREEDOM-RESTRICTING BUREAUCRACY--THE FDA. AFFLICTED PATIENTS ALREADY KNOW THE SIDE EFFECTS OF THEIR DISEASE--THE MOST COMMON OFTEN BEING DEATH. SO THE MUCH LOWER POSSIBILITY OF LIVER DAMAGE OR SOME OTHER FAR LESS LETHAL CONSEQUENCE SEEMS A DISTURBING BUT WORTHWHILE PRICE TO PAY FOR LIFE. IN MY VIEW, TAKING THIS SORT OF INFORMED RISK IS THE DECISION OF THE INDIVIDUAL, NOT OF THE GOVERNMENT. SO IT WAS WITH A BIT OF FURY THAT I WATCHED A BRITISH MEDICAL SCIENTIST SAY THE OTHER NIGHT THAT TO GIVE A DRUG TO A SERIOUS OR TERMINALLY ILL PATIENT BEFORE IT HAD BEEN THOROUGHLY APPROVED FOR LACK OF SIDE EFFECTS LIKE HEADACHE WAS "UNETHICAL." TO HIM, PASSING A DEATH SENTENCE WAS THE ONLY MORAL WAY TO GO. DISGUSTING. HMM, IN SCIENCE ARE WE ALLOWED TO GET EMOTIONAL? MY RHETORIC IS CERTAINLY NOT DISPASSIONATE TONIGHT. Given that I read a lot of clinical papers I understand why these kind of things happen, and I can't think of a better way to do it. LET PATIENTS MAKE INFORMED DECISIONS FOR THEMSELVES. ASSURE THAT LABELS EXPLAIN EXACTLY WHAT THE SUSPECTED AND KNOWN POSITIVES AND NEGATIVES OF A DRUG ARE. THIS CAN EASILY BE DONE IN SIMPLE LANGUAGE. DR. EARL MINDEL, WHOSE DRUG AND VITAMIN "BIBLES" ARE WRITTEN BY ANOTHER FRIEND, DOES IT ALL THE TIME. THEN USE EPIDEMIOLOGICAL RATHER THAN LABORATORY STUDIES TO HONE THE ACCURACY OF THE INFORMATION GIVEN PATIENTS IN THE FUTURE. IF NECESSARY RESTRICT THE USE OF MEDICINE TO THOSE WITH SYMPTOMS WHICH SEVERELY RESTRICT THEIR ABILITY TO LEAD A "NORMAL" LIFE. BUT PLEASE SAY IT'S NOT NECESSARY, DECIDING ON WHOSE SYMPTOMS ARE SERIOUS AND WHOSE ARE NOT MEANS YET ANOTHER BUREAUCRACY. But I didn't take the pills. > Financial difficulties are a very important cause of depression. Mental > health professionals fail to see this because people who are in financial > difficulty are unable to afford counseling by professionals and they won't > accept a layperson's diagnosis that a person is depressed. I agree. Most marriages break up on financial rocks. Being broke sucks. If you hate your job, you can't quit becuase you have to pay rent...which, itself, sucks because the only reason you pay rent is becuase you don't have the money to buy someplace to live. AGREED. IT'S LACK OF STATUS AND CONTROL SWITCHING ON THE SELF-DESTRUCT MECHANISMS AGAIN. It's worse if you are carrying 30 or 100 thousand dollars in student loans. Ask people why they decided to become Doctors or Lawyers instead of something else...to pay of student loans. Ask them why they work for the Big Firm or Hospital instead of helping out the little guy when they're done. SOUNDS LIKE A DESCRIPTION OF A RATHER GHASTLY SELF ORGANIZING SYSTEM. YOU ARE EXPLAINING HOW A BUREAUCRATIC ORGANISM SPAWNS MORE AND MORE UNCARING BUREAUCRATS. SPECIFICALLY, IT PRODUCES INDIVIDUALS DRIVEN BY SURVIVAL MOTIVES TO JOIN ORGANIZATIONS WHICH, AS YOU'VE POINTED OUT VERY EFFECTIVELY, CHEW UP LITTLE GUYS LIKE REED KONSLER THE DEPRESSED STUDENT. NOW WE ARE BACK TO ONE OF THE BIG QUESTIONS OF PALEOPSYCHOLOGY, THE SORT TO WHICH DE LANDA HAS CONTRIBUTED GREATLY: SPECIFICALLY HOW SUCH A MEGASYSTEM SURVIVES. ONE COMMENT. WE ARE BEYOND THE DEBATES WE INHERITED FROM THE 19TH CENTURY. IT ISN'T A QUESTION OF WHO OWNS THE SYSTEM--THE "PEOPLE" OR PRIVATE ENTERPRISE. SO-CALLED "PEOPLE'S SYSTEMS" LIKE THE COMMUNIST DICTATORSHIPS OF THE PROLETARIAT OR THE CURRENT BRITISH HEALTH CARE SYSTEM (NOW TRYING TO DENY VIAGRA AND FAR MORE CRITICAL DRUGS EVEN TO THOSE WHO WANT TO PAY FOR THEM OUT OF THEIR OWN POCKETS) WERE MASSIVE UNCARING BUREAUCRACIES. THE PROFIT-DRIVEN HMOS ARE MASSIVE UNCARING BUREAUCRACIES. AS THE WORK OF MARTHA SHERWOOD AND OF ELISABET SAHTOURIS IMPLY, THE NEW CHALLENGE IS TO COME UP WITH A STRUCTURAL ALTERNATIVE TO BUREAUCRACY, ONE WHICH TRULY *DOES* EMPOWER THE INDIVIDUAL. (AND, AL GORE, DON'T HAND ME NEWSPEAK TELLING ME THAT A LAW DEPRIVING A CHILD OF THE RIGHT TO VOLUNTARILY FILL OUT A FORM IN ORDER TO GAIN ACCESS TO GAMES AND PRIZES ON THE WEB IS ONE PROMOTING "PARENTAL FREEDOM." BILL CLINTON, DON'T GIVE ME HORSE PUCKEY ABOUT HOW DENYING MARIJUANA RAISED AND PROVIDED BY PATIENT GROUPS TO THOSE TERMINALLY ILL WITH AIDS IS DOING US ALL A GREAT SERVICE. AND REPUBLICANS, PLEASE LEAVE MY PRIVATE LIFE, BILL CLINTON'S, MONICA LEWINSKY'S, AND THOSE OF FOLKS WITH A DIFFERENT SEXUAL INCLINATION ALONE.) BY THE WAY, JUST TO CLARIFY MATTERS, I AM NOT A CONSERVATIVE, BUT A REGISTERED DEMOCRAT. BUT IT'S A NEW AGE WITH NEW PROBLEMS AND NEEDS NEW CONCEPTUAL TOOLS IF WE'RE TO DEAL WITH THEM. To pay off grad school loans, of course. I know a number of these people from UM and Harvard, it isn't a dirty little secret or a secret conspiracy...it isn't ever a topic of conversation unless there is an outsider (like me) present...it's an acknowledged "fact of life" for the professional.There isn't anything really insidious about it, I guess. If you want to have power in our society, you have to spend extraordinary amounts of time on a very expensive education. Once you have that education, the debt you have acquired binds you to the power structure. Of course, two-thirds of those girls are on anti-depressants. The doctor that prescribes that medication did so becuase, if he was an anti-medication physician, he would have had trouble finding a job. You know, I try not to be paranoid. Really, I do. It's such a dysfunctional mindset. Anyway, student loans represent a mechanism by which hierarchical institutions replicate and strengthen their hold on communal resources. VERY GOOD POINT. And Credit Cards? Crack Cocaine for the Consumer Culture. AN OMINOUS AND INTRIGUING IDEA. THESE THINGS ARE LEADING TO THE KIND OF CREDIT HOUSE OF CARDS WHICH TOPPLED DISASTROUSLY FROM 1929 TO 1932. BUT DO YOU SEE A WAY IN WHICH THEY'RE FEEDING THE BUREAUCRATIC METASTASIS WHOSE WORKINGS YOU'VE JUST ILLUMINATED SO WELL? > Antidepressants and antipsychotics do have serious side effects. Everyone > I talk to who has taken them complains of them. Even those which don't > have obvious physical effects have subtle mental effects which can be quite > disturbing. SORRY, THEY PRODUCED NO NEGATIVE SYMPTOMS IN ME DURING THOSE PERIODS WHEN I WAS PRESCRIBED THEM. Well, they are psychotropic, after all. The brain is a very complicated thing. The chemicals are remarkably simple in structure and their target enzymes are dispersed throught the system. It's not exactly a precision insturment. On the other hand, it is the beast we have. TRUE OF ALL PILLS--ANOTHER GREAT IMPROVEMENT OVER WHAT PROCEDED IT WHICH TURNS OUT TO APPEAR, AFTER YEARS TO CALL OUT FOR A MORE PRECISE DELIVERY SYSTEM. IN OTHER WORDS, IT'S TIME TO RACHET UP AND IMPROVE THE IMPROVEMENT. BUT WOULD WE HAVE SEEN THIS WITHOUT THE PREVIOUS UPGRADE PROVIDING US A NEW PERSPECTIVE? MEDICAL RESEARCHERS AND PHARMACEUTICAL HOUSES HAVE BEEN WORKING ON MORE TARGETTED DELIVERY SYSTEMS FOR AT LEAST TWO DECADES. SO THERE ARE SOME GOOD GUYS SOMEWHERE. AND THERE ARE MECHANISMS FOR SELF IMPROVEMENT BUILT INTO THE MASS OF MEGALITHIC SUPERORGANISMS SERVING AND SQUASHING US. Oops, that was a typo...ah well, leave it. > One effect of antidepressants is to suppress creativity, which > is very distressing to people who make their living as artists and writers. HMMM, I HAVEN'T FOUND THAT TO BE THE CASE. HOWEVER THOSE WHO READ MY PUBLISHED WORK MAY DISAGREE. > Medical people
consistently underestimate the severity of the side effects > of
the drugs they prescribe. Can you ignore that fatal reactions to >
prescription drugs are now the sixth leading cause of death in the US?
WHAT IS THE SOURCE OF THIS STATISTIC? MANY OF THOSE WHO PROMOTE SUCH
FIGURES ARE HIGHLY SUSPECT, OR AT LEAST I FIND THEM SO. DR. SIDNEY WOLF
LOOKS LIKE THE SWEETEST MAN ON EARTH, BUT AS A PERSON WITH A DEBILITATING
AND PERMANENT ILLNESS, I LOOK AT HIM AS A SERIOUS IMPEDIMENT TO MY FREEDOM
OF CHOICE WHEN IT COMES TO GRAPPLING WITH PHYSICAL AND MEDICAL RESTRICTIONS
I PREFER TO OVERCOME. > Antidepressants alone have not, I believe,
been implicated, but most adults > put on antidepressants are also
taking a stew of other prescription and > non-prescription medications.
One thing to remember is that "drug" has a lot of negative
connotations. Drugs are just chemicals. Oops, that word has a negative
connation, too... Anyway, we are comprised of chemicals and we live
in a sea of chemistry. St. John's Wort is to a prescription drug as
my fist is to a pistol. Technology begets powerful insturments. It's
up to us to use them wisely. IF US MEANS YOU AND ME AS INDIVIDUALS,
THEN THREE CHEERS. Howard
In a message dated
98-09-05 15:17:54 EDT, RK writes: Subj: Re: Education and un-natural
selection Date: 98-09-05 15:17:54 EDT From: (Reed Konsler) Sender: owner-paleopsych
To: paleopsych Peter: >Much of education is like this. Certification
requires that you be good at >or adapt to universal education standards.
They are almost always extremely >linear in nature. The brilliant
dyslexic abstract random personality >doesn't stand a chance. Speaking
as such a person, it is possible to do it. I MUST ADMIT THAT MY OWN
TOTAL INABILITIES TO HANDLE SUCH COMPLEX MANUAL MECHANISMS AS A PENCIL
OR PEN GOT ME TOSSED TO A PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTER IN FIRST GRADE TO DETERMINE
IF I WAS, AS THE TEACHER SUSPECTED, MENTALLY RETARDED. HEY, HASN'T ANYONE
HEARD OF MANUAL RETARDATION? WHEN I THROW A DART, I AM LUCKY TO HIT
THE WALL I AM AIMING FOR. NO KIDDING. DON'T GET ME TO TELL YOU ABOUT
THE DAY I TRIED TO HIT THE BULLSEYE, MISSED THE TARGET, MANAGED TO AVOID
THE WALL IT HUNG ON, SENT THE LITTLE POINTY WEAPON HURTLING INTO THE
KITCHEN AND ALMOST NAILED OUR HOSTESS DU SOIR. THIS MAKES ME SUSPECT
THAT MY BRAIN WIRING ISN'T QUITE SPLICED IN THE NORMAL MANNER. BUT YOU'VE
PROBABLY FIGURED THAT OUT BY NOW. HOWEVER I VAGUELY REMEMBER RESEARCH
INDICATING THAT US SLIGHTLY TWISTY NEURAL TYPES ARE THE ONES WHO TEND
TO COME UP WITH THE MOST INTERESTING SCIENTIFIC AND CREATIVE INNOVATIONS.
I MEAN LOOK AT EINSTEIN--THE GUY WHO'D GET OUT OF BED AND SHUFFLE DOWN
THE STREET TO GIVE HIS CLASSES IN HIS PYJAMAS. FOR THIS, HE SHOULD HAVE
BEEN NAMED AN HONORARY MARX BROTHER I had a very enlightening conversation
with a friend of mine about her lesbian partner's quest to get ordained
as an Episcopalian (sp?) priest. There are tests and proposals and reviews
before boards of church deacons and the local church administration.
The whole thing was very like getting a PhD or becomming certified in
anything. REED, YOU HAVE ME WORRIED AND BROODING PRECISELY OVER THE
UPSIDE-DOWN-BACKWARD-AND-DESTRUCTIVE NATURE OF OUR SOCIETY OF CERTIFICATION.
(SEE JAMES FALLOWS' WELL-CREDENTIALLED KVETCH ON THE MEDIOCRITY IMPOSED
BY CREDENTIALLING IN HIS BOOK _MORE LIKE US_. FALLOWS CAN BE CONSIDERE
INFALLIBLY EXPERT BECAUSE HE'S AN EDITOR AT _ATLANTIC MONTHLY_) NOW
BACK TO MY LAMENT. I SUDDENLY REALIZED THAT MOST OF US REVOLUTIONARY
THINKERS ABOUT TO UPEND THE PERCEPTUAL SYSTEM ARE OLD FARTS IN OUR FIFTIES,
SIXTIES, ETC. MANY IS THE GROUP MEMBER WHO HAS SAID PRIVATELY THAT HE
DIDN'T DARE REVEAL HIS MOST CREATIVE SCIENTIFIC CONCLUSIONS, THE ONES
HE CARED ABOUT MOST, UNTIL HE HAD RETIRED. OTHERS HAVE CONFESSED TO
HAVING STARTLING CONCLUSIONS, WELL SUPPORTED AND READY TO GO, BUT BEING
FORCED TO SUPPRESS THEM FOR FEAR OF LOSING A CAREER. IT'S SUPPOSED TO
BE YOU YOUNG'UNS WHO TURN THE TABLES OVER AND SHOW US THAT THE MOST
INTERESTING STUFF IS ON THE UNDERSIDE. WE ARE SUPPOSED TO BE THE STUCK
IN THE MUDS. YET IT'S YOU, WITH YOUR BRILLIANCE AND ABILITY TO STALK
FAR BEYOND THE CONVENTIONAL POINT OF VIEW, WHO ARE BEING GLUED TO THE
OFFICIAL VIEWPOINT BY THREATS OF VERY HEFTY PENALTIES, AND US OLDSTERS
WHO ARE KICKING UP OUR HEELS INTELLECTUALLY AND CAPERING. HOW IN THE
WORLD DO WE DEFEAT THE CONFORMITY POLICE AND UNDO THIS CREATIVITY KILLING
TYRANNY? It was striking, in fact, how a "spiritual" organization
used almost exactly the same kinds of waiting periods, testing, and
apprenticeships that a corporation or a scientific discipline might
use. HMM, THE TORTUOUS INITIATION RITUALS WHICH KILL THE SOUL. THEY
UTILIZE A PRINCIPLE DISCOVERED BY SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGISTS. MAKE A PERSON
SUFFER MIGHTILY FOR THE PRIVILEGE OF ENTERING A GROUP AND THAT INDIVIDUAL
WILL ADHERE TO THE GANG, NO MATTER HOW WORTHLESS, AND ESPOUSE ITS POINTS
OF VIEW UP THE KAZOO. MAKE IT EASY TO ENTER, AND THE CANDIDATE WILL
UP AND LEAVE IF THE GROUP TURNS OUT TO BE A PILE OF TRASH. THIS PRINCIPLE
OF THE INITIATION RITUAL HAS BEEN USED FOR OVER A CENTURY IN THE MEDICAL
PROFESSION TO TAKE FOLKS WHO WANT TO HEAL AND TURN THEM INTO ZOMBIES
WHOSE REAL INTELLIGENCE GOES NOT INTO SERVING PATIENTS WITH COMPASSION,
BUT INTO THEIR INVESTMENT STRATEGIES. I suppose they all derive from
the same root... So, if you don't want to be certified, don't do it.
I know a very intelligent man, quite finacially successful, an author...and
he never graduated from college. But his book jacket still reads "...educated
at Harvard". Why? To take advantage of the association. Why do
Zen temples in Japan have shrines to the fingernail of Buddha? What
do you think the word CERTIFICATION means, anyway? A certified person
conformed enough to meet of exceed the standards of the certifying institution.
EXACTLY. If you think Harvard, or the California psych association,
or the U.S. Navy, or your local church are full of crap then so be it.
But all the self-proclaimed "brilliant dyslexic abstract random
personalities" turn right around and whine that they don't have
access to the resources or wield the respect derived from these same
institutions they, just a moment ago, claimed to hold in such low esteem.
If all psychologists are linear assholes, then don't go see a psychologist.
I don't. No problem. Look, there are some very interesting guru's broadcasting
right now on Boston public access. There is this one interesting guy
with a program called "new intelligence" or something related.
He communicates to people, and they pay him some attention. But if you
want to wield the power which an institution can focus, you have to
attain that position from the inside. Oh, and don't think there are
millions of niches out their waiting to be filled. Any abstract object
which our culture reveres has more than one institution competing to
collect tithes from it's penintents. You either operate within the structure,
or you compete with it. That isn't a dysfunctional...everything is working
EXACTLY the way it ought to be. HMMM, IMAGINE A SOCIETY STRUCTURED IN
A DIFFERENT WAY, WITH AWARDS BEING GIVEN ON THE BASIS OF UNCONVENTIONAL
BRILLIANCE AND WHACKY BUT HIGHLY USEFUL CONTRIBUTION. THIS IS THE PROCESS
USED BY THE MACARTHUR SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAM, AT LEAST ALLEGEDLY. TELL
SOMEONE YOU'VE GOT A MACARTHUR AND IT'S AS GOOD AS ANY CREDENTIAL ON
THE PLANET SHORT OF A NOBEL PRIZE. NOW IMAGINE THAT UNIVERSITIES AND
PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS ARE STRUCTURED LIKE MACARTHUR FELLOWSHIPS,
TO AWARD CONTRIBUTIONS THAT JUMP THE TRACKS, SILICON VALLEY'S CERTIFICATION
VIA IPO OPERATES SOMEWHAT LIKE THIS. TRUE, WE NEED BOTH THOSE WHOSE
BEST IS A GOOD PERFORMANCE WITHIN THE NORMS AND THOSE WHOSE GIFT IS
TO EXPAND THE COMPASS OF THOSE NORMS. SO LET'S HAVE WAYS TO DIGNIFY
AND FUND THEM BOTH. SOUND SILLY? IN SOME SMALL WAY THAT IS WHAT WE ARE
DOING WITH THE IPP. SHOULD BILL BENZON'S BOOK BE ACCEPTED BY THE PUBLISHER
WHO'S INTERESTED IN IT, WE WILL HAVE MADE OUR FIRST CONTRIBUTION TO
FUNDING A RESEARCH PROJECT OUTSIDE THE BOUNDARIES OF ACADEME. PETER
HAS MANAGED TO DO HIS BIT FOR EXPANSION AND FUNDING OF THE NORM BY GOING
ENTREPRENEURIAL, SOMETHING FRANKLY I WAS FORCED TO DO AS WELL. THE KNOWLEDGE
ONE GETS OUT THERE IN THE COLD, HARSH BUSINESS TRENCHES IS PRICELESS
FOR THOSE OF US WHOSE FIELD IS MASS BEHAVIOR, HUMAN NATURE, AND THE
WORKINGS OF SOCIETY. THEN THE TASK IS TO HAVE SUFFICIENT SELF-FUNDING
AND LIFE FORCE LEFT OVER TO CONVEY WHAT ONE HAS CRAFTED, CREATED, AND/OR
LEARNED. And certianly, it's one of the noblest of missions to erect
a 5th column organization in competition with the giants. But if you
win, and your quick, adaptable, hungry group topples the present generation...your
institution will expand and rigidify like any vast institution. SO SAYS,
WEBER, AND I SUSPECT HE'S RIGHT. The stories you can relate will degenerate
from nuanced and sophisticated ideas appreciable only by a select educated
audience into the simplistic sound-bites that a general audience can
access: HEY, WADAMINIT. I BELIEVE STRONGLY THAT BEING FORCED TO EXPRESS
AN IDEA IN A MANNER ACCESSIBLE TO AND ENJOYABLE BY A LARGE AUDIENCE
FORCES A THINKER TO MAKE SURE HE KNOWS WHAT HE'S TALKING ABOUT. SAYS
OSCAR WILDE, "TO BE UNDERSTOOD IS TO FOUND OUT." MANY IS THE
TIME I CAN REMEMBER WRITING IN THE STANDARD INCOMPREHENSIBLE MANNER
DEMANDED BY ACADEME, THEN ANALYZING WHAT I WAS TRYING TO SAY AND DISCOVERING
IT WAS A GREAT BIG NOTHING I'D DONE UP IN ELABORATE DISGUISE. THE PROBLEM
WAS THAT THE AMONG THE PEOPLE I'D FOOLED THE MOST UNTIL DOING A MERCILESS
SELF-ANALYSIS WAS ME. SOUND BITES WON'T CUT IT, AND THEY MAY BE ANOTHER
ENEMY TO INTELLECTUAL EXPLORATION. BUT WHERE WOULD RICHARD DAWKINS BE
IF NOT FOR HIS ABILITY TO BUMPER STICKER HIS IDEA AS "THE SELFISH
GENE." OR HOW ABOUT THAT SOUND-BITE MAKER CHARLES DARWIN, WITH
"NATURAL SELECTION." EVEN MY HERO ALBIE THE PYJAMA MAN MANAGED
TO GET HIS MULTI-DIMENSIONAL COSMIC NOTION DOWN TO T-SHIRT SIZE WITH
E=MC(2). THERE'S LOTS OF OTHER AMAZING OBSERVATION IN YOUR COMMUNQUE.
BUT AS FOR THE INCREASINGLY CREDENTIAL BOUND STATUS QUO, ANY SOCIETY
NEEDS ITS BALANCE BETWEEN CONFORMITY AND DIVERSITY. AS YOU'VE EITHER
SAID OR IMPLIED, I'M NOT SURE WHICH, WE CAN'T HAVE PRODUCTIVE WACKINESS
WITHOUT STABILITY. AND FRANKLY, WE NEED PRESTIGE AND FUNDING FOR BOTH.
AS USUAL, IN THIS PARTICULAR DEBATE, EVERYONE IS RIGHT. Howard
Subj: Re: Stephen
the righteous word cop Perhaps those who
are not on campus If you listen closely
to some of these My two biggest problems
with all this are I would have much
preferred a series of The university has
become the most repressive PATTI
he following is
an interview I've just done for Club Nietzche, on online discussion
group. It has one or two elements that may be of interest to paleopsychologists.
Howard Subj: interview questions??part 2 Date: 99?06?19 02:43:27 EDT From: (Erin) To: HowlBloom Dear Mr. Bloom,Thanks so much for getting back to me. Your answers to the first group of questions were very informative, and your understanding of Nietzsche seems quite good. Thank you for offering to continue where we left off. Here are four more questions, these are the ones I'm most curious about. I'm really anxious to read your responses to them:C.N: Mr. Bloom, in your book you speak of pecking orders, or dominance hierarchies existing on all levels of interaction, from barnyard chickens to the status of nations, so is it safe to say that you see the will to dominate, the Will to Power as being a force of nature and not a typically human flaw? HB: the will to power is the will to suck in every molecule around you and craft it in your own form. It's a cosmic and biological imperative which began with the greed of quanta to grab hold of each other and form neutrons and protons in the first 10(?32) of the universe and has not stopped since. Molecules called replicators do it. Genes do it, bacteria do it, lizards do it (the establish brutal dominance hierarchies), and so do we. Only we have the grandeur to spin dreams around it. But the will to power is so strong that if given their way, lowly bacteria would spawn more copies of themselves than there are atoms in this universe. And they'd do it in a few short months, swallowing all creation and stamping it out in their own image along the way. CN: (If your answer was yes) Do you see the pecking orderö drive as a more important factor in the evolution of species than mere individual ôsurvivalö?HB: Yes, but we humans call it honor and prestige. In World War I pilots of the early biplanes refused to wear parachutes. They felt it would make them look like coward and besmirch their honor. They saw themselves as heirs apparent to the knights of Arthur's court, men who would rather die with their status high above all others in the pecking order of chivalry than to live as cowards beneath the contempt of even those at the bottom of the social pyramid.CN: In the chapter The Secret Meaning Of ôFreedom,ö ôPeace,ö And ôJustice,ö you say: ôà.peace, freedom, and justice are deceptive concepts. Hidden beneath their surface are the instincts of the pecking orderà.Stripped of their moral disguises, the slogans of freedom, peace and justice are often weapons that those attempting to achieve hierarchical superiority use to stuff the rest of us into the lower ranks of the pecking order.ö Do you think the notion of ôequalityö could also be added to this list? Do you see the notion of ôequalityö being used as a mask for hierarchical ascendency, either in history or the present day? hb: Absolutely. Equality is the mask worn by those who champion the rights of masses well below them on the social scale. What egalitarians never admit to themselves or others is how much they glory in their superiority to those they want to "aid." Even more insidious, by raising the masses, they will raise themselves and take over the throne of ultimate power, just as Lenin did. Lenin was the son of a high class bureaucrat??the head of the educational system for a large part of Russia. He was raised on his father's estate by a German mother who was far more educated than even the Russian aristocracy. Lenin hardly ever met "the masses," for him they were an abstraction, people whom he would always be above no matter what. They were his tool for coming from below and toppling those above him, then grabbing absolute power in his fist. His egalitarian, proletarian paradise simply ensconced a new group of aristocrats??other sons of the upper middle class. What did Lenin create? A haven for the son of his father. A state in which absolute power was stolen from the hands of producers and creators??of entrepreneurs and capitalists who in the first thirteen years of this century had made Russia's one of the fastest growing economies on this earth. A state in which all was run by the smotherers of creativity??bureaucrats like Lenin's dad. With Lenin as the king above them all. It's quite a mountain climbing tool??the hoax of absolute equality. CN: You say in your book, ôThe nature scientists uncover has crafted our viler impulses into us: in fact, these impulses are a part of the process she uses to createà..Nature does not abhor evil; she embraces it. She uses it to buildà.Death, destruction, and fury do not disturb the Mother of our world; they are merely parts of her plan.ö Do you think we need to reevaluate our notions of ôgoodö and ôevil,ö or is it time we transcended altogether such absolute concepts?HB: Good is something we conceive, though much of the concept is built into our genes. Good is genuinely aiding others and genuinely cultivating the vast power of human passion, cultivating it in such a way that it generates new luxuries and makes real ancient human fantasies, fantasies like soaring to the top of the skies, roaring to the stars, terraforming mars, being able to shift from where you are to where you want to be in seconds, not in hours or days. Good is managing to create without damaging others. Good is generating in yourself and others the joy Aristotle talks about in his Nicomachaean Ethics??the joy of exercising with exhilaration the unique powers each of us possess. (Aristotle called these uniquely personal talents our "virtues.") This is not the joy of relaxation but the joy of activation. Our role in evolution is to make the dreams of an empowering, muscular, and thrilling peace come true. It is giving to each of us the feminine side of peace as well??the hugging, touching, haptic joy of intimate and committed love. Who cares that these dreams come from the social impulses built into our genes by fourteen billion years of evolution. They are ours and with them it's our task to build the universe anew.
You have to watch what you say to journalists. "Everyone is afraid to be an enthusiast." You are so right. I am a professional enthusiast. I get burned for it all the time, but it pays off far more often. hb: it sure does. jq: As for Afghan activists, it sounds like Tamim Ansary is your man. He is a beloved friend. I just did some research for him about conspiracy theories. He just got back from Afghanistan a little while ago, and he showed me an amazing documentary film he made. Everybody he talked to in Afghanistan was superstitious, living amongst rubble, usually missing a limb, and cheerful. Everybody I know in USA is secular, rich, fat, and in therapy. hb: we have to squeeze you into the social circle that pumps through the Bloom Brownstone. it's a group of intellectual adventurers from a wide variety of backgrounds, but all very, very alive. jq: Tamim said his back stopped hurting when he arrived in his bombed out homeland, then started hurting again the minute he got back to lavish Italy. You could have a field day with that phenomena, Howard. What I found most amazing about the people in his film was how utterly unselfconscious Afghans are to be filmed. That was the most un-American thing I saw. Those people could give 2 shits about cameras. What was important to them was the cameraman. hb: I've put him in my file. I have to somehow get out from under a backlog of 800 emails (it's finally pared down to 70) so I can write the proposals for the next two books in my Grand Unified Theory mosaic--the series that began with Lucifer Principle and Global Brain. jq: I think he's on a lecture tour right now, but he should be back soon. I will be in NY area December and January for 3 reasons: One, I grew up in NJ, so it's time for my yearly dose of Quirk family insanity. Two, my ex-ex-ex-girlfriend and her future husband-- who are visiting me right now in fact-- live in Manhattan, and I will visit them back, as revenge. hb: LOL. jq: And three, my friend Steve Potter the neuroscientist is flying me to Atlanta to try to talk me into being his professional stooge. hb: fabulous. If it weren't so late, i'd look up his research. tell me about him. jq: Sometime in there I'd love to visit the Bloom brownstone. My mom grew up partially in Brooklyn. hb: great. the minute you get the dates call or email my assistant, Stephen Lee got the calendar and if tends to fill up fairly fast. jq: I must tell you about Steve's work, because it seems Bloomy. hb: that's what I was hoping for. jq: He used to be at Cal tech in Pasadena CA, and I visited him down there. The guy removes live slices of rat brains and puts them in a petrie dish. Then he's got some kind of electrode hooked up to the live cells and connecting to a computer where he has a "virtual rat"-- basically a cartoon rodent bumping up against cartoon walls. He's got the computer sending signals back to the neurons, then he's got the neurons, of their own volition, sending signals back into the computer. The fucker has got a FEEDBACK LOOP of information going. hb: incredible...and incredibly important. this fits into another mosaic--he has to meet some of my friends. jq: The trouble with measuring live brains cells with an electron microscope is that a few zaps kills them. Steve rigged up some kind of photon microscope that sends 2 photons from opposite directions that strike the cell at precisely the same time. Basically this means he can film them for weeks before they die. He described it best: "Before we had one photograph of a football game taken every half hour, and we tried to figure out the rules of football. Now we've got a film of the whole game." The man has films of neurons making connections and branchings as they react to what the virtual mouse is doing. hb: incredible. I have to see these. They might even be useful in my Lucifer Principle TV series. Or in music videos--which I want to make based on science--see howardbloom.net/attraction_repulsion for a treatment. jq: I called this learning. Steve says this doesn't count as learning. But it sure as hell blew me away. It sparked a few years of philosophical conversations. He is also a hang glider, and I am an ex-hang glider, which is another bond. He's got his empire of the brain and mind going at GaTech, and he's getting flown around to show off his work to other scientists. All my bullshiting skills finally paid off. Steve has spent the last year pressuring me to be his adjunct brain. He wants to hire me to be his "Information Czar". The only problem is, he wants me full time. I want to keep reading about evolutionary biology and keep writing novels. I don't want to spend all my time on consciousness. But the bastard keeps sweetening the deal, and I keep getting more and more broke. So I'm letting him fly me in. You can find his web site on google, if you want. Steve Potter and Georgia Tech. We've only exchanged a few emails, and I've already told you about a few of my friends. In part it's because your interests coincide with some of mine, but mostly it's because we enthusiasts tend to be enthusiastic about our friends. hb: it's time I met your friends and they met mine. how, with time pressures that are unbelievable, that will happen, I haven't figured out. But I shall now suppress all curiosity, attempt to shut down the computer for the night, eat dinner, watch the last half of American Pie and some news, and try to get to sleep before 5 am. You seduced me. I was about to shut down for the night 40 minutes ago...then I saw your email and couldn't resist. Howard HowlBloom wrote: In a message dated 10/29/2002 2:14:58 AM Eastern Standard Time, joe writes: Thanks so much for the contact, Howard. I've heard of Richard Curtis, and I will send him my proposal next week. I'm outraged that Lucifer Principle was rejected 43 times. What is wrong with publishers and agents these days? hb: they leave their emotions at home when they come to work and act like robotic copies of the others in their social clique. To gain uniqueness within the group, they show that they know how to put down exactly what it's fashionable to despise--but they throw in a novel twist--perhaps a nasty word about the cover page of your proposal or mine. Everyone's afraid to become an enthusiast over the wrong thing. That way lies exile. jq: If I was an agent, and that thing came across my desk, I would see $$. I actually accumulated 375 rejection letters before my first novel was published and became a bestseller. hb: amazing. jq: My friend Tamim Ansary wrote an email about his homeland in Afghanistan, sent it to 20 friends, and 2 days later 100 million people had read it. It was a good meme. An agent signed his memoir immediately, then claimed that his famous email had nothing to do with it. She claimed she knows a good writer when she reads one. He didn't have the heart to tell her he'd sent her the same memoir a year before, and she rejected it. hb: hmmm, I'm reaching out to activists in the Afghan expatriate community who want to see pluralism, tolerance, and modernism flourish within an Islamic context. Know any? jq: Now our other Afghan friend Khaled has published his novel set in Afghanistan, and she was outraged that Tamim didn't have him send it to her first. He had to tell her that he did, and she rejected it. I pitched both these guys to my agent 2 years ago, and she turned them down. Then the superorganism decided it needed them, and wham! obscurity to fame in an eyeblink. My agent just asked me why I had never sent their manuscripts to her. hb: when the word "Afghanistan" was repeated in headlines for over a year, it gained social gravity. So did anything associated with it. Until then the word Afghan repelled instead of attracting. It's all part of the physics of attention, the field forces of mass mind. jq: May the neural net turn to you. hb: may it do so to both of us. please let me know when you come to ny and we'll set an evening in the calendar to have you out here to the bloom brownstone in park slope, brooklyn. Howard Joe HowlBloom wrote: In a message dated 10/23/2002 1:45:22 PM Eastern Daylight Time, joe writes: I got my heart broken a while ago, and after a year or so of no recovery and non-stop pain, I began to think killing myself wouldn't be so bad. It would stop the suffering. hb: I've been in a similar situation, so have a sense of how you might have felt. But it's pretty ghastly when it happens. jq: The thing that stopped me was knowing I would let down all the people who love me. One thing about having deadened emotions, it really frees up the rest of you to function efficiently. During this time of emotional hell, I was never so intellectually engaged. I read Lucifer Principle and Global Brain in quick succession, and your blazing vision struck tinder in me. I came out the other side awed at the majesty of life, and awed that life could produce a brain of such titanic insight. I found myself miraculously emerging from my depression. hb: you have made my day--possibly my week. The way you make connections through your junkyard mind, and the way you seem to have read every book in the Library of Congress reminds me of my friend Nathan Newman, another dazzler. I have to make him read your books. I don't know anyone else who has read you. I attended Burning Man, heard someone giving a talk about memes and brains and the coming singularity, and I had to stop and listen. Amazing ideas, contagious enthusiasm. I found out he was John Smart, a guy I'd only heard about through my neuroscientist friend Steve Potter. John had read your books, and we spent hours talking about them. That's the only guy I know whose ever heard of you. I plan to change that. I just read an interview with you. Imagine my dismay when I find out that the guy who inspired me out of suicidal thoughts had himself attempted suicide. I have no choice but to put the pressure on you that my loving friends put on me. I've read your ideas, Howard, and in your books you are weirdly lovable. My name is Joe Quirk, I'm the author of "The Ultimate Rush" an action thriller about a rollerblading messenger in SF who gets himself into a heap of trouble delivering illegal information, and he has to fall back on his computer hacking skills to save himself. hb: Joe, this sounds neat...like thrilling stuff and terrific for film. jq: Warner Bros renewed the film option and all that. I'm finishing my second work of fiction, "Exult", about hang gliding, LSD, and philosophy. hb: another neat one--potentially much better than neat. jq: My other project is about evolutionary psychology. It's a subject I've been voraciously reading for the past 2 years, and I think it's time for a pop writer to mainstream it. I writing about the biology of our choices. I've got 12 fun and funny sample chapters and a proposal. My fiction agent says I need a Ph.D. to do this. I think she's dead wrong. Robert Wright doesn't have a damn Ph.D.. hb: neither do I. jq: Can you give me the name and address of your agent, if you have one? hb: I just left my agent, Richard Curtis, yesterday for a new one. However Richard is a good guy, has a great sense of humor, and likes science. You can use my name in contacting him--I've told him that I intend to send him projects up his alley in the future. Here's the info: www.curtisagency.com Richard Curtis Richard Curtis Associates president--Association of Author's Representatives jq: Whoever represented Lucifer might take a chance on me. hb: Ultimately, I represented The Lucifer Principle--guiding it through 43 turndowns from publishers over four years until getting a yes from Atlantic Monthly Press. Richard was one of many agents who turned The Lucifer Principle down. jq: Also, I'd be
happy to snail-mail you some sample chapters if you're interested. hb:
your territory sounds fascinating, but my reading pile is stacked three
miles higher than despair. Keep inspiring us, Howard. We need you. hb:
Many thanks, Joe. As you know, there's many a time when even the most
secure among us feel extremely expendable. Stay in touch. HowardYork
Academy of Sciences, American Association for the Advancement of Science,
American Psychological Society, Academy of Political Science, Human
Behavior and Evolution Society, International Society of Human Ethology;
founding board member: Epic of Evolution Society; founding council member,
The Darwin Project; advisory board member: Youthactivism.org; executive
editor -- New Paradigm book series. e-mail [email protected] For
two chapters from The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition Into
the Forces of History, see www.howardbloom.net/lucifer For information
on Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the
21st Century, see www.howardbloom.net Yet large, bureaucratized societies have much lower levels of violence than tribal societies. (See The Lucifer Principle for the details.) How do we explain this violation of the "norm." Possibly by taking into account that the following neural imaging studies of humans caught in a moral dilemma all operated on the assumption that the person you might have to kill to save others was a friend, not a foe. Had the experiment's subjects been asked whether they'd be willing to save five friends by pushing one enemy off a foot bridge, the answer would probably have been "yes." In a tribal society, roughly 50 people are your friends and six billion are foes. In a large industrialized society like the US or China, anywhere from a quarter of a billion to a billion-and-a-quarter fellow citizens are "friends," leaving a much smaller pool of enemies. Howard Retrieved September
14, 2001, from the World Wide Web << Were all the subjects working class or were some college?educated? If some were college?educated, was there any difference between their behavior and those who weren't college?educated? >> As I recall it, most of the subjects in Milgram's experiments and of those who repeated his work in various forms were the standard fodder for psychological studies??college students. One of the things which astonished Milgram was that factors like education and socioeconomic level had absolutely no influence on the willingness to administer shock. I suspect you can find the details and those of the many studies inspired by Milgram's work in Raven & Rubin's _Social Psychology_. <<In this case we would be dealing, not only with college?educated folks on review and medical boards, but folks with considerable post?graduate education. I wonder if this kind of professional solidarity isn't the result of the brutality of the internship experience with its long hours, etc. I've never really understood the rationale for that sort of thing, but this might be one result. A hypothesis I've
entertained many times myself. But thinking back on the experiences
with literally murderous bureaucrats which I cited in a previous posting,
it suddenly dawns on me that these people had not gone through the brutal
initiation rites which so frequently seem to drain the humanity and
compassion from medical practitioners. Howard
Howard In a message
dated 5/1/02 5:38:42 AM Eastern Daylight Time, punset writes: My colleague
Pere Estupinya is advising you by e-mail that we have had to delay our
trip to the US by two or three weeks to record the scheduled program
on The Global Brain.I have instructed him to try to negotiate another
date at your convenience, but I wanted to personally apologize for this
unexpected delay, and to ask you to for a bit of patience. Spanish public
television is -as most public entities in Europe at this moment under
very strict budgetary surveillance. All recordings abroad must be approved
by the Managing Director, and this particular request was duly accepted
in view of your personality and interest. All the more, I had already
agreed with the Head of the News Department to include a short abstract
of our converation in their Daily News. The multicellular cooperation
you refer to in Global Brain, however, does not seem to apply, when
two different Departments of the same living organism are implied. In
this particular case the budget approved did not include expenses for
an official from the Production Department to come along with us -which
I don't need anyway and hardly ever ask for it.I just need to good cameras
which are rented locally, and one camera supervisor who comes with me.
Unfortunateley, the Production Department has raised this time their
supposed right to assist in the logistics of every team travalling abroad.And
both Departments -Production, and Budgeting-, have had no time to sort
out their differences in time for me to fly on the Delta flight to New
York from Barcelona which is taking off at this very minute. I do apologize
once more, and hope to meet you soon. |
