Rants, Raves, and Rhetoric v4

Category: Philosophy

  • Is MAGA pro-Social Democrat?

    When people use Make America Great Again, the question is often posed as to what period? I often see the assertion to the late 1940s through the 1950s, which was before the removal of segregation. These are not usually MAGA supporters, but let’s hypothetically say this is true. Something that came to mind is this…

  • Opposite of face blindness?

    Face blindness means that I would not recognize individuals I know. Clothing, voice, or other cues would be the only way to know person A from B. I keep thinking new people I see look like a close relative of an acquaintance. I am not confusing them with the person. Just wondering if they are…

  • The Bystander Effect

    I am seeing more and more where people are complaining about the filming of an attack and not intervening in it. People are claiming they would do something. But… I suspect many of the people who film these events without intervening think beforehand they would do something too. Why they do not intervene is pretty…

  • Trump’s best shot at reelection is false-consensus effect

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    Thinking back to Obama’s campaign for reelection, I recall much talk about how incompetent, evil, and terrible a president he was from his opposition. Not Romney directly but the his likely voters on social media. To the point of Romney feeling moral obligation to defend Obama as not that bad of a person to his…

  • Collected Quotes 2019

    Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together. —  Van Gogh …clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness… —  Carl Sagan  

  • B’Elanna

    Years ago, I wrote about half-blood characters being role models. I missed one. B-Elanna Torres was half Klingon and half human. I was reminded about the omission by watching Voyager again. In the episode, an alien divided her into two individuals. As stereotypes of her races, she epitomized the war I sometimes feel about myself…

  • Birthright Citizenship

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    Since 2015, the idea of ending birthright citizenship has been on my radar. Those favoring anti-immigration, view the bestowal of citizenship on children of foreign citizens as a problem. In their mind, pregnant women are invading the United States specifically to have children and force the country to keep the parents. (It may delay, but the…

  • Juggling Social Roles in Social Media

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    Sociology has a concept of us holding multiple social roles. At home, I am both a husband and a father. With relatives, I am a son, nephew, or cousin. At work, I am a supervisee, mentor, subject matter expert, or organization historian. Things get a bit more undefined out in the wider world, but I…

  • Micro Quorums

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    Listening to the Radiolab Bit Flip episode. If you haven’t listened, then you really should first.