Science vs Scientism

 Pure Science is not an ideology; it is a method of examining claims through empirical investigation and then drawing a conclusion that has predictive value. It uses the framework of mathematics and statistics to analyze the evidence, thereby opening up further avenues of investigation to test deeper claims. In this regard, it has been very successful.

Having said that, the Philosopher Paul Feyerabend argues that when the practitioners of science become dogmatic and political in their outlook, they transform the practice of science into a milieu dominated by groupthink. The willful neglect of contrary evidence and the elevation of the power dynamic of credentialism then dominate.

This invariably results in stagnant thinking, the formation of a closed secular priesthood/authority, and the sacrifice of the rigorous scientific methodology to preordained conclusions.

Reflections LXI - Opening the Invisible

 It is is my experience as a teacher that many science educators revel in displaying Schrödinger’s equation on the board as it has an inherent wow factor. However it is also my observation that most have no clue whatsoever what it means. Fortunately for such teachers there are very few people who can call them out on this, as the equation together with Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle,  is one of the least understood phenomena in the mainstream milieu.

You would think that those given asylum as refugees would be grateful to their host country but as evidenced by the welfare fraud committed by Somalians in Minnesota these expectations of common decency at best fall far short of the mark. Sadly I think many will avoid prosecution as the rot of decline has infested the American Judiciary system. 

The avenue for disappointment and error of judgement is placing any individual, institution or ideology on a pedestal. Nothing is beyond criticism.

The logic of an ideologue is to rationalize oneself out of the reality check of evidence. This drive seems to know no restriction which is why the truth is the first facet to be damned.

The pieces of the puzzle fit in better when you activate the assumption that most people operate from an inflated estimation of their own abilities.

Reflections LX - Political Malfeasance

 It is through its blindness to dirty money and its flirtation with some of the worst players in global politics, that the Swiss have built a financial Empire on which they stand to at times lecture the world on moral clarity.

The worst aspect of the current world order in the west is that it has vaunted to the top of the political podium those who simultaneously demonstrate weakness and compliance to the most destructive policies. Europe’s demographic shift is the most obvious expression of such a deleterious fusion.

I have much admiration for Victor Davis Hanson, the classic historian and political commentator, who has that rare and extremely underrated habit of bringing fact based evidence to a debate of any kind. The fact that he has one-tenth the outreach of a blowhard such as Candace Owens exemplifies the sad zeitgeist of our time.

I find it hypocritical to call yourself a good Christian as many American Firsters claim to be and then subsequently turn your back on the suffering of Christians worldwide in places such as Nigeria and the Middle East. Looking back further It astounds me as well as to how these so-called Isolationists would have left the fate of European Christians in World War Two to the discretion of the Neo-Pagan Nazi Regime.

On Keir Starmer

 As an island nation the British have historically relied on trade to survive. This required an independence of action and a will to take advantage globally of opportunities. Subservience to the European mechanism curtailed Britain on the former. However it is an epidemic of a lack of belief in itself that have eroded its will to win abroad. Bad has fostered a malaise that appears to be terminal. Keir Starmer is more suited to the role of Grim Reaper at this point in time then he is to that of Prime Minister.

Reflections LIX - Sobering Thoughts

 A driver for civilization instability is the lag time when one aspect of the flow of information increases at a rate that far exceeds the ability of further steps along the processing line to understand and make sense of it.

Without brute force ideological policy making cannot withstand the empirical push back of the economic reality.

We will reach a breaking point when the false metrics of success run head first into the unyielding wall of  the physical universe.

Nature has an inherent bias in rendering the vast majority of predictions to the effuse of history.

The older I become the more apparent it is to me that many a belief system is based on lies, misconceptions and a dangerous disregard of skepticism.

How much time has been wasted by physicists on a theory of everything? So many hours lost as slaves to hubris. 

Listening to the rhetoric of politicians it is overwhelmingly obvious that the most common trait they share is narcissism.

Reflection LVIII- May's Murmours

A proportional Allied response in world war two would have likely ensured a thousand year Reich.

Systems fails as they have innate flaws in that those who design them rarely have to use them. How many of the framers of Obamacare for example use Obamacare themselves?  The same can be said for public education wonks who send their offspring to private schools while pontificating about the benefits of the state system.

The scarcity of evidence is not evidence in and of itself.

The curse of the podcaster is that in order to stay relevant they inevitably platform garbage,

Ireland has a victim mentality which makes it a perfect  breeding ground for post-Catholic Wokeism. They lost a lot of their best to the United States (through emigration) and in a post-Catholic era are looking for a new religion which requires a devil.  Israel fits that bill for many in the population. The irony is that immigration into Ireland  is eating the out the framework of its society providing a backdoor for an Islamist surge on the Emerald Isle. 

Green parties in the west are far more red than they are green. The environmentalism is the hook for the Marxism.

Once you realize that true happiness comes from cultivating a restful soul based on a transcendence then material wants recede into the background.

A great part of wisdom is honing one’s mind filter to contextualize the information deluge. 

Reflections LVII - Pesky Pontifications

Western Progressives often excuse the worst behavior exhibited in the Arab world by evoking a context of culturally different but ultimately lowered  standards. The Arab Street with remarkably few exceptions have done their best to live up to this appraisal.

The hatred of the Jew and Israel by various Christian nationalists is so diabolical that many seem to show little concern for the possibility that the Holy Land could indeed fall into Islamist hands. Hatred does indeed blind one to rational decision making. 

Ultimately every framework of knowledge acquisition is guided by a leap of faith in a system of understanding. The more robust of these systems minimize such a leap.

The problem with change is not that it is intrinsically bad (it can often be positive) but that much of it is initiated by partisans who have devoted too little time to the mechanism of its initiation and workable contingencies that can re-correct should the change fail.

It is the politics of envy that guides most leftist policy.

Nobody can truly believe in G-d and still be a self centered narcissist for it is the transcendent being that reaffirms our limitation.

It is a poverty of historical knowledge that drives extremism.