neonvincent

My comment on "Send Out the Clowns”

"It’s mom against daddy. The kid’s know they’re both idiots, and are voting for grandpa!"

It's not just the kids. In advance of last week's premiere of Season 6 of "Game of Thrones," SurveyMonkey conducted a poll and found that Tyrion Lannister ties Sanders and beats Clinton and Trump. The show's fans preferred Sanders to both Clinton and Trump. That a fictional character might win an election is par for the course. Last December, Reuters found that both Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi would beat Clinton and Trump. Even Darth Vader would beat Trump!

That's not all. Vox looked at the candidates and figured out who they'd be in Westeros. Clinton, no surprise, would be Circei Lannister. Trump wouldn't be any known character, but he'd fit right in with the Lannisters, too, maybe as Joffrey all grown up. Americans want a Lannister, but poor Tyrion won't be on the ballot. Instead, Trump is coming and he's building a wall.


My comment on Eyesore of the Month for May 2016

The top looks like a ship in fog. The bottom looks like an iceberg. Together, they make The Titanic.


My comment on The Dawn of the Cthulhucene: A Retrospective.

A belated Happy May Day and congratulations on your decade of blogging here! I've found the same thing when I go through my most read entries every year; the default top ten and its page counts do not match the results of going through the raw data. One year I had two different top posts

"Then there’s the most embarrassing claim of all, the devout insistence that humanity’s destiny lies out there in space."

Some of your readers might find it ironic that you posted this today, Star Wars Day, which is as much dedicated to the idea of a future (actually a past, but never mind that) in space, no matter how fantastic. However, I've found an appreciation of irony is necessary to get through life. Besides, there are things that Star Wars can teach us, even if they belong on your other blog.

"[W]e balding social primates are of no more importance in the great scheme of things than the trilobites or the dinosaurs, or for that matter the countless species—intelligent or otherwise—that will come into being long after the last human being has gone to join the trilobites and dinosaurs in Earth’s library of fossil beds."

That's almost exactly the example I use to drive home to my students the logical result of accepting an ecosystem-centered environmental viewpoint looks like. We are not going to save the planet. If we're lucky and careful, the planet might save us--for a while. Having started my scientific career as a paleontologist, I can come to no other intellectually honest conclusion.

"Given that the universe is simply not interested in pandering to the fantasies of omnipotence currently fashionable among influential members of our species...how should we then live?"

So you've discovered that your blog is a discursive meditation on philosophy in an age of limits. I like that. May you continue your exploration of that theme for at least another decade!

JMG: Pinku-Sensei, the irony is duly noted. Do you happen to know if anyone's ever worked through the implications of the claim that Star Wars happened "a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away"? Did they, for example, use up the resources that made interstellar flight possible, and that's why we're sitting here on an isolated planet with no way off, ever? ;-)

Me: I know you're winking me while making the suggestion, but I'll answer as seriously as I can--yes and no.

Yes in that people have worked through the idea that Star Wars happened in the past, although that was mostly to find a way to connect Han Solo to Indiana Jones in a way both more direct and more distant than the Lone Ranger was connected to The Green Hornet before different companies bought the rights to the characters. The best I can say about this is it appears to be an attempt to turn commercial entertainment into a new mythology.

No in that I suspect that most of the people who'd speculate on such matters would reject the idea that interstellar travel is so impractical as to be effectively impossible. Whether they realize it or not, they're adherents of the religion of progress, and such thoughts would be blasphemy. In that regard, as I once wrote about those who tried to write histories of drum and bugle corps during the 20th Century, the people who were interested weren't qualified and those who were qualified weren't interested. Consequently, you might be the first.


My comment on Trumptopia

Bernie Sanders is trying. He won Indiana at the same time Trump won and Cruz dropped out. He's likely to win all the states, if not all the contests, between now and June 7 (Hillary will win the caucuses in the territories and commonwealths). That won't be enough; I expect Clinton will win enough delegates next month to put her over the top.

Speaking of not enough, I had to revisit Cruz's and Kasich's capitulation as an episode of the "Hungry for Power Games." How appropriate--a post-apocalyptic dystopian reality show as the format to cover our current election!

I agree with you about Jill Stein. However, the candidate to watch will actually be likely Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson, who will probably be on all 50 state ballots and is polling at 11% but is usually left off of polls. CNN has an interview of him, touting him as Gary Johnson: GOP Trump Alternative? I can already tell this will be a good year for minor parties.


My comment on "A Few Notes on Burkean Conservatism"

I have to congratulate you on two wonderful quotes--"'Ewww, gross!' does not count as a compelling interest" and "there are no Purple Hearts issued for being butthurt." I found both of them simultaneously hilarious and truthful.

I examined how well different ideas of conservatism and liberalism worked to explain what was going on in Food Fight! Thoughts on liberalism and conservatism inspired by the Preface to Food, Inc. The Burkean definition used by Jerry Pournelle proved utterly inadequate in identifying modern American conservative and liberal positions. In fact, the liberal solution to the example I was examining ended up fitting Burke's and Pournelle's idea of conservatism, while the conservative solution would have been identified by the same authors as being the liberal one! Instead, classifying political positions based attitudes about inequality worked better than tradition vs. rationality. Score one for Marx.

As for your solution regarding accommodation for minority religious views, it reminds me of Andrew Sullivan's call for magnanimity by the activists on behalf of same-sex marriage. He observes that they don't seem to have any, even in the face of stunning successes. Sullivan may be the most visible Burkean conservative in the U.S. It helps that he's originally from the U.K.


My comment on The lovably ironic Charles Krauthammer

"We are now in the eighth year of the most liberal administration since Lyndon Johnson’s."

Statements like that always annoy me, if for no other reason than the facts not backing them up. Voteview has analyzed the ideology of federal politicians, including presidents, and found that Carter was the most liberal president since FDR. In contrast, Obama is the least liberal Democratic president since WWII.

https://voteviewblog.com/category/presidential-square-wave/

"After nearly two terms of Barack Obama’s corrosively unsuccessful liberalism, both parties have decisively moved left."

Again, Voteview shows exactly the opposite. Since the beginning of Obama's term, the Republicans have moved even more to the right, while the Democrats have stabilized.

https://voteviewblog.com/2016/01/30/more-on-polarization-through-the-114th/

Yet again, Krauthammer demonstrates why his side of the political spectrum is not part of the "reality-based community."


My comment on What Could Possibly Go Wrong? May 2016 Convention Edition, which linked to Libertarian Gary Johnson picks former Mass. governor for VP.

I've heard of worse than what you're facing next weekend. Drum Corps International has its World Championships in Indianapolis during August, as does Gen Con. At least once, the two happened the same weekend. Two of my fandoms collided! If I had gone that year, I'd have split my time between the two. Since then, the two events have been scheduled on consecutive weekends. I guess both at one time was too much.

As for Weld running with Johnson, that's a very serious ticket should the Libertarians actually choose both. They are serious about being the alternative to Trump and whoever he picks (please, let it be either Gingrich or Palin--the laughs will keep coming all the way to Election Day!) Too bad neither will meet the approval of William Kristol; the Libertarians are insufficiently hawkish and interventionist for his taste. He'd be better off with Hillary Clinton, but he'll never admit it. No wonder liberals call him "Captain Always Wrong."