Jason G. Williscroft

Intractable Debates

2006-10-19T14:55:00Z

I'm always showing up to the game a little late.

This morning I discovered Maximilian Pakaluk, associate editor at the National Review Online. Given that he's an associate editor, I suspect I may not be the first to discover the man, but his recent review of Michael Bérubé's latest book, What's Liberal About the Liberal Arts, was a rare example of the art of rhetoric.

One of his comments, though, took me in a completely different direction. Here it is:

Whatever disagreements one might have with his philosophical views, Bérubé does come across as a thoughtful and fair teacher. If it were not for the outrageous polemic, his book would be an enjoyable read. Alas, his view of conservatives hardly rises above a caricature, which explains, perhaps, how he can describe the “intractable” nature of the debate over postmodernism thus: “[T]here’s no way to negotiate between people who insist on the scientific evidence for evolution and people who insist on the scriptural evidence for Armageddon”; or: “[T]he liberals believe that the religious conservatives will craft social policies that will hurt gay men, atheists, and rape victims, whereas religious conservatives believe that a just and omnipotent deity will consign liberals to unending torment in hell, where they belong.”

Now, anybody who has spent any time at The Dead Hand will agree that I am a conservative, at least on the issues that matter (see here for an example of one that doesn't). And I couldn't agree more that many liberals—particularly those who lock themselves into ivory towers with the rest of the choir—have a somewhat less than nuanced picture of who conservatives are and what they believe. So imagine my surprise when I found myself in cautious agreement with Professor Bérubé (at least, with Pakalik's characterization of him) regarding the "intractable" nature of certain ideological debates between otherwise reasonable, well-meaning people.

See, yesterday I had an argument with my girlfriend.

The topic was selective reduction, the practice of reducing the number of fetuses in a multifetal pregnancy, typically applied when fertility treatments result in unusually fecund pregnancies. Jenna—an evangelical Christian and a staunch Pro-Lifer—opposes the procedure, whereas I—a pragmatic Jew with little regard for the intrinsic value of the blastocyst—do not.

Here's how the argument proceeded:

Jenna: I think it's wrong.

Jason: [10 minutes of supremely rational argument in favor of the procedure]

Jenna: [Silence]

Jason: I'm sorry.

My apology was heartfelt, and sprang from an epiphany rooted in—because this is where I go mentally when girls get mad at me—mathematics.

Mathematics is, among other things, a language. Because of its rigorous structure, though, mathematics is unique among languages in the way it deals with isomorphism, which describes the situation that arises when (loosely speaking) two things that appear to be different turn out to be described by the same set of symbols.

In math, two isomorphic structures are equivalent, to the degree that they are isomorphic. This has all sorts of useful consequences. For example, if the equations that describe the respective dynamics of an electrical circuit and a hydraulic system look the same, then there is at least one way to measure the behavior of both that will produce identical results... guaranteed. In fact, one could assert that this behavior under isomorphism is a categorical test for math-ness: if isomorphic statements in a given language don't describe the same thing, then the language isn't a mathematical one!

It should come as no surprise that most human languages are not mathematical. Dr. John Gray built an empire on this concept, starting with his popular relationship manual Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus. Gray's concept is simple: men and women may speak the same language and use the same words, but the things they're describing with those words—their respective referents—are often wildly different.

The same thing happens in other arenas as well... the abortion debate, for example.

When Jenna talks about abortion, she approaches it from a moral perspective. Her point of view—whether explicitly or implicitly—is based on tenets of faith, the axioms, loosely speaking, of the semi-formal system that constitutes her religion. When she talks about abortion, the words she uses have religious referents.

When I talk about abortion, I approach it primarily from an economic perspective. My point of view is based on the axiomatic notion that all men are not created equal, and that—compared to the needs of an adult human, or a child, or even the family pet—the requirements of an eight-cell blastocyst are so trivial as to be entirely beneath consideration. When I talk about abortion, the words I use have secular referents.

Both of us derive our positions by following a mental calculus that proceeds, via rules of transformation, from the small set of axioms that constitute our core beliefs. Both of us use the English language—and use it well, I might add—to express to one another how we traverse this path. But these calculi—these rules of transformation that get us from A to B to C—are not isomorphic.

Not even a little bit.

At this juncture one might be tempted to offer a value judgment, to point out that since my process uses logic, and Jenna's process uses... well... something else, that mine is better. The trouble with that argument, though, is that it just isn't true.

One way to characterise logic—in a hand-wavy sort of way—is as a set of transformations that, given the same point of departure, reliably get you to a consistent conclusion. What non-logicians often don't appreciate, though, is that this is a pretty loose definition. In fact, there are lots of logical systems, just as there are lots of algebras that bear no resemblance to the one you learned in high school.

There is only one mathematical logic because in mathematics, by definition, all logics are isomorphic and thus equivalent. Start expressing logic in a non-mathematical language, though, and the isomorphism constraint goes away... and the sky's the limit.

One consequence of this is that virtually every field has its own logical system, which only resembles "real" logic to the extent that the field is mathematical. Since religion, by and large, is not mathematical at all, it should come as no surprise that religious conclusions often derive from religious axioms in a manner guaranteed to set a mathematician's teeth on edge. This isn't a shortcoming of religious logic, though, so much as it is the consequence of unreasonable expectations on the part of the mathematician.

So: intractable debates. When two intelligent people are discussing a topic, and neither one credits as legitimate the path whereby the other proceeds from A to B, there's a good chance that apparent linguistic isomorphisms (i.e., the fact that both are using the same words) have misled each to assume that the other's logical system is isomorphic with his own. In the case of my argument with Jenna, this was a completely unwarranted assumption... hence my apology.

If this is generally the case, though, then how can intelligent people have meaningful, conclusive discussions about substantive issues without completely adopting one or the other set of core values and logical system and abandoning their own?

I don't have an answer to that.

Nice To Be Back!

2006-10-16T14:39:00Z

Been a busy few months. Lots of new stuff.

Beyond the new girlfriend, the new apartment, and the new job search, I would be remiss if I didn't point out that we're all somewhat at risk of acquiring a new Congress and a new Senate, neither one of which would be in anybody's best interest (except for the Democratic congressmen & senators in question, of course).

So, what's a good libertarian to do? Well, recall the words of science fiction giant Robert Heinlein:

If you are part of a society that votes, then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures you want to vote for ... but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against.

Amen, brother. There may be plenty of useful idiots on both sides of the aisle, but the idea of placing Nancy Pelosi just two heartbeats from the Oval Office should be enough, all by itself, to give any thoughtful American pause.

And nightmares.

Chicago HVAC Rock Star

2006-07-22T23:29:00Z

When it started warming up in Chicago a couple of months ago, Corey & I started pestering our landlord to install central air in the office. For various reasons, it didn't happen until this week, by which time the six of us who share the office had been enduring temperatures in the high 80s and low 90s for what seemed like an eternity.

Finally we took matters in our own hands, ably assisted by a young Eastern European fellow named Michal. I simply can't praise his work highly enough: not only did he get it done in record time, but his bill came in at under $1,000... this despite a fair amount of aggravation on the part of our landlord.

If you live in the Chicago area, and require heating, ventilation, or air conditioning service for your home or office, Michal has my hands-down recommendation. Here's his contact info:

Michal's Heating & Cooling LLC
1622 N 33rd Ave
Melrose Park, IL 60160
(773) 742-8679

The ACLU? Venue Shopping?

2006-07-11T09:23:00Z

From The Washington Post:

The American Civil Liberties Union has filed a lawsuit in Detroit, home to one of the largest Arab populations outside the Middle East, on behalf of scholars, lawyers, journalists and nonprofit groups challenging the National Security Agency's domestic eavesdropping program. It alleges that the program hindered communications by phone and e-mail between the plaintiffs and people in the Middle East. The Center for Constitutional Rights has a parallel case pending before a federal judge in New York.

Get it? The American Civil Liberties Union seems to be concerned that mainstream America might just not have a problem with the Feds tapping international phone calls made by suspected terrorist sympathizers within the U.S. Otherwise, why would they try to cherry-pick in favor of Arabs the demographic pool that will provide their jury... Arabs, who as a group are pretty much guaranteed to oppose this program more than anybody else?

Here's a crazy thought: Maybe the ACLU is trying to defeat this intelligence-gathering program—of which its own actions indicate that some preponderance of Americans approve if only out of a pure sense of self-preservation—because the ACLU isn't really on their side!

Hey, if it quacks like a duck...

Lion Mutilates 42 Midgets in Cambodian Ring-Fight

2006-07-08T04:15:00Z

Seriously, I couldn't make this up. Here's the link.

Wedding Survey

2006-07-03T22:05:00Z

Got marriage?

In partnership with Fragrant Design, LLC, my company is conducting a quantitative study to figure out just what aspects of a wedding make it particularly satisfying. The point is to help FD construct wedding packages for its clients—mostly hotels and such—that maximize the odds of satisfaction while minimizing cost.

If you're currently married, and if you have five minutes to spare, you'd be doing me a huge favor to participate in the survey. Just click here and follow the instructions.

Incidentally, we constructed our survey using a very neat tool at QuestionPro, and nationwide random sampling is being handled by qSample. I'll post a follow-up at some point with an analysis of our results and a review of these two services.

New Dead Hand Apparel Shirt: Che In The Crosshairs

2006-03-17T13:07:00Z

Ahh, your hipster friends love El Che, don't they? Physician, intellectual, and freedom fighter, Che Guevara remains the beloved icon of the Great Unwashed.

Of course, the reality on the ground is a little different. The real Che Guevara was a sociopathic thug. He was personally responsible for the torture and execution of hundreds of people in Cuban prisons, and the murder of many more peasants in the regions controlled or visited by his guerrilla forces. In short, Che Guevara was the quintessential terrorist.

But now, Dead Hand Apparel finally brings you a Che shirt you can wear with enthusiasm! Rendered in rough halftone, the iconic image is drawn from the Alberto Korda photograph considered by many the most famous photograph of the 20th Century. It's a sweet shirt, and it just might get you laid.

Unless she notices those faint, crimson crosshairs...

Dead Hand Apparel is stylish, sexy, and the perfect antidote to every idle hipster who ever quit picking your pocket just long enough to flip you the bird. Visit our shop today and save $5 with coupon code qzaakg6p!

By the way, this is a test run for us, so inventory is limited. If you want a shirt and we're out of your size, just drop us a note and we'll restock ASAP.

The Sexiest Hypocrite Alive

2006-02-27T22:14:00Z

PETA wants you to cast your vote for the sexiest vegetarian alive. At the top of the list of finalists: Kelly, pictured below, who evidently hasn't made the connection on where her shoes and handbag came from.

Is That Egg On My Face?

2006-02-21T18:25:00Z

Turns out the incredible speaking pottery of Pompeii is nothing but a well-crafted 2005 April Fool's Day joke from Belgian television. The admission is here... although, oddly, the April-Fools disclaimer doesn't show up every time you load the page. In any case, in retrospect, if the story were for real you'd think it would have received wider dissemination.

Also, Corey pointed out a hole in the story. The video reports that the accidental recordings occurred when a stylus, used to inscribe a decorative groove on the rotating pot, vibrated in resonance with ambient sound in the potter's workshop. This actually isn't hard to believe; it's almost exactly how Edison made his first audio recordings on wax cylinders.

The critical difference, though, is that Edison's apparatus held the recording stylus in a rigid metal framework. Meanwhile, one presumes that the ancient Pompeiian potter held his stylus in his hand, which—being somewhat softer than steel—would have damped out most audio-frequency vibrations.

Too bad... there was something deliciously spooky about listening to thousand-year-old voices, when I believed it might be real.

The Incredible Speaking Pottery of Pompeii

2006-02-20T23:18:00Z

Note: Sadly, this story turned out to be a hoax. Click here for more detail.

Many thanks to my old classmate Collette McNeill for turning me on to this amazing story.

It turns out that a group of French archaeologists made a remarkable discovery while examining a thousand-year-old piece of Pompeiian pottery. While crafting the piece, the artisan placed the pot on a wheel and inscribed a thin, decorative spiral line down the surface of the pot using a sharp stylus. During this process, the stylus vibrated in resonance with ambient sounds in the room... and encoded those sounds into the grooves on the surface of the pot!

The process is exactly analogous to that used to make old-fashioned vinyl record masters, and the subsequent firing of the ceramic preserved these sounds with sufficient fidelity that the potter can be heard talking and laughing with another person in his workshop. The only source I have been able to find is this video (click on Lire la vidéo), recorded from French television. The narrator—one of the French archaeologists—describes the process, after which the viewer is treated to a playback of some of the recorded voices.

It boggles the mind: you are listening the the voice of a man who has been dead for a thousand years. Now that this technique is out there, you have to think it's only a matter of time before we find other accidental audio sources, some of which may fill gaps in the history of civilization from which no written records survive.

I am—assuming that this whole thing isn't just a hoax—utterly blown away.

Personal Responsibility: A Near-Death Experience

2006-02-20T10:58:00Z

Thanks to USNA-at-Large's John Howland for this:

One August night in 2002, John P. Ruggiero went drinking.

Ruggiero, a 20-year-old Midshipman at the U.S. Naval Academy, returned to his dorm room so obliterated that he thought it might be a good idea to crawl out of his window and hang out on the roof of Bancroft Hall. As it turned out, bad idea: Ruggiero fell off the roof., tumbling 53 feet to his death.

It's a sad story. Tragic, even: like it or not, most underage college students drink, but few of them die as a result, and even fewer work as hard as Ruggiero to earn the right to walk the ground that killed him.

Unfortunately, however, the epilogue to Ruggiero's death offers up a cultural commentary even more tragic than one young man's demise. Ruggiero's family—understandably distraught at their son's death—has elected to file suit against the Department of the Navy, alleging that the Academy was negligent because the window in Midshipman Riggiero's room had no screens or safety devices.

I'm damn near speechless.

Let's leave aside, for the sake of argument, the fact that Ruggiero had given himself over to an institution whose very foundation depends on the most uncomprimising sense of personal responsibility on the part of its members. Let's skip over the inconvenient truth that the bridge wing of a warship doesn't have a safety screen, either. Let's forget that, in order to place himself in jeapordy, this drunk 20-year-old had to break the law.

Forget all that. Even so: on what funhouse-mirror planet does it make sense to argue that a man who liquors himself up, crawls out a window, and plummets to his death is not entirely responsible for his own demise? With respect for their terrible loss, I remain appalled and not a little disgusted that Ruggiero's family has elected to honor his memory by entering a public forum and reducing this talented young man to the moral equivalent of the village idiot: so incompetent that the U.S. Navy must be tasked with preventing him from getting smashed and falling out of a window.

Thankfully, my position still prevails: last January, U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo dismissed the suit, and last week a three-judge panel on the U.S. 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal. So—for now—personal responsibility remains alive and well at our nation's service academies.

For now.

Asymmetrical Warfare, 1906

2006-02-19T19:04:00Z

Trust Wretchard the Cat for a riveting historical perspective.

“Asymmetrical Warfare, 1906” tells the story of American forces locked in desperate combat with Moro forces in the Phillippines at the turn of the 20^th Century. The tactics and attitudes of the enemy are chillingly similar to what we experience today in the sands of Iraq and Afghanistan, as are the resolve and deadly intent of the warriors who will enable us to prevail today.

One has to presume that, 100 years ago, our side also included the same flavor of effete apologist that characterizes today's political Left. Now, as then, our warriors will do the job and move on the the next hot spot, and the endlessly, pointlessly irrelevant debate at home will never skip a beat.

Terrorists Want WMD After All!!!

2006-02-18T22:10:00Z

You heard it here first.

Arrianna “Oh, what famous friends I've got” Huffington, founder of the eponymous Huffington Post, wants you to quit driving your SUV. In particular, her “Detroit Project” wants you to watch this video, which asserts that your gas money goes to buy—among other nasty things—weapons of mass destruction for terrorists.

Of course, it also provides residents of the Middle East with employment, sustenance, medicine, education, suffrage, and all those other benefits of a modern economy, but hey, why should we care about that? After all, those little brown people were much happier when all they had to worry about was raising enough daughters to placate the local warlord.

Great Reagan Quote

2006-02-18T15:53:00Z

I keep a “Quote of the Day” module up on my Google home page. To be honest, I rarely look at it, but occasionally it serves up a doozy like this one:

The government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

— Ronald Reagan

Amen, Mister President.

Alec Baldwin: "Cheney is a Terrorist!"

2006-02-18T10:21:00Z

Surprised?

Actually, what did surprise me is where I read it: The Huffington Post. This blog, as it turns out, offers this and other similar drivel from an absolute gold mine of cranks, including Deepak Chopra, Bruce Cohen, Walter Cronkite, John Cusack, Larry David, Ellen DeGeneres, Alan Dershowitz... and that doesn't even get up up through the Ds... and I left out anybody whose name I dodn't immediately recognize.

Oh, and Alec Baldwin.

Seriously, this is going to be the most fun I've had since I discovered Richard Torgerson.