Decoding The Trump Conviction, Ukraine, Israel, Science, Liberalism, Academy (6-2-24)

Posted on June 2, 2024 by Luke Ford

01:00 Liberal catharsis after law does what politics can’t — constrain Trump, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NweVBH_QLtg
07:00 Male sex drive is stronger than the female sex drive, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/15/well/family/sex-myths.html,
21:00 More Americans identify as Republican than Democrat
31:00 Robert Barnes on the Donald Trump Conviction, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rB0UtOpoq8A
37:00 Hitler and Abductive Logic: The Strategy of a Tyrant, https://www.amazon.com/Hitler-Abductive-Logic-Strategy-Tyrant/dp/0739194615
40:00 Science Envy in Theories of Religion, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=155267
Is a Second Civil War INEVITABLE?, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCogKGV2NDw
The Axis of Chaos, with Matt Pottinger, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBhL1kV1EeQ
Prof. John Mearsheimer on the Israel Lobby’s Grip on U.S. Politics, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKXSReKRWaQ
Hypervigilance and diversity, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py0lBpkSyHM
Secure attachment, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTd6SyKLFH4
Why Civilisations Collapse Into Dust, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTd6SyKLFH4

01:00 My livestream keeps getting shutting down after I make a point about politicians and public officials lying
03:00 The Axis of Chaos, with Matt Pottinger, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBhL1kV1EeQ
11:45 Israel enters Rafah
15:00 How do RW academics make it? Should they diversify to podcasts?
18:00 Prof. John Mearsheimer on the Israel Lobby’s Grip on U.S. Politics, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dKXSReKRWaQ
25:00 Vali Nasr: Iran, Israel, and America’s Future in the Middle East | Foreign Affairs Interview, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVM0HRx5Wss
36:00 Christopher Caldwell: Is Israel Defensible? The cruel geostrategic logic of the Holy Land, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=155305
55:00 Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power by Randall Schweller, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=155281
1:02:00 CRITICAL THINKING – Fundamentals: Abductive Arguments, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vflZuk-_Hz4
1:09:00 Max Weber and the Two Universities, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=155263
1:13:50 Why Civilisations Collapse Into Dust, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTd6SyKLFH4
1:20:20 Sometimes dictatorship is the most effective way to get things done
1:28:00 NYT: Extremely Inappropriate, A Show That Makes Young Japanese Pine for the ‘Inappropriate’ 1980s, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/29/world/asia/japan-extremely-inappropriate.html
1:35:00 The naked state, https://lukeford.net/blog/?p=140282
2:04:00 Young men tilt conservative
2:15:20 Is a Second Civil War INEVITABLE?, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCogKGV2NDw
2:30:40 Big Tech Bans Alex Jones, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Id4C9k06jcs
2:32:00 Elliott Blatt joins
2:50:00 The dissident right has become tedious
3:11:45 The adaptive use of illness and depression
3:18:00 Colds v flu, https://www.cdc.gov/flu/symptoms/coldflu.htm
2:29:40 Big Tech Bans Alex Jones, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Id4C9k06jcs
3:33:25 The Atlantic: Why Is Charlie Kirk Selling Me Food Rations?, https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/05/charlie-kirk-podcast-ads/678450/
3:35:00 The Long Con by Rick Pearlstein, https://thebaffler.com/salvos/the-long-con

Full transcript.

From the Podnotes AI summary: Matt Pottinger, who served in Trump’s administration and is discussing Cold War similarities with China, emphasizing the need for a strong strategy to prevent escalation into World War III. He highlights that we’re facing challenges due to China’s aggressive stance as they exploit our weaknesses.

Pottinger also talks about Taiwan and the possibility of conflict there. He argues that deterrence requires showing hard power and not revealing what we wouldn’t do strategically. The debate on whether America should defend Taiwan alone continues while considering other countries’ roles in their defense spending compared to Israel’s higher budget allocation post-Yom Kippur War.

In academia, PhD students are advised to focus on education quality and diversify beyond traditional career paths due to changing academic landscapes. However, one must be cautious not to compromise academic integrity when engaging with broader audiences through various media platforms.

Lastly, support for Israel within American politics is complex; it involves campaign contributions from donors committed unconditionally and influences from both Jewish communities and Christian Zionists. As conflicts continue in Gaza, opinions on US-Israel relations vary across political parties creating tension regarding foreign policy decisions.

Israel is grappling with being labeled an apartheid state, a term even some Israeli leaders acknowledge. Vali Nasr, an expert on Iran and professor at Johns Hopkins University, discusses the complex relationship between Israel and Iran. Historically, they’ve had periods of silent cooperation; however, as Arab states opposed Iran and supported American containment strategies, Iran began to exploit anti-Israel sentiment strategically.

Iran invested in groups like Hezbollah because it saw them as part of its own security concerns. Now, Israel and Iran are the two main powers in the region vying for influence over Saudi Arabia – not as a threat but as a potential ally or neutral party.

On campuses across America and beyond, discussions about Israel’s actions towards Palestinians have become more prevalent due to diverse student populations from around the world. This has led to increased scrutiny over Israel’s policies and military actions in Gaza.

The tension within Israel itself lies between maintaining its Jewish identity versus economic prosperity through global relations. Netanyahu’s government focuses on sovereignty while secular Israelis prioritize international business ties.

In conclusion, despite their power struggles both internally and regionally with neighbors like Iran, Israeli society remains largely united when facing conflict – illustrated by high reservist turnout during crises. However, challenges persist regarding how they manage Palestinian territories without exacerbating accusations of apartheid or genocide.

Few third-world countries have waged wars against each other, a contrast to Europe’s historical interstate conflicts led by powers like the Habsburgs and Napoleon. Today, nations such as India, China, and Brazil remain potential rather than actual regional hegemons. This could be due to various reasons including intergenerational trauma affecting political maturity.

Western societies face issues of hyper-vigilance and social distrust partly due to massive immigration. Emotional intelligence is crucial for children’s development but requires secure attachments that are often disrupted by emotionally immature caregivers. Such inconsistency in caregiving leads to insecure attachment styles in children – avoidant, anxious, or disorganized – which can impede their ability to learn and adapt.

Children with insecure attachments may become hypervigilant and unable to regulate emotions effectively. They struggle with identifying feelings like anger or anxiety, leading them into a state of constant alertness that hinders learning new skills.

Supporting channels like Dr. Sn’s helps provide practical tools for dealing with emotional immaturity in caregivers and its consequences on children’s development.

Moving on to politics: Fascism differs from realism by rejecting balance-of-power concepts while embracing racist ideologies capable of mobilizing masses—something pure realism fails at since it lacks moral appeal necessary for large-scale mobilization efforts.

In academia today there is an ongoing crisis involving freedom of speech versus harmful opinions; this has been exacerbated by recent events around the world including controversies over academic integrity and affirmative action policies following Supreme Court rulings.

Finally, societal divisions based on education levels create competing interests between college-educated elites who advocate for diversity roles (which may disregard merit) versus non-college-educated groups whose priorities lie elsewhere. These tensions reflect the scarcity of rewarding jobs leading both sides into a fierce competition influenced more by group identity than individual abilities or achievements.

The parliament and royalty historically had conflicts with the landed gentry. During tough times, populations often divide and engage in civil wars to advance their interests. However, there have been periods of high social trust and cohesion, such as America in the mid-20th century after immigration laws were passed in 1924.

A documentary on Manchester United’s successful season under Alex Ferguson highlights how fear can drive success; it demonstrates that sometimes authoritarianism is effective for achieving goals. This idea extends beyond sports into business where hierarchy can lead to higher performance.

Economic stability is linked to a society’s ability to support families. In the 1950s, many Americans could afford three children—a benchmark for family sustainability—unlike today. Various factors like globalization and automation have reduced labor value over time despite occasional wage increases like those seen during Donald Trump’s presidency.

Cultural shifts are also evident through media portrayals. A Japanese TV series set in the 1980s showcases societal changes regarding wages, prices, and political correctness compared to today.

Ultimately, individuals’ well-being is influenced by both subjective perceptions of wealth and objective measures like marriage rates or health indicators. Group survival often takes precedence over liberal individualistic values when nations make strategic decisions for self-preservation—even if these choices contradict public statements or liberal norms.

Discussions about group interests versus individual rights reveal philosophical differences about whether groups or only individuals possess consciousness—and thus interests—or not. Emergencies can prompt governments to suspend rights temporarily but raise questions about who defines an emergency situation’s legitimacy.

Language is essential to our identity; without it, we can’t fully be ourselves. Steven Turner’s analysis explores normality and emergency states, highlighting that experts often dictate when a state of emergency exists. In emergencies, normal legal rules are suspended to preserve the state—revealing the “naked state,” where force enforces order.

David Brooks suggests scientific experts determine emergencies, leading to temporary rule by decree. Emergencies reveal the fragility of normalcy and democracy’s inability to self-perpetuate in crisis without adapting governance systems.

The COVID-19 pandemic showcased this dynamic as public health officials wielded significant power based on their expertise. The interplay between government reliance on expert advice and public acceptance or enforcement of such guidance became evident.

However, disagreements among experts typically remain private but were publicly aired during the pandemic—exposing conflicts within science and policy-making. This led to questioning trust in authorities as divergent views surfaced online.

In times of crisis like COVID-19, rapid decisions overshadowed traditional slow scientific processes. Experts’ political affiliations influenced policies adopted across regions with varying severity levels impacting outcomes differently—a stark reminder that crises test all societal structures’ resilience and transparency.

One reason to question liberalism is its focus on the individual as an autonomous political agent, which seems at odds with the interconnected nature of society. Every action has ripple effects, impacting others in various ways – from personal choices affecting the dating market to behaviors influencing social dynamics.

This interdependence challenges liberal ideology’s core principle of individual autonomy. Even if we accept this framework for argument’s sake, it inevitably leads us to recognize that every personal act influences society as a whole.

The contradiction within liberalism becomes apparent when considering group interests and societal impacts. For example, libertarianism struggles because it fails to acknowledge how individuals’ actions affect their community.

Discussions about civil unrest often point out that radical minorities can sway public opinion and lead revolutions; history shows us numerous examples like the Bolsheviks in Russia or radical Republicans during the American Civil War. Such movements demonstrate that small but determined groups can have disproportionate influence over larger populations who may not initially seek conflict.

Current debates around U.S. politics touch on concerns about division and potential conflicts akin to those seen in Northern Ireland rather than another full-scale civil war. Many Americans just want normalcy despite ideological divides suggesting otherwise.

In conclusion, while some advocate for more government intervention based on our societal interdependence, there remains debate over whether such measures would be beneficial or exacerbate issues further. The complexity of these discussions reflects deep-seated tensions within modern political thought and practice.

I struggle to pay attention to him, especially about exercise. He suggests it’s okay after a week of flu, but I’ve been too tired. My social life is minimal, though I did run into a friend and now have some unwanted social obligations.

I’m not thrilled by the idea of socializing; it often leaves me drained. There are exceptions—like steam rooms at spas—but my upbringing doesn’t quite approve of such indulgences. Speaking of which, I tried a spa that could’ve been mistaken for something else entirely!

With 30 radio stations and nothing to listen to, I find myself often just looking for dull content to help me fall asleep. Currently, I’m listening to Richard Ben Cramer’s book “What It Takes” about the ’88 election. It plays in the background as I drift in and out of sleep while struggling with my CPAP machine. Sometimes it feels like a battle keeping it on; other times, its air helps clear my nasal passages.

Despite mild sleep apnea, losing weight has helped reduce its severity. Health insurance doesn’t seem worth it since dental care – what I really want – isn’t covered adequately. Plus, past experiences with prescribed medications weren’t helpful.

I’ve been reflecting on life choices during illness; considering how diet and lifestyle impact health is key. Avoiding unnecessary comments can be wise too; silence might serve better at times.

The healthcare system seems flawed, catering more towards unhealthy lifestyles subsidized by those who live healthily but occasionally need medical attention for accidents or rare conditions.

Lastly, being sick reminds us of our vulnerability and dependence on others sometimes—a humbling experience that can lead to personal growth and reassessment of priorities in life.

Right-wing talk radio and podcasts are filled with a particular kind of discourse, often promoting products like gold investments and food rations. For example, Kirk’s ads for My Patriot Supply offer 90 meals for $150, claiming it’s a good deal. Similarly, Patriot Mobile positions itself as America’s only Christian conservative wireless provider and claims switching supports various conservative values.

Kirk also promotes charitable causes; he advocates for donations to provide ultrasounds to prevent abortions. These podcasts have gained immense popularity; Kirk’s show is the twelfth most popular news podcast on Spotify and has a significant YouTube following.

However, not all conservatives agree with these advertising methods. Stephen Crowder has openly criticized the promotion of unnecessary or low-quality products that don’t genuinely benefit consumers.

Advertising now targets specific demographics through analytics—brands like Blackout Coffee reach niche audiences via shows like Kirk’s. But these ads aren’t just commercial—they reinforce the narrative presented in the podcasts themselves about societal instability and conservative values.

Ultimately, this creates an echo chamber where listeners are surrounded by reinforcing messages and products vetted by their trusted hosts—a self-contained world free from external moderating influences.

Posted in America | Comments Off on Decoding The Trump Conviction, Ukraine, Israel, Science, Liberalism, Academy (6-2-24)

Trump conviction – best narrative won – power of abductive reasoning

Posted on June 2, 2024 by Luke Ford

Posted in America | Comments Off on Trump conviction – best narrative won – power of abductive reasoning

Seminary to University: An Institutional History of the Study of Religion in Canada (2020)

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Aaron W. Hughes responds to his critics:

…all our narratives, terms, categories, and frames of reference emerge from the shadows, and we would do well to illumine them. Only by understanding these narratives and frames of reference—their genealogies, their investment in political, legal, intellectual, and social contexts—is it possible to reflect on where we have been, where we currently are, and where we are heading collectively.

…I do think the academic study of religion, both in Canada and abroad, is in a
precarious situation at the current moment. Enrollments in courses are down, provincial
funding for the arts post-COVID will inevitably be even worse than that in the pre-
COVID era… Will we survive?

Posted in Aaron W. Hughes | Comments Off on Seminary to University: An Institutional History of the Study of Religion in Canada (2020)

Is Israel Defensible? The cruel geostrategic logic of the Holy Land

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Christopher Caldwell writes for the Claremont Review of Books:

…the settlements are part of a conscious but never-written-down government policy: to divide the Palestinian population in such a way as to make the massing of force difficult and conspicuous, to separate Jerusalem from the Palestinian hinterland, and to provide the populated areas of Israel with enough strategic depth to minimize the damage of a sudden invasion. A lot more people than will openly declare it, including many who describe themselves as on the “left,” share this vision of Israel’s predicament and are willing to accept this as a solution. The defensible country—the country as a logical geostrategic unit—runs from the River Jordan to the Mediterranean, “from the river to the sea.” On this, hardline Israelis and radical Palestinians can seemingly agree.

…Israelis often repeat what some of the female hostages released from Gaza in November said on their return: “There are no civilians.”

…Under the influence of both religiosity and constant war, Israel is becoming the most right-wing advanced society on the planet… Israel grows steadily more attractive, as a place to move to, for those Jews who understand their religion and their peoplehood in a conservative way. It is the red state of world Jewry.

…when reservists were called up October 7, 130% reported—that is, men not required to go to war at all were refusing to leave army offices until they had received a role in this very dangerous conflict.

…Israelis are one people in a way that Americans are not. The Israeli Left and Right, even when heated and hateful, are doing something more elevated than just anathematizing each other. They are vying, however narrow-mindedly, for patriotic distinction.

…Whether to be part of the wider world (at the risk of losing yourself, your culture, your connection to God) or to keep to yourself (at the risk of provinciality and lost economic opportunity) is a decision that faces all peoples and individuals.

* Netanyahu’s coalition partners have one vision for defending Israel. It involves sovereignty, pro-natalist policies, prayer, and a command of military strong points—but at the risk of isolation, and even retaliation, from the outside world. The secular tech elites who lead the Israeli opposition propose another vision: good relationships with other global elites, above all those of the United States.

Posted in Israel | Comments Off on Is Israel Defensible? The cruel geostrategic logic of the Holy Land

Science Envy in Theories of Religion

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Aaron W. Hughes published in 2010:

In the recently published Contemporary Theories of Religion (Stausberg; 2009,
hereafter CTR), at least 9 of the 15 chapters are devoted to theories that interpret
and/or explain religion from perspectives that can loosely be labeled as “cognitivist,” “evolutionary” or “neuropsychological.”…

Stausberg argues that theories of religion must take into consideration four overlapping questions (2009: 3-6): (1) specificity (i.e., what is unique about religion); (2) origins (i.e., conditions that witness foe emergence/origination of religion); (3) functions (i.e., what religion is perceived to do); and (4) structure (e.g., coherence)…Yet, if I must address these questions, let me state (albeit hesitantly) that: (I) foe specificity of religion is its evocation of transcendence for believers (not theoreticians); (2) that it is invoked and/or appealed to in foe invention of cultural identity; (3) that its main function is self- and group-making; and (4) that its structure is, paradoxically, its lack of structure, namely, that “religion”’s porosity and instability permits manifold and contradictory appeals across time and geography.

All of these four points pivot around a few key terms: identity, discourse, and invention….

I am calling for replacing one sort of reductionism (biological, cognitive) with another (issues of identity). The latter sort, it seems to me, enables us to factor in its ubiquity rather than isolate “religion” as an independent variable. Because I largely refuse to take religion seriously as a category, my form of reductionism hopefully accounts for “religion” as it is folded into, and indeed non-existent apart from, other historical, social, economical, and political forces…

…religions, like all social formations, are actively produced temporally, in time,
and in ways that are contingent upon social and ideological categories of alterity…

Rather than envisage the existence of a permanent inner core peculiar to each culture that confers upon it a veridical nature that determines present and future, cultural theorists prefer to stress the process of the subsequent elaboration of an ideology that speaks of the present by imagining an ideal past. Such a process enables those in the present to tame unruliness where meanings are often fraught with ambiguity and where identities are anything but stable.

…the liberal Protestant and ecumenical vision that currently reigns supreme in humanities-based theorizing on and about religion.

…Until science progresses, we have little evidence that we are any more predisposed
to religion than we are to economic or political systems. Religions, qua discourses that invoke transcendence, provide the tropes or the shards (or whatever we want to call them) that help facilitate the scattered, irregular, and often damaged hydra of identity, both collective or individual.

Posted in Aaron W. Hughes, Religion | Comments Off on Science Envy in Theories of Religion

Max Weber and the Two Universities

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Professor Stephen P. Turner published in January 2024:

No sooner than the ink had begun to dry (or should we say the pixels stopped changing) on the publications written to celebrate the centennial of Weber’s ‘Science as a Profession and Vocation’ ([1919]2012) than Covid and a series of shocks to the university, especially in the United States, changed the conditions for discourse. The shocks included the ‘enrollment cliff,’ the early arrival of an expected decline in students for long-anticipated demographic reasons, an unexpectedly rapid decline in enrollments in the humanities, notably history, the recognition that young men especially were choosing not to go to college, a simultaneous and related turn against wokeness, a rapidly developing skepticism about the medical research establishment as a result of the admitted failure of Covid vaccines to prevent the disease as promised and the revelation of the false narratives that were officially promoted about its origins together with the silence of the grant-dependent academy and the intimidation of those who spoke out, the great price inflation and the spectacle of prominent academic economists minimizing what was part of people’s everyday experience, and ongoing crises of governance in universities as presidents resigned, and politicians and donors intervened.

If this were not enough, the events of October 7, 2023, produced an outburst of anti-Zionist and pro-Palestinian demonstrations that quickly veered into anti-Semitic and anti-western directions. The Presidents of three elite universities, called to testify to congress about their response, repeated carefully crafted excuses that were immediately
seen as hypocritical about free speech—defending students calling for genocide at the same time as they enforced elaborate regimes prohibiting misgendering and micro-aggressions, and promoting anti-racism. The scientist President of one major university, Stanford, had been caught up in a scandal involving what amounted to research fraud. The limited scholarship of the recently appointed President of Harvard, Claudine Gay, was scrutinized after her performance at the congressional hearing and numerous instances of what was arguably plagiarism were found.

Much of the scrutiny was in politicized on-line forums which often either seized on them as evidence of fraudulence or attacked the scrutinizers as racists or as inferiors jealous of Harvard excellence; the main results appeared on Substack, and were selectively amplified in the subsequent public discussion. Soon older questions about the dataset some of this research was based on, which she had refused to share, were raised anew. But 700 Harvard faculty supported her in a petition, some probably motivated by the idea that outsiders should have no influence over the university. A smaller number called for her to resign.

The idea of academic freedom was caught up in this crisis. It was publicly challenged, along with the idea of freedom of speech in general, by the crisis produced by the Israeli-Palestinian war, which was seen as a source of harm, but also which produced problems over the key notions of harm, genocide, and hate speech, which now seemed to be selectively applied and in ways that reproduced the political and intellectual divisions that discourse was supposed to cure. This occurred against the background of an effort to delegitimate the west and ‘whiteness’ in the name of anti-racism, decolonization, and resistance to cognitive imperialism, incarceration, and environmental destruction, all
of which were to be laid at the feet of racialized capitalism. The war was a convenient fit for the zero-sum theory of oppression to the effect that every group’s misery was the result of another group’s ‘privilege’ and exploitation.1 This kind of speech was promoted; responses to it were punished. The short-term result of these conflicts was a widespread acceptance of the need to reconsider these core freedoms as harmful and speech in need of more regulation, especially on-line. But there was also a reaction in favor of free speech and academic freedom, and a sense that it had already been deeply compromised. The fact that people had come to self-censor and act out of fear had become obvious, and documented (Clark et al. 2023; Stevens, Jussim, and Honeycutt 2020).

There was much more: the US Supreme Court had just decided, on June 23, 2023, that the scheme of racial preferences that Harvard and the University of North Carolina had relied on were cases of illegal discrimination2, leading to a massive effort to circumvent the ruling and continue the practices under different terms. In science, retractions, conflict of interest issues, and financial misdeeds had become a worldwide epidemic, in part as a result of the metricization of research evaluation and rewards, in part because of the vast system of science funding itself, which produced an artificial competition oriented toward pay-offs rather than intellectual content, and, particularly in the US, great financial rewards for patents and business deals—the perfect example of the neoliberal idea of artificial competition. At the same time, in the humanities and the social sciences, employment in academic life has become more precarious. Tenure, and the freedoms it implied, has become rarer and alternative forms of support were tied to other agendas…

‘Just and sustainable’ is a fundamental desire that needs no rational support or additional justification, any more than any other desire. In practice the bad purposes came to be interpreted in terms of terms of ‘harm.’ The concept of harm became the de facto replacement for a value system. To ask where one got the authority to pronounce something good or bad was itself harmful: it asserted the authority of the harmer over the harmed. But this denial of authority was selective: only the oppressed, or those speaking for them, could say they were harmed…

Needless to say this understanding is never articulated as a coherent theory, which is why Brown uses the notion of desire. Harm is normally invoked by examples. Freedom of speech and protest over harmful speech is a typical case where the issue arises, and typically the value of freedom of speech (and protest) is not directly attacked, but a notion like ‘responsibility’ is invoked and an affective harm is described. An example of this is the exchange between Eddie Glaude, Jr. of Princeton, and Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky. Here the harm is entirely on the level of feelings.

Posted in Academia, Stephen Turner | Comments Off on Max Weber and the Two Universities

Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Randall Schweller wrote in 2010:

ALTHOUGH THE BRITISH EMPIRE according to J. R. Seeley and Winston Churchill was acquired in a fit of absentmindedness, territorial expansion usually advances through a deliberate and collective will to imperial power, through a single-mindedness for expansion shared by both rulers and ruled… History shows that those restless leaders who have not only succumbed to imperial temptations but most zealously pursued their expansionist aims have generally led strong and unified polities, not weak and fragmented ones…

Operating within an anarchic, self-help environment, states must provide for the means of their own security and whatever other desires they develop; they must devise strategies, chart courses, and make decisions about how to meet internal and external exigencies… Realists argue, therefore, that expansion and preventive aggression to gain control over
scarce resources are often the best means of achieving more power and security in an anarchic setting that resembles Hobbes’s state of nature..

Yet there have been relatively few bids for hegemony in recent history. This is especially true in the Third Word, which consists of regions where significant power inequalities exist among neighboring states that should, according to offensive realism, engender opportunistic expansion. Since the end of the Cold War, however, very few Third World states have fought interstate wars, and the vast majority of Third World states have not even confronted significant external threats. As Jeffrey Herbst observes:
“Even in Africa, the continent seemingly destined for war given the colonially-imposed boundaries and weak political authorities, there has not been one involuntary boundary change since the dawn of the independence era in the late 1950s, and very few countries face even the prospect of a conflict with their neighbors. Most of the conflicts in Africa that have occurred were not, as in Europe, wars of conquest that threatened
the existence of other states, but conflicts over lesser issues that were resolved without threatening the existence of another state.”5 Likewise, K. J. Holsti comments: “The search for continental hegemony is rare in the Third World, but was a common feature of European diplomacy under the Habsburg, Louis XIV, Napoleon, Wilhelmine Germany, Hitler, and Soviet Union and, arguably, the United States.”6

Potentially powerful states such as India, South Africa, China, Nigeria, Indonesia, and Brazil have chosen to remain potential regional hegemons rather than actual ones. None has even contemplated much less actively pursued a grand strategy to achieve this exalted status. And so what Gerald Segal claims about contemporary China can be said for all these countries: “China remains a classic case of hope over experience, reminiscent of de Gaulle’s famous comment about Brazil: It has great potential, and always will.”7Why have we seen so few wars of aggression in modern times?

…fascism shared many of realism’s core assumptions about world politics and views about the nature and role of the state. There are two very significant differences between fascism and realism, however: fascists did not believe in the balance of power and they
activated realist principles with a racist ideology that, unfortunately for humankind, succeeded in mobilizing the passions of the multitudes.

…if Germany had not attacked the Soviet Union in 1941, Hitler and Mussolini would have accomplished bold but prudent expansion for their states—expansion consistent with a
realist view of appropriate state interests and behavior because it did not provoke an overwhelmingly powerful counterbalancing coalition.

…a political regime that is able to mobilize and allocate resources to meet its policy commitments, has broad scope over societal activities and social groups, is autonomous from domestic and outside pressure groups, can command compliance from its subjects,
and enjoys the general consent of its citizenry will be less constrained to act in accordance with international systemic incentives than will a political regime that does not have these characteristics.

…Aside from the Mexican-American, Indian-American, and Spanish-American wars, U.S. growth in territory and power was accomplished by the attractiveness of its political system, which proved so seductive that other republics voluntarily relinquished their sovereignty and applied for admission to the American Union.

…Aggressive expansion requires a unified state composed of elites that agree on an ambitious grand strategy, and a stable and effective political regime with broad authority to pursue uncertain and risky foreign policies.

…Realism provides neither a theory of despotic power nor an ideology for whipping up nationalist sentiment to wage large-scale wars. Indeed, there is nothing about the realist creed that would stir the passions of average citizens in support of the state, much less cause them to rise up as one without regard to hardship. Large-scale mobilization campaigns in pursuit of risky and aggressive expansion require a crusade of some kind, which is precisely what realism decries as a basis for foreign policy.39 Realism is, instead, a cynical and largely pessimistic political philosophy about why things remain the same, why wars and conflict will persist, why the struggle for power and prestige among states will endure, and why, in Morgenthau’s words, “man cannot hope to be good but must be content with being not too evil.”40 At its core, realism is a hollow political doctrine, as E. H. Carr asserts: “realism, though logically overwhelming, does not provide us with the springs of action which are necessary even to the pursuit of thought. . . . Consistent realism excludes four things which appear to be essential ingredients of all effective political thinking: a finite goal, an emotional appeal, a right of moral judgment and a ground for action. . . . The necessity, recognized by all politicians, both in domestic and international affairs, for cloaking interests in the guise of moral principles is in itself a symptom of the inadequacy of realism.”

…fascism is offensive realism with a racist and social Darwinist overlay…

Posted in International Relations | Comments Off on Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power

What Is Religion?: Debating the Academic Study of Religion

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Here are some highlights from this 2021 book:

Jews who practice Judaism do not necessarily think they are practicing religion, unless they are part of a larger Western society that defines Judaism as such. Many ultra- Orthodox Jews do not, in my view, see themselves as practicing a “religion,” and perhaps not even “Judaism”; rather they are devoted to a series of beliefs and practices that they believe is the will of the one God who transmitted God’s will to Moses on Mount Sinai. “A” religion would imply other religions. But many devout Jews do not acknowledge
other religions that are in any way comparable to what they do; thus the term “idolatry” has long been a term Jews use to define the “religions” of others, or maybe religion itself. Religion is idolatry; Judaism is truth!

…My father- in- law is a professor emeritus of electoral politics. He does not vote in elections. When asked why, he says he does not want to tamper with the data… There is a story that every year on Passover, J. Z. Smith’s wife, who was an active member of a synagogue in downtown Chicago, would prepare a Passover seder. When the ritual of the seder began (which happens before the meal), Smith would get up from the table and go upstairs to his study. He would remain there until the ritual part of the seder was complete, then he would come downstairs and join everyone for the meal. I do not pretend
to know if and why he did that. But if he acted so, it may not be that different
from my father- in- law’s choice not to vote. Smith was a scholar of religion.

…J.Z. Smith once confessed to me his voracious and promiscuous television- watching habit, which both delighted and scandalized me as a graduate student.

…I have not seen a major textbook, nor scholar, for almost three decades that affirms the old Protestant “belief in God” model of religion, but that’s clearly still the common understanding of the public. Public discussions of religion, from television to the nightly news, revolve around what people believe, and whether they believe in “God,” as well as some code of ethics…

…Religion is whatever people think it is…

Posted in Judaism | Comments Off on What Is Religion?: Debating the Academic Study of Religion

Impulse Control Disorders

Posted on June 1, 2024 by Luke Ford

Here are some highlights from this 2010 book:

Pathological Gambling: Promoting Risk, Provoking Ruin

* Americans spend more money on gambling than on any other form of entertainment (Volberg 2001). From 1995 to 2006, consumer spending on commercial casino gambling almost doubled, from $18 billion to $34 billion. Revenues from casinos, pari-mutuel wagering, lotteries, legal bookmaking, charitable gambling and bingo, Indian reservations, and card rooms experienced similar growth, from $51 billion in 1997 to $94 billion in 2007.

* One hundred years ago, gambling was essentially outlawed in the United States, and it
remained so until 30 years ago, when it was first legalized. By 2007, there were casinos in 32 states, and every state except Hawaii and Utah had some form of legalized gambling.

* A preoccupation with gambling can result in poor job performance, absenteeism, health
problems, job loss, and unemployment. A national study established that problem and
pathological gamblers were more than four times as likely as low-risk gamblers to have
lost a job and more than three times as likely to have been fired within the past year. They were also six times more likely than their low-risk counterparts to collect unemployment.

* Efforts to replace words such as “pathological gambling,” “compulsive gambling,” and
“gambling addiction” with the term “disordered” gambling and the like are intended to
replace language clinically recognized by the American Psychiatric Association or well
established in the literature. Industry also substitutes the word “gaming” for “gambling” in an effort to have the public view their venues purely as entertainment and fun.

Virtual Violence: The Games People Play

* Experimental and correlational studies have reported that playing violent video games is associated with increased levels of physiological arousal, decreased prosocial behaviors, greater hostility, more frequent arguments with teachers and poorer school performance, and more frequent physical fights and aggressive or antisocial behavior…

* A hypothetical analogy may be useful here: how would society treat video games that
portray child abuse (physical or sexual)? Although exposure to such video games would not
necessarily cause one to abuse children, these games would be considered to promote or
condone child abuse, perhaps in a way that child pornography does. As a result, such video games would probably be illegal in most countries, as is child pornography. If exposure to most violent video games also promotes or condones aggression without necessarily causing it, why should these video games be legal and held to a different standard? This is a paradox that is ultimately related to societal attitudes and values. Video games that depict particularly extreme forms of violence such as decapitation and dismemberment or feature violence directed against defenseless women are less socially acceptable and are frequently banned or censored in some countries. However, many modern Western societies consider “ordinary” aggressive behavior to be to some extent socially acceptable and tolerate it, while (at least publicly) showing zero tolerance for aggressive behavior toward children. As a reflection of these societal norms, in the realm of video games, killing an adult might seem more acceptable than hitting a child. This double standard sends conflicting and confusing messages about the type and amount of aggression that is or that could be tolerated by the society.

The Sex Industry: Public Vice, Hidden Victims

* Sanders (2004), in interviews with women working mainly in indoor settings, found
that emotional and psychological distress related primarily to feelings of depersonalization and loss of self-esteem as well as to the fear of discovery by family and intimate partners. The workers identified the practical and emotional difficulties encountered in keeping their working and private lives separate as a greater threat to their well-being than either violence or infection. There seems little doubt that sex trading as an occupation has a propensity to cause psychological distress, although common sense also suggests that the context in terms of the physical setting, levels of violence, drug dependence, coercion from pimps, and pressure from police must have a major impact on the extent to which this occurs.

Sex work is a dangerous business. The constant threat of violence, the consequences of sexually transmitted disease, and the cumulative damage to mental health are all compounded by the effects of heroin, crack cocaine, and other drugs.

Posted in Addiction | Comments Off on Impulse Control Disorders

Harvard Psychologist Steven Pinker Lectures On Rationality At UCLA 2 (5-30-24)

Posted on May 30, 2024 by Luke Ford

Posted in Steven Pinker | Comments Off on Harvard Psychologist Steven Pinker Lectures On Rationality At UCLA 2 (5-30-24)