Wednesday, June 29, 2005 |
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"Music Without Magic" |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 7:34 AM   
I recently ran across this fascinating article on musical aesthetics, which was basically a defense of tonal music and a pointed (but justified) critique of the avante-garde atonal music popularized by Schonberg and his intellectual descendants. Here are some selected excerpts:Let me emphasize immediately that the pleasing qualities of consonant chords and intervals, and the power of tonal relationships in general, are not arbitrary constructs. They were determined empirically, over the course of centuries. And they are firmly rooted in the laws of acoustical physics, with frequency ratios and a natural phenomenon called the harmonic series (or overtone series) playing vital roles. This is why Leonard Bernstein, in his 1973 Norton Lectures at Harvard University (published in book form as The Unanswered Question), devoted considerable time to a discussion of the harmonic series, and why he said, "I believe that from... Earth emerges a musical poetry, which is by the nature of its sources tonal." Or to put it another way, the origins of tonality lie not in a set of inventions and decisions but in the fundamental nature of sound.
To be clear: Tonal music contains lots of dissonance. If you were to string together all the dissonant chords in a piece by Bach (or Schubert or Tchaikovsky or any other composer of tonal music) with no other chords between, the effect would loosen your fillings. But the dissonances in tonal music are never strung together that way, because the specific function of dissonance in tonal music is to provide tension, and that tension, in whatever degree it is established, is always resolved by a return to consonance. Indeed, the true genius of the tonal system is that in any given piece it enables a composer to combine the power and momentum of harmonic progressions with the simultaneous manipulation of melodic material, in ways that create the impression of a narrative, a dramatic structure complete with characters, rhetoric, direction, conflict, tension, uncertainty, and ultimate resolution.
So, pleasing sounds, striking contrasts, coherent dramatic structures based on expressive musical elements that form clear (if sometimes complex) relationships and patterns -- for more than 200 years this remarkable system served as the unquestioned foundation of Western music, the foundation on which the works of the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods were all built. From Vivaldi to Mahler, Bach to Verdi, Mozart to Mussorgsky, Beethoven to Faure, countless composers of every conceivable individual and national style shared the basic framework of tonality; they spoke what was essentially a common musical language. Is the enduring popularity of these composers' works unrelated to that musical language? Is the still-central role of these works in our musical life an accident, a matter of chance or good public relations? No, and no. Is it fair to say that the powerful and perennial emotional appeal of tonal music reflects its extraordinary capacity to meet our oh-so-human musical expectations, to satisfy our longings for beauty, comfort, and meaning? Yes, indeed.
[With respect to the 20th century atonal music] ...[I]t led ultimately to a 50-year modernist reign in the world of Western classical music, a reign in which to have any hope of being taken seriously by the critical and academic communities, composers were obligated, regardless of their specific styles and techniques, to avoid traditional tonal procedures and the comforts of consonance and to accept that dissonance was king.
Now, it's true that we often add salt and hot spices to our food to enhance its flavor and heighten contrasts, and it's important to remember that some people like their food much hotter and spicier than others. I should emphasize here -- and I can't emphasize strongly enough -- that there are many contemporary composers, along with a host of not-so-contemporary composers, who have in varying degrees made use of 12-tone techniques and atonal procedures to write richly expressive and, indeed, powerfully moving and beautiful works...
It's true as well that harsh elements can be a tool of great visual art, and that much great literature makes use of disturbing images or harrowing episodes, or both. But is there a chef on the planet who suggests swallowing a tablespoon of salt for an appetizer and following it with a bowl of Tabasco for an entree before washing it all down with a cup of vinegar? We know from listening to tonal music that dissonance can be wonderfully useful when it's employed imaginatively. It can enhance and even create meaning. But in and of itself, dissonance is something that people fundamentally don't like -- that's its very definition. When composers nonetheless demand that their listeners endure dissonance at great length and without letup, it's hard not to see that demand as something spiteful, as evidence of a musical philosophy that is stubbornly aggressive, even hostile. And it's easy to understand why that philosophy has never proved terribly popular with the concert-going public.
The primary proposition in defense of avant-garde music of the relentlessly dissonant and persistently unpopular variety has always been that, through exposure and familiarity, we often come to appreciate, and even love, things that initially confuse or displease us. Here what we might call "the Beethoven Myth" comes into play. "Beethoven was misunderstood in his time," the argument goes, "but now the whole world recognizes his genius. I am misunderstood in my time, therefore I am like Beethoven." This reasoning, unfortunately, has been the refuge of countless second- and third-rate talents. Beethoven ate fish, too. If you eat fish, are you like Beethoven? But there's a much graver flaw in the argument: Beethoven was not misunderstood in his time. Beethoven was without doubt the most famous composer in the world in his time, and the most admired. And if there were those who didn't "get" his late string quartets, for example, there were plenty of others who did, and who rapidly accepted the quartets as masterpieces. In fact, the notion that great geniuses in the history of music went unrecognized during their lifetimes is almost entirely false. It's difficult to find an example of a piece we now consider a masterpiece that was not appreciated as such either while its composer was alive or within a relatively short period after his death...
Inevitably, however, we return to the fact that there's something basic to human nature in the perception of "pleasing sounds," and in the strength of the tonal structures that begin and end with those sounds. Blue has remained blue to us over the centuries, and yellow yellow, and salt has never started tasting like sugar. With or without physics, consonances are consonances because to most people they sound good, and we abandon them at great risk. History will say -- history says now -- that the 12-tone movement was ultimately a dead end, and that the long modernist movement that followed it was a failure. Deeply flawed at their musical and philosophical roots, unloving and oblivious to human limits and human needs, these movements left us with far too many works that are at best unloved, at worst detested.
The good news is that there are many composers today who, despite the uncertain footing, are striving valiantly, and successfully, to write works that are worthy of our admiration and affection. They write in a variety of styles, but the ones who are most successful are those who are finding ways -- often by assimilating ethnic idioms and national popular traditions -- to invest their music with both rhythmic vitality and lyricism. They're finding ways to reconnect music to its eternal roots in dance and song. They're also rediscovering, in many cases, the potential of tonal harmonies, and this seems like a positive step. Although the author is not an Objectivist and I don't agree with everything he says, there is much of value to Objectivists with an interest in musical aesthetics. Read the whole thing (original version or printer-friendly version). Via ALDaily.
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Monday, June 27, 2005 |
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Explaining Grade Inflation |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 10:59 PM
Marginal Revolution recently linked to an interesting report on grade inflation by economist Mark Thoma. The data itself is fairly clear: Average GPAs stabilized in the '70s and '80s after a massive upward trend likely due to the Vietnam War draft. Then grades started drifting upwards again, for less obvious reasons, starting in the early '90s. Thoma's analysis of the data suggests an explanation that I've never heard before:
My study finds an interesting correlation in the data. During the time grades were increasing, budgets were also tightening inducing a substitution towards younger and less permanent faculty. I broke down grade inflation by instructor rank and found it is much higher among assistant professors, adjuncts, TAs, instructors, etc. than for associate or full professors. These are instructors who are usually hired year-to-year or need to demonstrate teaching effectiveness for the job market, so they have an incentive to inflate evaluations as much as possible, and high grades are one means of manipulating student course evaluations. Even if younger teachers in fairly tenuous positions are largely responsible for the recent upward trend in grades, even a subconscious desire to bribe the students into good evaluations is hardly the only possible explanation for it. (I'm particularly skeptical given that evaluations are often done a week or two before the end of the semester, when students don't yet know their final grade, but only their grades on early exams and/or papers.)
So here's another possibility: Due to their lack of experience, newer teachers are less likely to have the skills required for doling out low grades, such as a finely-honed detector of student bullshit, a cultivated indifference to the self-created problems of irresponsible students, an adequate understanding of all that a diligent student is capable, confidence in the justice of the grades awarded, strategies for putting off pushy students, and so on. Those skills can be difficult to cultivate, even for teachers committed to actually educating their students. Of course, honest educators will develop them with time. In contrast, second-handers who primarily seek to be liked by their students, whether in exchange for high evaluations or not, will not.
The unpleasant results of the inexperienced teaching the lazy but demanding seems fairly evident in this Washington Post article on grade inflation. I suspect the real culprit has not yet been identified.
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No Stockholm Syndrome For This Swede |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 8:25 AM
A Swede who had been held hostage in Iraq for 47 days has "hired bounty hunters to track down his former captors, promising to eliminate them one by one". Ulf Hjertstrom told reporters, "I have now put some people to work to find these bastards,...I invested about $50,000 so far and we will get them one by one."
If Iraq had a fully functioning, effective, rights-protecting government, I would not condone this sort of action. But given that it doesn't, I don't have the same sort of objections that I normally would. Or as Doc Holliday said of Wyatt Earp in Tombstone, "It's not revenge he's after. It's a reckoning." (Via Rand Simberg.)
In a related story, Douglas Wood (the Australian hostage who had been held captive by the same terrorists) recently called them "a**holes" during his press conference. In response, Andrew Jaspan (editor-in-chief of the Australian newspaper The Age), said that Wood's remarks were "boorish" and "coarse". According to Jaspan,"The issue really is largely, speaking as I understand it, he was treated well there. He says he was fed every day, and as such to turn around and use that kind of language I think is just insensitive." I guess he thinks Wood should have sent the kidnappers a thank you note, instead. (Via Volokh.)
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Sunday, June 26, 2005 |
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Medical Notes |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 8:03 AM
Fun medical humor, supposedly actual notes from medical records:
1. The patient refused autopsy.
2. The patient has no previous history of suicides.
3. Patient has left white blood cells at another hospital.
4. Patient's medical history has been remarkably insignificant with only a 40 pound weight gain in the past three days.
5. She has no rigors or shaking chills, but her husband states she was very hot in bed last night.
6. Patient has chest pain if she lies on her left side for over a year.
7. On the second day the knee was better, and on the third day it disappeared.
8. The patient is tearful and crying constantly. She also appears to be depressed.
9. The patient has been depressed since she began seeing me in 1993.
10. Discharge status: Alive but without my permission.
11. Healthy appearing decrepit 69-year old male, mentally alert but forgetful.
12. Patient had waffles for breakfast and anorexia for lunch.
13. She is numb from her toes down.
14. While in ER, she was examined, x-rated and sent home.
15. The skin was moist and dry.
16. Occasional, constant infrequent headaches.
17. Patient was alert and unresponsive.
18. Rectal examination revealed a normal size thyroid.
19. She stated that she had been constipated for most of her life, until she got a divorce.
20. I saw your patient today, who is still under our car for physical therapy.
21. Both breasts are equal and reactive to light and accommodation.
22. Examination of genitalia reveals that he is circus sized.
23. The lab test indicated abnormal lover function.
24. Skin: somewhat pale but present.
25. The pelvic exam will be done later on this floor.
26. Large brown stool ambulating in the hall.
27. Patient has two teenage children, but no other abnormalities.
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Saturday, June 25, 2005 |
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Lost Trivia |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 9:59 AM
While poking around on IMDB, I found this interesting little bit of Lost trivia:
Due to his childhood in America, Daniel [Dae Kim] knew very little Korean before he did "Lost". He has said that his co-star on that show Yoon-jin Kim, who is fluent in both English and Korean, has been invaluable in coaching him on his Korean, which has apparently improved. Ironically, to the audience's knowledge, Daniel's character knows nothing but Korean. Heh.
Just in case I haven't mentioned it before, Daniel Dae Kim is a pleasure to behold. If I were to channel Homer, I'd say: "He appears comely like a god amongst mere mortal men." If I were to channel The Cure, I'd say: "Hot Hot Hot!"
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Friday, June 24, 2005 |
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Unexpected Creatures |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 3:29 PM
While biking around Sedalia, I expect to see horses, donkeys, mules, cattle, bison, and llamas, and so on. I don't expect to see camels. So I was pretty surprised to see two of them in pasture on a recent bike ride. It was quite surreal, actually.
One was laying in the grass a few hundred feet off, while this friendly guy was near the fence by the road.
Although I'm not wholly certain of the division of property, they seem to be at Boomerang Farm, the former home of my two horses.
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Thursday, June 23, 2005 |
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Rollback on Rights |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 3:40 PM
I'm really depressed by this announcement from the Institute for Justice. I'm used the Supreme Court handing down a mixture of good and bad decisions, but this term seems like all bad, all the time.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
June 23, 2005
Homeowners Lose Eminent Domain Case
Institute for Justice Warns:
Supreme Court Leaves Homeowners Vulnerable
To Tax-Hungry Bureaucrats & Land-Hungry Developers
Washington, D.C.- Today, the U.S. Supreme Court delivered a blow to home and small business owners throughout the country by allowing the government to use eminent domain to take homes so that businesses can make more money off that land and possibly pay more taxes as a result.
The Institute and its clients issued the following statements after learning of today's decision.
Chip Mellor, the president of the Institute for Justice, said, "The majority and the dissent both recognized that the action now turns to state supreme courts where the public use battle will be fought out under state constitutions. The Institute for Justice will be there every step of the way with homeowners and small businesses to protect what is rightfully theirs. Today's decision in no way binds those courts."
"The Court simply got the law wrong today, and our Constitution and country will suffer as a result," said Scott Bullock, senior attorney for the Institute for Justice. "With today's ruling, the poor and middle class will be most vulnerable to eminent domain abuse by government and its corporate allies. The 5-4 split and the nearly equal division among state supreme courts shows just how divided the courts really are. This will not be the last word."
"One of the key quotes from the Court to keep in mind today was written by Justice O'Connor," Bullock said. "Justice O'Connor wrote, 'Any property may now be taken for the benefit of another private party, but the fallout from this decision will not be random. The beneficiaries are likely to be those citizens with disproportionate influence and power in the political process, including large corporations and development firms.'"
Dana Berliner, another senior attorney with the Institute for Justice, said, "It's a dark day for American homeowners. While most constitutional decisions affect a small number of people, this decision undermines the rights of every American, except the most politically connected. Every home, small business, or church would produce more taxes as a shopping center or office building. And according to the Court, that's a good enough reason for eminent domain."
Mellor said, "Today's decision doesn't end the Institute for Justice's fight against abuses of eminent domain. We will work to ensure not only that the property owners in New London keep their homes, but that all home and small business owners are protected from these unconstitutional land grabs by governments and their business allies. This is a terrible precedent that must be overturned by this Court, just as bad state supreme court eminent domain decisions in Michigan and Illinois were later overturned by those courts."
Susette Kelo, one of the homeowners challenging eminent domain abuse, said, "I was in this battle to save my home and, in the process, protect the rights of working class homeowners throughout the country. I am very disappointed that the Court sided with powerful government and business interests, but I will continue to fight to save my home and to preserve the Constitution."
Mike Cristofaro, another one of the homeowners whose family has owned property in Fort Trumbull for more than 30 years, said, "I am astonished that the Court would permit the government to throw out my family from their home so that private developers can make more money. Although the Court ruled against us, I am very proud of the fight we waged for my family and for the rights of all Americans." This dark cloud does have a silver lining in the hard work of the folks at the Institute for Justice. Still, it's pretty damn depressing.
Update: Paul told me of a Slashdot post that summarized this news well: "All your home are belong to us." If you don't know what that means, see this Google search.
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Explaining Lunacy |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 6:15 AM
At some point, I would like to see an explanation as to why so many very successful businessmen are complete loons. Case in point: Ted Turner. On The Corner, John Podhoretz writes:
TED TURNER, SOVIET SUCK-UP, NOW SAYS HE WON THE COLD WAR [John Podhoretz]
Check this out: Speaking on the occasion of the network's 25th anniversary, CNN founder Ted Turner told Christiane Amanpour, "I'm absolutely certain I did" play a major role in ending the Cold War. How, exactly? By sucking up to Soviet puppet states from Cuba to the Sandinista-dominated Nicaragua? By paying the Soviet government millions to host a counter-Olympics called "The Goodwill Games"?
Turner is a perplexing figure. On the one hand, he's a brilliant businessman -- and if his former colleagues at Time Warner had listened to him instead of sending him to the glue factory, the company wouldn't have made the ridiculously ruinous merger with AOL. On the other, he's a loon.
I have personal experience of his lunacy. In 1994, I attended the annual confab of television critics in Los Angeles. One evening, Turner hosted and sponsored an event to promote a documentary series called The Native Americans. This was the most politically correct program imaginable, and the event featured a Sioux dance-and-drum troupe putting on an endless performance in a hotel ballroom. We all watched in respectful silence. Then Turner got up and said, "I want to thank you all for coming. But I better thank the entertainment first. After all, I don't want them to scalp me."
One of the show's producers, Jonathan Taplin, put his head in his hands. The musician Robbie Robertson, who wrote the score and was sitting next to me, coughed in astonishment, tapped me on the shoulder and shook his head in disgust. And then Turner laughed at his own joke. And kept laughing. Like a hyena. Lovely.
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Tuesday, June 21, 2005 |
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Fake Apologies |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 5:17 PM
I've grown to thoroughly hate fake apologies like that recently offered by Senator Dick Durbin. As you might recall, he offered the following astonishing remarks about the treatment of Guantanamo Bay prisoners last week:
If I read this to you and did not tell you that it was an FBI agent describing what Americans had done to prisoners in their control, you would most certainly believe this must have been done by Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime--Pol Pot or others--that had no concern for human beings. Sadly, that is not the case. This was the action of Americans in the treatment of their prisoners. Unsurprisingly, more than a few people were upset by these remarks. After first refusing to apologize, he issued this statement on Friday:
I have learned from my statement that historical parallels can be misused and misunderstood. I sincerely regret if what I said caused anyone to misunderstand my true feelings: our soldiers around the world and their families at home deserve our respect, admiration and total support. Best of the Web correctly observes that "Durbin is trying to appease his critics by offering what looks vaguely like an apology but actually isn't." Unfortunately, the mainstream news media isn't so perceptive. All of the latest headlines report that statement as an apology.
If Senator Durbin genuinely believes that American soldiers are acting like the Nazi, Soviet, or Khmer Rouge soldiers who starved, tortured, and murdered millions, he ought to defend that view. If he realizes that he misspoke in some horrible way, he ought to offer a genuine apology, as well as clearly explain the relationship between what he said, what he meant to say, and his "true feelings." In either case, he's likely still be rightly judged an idiot. However, at least he wouldn't be a cowardly spineless weasel of an idiot.
This absurd episode makes me all the more appreciative of Aristotle's comments on the qualities possessed by the proud man, some of which I read at Titan Toastmasters last night. Here's the relevant bit:
[The proud man] must also be open in his hate and in his love (for to conceal one's feelings, i.e. to care less for truth than for what people will think, is a coward's part), and must speak and act openly; for he is free of speech because he is contemptuous, and he is given to telling the truth, except when he speaks in irony to the vulgar. Although it goes without saying, I'll say it anyway: Senator Durbin is not a proud man.
Crossposted to The Egosphere.
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Listening to Aristotle |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 7:50 AM
As I mentioned in my book meme post, I'm re-reading Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics by listening to the audiobook from Audible.com. (It's just over 10 hours long.) I finished Book I last night.
When I purchased the audiobook, I was worried that Aristotle might be too dense and compact to work well in audio form. However, it seemed reasonably comprehensible when I listened to a sample. I'm pleased to report that it's going rather well, although it is quite strange to be listening to rather than reading Aristotle. The narrator is slow and measured in his reading, but not exciting. So it feels like I'm carefully chewing on the text, rather than racing through it, as I sometimes do while reading. Yet listening to Aristotle also requires significantly more concentration than listening to Homer, Herodotus, and Xenophon. (Over the years, I've carefully trained myself to quickly notice when my attention falters, so that I can immediately rewind and listen to the missed portions of an audiobook or lecture again. That habit makes a huge difference in my capacity to absorb the material.) So it's pretty hard work, but well worth the effort, of course.
Overall, I'd recommend the audiobook as an worthwhile addition to reading Aristotle. The audio offers a bit of a fresh perspective on the text. However, I suspect that the audiobook would be tough going for someone wholly new to Aristotle's ethics, since it's harder to re-listen to confusing passages than to re-read them. I'd like to try some other philosophy texts in audiobook form, although the mere thought of listening to Kant's convoluted Critique of Pure Reason fills me with existential dread!
Crossposted to The Egosphere.
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Monday, June 20, 2005 |
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Swimming Pools Vs. Guns |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 3:15 PM
According to this interesting article,A child is 100 times more likely to die in a swimming accident than in gunplay, writes Steven D. Levitt, University of Chicago economics professor and best-selling author.
Levitt analyzed child deaths from residential swimming pools and guns and found one child under 10 drowns annually for every 11,000 pools. By comparison, one child under 10 each year is killed by a gun for every 1 million guns...
In part because they are so familiar, swimming pools are less frightening than guns, Levitt writes...
Water kills an average of three children each year in Tucson and, even with proper fences, swimming lessons and caution, danger lurks.
"Living with a swimming pool in your back yard is like living next to the Grand Canyon," said Dr. Bob Berg, a pediatric intensive specialist at University Medical Center and a UA professor. "You should never feel comfortable there."
But for some reason, the same people who advocate gun control aren't also advocating mandatory licensing and safety tests for homeowners prior to letting them put a swimming pool into their backyards. (Via Tom McMahon.)
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The Book Meme |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 7:48 AM
I hope that late is better than never for this "book meme" from The Anger of Compassion:
You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?
The Iliad, preferably in its original form, but only if I first learn ancient Greek. (The original poetry would be much easier to memorize than any translated prose version.)
Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
Hank Rearden, maybe. (Perhaps that's why I always imagine him dark-haired, rather than as the blonde that he is.) Oh, and Mr. Darcy of Pride and Prejudice, of course.
The last book you bought is:
Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives
The last book you read:
Ayn Rand and Song of Russia: Communism and Anti-Communism in 1940s Hollywood
Oh wait, I just finished The Histories by Herodotus. I actually listened to the two volume audiobook under the title "The Persian Wars," available from Audible.com here and here.
What are you currently reading?
Since I'm presently reading a bunch of books, I've ordered them by frequency of read:
Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle. Instead of re-reading, I'm listening to the W.D. Ross translation available from Audible.com.
The Landmark Thucydides, a well-annotated version of History of the Peloponnesian War.
The Russian Tradition by Tibor Szamuely. This work is a fantastic cultural study of Russia. It nicely fills in the cultural gaps in Richard Pipes more political/military trilogy on Russia. (Although I'm just in the first section of the book, so far it seems like the best possible source for understanding why Ayn Rand hated the culture of Russia so completely.)
The Ideas of Ayn Rand by Ron Merrill. See my comments here and here on this work.
Virtue Ethics edited by Roger Crisp and Michael Slote. A collection of better and worse essays in virtue ethics.
A Short History of Medieval Philosophy. A good survey, if you're interested in the topic.
Oh, and I forgot Return of the Primitive and The Ayn Rand Reader. I'm reading them for the two Front Range Objectivism discussion groups, 1FROG and 2FROG respectively.
Five books you would take to a deserted island:
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
The Objectivist Newsletter by Ayn Rand et al
The Objectivist by Ayn Rand et al
The Iliad by Homer
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Who are you going to pass this stick to (3 persons)? And Why?
Paul Hsieh of GeekPress. To pester him into writing for NoodleFood.
Don Watkins of Anger Management. To see what he's been up to of late.
Mr. Self of Noumenal Self. To perhaps induce him to blog something, even if silly.
As for everyone else, feel free to post your own lists in the comments, if you're so inclined!
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Sunday, June 19, 2005 |
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Paul's True Nature Revealed |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 10:15 PM
A few weeks ago, Paul and I were watching an early episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. (Actually, I was watching intently, but Paul was somewhat distracted by work on his computer.) The episode was that horribly gripping one in which Angel loses his soul after a night with Buffy. Toward the end of the episode, as Buffy is fighting the soulless shell of the man she loves, Paul suddenly pipes up from nowhere with a plaintive "Oh Buff-a-roo!"
Of course, I was so delighted with this unexpected cry that I spent the next few days loudly exclaiming "Oh Buff-Buff-a-roo!" at random intervals around the house. (The double "Buff" was my own embellishment, of course.)
Truly, I have The Best Husband Ever. Buff-Buff-A-Roo!!!
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Ayn Rand and Song of Russia |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 7:50 AM
I recently finished reading Robert Mayhew's latest book: Ayn Rand and Song of Russia: Communism and Anti-Communism in 1940s Hollywood. (It won't be his latest book for long, since the much-anticipated anthology he edited, Essays on Ayn Rand's Anthem, will be available on June 28th, according to Amazon. Mayhew seems to write and edit books faster than I can read them!)
As the title suggests, the book is an examination of Ayn Rand's testimony on the movie Song of Russia before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947. (As such, it is a work of history rather than philosophy, although it does contain philosophic analysis of the issues at hand.)
Part I offers three chapters of helpful background information on the movie. Perhaps most importantly, Mayhew offers a detailed synopsis of Song of Russia. (According to a footnote, the movie is occasionally shown on TCM. I've set the TiVo to record it automatically if it shows up, as I'm very curious to see it now! I've also set it to record Mission to Moscow, which is apparently even worse communist propaganda.) In addition to the synopsis, Mayhew includes a chapter on the making of the movie with particular attention to the involved communists and the changes made in production and a chapter on its reception in the press and elsewhere. (I was particularly surprised to learn of the nature and extent of the meddling in the production of movies by FDR's administration.)
In Part II, Mayhew turns to Ayn Rand's testimony before the HUAC. He begins with a chapter on her life up through the testimony, particularly focusing on her childhood in Russia, her work in Hollywood, and the publication of We the Living. He examines Ayn Rand's general view of the HUAC hearings, including a detailed and interesting discussion of the supposed moral crime of "naming names." In the next two chapters, Mayhew examines the accuracy of Ayn Rand's testimony about the utterly false picture of life in Soviet Russia in Song of Russia, as well as her rejection of the supposed need to lie about the true condition of our Russian ally during World War II. The final chapter considers the absurd responses of various leftists to Ayn Rand's testimony.
As I've come to expect from Robert Mayhew's work, Ayn Rand and Song of Russia was a careful and thorough examination of the topic at hand. I particularly appreciated the clarity of Mayhew's writing, in both the structure and the prose. The analyses were methodical, but never dragged on in dullness. (In fact, I ever remarked on a number of powerful points of rhetoric to Paul as I was reading.) Although more can always be said about side topics in any writing, I finished the book with a good grasp of the core issues. (Although all that praise is well-deserved, but I'd better stop before I embarrass myself by gushing like a schoolgirl!)
As you might have guessed already, I highly recommend Ayn Rand and Song of Russia, particularly to those with an interest Ayn Rand's HUAC testimony or the communist influence in Hollywood.
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Thursday, June 16, 2005 |
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It's About Time! |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 2:53 PM
I've finally updated my musty old blogroll, as you can see for yourself to the right. (I also switched from a weekly to a monthly archive and moved that list to below the blogroll, as suggested.) A few comments are in order:
First, the listing is permanently provisional. Over time, new blogs will be added, defunct blogs will be removed, and listed blogs will be read more or less often. To keep the blogroll relatively fresh, I've set up a recurring task in Outlook to remind me to update my blogroll every three months.
Second, if a blog you think I'd like (whether your own or not) isn't listed, drop me an e-mail. (You can also post a link in the comments on this post.) I'll privately bookmark it in my "blogroll in future" folder, read it for a while, and then add it to my blogroll with the next update if I like it. Also, if you've written a particular post in which I might be interested (whether just to read or also to link), drop me an e-mail with the link and text in the body of the e-mail. It's always good to include a sentence or two indicating why I should be interested, even when it seems glaringly obvious to you.
Third, I read the blogs I do because I find that the writers have something interesting to say, even though I might strongly disagree on a host of issues. So please do not consider a blogroll listing to be an endorsement of the blog over and above the minimal notion that "Diana finds this blog interesting."
Fourth, although Paul posts here on occasion, his musty old blogroll can be found on GeekPress. This blogroll is all mine.
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Flight from Facts |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 8:34 AM
Why am I not surprised by this news?
Schiavo's Parents Not Swayed by Autopsy: "An autopsy that found Terri Schiavo suffered from severe and irreversible brain-damage has done nothing to sway her parents' position that she deserved to live and may have gotten better with therapy."
I expected as much. Her family traded in facts for fantasy a long, long time ago. (Also as expected, the autopsy also cleared Michael Schiavo of their malicious accusations that he abused his wife.)
Those who savagely attacked Michael Schiavo for wanting to end his wife's life were beyond wrong. Life is not intrinsically valuable. She had a right to end it if she no longer found it worth living. (By definition, someone in her state could not "find it worth living," but that's beside the point, legally speaking.) The worry that Terri ought to live because she never put her wishes into writing is somewhat more reasonable, but still wrong. The man she voluntarily chose to marry was empowered by law to make such decisions for her, should she become incapacitated. Her verbal comments about her end-of-life preferences to him were more than legally adequate.
(Frankly, I wish that Colorado law was so clear, in that I'd like the default to be that Paul is wholly in charge. Here, friends and family are supposed to reach a "consensus." For the record, I want the plug pulled if no reasonable hope exists of meaningful intellectual work, i.e. of intelligently reading, writing, and discussing ideas. I don't want to be a permanent moron any more than I want to be a permanent vegetable.)
Those who doubted Michael Schiavo's concern for his wife due to his new family (i.e. his live-in girlfriend and kids) were making unreasonable, intrinsicist demands on him. He stayed with Terri faithfully for the first few years, when he had some hope of recovery. After all hope was gone, what obligation does a man have to remain faithful for years and years to his breathing corpse of a wife? None, obviously. He did so in order to faithfully execute her wishes. That shows him to be a more devoted husband than most, I think.
Even those sympathetic to Michael Schiavo's side were often confused by his commitment to ending his wife's life. Why not just let her parents take over Terri's care? Were all the years of legal wrangling really worth it? If she's just a breathing corpse, what does it matter?
Although I certainly don't know the details, Michael Schiavo's quiet actions suggest a strongly principled stand on the matter. He loved his wife. He knew that she did not wish to remain alive in such a condition. Perhaps he even knew that she doubted or rejected her parents' faith. Out of respect for the person she was, he was unwilling to dump her into the nightmare fantasy world created by her parents.
Speaking personally, if Paul was in a similar situation, I would fight to my last penny to end his life. The thought of voluntarily turning him over to faith-driven family wishing to keep him alive at all costs is just horrifying. To do so would constitute a betrayal of all the principles by which we had chosen to live. The fact that he wouldn't know the difference is irrelevant: I would know. (Happily, Paul's parents are reasonable Christians. My parents aren't religious at all. So I have few worries about either family interfering with our wishes in such matters.)
Frankly, I think that all reasonable people owe Michael Schiavo our gratitude. His principled commitment to his wife revealed the dangerous ugliness of those advocates of the utterly misnamed "culture of life."Labels: Religion
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Wednesday, June 15, 2005 |
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Oh, Happy, Happy Day |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 9:58 PM
Paul and I saw Batman Begins this evening. As I wrote a few days ago, I was cautiously optimistic about the movie. I feared that it would be like all other live action Batman movies to date, namely Yet Another Complete and Total Betrayal of the True Nature of Gotham's Dark Knight. Yet I was also slightly hopeful, since the creators seemed to recognize those past wrongs -- and wanted to right them.
I was pretty flabbergasted by the movie. Even in my wildest dreams, I did not expect it to be so good. (I didn't think it was possible!) Since it's too difficult to say what I liked so much about the movie without spoiling it, I won't bore you with a bunch of glittering generalities. Let me just say that it's real Batman movie, particularly in its dark psychology.
So if you love Batman, do not fear seeing this movie. Unless you are wholly deranged, you will enjoy it.
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Lateral Thinking Puzzle of the Day |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 7:20 AM
This is from the CarTalk website.I'm getting old and a little absent-minded, so my friends got together and bought me a stylish little desk calendar. It's a cradle for two cubes, each with one number per face.
They figured I probably had enough left in me to figure what year it was and what month it was, but the date was going to elude me. So, this little gift was going to show the date. So, for example, if it were the 21st, I'd rotate one cube until a "2" was showing, and the other would show a "1". The next day I would know to rotate one cube so, together, the two cubes would read "22".
With the two cubes, I was able to express every date. For example, if it were the 2nd of the month, it would be expressed as "02". If it were the 18th you'd put up a 1 and an 8, and so on.
Here's my question. If you were designing the cubes, what numbers would you paint on each one so you could express all the dates from "01" to "31"?
Here're a few hints: you're going to run into a problem because you're not going to have enough faces. Maybe. There are several right answers and lots of wrong answers. But all the right answers have one thing in common. (It took me 5 minutes; I don't know how long it took Diana.)
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The iPod on Wheels |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 11:35 AM
A few months ago, Paul bought a Griffin iTrip, an FM transmitter that enables him to listen to his iPod on any FM station in his car. I wasn't happy with its performance in either of our cars. Even when it worked well, the signal wasn't stong enough. At other times, the static was unbearable, whatever the station. So I certainly didn't want an iTrip -- or any FM transmitter.
I was hoping to get the NeoCar Ion. It corrects directly to the stereo, both piping in the music and charging the iPod. It even allows you to control the iPod with the stereo controls. Unfortunately, despite what their web site says, it is not available yet for my 2002 Mazda Tribute. (They were good enough to call me about it after I placed my order. They also promised to notify me once they get it working for my make and model of car.)
So until the NeoCar becomes available to me, I decided to content myself with a cassette adapter. However, the one I had wouldn't work at all: it kept autoreversing in my cassette player. Happily, I quickly found these instructions on how to modify the cassette adapter so as to eliminate the problem. (Internal parts must be removed; it took about 5 minutes.) Interestingly, the sound quality is much, much better with the cassette adapter than with iTrip even at its best.
Most unexpected results, I must say!
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Monday, June 13, 2005 |
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Okay, Now I'm Tired |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 4:13 PM
I just biked 40 miles south and east of our house, including 2400 feet uphill. (The clip that attaches our GPS to my bike handles was the best $18 I've ever spent, I think.) Most of the ride was stunningly beautiful.
Since I began biking this spring, I've realized just how much fabulous countryside we have around Sedalia that can only be properly appreciated from a bicycle. Traveling the same roads by car is inadequate, due both to the greater speed and to the enclosure of the car. One of my other delights, cross country horseback riding offers many of the same benefits, although with territory not accessible by vehicle. I regard it as infinitely superior to hiking in that a rider can cover far more territory. More importantly, the rider is not stuck looking down at the boring dirt and rocks of the trail to ensure his footing. Of course, some territory cannot be traversed except on foot, so then hiking is necessary.
In any case, I must admit: After all that pedaling, I'm a bit pooped.
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The Ideas of Ayn Rand, Take Two |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 11:07 AM
Unsurprisingly, my reading of Ron Merrill's The Ideas of Ayn Rand is still not going well.
In the third chapter, Merrill advances his "Nietzschean Thesis" that "during the first part of her career [into the late 1930s] Rand's writings are clearly and explicitly Nietzschean" (21). That's a bold claim. It's an important claim, since it's his grounds for accusing Ayn Rand of lying. Yet his evidence for it is weak.
First, he briefly discusses various parallels -- often superficial, inessential, and/or dubious -- between Ayn Rand and Nietzsche's ideas, such as mind-body unity, harmony between reason and emotion, the need for discipline over the emotions, the repudiation of religion and the supernatural, and the pain inherent to moral and intellectual growth (22-6). With each supposed point of commonality, Merrill asserts that Ayn Rand was actually influenced by Nietzsche -- without any evidence of causal connection whatsoever.
Consider, for example, his claim that Ayn Rand's exhortation to "check your premises" was of Nietzschean origin. He writes:
We should note that one of Nietzsche's most often-stated themes is the necessity for continual challenge of one's intellectual substructure. [Quoting three separate passages from Nietzsche:]
Convictions are greater enemies of the truth than lies.
The presupposition of every man of faith of any shade was that he could not be refuted. If the arguments against it prove to be too strong he could still take resources in belittling reason itself...
Are are under obligation to be true to our errors even when we realize that by doing so we do harm to our higher selves? ...No, there is no law, no obligation of this kind, we must be traitors, must be disloyal, again and again, must abandon our ideals. Here we may discern the root of Rand's "check your premises," as well as the realization that those who cannot justify their beliefs may reject reason rather than accept the truth. Yes, that's really all that he says about the matter. So what should we make of it? Even if we grant Merrill the dubious theoretical possibility that someone might have been able to develop the two ideas mentioned from Nietzsche's call for intellectual treason, does Merrill offer any justification for his claim that Ayn Rand actually did so? No.
The only other evidence that Merrill offers for his Nietzschean Thesis consists of the changes that Ayn Rand made to the second edition of We the Living. He claims that "two passages in the first edition have been made in a way which clearly shows an intent to expurgate Nietzschean ideas" (38). This evidence is certainly more compelling, but still inadequate to his bold thesis.
I will not offer a detailed analysis here, since Robert Mayhew has already done than better than I could in his essay "We the Living: '36 and '59," published in the excellent anthology Essays on Ayn Rand's We the Living. In the discussion of "The 'Nietzschean' Passages" (pages 205-13), he offers a detailed analysis of six potentially Nietzschean passages edited to varying degrees by Ayn Rand for the second edition. He persuasively argues that each one is best understood as either an attempt to clarify some potentially misleading implications (e.g. determinism) or indicative of a confusion on some philosophic point (e.g. the initiation of force). He rightly concludes that the edited passages are "at most a residue of Ayn Rand's early exposure to Nietzsche," but that "they do not add up to some full-blown Nietzschean phase" (213). He also observes that "the 'Nietzschean' passages--especially when interpreted unsympathetically [i.e. in a Nietzschean way]--contradict the spirit of the novel" (213). Indeed, try to imagine just for a moment how utterly transformed We the Living would be if written by Nietzschean ideals. (I have a vision of a novel entitled Me the Powerful about Victor clawing his way over piles of bodies to the top of the Party.)
Somewhat to my surprise, the parade of absurdly facile claims that constitute The Ideas of Ayn Rand so far are not the most disturbing feature of the book. That honor goes to Ron Merrill's endless back and forth leaps between glowing admiration and utter contempt for Ayn Rand as a person, novelist, and philosopher. It's not like the "balanced" portrait at which Barbara Branden aims, but rather great swings between extremes. Honestly, I feel like I'm in the grip of Dr. Heckle and Mr. Hyde. Even just as a regular reader, it's quite disconcerting.
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Sunday, June 12, 2005 |
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The Ideas of Ayn Rand |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 10:55 AM
I just started reading The Ideas of Ayn Rand by Ron Merrill for the first time. It's not going well.
I'm pretty thoroughly disgusted by Merrill's uncritical acceptance and extensive use of Barbara Branden's portrayal of Ayn Rand from The Passion of Ayn Rand in the first two chapters. Despite the fact that his reported personal experiences utterly fail to support Barbara Branden's sweeping conclusions about Ayn Rand's psychology, he appeals to them over and over and over again.
For example: Merrill claims that she "extorted" Frank and Barbara into consent to the affair by her "extraordinary skill in personal argument" and "their admiration of and gratitude to [her]" (5). He reports that in his few conversations with her, "her mind shone out at you through her incredible eyes with an intensity that seemed almost physically sizzling," but then adds that this "stellar intellect... burned away" the personalities of her close associates (6). After the perfunctory qualification that "if we accept [Nathaniel and Barbara's] accounts," Merrill then declares that Ayn Rand "stifled intellectual independence," "crushed originality," and "became a hypocrite who violated in her own life the ideals she had devised and explained to her followers" (6). Without even the bother of an example, he claims that she showed "an unwillingness to face unpleasant emotions--and consequently an unwillingness to face unpleasant facts" by the 1960s (16).
Merrill justifies this uncritical acceptance of Barbara Branden's vision of Ayn Rand in a footnote: "Barbara Branden's account of l'affaire Branden has been challenged. No doubt perfect objectivity cannot be expected of one so emotionally involved in the events, but overall her version rings true" (166).
No comment required on that absurdity, I think.
Update #1: I forgot to mention this little gem of an opening paragraph for the section entitled "The Evolution of Objectivism":
Ayn Rand attempted to present herself as having started her adult life as an Objectivist. She claimed that she always held these beliefs, thought she gradually expanded and improved her understanding. This was a falsehood. Ah, how easily Ron Merrill accuses Ayn Rand of being a liar! With defenders like that, who needs detractors?!?
Update #2: I can't resist offering two small bits of commentary on the absurdity that requires no comment. First, Merrill is clearly appealing to the standard conception of objectivity as impaired by emotions, rather than the Objectivist view. The predictable result is skepticism. Second, how does a ring of truth establish the credibility of a biography, particularly in the face of (conveniently unidentified) objections? Oh right, it doesn't.
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Saturday, June 11, 2005 |
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What?!? |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 4:58 PM
It's unbelievable but true: Unless already a father, Virginia imposes a thirty day waiting period upon any man who wishes to get a vasectomy:
S 54.1-2974. Sterilization operations for persons eighteen years or older capable of informed consent.
It shall be lawful for any physician licensed by the Board of Medicine to perform a vasectomy, salpingectomy, or other surgical sexual sterilization procedure on any person eighteen years of age or older, who has the capacity to give informed consent, when so requested in writing by such person. Prior to or at the time of such request, a full, reasonable, and comprehensible medical explanation as to the meaning and consequences of such an operation and as to alternative methods of contraception shall be given by the physician to the person requesting the operation. No such operation shall be performed prior to thirty days from the date of the written request therefor upon a person who has not previously become the natural or adoptive parent of a child.
(1981, c. 454, S 54-325.9; 1988, c. 765.) The law does seem to be enforced.
The traditional rationale for forced waiting periods is that they prevent rash decisions on important matters. Surely, the choice to sterilize oneself is an important decision in life. However: Is it a choice that a man is likely to make without adequate consideration? (Um, no.) Is it a choice that a man without children is less competent to make than a man with children? (Um, no.) It is a choice fundamentally different from that for any other elective medical procedure? (Um, no.)
So perhaps the purpose of the law is to give these future sinners time to reflect upon their sacred religious duty to reproduce. Given some of Virginia's other recently-passed laws, I wouldn't be shocked.
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Anti-Evolution Peer Pressure |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 8:01 AM
Here is a disturbing article about a phenomenon that's not getting enough press attention:The battle over teaching evolution is raging in communities across the country, but the headlines rarely focus on the "quiet" impact of this controversy.
Science is becoming a political "hot potato" for some students -- transforming what should be a dynamic, fascinating topic into a total turn-off. And some students are choosing silence over losing a prom date.
"Children are very much worried about their place in the world. Some students only ask me about evolution privately, after class," said Wes McCoy, PhD, who teaches Genetics, Biology and Astronomy at North Cobb High School in Kennessaw, Ga...
"Students face consequences if they choose to accept evolution in a family or a church or a community that patently rejects evolution ... It might affect whether you get a date to the prom, or whether you get that summer job or not," McCoy said. "You may even anger close family members. Conversations about evolution can make family reunions very tense."
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The Russian Trilogy |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 8:09 AM
I recently finished reading the third book of Richard Pipes' trilogy on Russia. So now I'm done with the full set: Russia Under the Old Regime, The Russian Revolution, and Russia Under the Bolshevik Regime. A few general thoughts occur to me that I thought worth sharing here.
First, I was surprised by the utter backwardness and primitivism of the Russian peasantry. Anarchists at heart, peasants were eager to loot their neighbor if given the opportunity. They refrained from doing so only so long as they were suppressed by a fearsome and powerful ruler. Isolated from the rest of their country, they cared for nothing beyond their immediate future, private family, and local commune. Even the peasants that moved to the cities to work in industry never progressed beyond such primitivism.
Given that, it's no wonder that Ayn Rand radically changed her view of "the common man" upon coming to America. The American common man is a radically different kind of animal from the Russian common man.
Second, Pipes is particularly adept at showing in detail the myriad ways in which Lenin paved way for Stalin. Perhaps most notably, Lenin established all the legal institutions and precedents necessary for Stalin's later mass slaughter. He heartily approved of mass terror as a means of controlling the populaion. His Red Terror of the 1920s differed only in scale from Stalin's terror of the 1940s. As Stalin later would, Lenin conducted show-trials to eliminate political opposition. Lenin oversaw mass starvation: His disastrous economic policies created it, then he refused to alleviate it, and then he exploited it for political gain. He ruled over the party as a single man, bending it to his will with threats and more. Toward the end of his life, he outlawed dissent in the party by outlawing "factionalism." He was fully committed to the same ideals and principles which justified all of Stalin's evils. Ultimately, the difference between Lenin and Stalin was merely a difference in degree, not a difference in kind.
So I now see Harry Binswanger's point (from his Logical Thinking course) that "Stalinism" is an anti-concept. The term seeks to draw some grand distinction between communist Russia under Stalin and communist Russia under his predecessors and successors. But such a distinction is entirely spurious.
Third, it was particularly clear from Russia Under the Old Regime that communist rule was not an aberration in Russia, but rather merely a new form of autocracy -- albeit one far more bloody and repressive than even the worst of the tsars.
Fourth, Pipes has some nice examples of the early Bolshevik government undermining freedom of the speech and of religion by the abrogation of property rights. After the state nationalized all church property, it leased it back to them at their discretion. Of course, that situation didn't last long, as the state soon decided that it had better uses for the property. Similarly, it's hard to print a newspaper critical of the government if the government owns all the printing presses, even if no law expressly forbids such.
Fifth, Pipes has a nice, albeit fairly short discussion of the assistance rendered to Bolsheviks in the early, precarious years of their rule by leftists and fellow travelers. Such people offered his regime sweeping praise, coupled only with a few small rebukes on minor issues. The government knew that such people could be easily manipulated -- whether by monetary gifts, feigned importance, or ideological blinders -- and did so with ease.
Sixth, Pipes has a nice discussion of the great similarities and few differences -- both in substance and structure -- between Lenin's Communist Russia, Mussolini's Fascist Italy, and Hitler's National Socialist Germany. (That's in Chapter 5 of Russia Under the Bolshevik Regime.) I highly recommend it as a detailed antidote to the absurd view that communism and fascism are opposites, as is all-too-commonly claimed.
Of course, the books contain much, much more of value and interest. So those are just a few tidbits.
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Regulating My Dinner |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 7:11 AM
By the principle adopted by the majority in the recent medical marijuana case, Gonzales v. Raich, my preparation of pork chops last night could be justly subject to almost any federal regulation via the commerce clause. I kid you not.
In case you've forgotten, let me remind you of the little that the Commerce Clause actually says: "The Congress shall have Power ... To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes." Although the wording is perhaps a bit too vague, the power regulate commerce between the states cannot be plausibly understood as the power to pass any law whatsoever, so long as the activity in question is somehow or other connected to interstate commerce. Yet the recent Supreme Court decision basically said just that. Although my understanding of the history of the commerce clause is somewhat sketchy, I suspect that this decision constitutes the most absurdly expansive reading to date.
Jonathan Adler's dissection of the logic of the argument is quite enlightening. (The whole article is well worth reading, as it discusses some of the history of the commerce clause. I'm just quoting a bit of it here.)Noting the Court's interpretation of the Commerce Clause "has evolved over time," Justice Stevens' majority opinion in Raich held Congress's effort to control drug abuse and illegal trafficking could be used to regulate conduct that has little relation to either. As in Wickard, the Court asserted that Congress may regulate "purely intrastate activity that is not itself 'commercial'" if necessary for the regulation of interstate commodity markets. As in Wickard, the federal government can regulate the activity of one individual if, when aggregated together with all similarly situated people, that person's activity will have a "substantial effect" on interstate commerce.
"That the regulation ensnares some purely intrastate activity" -- such as the personal possession of marijuana for medical use -- "is of no moment," Stevens explained. Congress enacted a "lengthy and detailed statute creating a comprehensive framework for regulating the production, distribution, and possession" of controlled substances, and reasonably determined that any possession or consumption of a controlled substance could undermine the entire scheme. Even personal consumption has the potential to displace demand for marijuana in the open, albeit illegal, interstate market. So, Angel Raich is no less subject to federal power than farmer Filburn. Yet if any privately produced item that can substitute for a commercially produced good is subject to federal control, then Congressional power knows few limits. Federal regulation of commercial day care services could justify regulating child care in the home; regulation of restaurants could justify regulating domestic food preparation; and so on. So yes, Congress could decide to regulate what meats we all cook on which days of the week under this reading of the commerce clause, given the impact of such choices upon the interstate traffic in animal products for human consumption.
Are the majority justices so incapable of thinking in principle that they failed to see the straightforward implications of their argument? Probably not, since it seems that the minority dissent pointed them out well enough. More likely, they were happy to put another stake through the heart of the principle of enumerated powers.
As if that weren't enough, another disturbing consequence of the majority opinion is that it encourages massive regulatory schemes, rather than narrowly-tailored laws:
Under Raich, it is easier for Congress completely to displace state power with a comprehensive and intrusive regulatory regime than with narrow legislation focused on a discrete and limited issue of particular federal concern. As Justice O'Connor noted in her dissent, the Court "suggests that the federal regulation of local activity is immune to commerce clause challenge because Congress chose to act with an ambitious, all-encompassing statute, rather than piecemeal." So long as Congress could rationally conclude that the control of a noncommercial, intrastate activity is "essential" to a broader regulatory scheme, a majority of the Court appears ready to go along. This not only gives Congress the incentive to adopt more ambitious legislation, it also severely constrains any meaningful judicial check on federal power under the commerce clause. Oh, lovely.
Update: For a bit of insight into the proclivities of the current Supreme Court, see this post by Orin Kerr.
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Tuesday, June 07, 2005 |
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Rabid Beasts |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 2:34 PM
Yesterday, TIA Daily pointed me to this eye-opening story of the behavior of prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay prison.
According to two Army prison guards, one 22 years old and the other 28, [a] prisoner was temporarily in another part of the prison for a bath when the jagged, rectangular piece of metal, three to four inches long was found and removed.
...After first allowing the detainee to return from his shower to the cell, a five-man team of guards then began a carefully choreographed "cell extraction" to move him to another cell, where he would not be able to do further damage.
"He was extremely aggressive from the moment we went in," said the 28-year-old guard, whose job it was to "push the detainee back" as another guard quickly handcuffed the prisoner.
Before the cuffs could go on though, things went wrong and the detainee forced his hands up under the first guard's plexiglass face mask and began digging for the eyeball.
"He tried to insert one finger into my eye socket, then he transitioned into a fishhook maneuver," the guard said. "He got his finger into my mouth and was trying to rip my cheek off." After another moment, the detainee's hands were forced down and into the cuffs.
The entire incident was videotaped, as are all cell-extraction procedures under the tight protocol with which military officials have been running the Guantanamo prison amid scrutiny and harsh criticism from human rights advocates.
Senior officials here, several of whom take ongoing criticism of their performance at the prison personally, eagerly described the incident as an example of "the other side of the story" about Guantanamo, which they say deserves a closer look. The militant Islamists may look human, but they are nothing but rabid beasts in human skin. (Of course, that's an insult to rabid beasts everywhere, but you understand my point, I hope.) My sense is that the serious leftist defenders of such people do not merely refuse to acknowledge their true nature, but work hard to conceal it from naively benevolent Americans.
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The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 5:27 PM
An alert NoodleFood reader recently asked me in e-mail: "Why no comments on the new "Passion of AR's Critics" book by Valliant? I can't believe you didn't pre-order and have read it by now. ;-)"
Indeed, I haven't yet read The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics. I don't even own it yet. Astonishing, I know!
Last summer, I was in the middle of writing up a long commentary on both Nathaniel and Barbara Branden. I had to set it aside for that small matter known as graduate school. I plan to finish it shortly. I'd like to finish writing it -- at least in draft form -- before I read Valliant's book. I want to keep my own thoughts separate from his arguments -- and the best way to do that is to put my thoughts on paper before reading the book.
So the fact that I haven't yet read the book is not due to any lack of interest -- quite the opposite, in fact! From what I've heard from multiple sources, I expect it to be a very interesting read.
However, I have been following some of the online commentary on the book. It's quite interesting to compare the comments on Objectivism Online and The Forum with those posted on SOLO. Tom Rowland summed up the state of the "debate" on SOLO nicely:
So far, all I have done, as far as I can remember, is raise questions about the posts given here and the appropriateness of giving the book an objective hearing on the merits. So far, most of the response has been anger, based on the assumed truth of Barbara Branden's biography, Nathaniel Branden's "Judgment Day", NBs "Benefits and Hazards" piece, and assorted other letters, papers and street wisdom. But the assumed truth is exactly what is in question here. And yelling and screaming and waving your arms and pointing to the received word from all of the above begins to look like an evangelist pointing to the "word of God" and asking me to accept it all on faith. (How's that for a metaphor?) I was also astonished by the repeated claim that Ayn Rand's history with Nathaniel and Barbara Branden is old news, unworthy of further discussion. Of course, that amounts to giving the Brandens the first, last, and only word. Oh yeah, that's justice.
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Ironic Story of the Day |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 8:06 AM
Two Greenpeace environmental activists who had spent over 2 years planning a summer trip across the Arctic Ocean to publicize the dangers of global warning had to terminate their trip because of an impassable blizzard:It took 2-1/2 years for polar explorers Lonnie Dupre and Eric Larsen to plan their trek across the Arctic Ocean.
But once launched, it took only three weeks for it to fall apart.
Amid a stretch of extraordinarily heavy snowfall, strong winds and broken and shifting ice, the two men from Grand Marais, Minn., who had hoped to become the first adventurers to cross the Arctic Ocean in summer, abandoned their expedition Thursday after advancing only 45 miles in 24 days.
Conditions were so treacherous, in fact, that the men, who had hoped to make the crossing to call attention to global warming and the receding polar ice cap, couldn't be picked up and airlifted out by helicopter until Friday. (Via Rand Simberg.)
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Friday, June 03, 2005 |
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The Bible May Be Dangerous To Your Health |
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By Paul Hsieh @ 1:04 PM
As a follow-up to Diana's post below, I was amused to read the following article:"Superbug threatens Bible's place in hospitals"
A hospital trust is considering removing Bibles from patients' bedsides for fear that they may be spreading the superbug MRSA, it emerged today.
The University Hospitals of Leicester NHS trust is meeting on Friday to discuss the health risks from copies of Gideon Bibles provided in patient lockers in Leicester's three main hospitals.
The trust wants to consult on the whether the books could increase the risk of spreading MRSA if they become contaminated with body fluids.
Gideons International, which distributes the Bibles widely in hospitals, hotels, cruise liners and prisons, said their removal would be "outrageous". For those who aren't in the medical field, MRSA is short for "methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus", an especially nasty drug-resistant strain of bacterium. It's something you don't want. Here's a related article. (Via Linkfilter.)
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Stupid Publicity Stunt |
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By Diana Hsieh @ 9:39 AM
This list of the ten most harmful books of the 19th and 20th centuries has got to be the stupidest publicity stunt ever. I won't bother to comment on the absurdity of the particular selected books (e.g. The Feminine Mystique as #7, Origin of the Species as Honorable Mention). Nor will I comment on the absurdity of the reasons given (e.g. the atheism and naturalism of Compte's The Course of Positive Philosophy). Let me make some more general comments instead.
First, the list is obviously a big package deal, in that the whole list of books is associated with the mass death of Hitler, Stalin, and Mao through the first three books, The Communist Manifesto, Mein Kampf, Quotations from Chairman Mao. So encouraging women to work is only slightly less harmful than mass murder, apparently.
Second, the list does not use any consistent notion of harm. Some books clearly inspired great evils, such as The Communist Manifesto. (I doubt that book was the most influential of Marx's work, in any case.) Yet others were merely incidental to such evils. Quotations from Chairman Mao, for example, was merely a tool of the Cultural Revolution, not its inspiration. Hegel, whose state-worship was the source of both communism and fascism, is nowhere to be found. (Pathetically, that's probably because he's not an atheist.) Also, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion is omitted, despite its role in pogroms in Russia, the Holocaust of Nazi Germany, terrorism against Israelis, and more. It's all hit or miss, thanks to the lack of standards.
The list is an interesting idea, but so poorly executed as to be laughably absurd. As it stands, it's little more than a list of "The Books We All Hate The Most." Done properly, such a list would be developed by first examining the worst disasters of the last two centuries by the clear standard of the requirements of human life, then identifying their intellectual roots. That method would result in a fairly interesting -- albeit very different -- list, I think.
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Archive Contents
Thursday, June 30, 2005
· Positive Press (Diana Hsieh)
· "Is It Normal?" (Paul Hsieh)
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
· "Music Without Magic" (Paul Hsieh)
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
· An Unpromising Beginning (Diana Hsieh)
Monday, June 27, 2005
· Explaining Grade Inflation (Diana Hsieh)
· No Stockholm Syndrome For This Swede (Paul Hsieh)
Sunday, June 26, 2005
· Medical Notes (Diana Hsieh)
Saturday, June 25, 2005
· Lost Trivia (Diana Hsieh)
Friday, June 24, 2005
· Unexpected Creatures (Diana Hsieh)
· Immigration Nightmares (Diana Hsieh)
Thursday, June 23, 2005
· Rollback on Rights (Diana Hsieh)
· Explaining Lunacy (Diana Hsieh)
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
· The World's Gayest Logos (Paul Hsieh)
· Giving to Altruism (Diana Hsieh)
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
· Fake Apologies (Diana Hsieh)
· Quick (Diana Hsieh)
· "Drop Those Nose Hair Clippers, Soldier!" (Paul Hsieh)
· Listening to Aristotle (Diana Hsieh)
Monday, June 20, 2005
· Swimming Pools Vs. Guns (Paul Hsieh)
· The Book Meme (Diana Hsieh)
Sunday, June 19, 2005
· Paul's True Nature Revealed (Diana Hsieh)
Saturday, June 18, 2005
· Lost in Translation (Diana Hsieh)
Friday, June 17, 2005
· The Little Girl and the Telescope (Paul Hsieh)
· Ayn Rand and Song of Russia (Diana Hsieh)
Thursday, June 16, 2005
· It's About Time! (Diana Hsieh)
· Flight from Facts (Diana Hsieh)
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
· Oh, Happy, Happy Day (Diana Hsieh)
· Lateral Thinking Puzzle of the Day (Paul Hsieh)
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
· Ayn Rand on Aristotle (Diana Hsieh)
· The iPod on Wheels (Diana Hsieh)
Monday, June 13, 2005
· Okay, Now I'm Tired (Diana Hsieh)
· The Ideas of Ayn Rand, Take Two (Diana Hsieh)
· The Amazing Story of Hamilton Naki (Paul Hsieh)
Sunday, June 12, 2005
· The Ideas of Ayn Rand (Diana Hsieh)
· Cautious Optimism (Diana Hsieh)
Saturday, June 11, 2005
· What?!? (Diana Hsieh)
· Anti-Evolution Peer Pressure (Paul Hsieh)
Friday, June 10, 2005
· More on Koran Abuse (Diana Hsieh)
· The Russian Trilogy (Diana Hsieh)
Thursday, June 09, 2005
· Serenity Hotcakes (Diana Hsieh)
· John Stossel on SPCA Abuse (Diana Hsieh)
· The Trojan Games (Diana Hsieh)
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
· Shocked Again (Diana Hsieh)
· The Egosphere (Diana Hsieh)
· Regulating My Dinner (Diana Hsieh)
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
· Rabid Beasts (Diana Hsieh)
· Shocked (Diana Hsieh)
Monday, June 06, 2005
· One More Thing I Don't Understand (Paul Hsieh)
· Greek Horsemanship (Diana Hsieh)
Sunday, June 05, 2005
· Sugar Free Blech (Diana Hsieh)
· The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics (Diana Hsieh)
· Ironic Story of the Day (Paul Hsieh)
· Anger Management Returns (Diana Hsieh)
Saturday, June 04, 2005
· The Blogroll (Diana Hsieh)
· Clean Your Plate! (Paul Hsieh)
· Sacred Philosophical Duty (Diana Hsieh)
· Heroism (Diana Hsieh)
Friday, June 03, 2005
· The Bible May Be Dangerous To Your Health (Paul Hsieh)
· Stupid Publicity Stunt (Diana Hsieh)
NoodleFoodlers
Diana Hsieh, Ph.D
diana@dianahsieh.com
@DianaHsieh
Paul Hsieh, MD
paul@paulhsieh.com
@PaulHsieh
Greg Perkins
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@gregperk
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