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In Brave New World, Aldous Huxley described a progressive utopia in which everyone is happy because everyone is engineered to fit the environment. One feature of that environment is the doctrine that "Everyone belongs to every one else." Promiscuity is required as the norm, since families and parents are seen as causes of strife. In the interest of stability in society, the babies are made by the state and conditioned for their future roles. Free love is the norm to prevent individual attachments (like mother and son or husband and wife) which lead to jealousy and possessiveness and strife and struggle.
Would humans thrive in such freedom? Or would they crave more permanent relationships, which must perforce exclude others?
Prince Says He Will Stop Using Dirty Words in His Music
May 6, 2014 8:44 AM
http://radio.com/2014/05/06/prince-says-he-will-stop-using-dirty-words-in-his-music/
Funny how language works! Take this one, for instance:
Dern
Of persons, proceeding in secret or in the dark; kept concealed; hence of evil or deceitful nature. Of persons, secret in purpose or action; reserved; hence, underhanded. sly, crafty. Of a person, treated as a confidant; entrusted with hidden matters. Of places, serving well to conceal, as lying out of the way.
Sir James Murray, New English Dictionary, 1897
Dern
Of persons, proceeding in secret or in the dark; kept concealed; hence of evil or deceitful nature. Of persons, secret in purpose or action; reserved; hence, underhanded. sly, crafty. Of a person, treated as a confidant; entrusted with hidden matters. Of places, serving well to conceal, as lying out of the way.
It always seems to come down to ends justifying means. If you sincerely believe that the earth is in danger, a little exaggeration in the cause of nudging folks in the correct direction makes utilitarian sense. It is bound to be worrying, though, that one might be following in the footsteps of other great manipulators of public opinion: Stalin, Hitler on the devil's side or Churchill and Roosevelt on the other. What do you think? Is this approach justified? If so, where do we draw the lines and when can we legitimately deceive?
Information Manipulation and Climate Agreements
+ Author Affiliations
- Fuhai Hong is an assistant professor in the Division of Economics, Nanyang Technological University. Xiaojian Zhao is an assistant professor in the Department of Economics, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
- Correspondence may be sent to: fhhong@ntu.edu.sg.
-
The authors thank Larry Karp, Madhu Khanna, Jinhua Zhao, two anonymous referees, and participants in the Conference on Global Environmental Challenges: the Role of China for their helpful comments.
Abstract
It appears that news media and some pro-environmental organizations have the tendency to accentuate or even exaggerate the damage caused by climate change. This article provides a rationale for this tendency by using a modified International Environmental Agreement (IEA) model with asymmetric information. We find that the information manipulation has an instrumental value, as it ex post induces more countries to participate in an IEA, which will eventually enhance global welfare. From the ex ante perspective, however, the impact that manipulating information has on the level of participation in an IEA and on welfare is ambiguous.
Key words
- Asymmetric information
- climate change
- information transmission
- international environmental agreements
JEL codes
- © The Author (2014). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com
Many, many geese. More than I remember and camped longer. Fighting amongst themselves. Who rules this flock? How is it organized? Why did it decided to pluck itself down here just now, for the first time in memory?
From my Ipod.
After we came out of the church, we stood talking for some time together of Bishop Berkeley’s ingenious sophistry to prove the nonexistence of matter, and that every thing in the universe is merely ideal. I observed, that though we are satisfied his doctrine is not true, it is impossible to refute it. I never shall forget the alacrity with which Johnson answered, striking his foot with mighty force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it — “I refute it thus.”
from James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson
Read by me.
Miracles 0-21
Miracles 15-22
Miracles 23-25
THE WORD ON HARRY REID: “If he were a conservative Republican, and not a liberal Democrat, he would be almost universally known as a McCarthyite.”
In 2012, Reid said the following on the Senate floor, about Mitt Romney: “So the word’s out that he hasn’t paid any taxes for ten years. Let him prove that he has paid taxes, because he hasn’t.” The word’s out — and you know about “the word.” To reporters from his home state of Nevada, Reid said, “I don’t think the burden should be on me. The burden should be on him. He’s the one I’ve alleged has not paid any taxes.” Bear in mind, this is the majority leader of the U.S. Senate speaking, not a comedian, not a right-wing satirist.
The other day, Reid was tearing into the Koch brothers, backers of causes Reid does not like. He said these guys were “about as un-American as anyone that I can imagine.” Wasn’t Tailgunner Joe supposed to have rendered such language verboten? Have the rules changed?
There are many damning things about today’s Democrats, in my view. None is more damning than that Harry Reid is their choice to lead them in the Senate.
Indeed. Say, how did he become so rich, after a lifetime spent in “public service?”
Posted at 6:03 pm by Glenn Reynolds 