Hands Up Heads Down!

Or hands up, heads up, and most importantly butts up!

"...a handful of epidemiological research groups around the world, and big names such as Ulf Ekelund of the epidemiology unit of the UK's Medical Research Council and James A. Levine of the US's Mayo Clinic, are trying to shift the debate about obesity. As well as talking about exercise, they want to discuss sitting." (1)

These large studies tell us something intuitively obvious: a job which requires you to constantly be moving (or at least standing) is better for your health presupposing your baseline is permitting, i.e. no arthritis, no orthostatic hypotension, no joint disorders, etc.

How many hours do you stand during the day?

According to the same article where the quotation was found, Donald Rumsfeld is quoted to say he stands for 8-10 hours a day but enemy combatants are only required to stand for 4 hours at a time as a measure of their incarceration in our prisons.

Perhaps the fitness of a nation should be assessed by the "flabbiness" of its citizens asses?

1) Stand up to the insidious dangers of sitting down

By Simon Kuper, in the Financial Times. Accessed at ft.com

Published: January 23 2010 02:00 | Last updated: January 23 2010 02:00

Supreme Court Case of the Week: Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission

Case

Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (2010)

Chief Justice
John Roberts

Background
Citizens United made a documentary titled "Hillary: The Movie" to be released before the Democratic primaries of 2008. Initially it was ruled that the company couldn't advertise the film before the primaries due to the restrictions set in place by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) of 2002, more commonly known as the McCain-Feingold reform bill for its two sponsors. This was to restrict corporations from using their treasury funds to openly campaign for or against candidates in elections.

Synopsis

On the basis of the 1st Amendment, the court overruled two previous rulings (Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce (1990) and partially overruled McConnell v. Federal Election Commission (2003)) and overturned the BCRA. The fact that they overruled other decisions was part of what made the decision a shock to many people. It seems laws on this topic go back nearly 100 years, starting when Theodore Roosevelt was president.

Vote & Dissenting Opinions

5-4

The conclusion of Justice Stevens, representing the dissenters (taken from the wikipedia page listed at the bottom of this post):

"At bottom, the Court's opinion is thus a rejection of the common sense of the American people, who have recognized a need to prevent corporations from undermining self government since the founding, and who have fought against the distinctive corrupting potential of corporate electioneering since the days of Theodore Roosevelt. It is a strange time to repudiate that common sense. While American democracy is imperfect, few outside the majority of this Court would have thought its flaws included a dearth of corporate money in politics."

Further Discussion
Does this give more weight to corporations than to individual citizens (who are limited to ~$2300, if memory serves correctly)? Even if corporations are restricted from donating directly to candidates, it's not as if a candidate will be unaware of who's putting multiple campaign ads out for them, and remember that during their term. However, do corporations not also deserve freedom of speech? If laws are made in regards to how they can act, shouldn't they also have the ability to speak out about it? I know many would argue they'll fill the airwaves with misinformation and lies for their own benefit, but don't normal people do that also? We don't argue to take away freedom of speech from them.

What will be the role of foreign companies in this? President Obama mentioned in his State of the Union address that this may open the door to foreign companies to play a roll in our campaigns. I'm guessing the entire law was overturned, but could it still be applied to foreign companies? It's not as if they're covered in the Constitution.

Support for this seems to be based entirely on party lines (which obviously isn't surprising) with conservatives arguing it's a blow for free speech, and liberals saying it gives corporations too much power. While corporate power in many instances does give me pause, I think according to the letter of the law, this ruling is probably accurate and in the better long-term interests of American citizens. I don't think this can just be viewed as corporations buying TV commercials around election time, as the implications of it could be far more reaching.

References & Further Reading

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary:_The_Movie

www.court.gov/arguments/Term2008/08-205.pdf

origin.www.supremecourtus.gov/qp/08-00205qp.pdf

The Problem of Evil: An Argument Against the Existence of God

The Problem of Evil

Consider the following three claims:

a) God is omnipotent (i.e., all powerful), omniscient (i.e., all knowing), and omni-benevolent (i.e., wholly and perfectly good).
b) God exists.
c) There is unnecessary evil in the world.

Most theists who believe in the Judeo-Christian God accept these three statements, but they are logically contradictory (i.e., that can’t all be true) so one of them must be rejected. Statement c) looks pretty difficult to deny—just consider the recent earthquake in Haiti. The rejection of b) would be the atheistic (or perhaps some species of agnostic) response. Theists have tried to respond to this problem in several ways which I’ll discuss below.

The Apologists Response: The most straightforward tack is to claim that God allows evil in the world and we can't possibly know the reasons for which he allows such evil to exist. For instance, some claim that maybe the Holocaust was a necessary evil for some future reasons or future good that we're not aware of. This strategy claims that the three statements are only apparently contradictory but can be rendered consistent. But this doesn't work because God would be, nonetheless, allowing such evil and harm to persist when he doesn't have to. And this doesn't seem to be characteristic of an omni-benevolent God. In order to emphasize this point, it’s worth noting that we all seem to be able to conceive of a world with less evil in it; we all seem to be able to think of a possible world in which things go better than this one. And if this is the case, then it seems God has failed in some way (since he has perfect knowledge, is all powerful, and is wholly good) by allowing evil in this world when he need not.

The Theodicy Response: Some theorists have tried to give some sort of reason for why God would allow evil in the world in order to explain away the apparent contradiction in the above statements. There are many different reasons one could give but a popular response is that God values giving man free will over creating a world with less evil. (Alvin Plantiga—a contemporary philosopher at Notre Dame gives this response.) Therefore, the theodicy continues, it's the existence of free will that has led to such evil in the world. But again, it seems as though God is nonetheless allowing evil to persist in this world when he wouldn't have to. In addition, this doesn’t seem to explain the existence of evil and suffering brought on by natural disasters.

Rejection of a) Response: One might try to reject a) claiming that their idea of God isn't exactly the Christian God. But if this is the case, it doesn’t look like a God who lacks one of the three main features (omnipotence, omniscience, or omni-benevolence) is worthy of our praise. One would need to explain what the difference is between this God and the conception of God in statement a), then further argue that he is a God that is worthy of our praise.

I’m interested in hearing other responses to this argument against the existence (and the possibility!) of God.

Google to potentially pull out of China

In case you haven't read yet, apparently Google had some Gmail accounts hacked into (or at least it was attempted) of Chinese human rights activists. As a result, Google may stop filtering their searches for Chinese citizens.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-approach-to-china.html

So a few questions:

What is the potential profit loss for Google in this scenario?

Should they have filtered the internet for China originally?

What kind of company steps into their void (American, Chinese, another country; established, new, something in between)?

How does this affect Chinese citizens in the short and long run?

Tuesday Morning Quarterback - Who is this guy, and why does he write for ESPN?

I occasionally read this column when the headline catches my attention, and numerous times the author has brought up good points, only to have them be quite short and easy for people to skip over.

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=easterbrook/100105&sportCat=nfl

Today he discusses two issues that I think are worthy of discussion, under the following headings:

Do Coaches Need To Be Coached?

Newspapers -- To Survive, Ignite Corporate Controversies That Require Image Advertising

I think the former applies to the discussion we had previously on the violence of sport in America, specifically in regards to Jarrod's comment that football in its current form is likely due to change in the near future, and this may be a big part of it. Considering the discussion on concussions, I'm surprised this hasn't gotten more attention than it has. I think his section on this should've been enlarged to an entire column and put on the front page.

The latter is an issue I hadn't fully considered. He's mostly just saying that newspapers have benefitted from controversial issues over the last year (mostly health care reform). But how much of a role do they play in the formation of these controversies?

Finally, to get back to the title of the post, I just looked the author up on Wikipedia, and he's actually the editor of the New Republic, and writes frequently on space and environmental topics.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregg_Easterbrook

Book Review: Problems of Knowledge and Freedom

Title
Problems of knowledge and freedom
Author
Noam Chomsky
Date
Two Lectures originally presented at Trinity College (Cambridge) in 1971

Reason
I previously read Chomsky’s “Profit over People” and greatly enjoyed his writing style as well as his insights and conclusions precisely pointed at not just interpreting our society, but also how we may improve it. While searching for additional Chomsky books to read I came across “Problems of knowledge and freedom” which offered a glimpse of Chomsky at the precipice of public admiration (or disagreement; 1971). The book couples Chomsky’s life (linguistics and politics) succinctly into two chapters (lectures) and reveals someone whom Chomsky revered (Bertrand Russell).


Synopsis
The book is two chapters; On interpreting the world and On changing the world. The first chapter summarizes Chomsky’s thesis on the acquisition and transfer of knowledge among humans (Linguistics, naturally). Briefly, a system of knowledge results from the interplay of innate mechanisms, genetically determined maturational processes, and the interaction with the social and physical environment (Chomsky’s Thesis). Herein lay the precepts from which the rest of the chapter evolves from; including our mental faculties being limited by our linguistic fecundity, neuroplasticity (use it or lose it), original thought being preempted by prior knowledge bases, and the necessity of a fully developed limbic system to give “scope and limits” to knowledge acquisition.

In the second chapter a relatively young Chomsky (41) recognizes the late work of his predecessor (Russell) and treks a similar path critically analyzing Western cultural and specifically the United States. This chapter builds nicely describing Chomsky’s phrase “consent without consent” highlighting the use of propaganda to galvanize a people into backing the concentration of power to ensure the status quo (a firm belief in the “benevolent” autocracies will be accompanied by one’s ability to accomplish the American Dream) and the chapter ends with many examples demonstrating the use and power of state propaganda (contextual; 1970s therefore Vietnam particularly). On of the more enjoyable sections in a chapter revealing subversion at the highest levels is a mental exercise Chomsky asks his readers to try reciting current United States handlings of war and inserting USSR for U.S. For an unfamiliar reader this could be a paradigm shifter.

Review
Why you should read this book. This is a Wikipedia page on Chomsky’s work. By this I mean it is brief but succinct with many references and best of all the author is Chomsky himself. I would recommend this book as a starter for those interested in Chomsky as his other readings will likely reiterate his statements here. The only criticism I might offer is Chomsky appears to be unaware of his critics or those holding opposing views with merit. This is a criticism of this particular book and not of Chomsky in general.


Quotes
“The major point that I want to show, by this brief and informal discussion, is that there apparently are deep-seated and rather abstract principles of a very general nature that determine the form and interpretation of sentences and such principles are language universals; it is plausible to attribute the proposed language invariants to the innate language faculty which is, in turn, one component of the structure of mind.”

“The systems of knowledge that underlie normal human behavior simply cannot be described in terms of networks of association, fabrics of dispositions to respond, habit structures, and the like.”

From Russell:
“There can be no real freedom or democracy until the men who do the work in a business also control its management…and the real obstacles lie in the heart of man, and the cure for these is a firm hope, informed and fortified in thought.”

Book Review: Asleep

Title
Asleep: The Forgotten Epidemic That Remains One of Medicine's Greatest Mysteries

Author
Molly Caldwell Crosby

Date of Publication
March, 2010

Reason for reading
Micki got an advance copy from the book store she works part-time at because she thought I'd be interested in it, and it did look interesting.