Category: Uncategorized

Mailvox: dating site science

AA asks about a new study purporting to demonstrate that religion only benefits people where it is a free rider:

What do you think about the newly released study that claims that religious beliefs only make people happier due to cultural factors? According to the new study of almost 200,000 people in 11 European countries, people who are religious have higher self-esteem and better psychological adjustment than the non-religious only in countries where belief in religion is common . In more secular societies, the religious and the non-religious are equally well-off.

“The results suggest that religiosity, albeit a potent force, confers benefits by riding on cultural values,” study researcher Jochen Gebauer of Humboldt University in Berlin and colleagues wrote online Jan. 5 in the journal Psychological Science.

Do you think this study indicates the truth or is there any other valid reasons why religion creates better lifestyles for people in need of purpose?

My initial assumption is that this study is the usual propagandistic garbage put out by pseudoscientists who are dishonestly attempting to bolster their preconceived opinion with a false sheen of science. No doubt it is the sort of quasi-scientific study that purports to “prove” that all conservatives are racist, low IQ child molesters and therefore all decent human beings have no choice but to vote for Nancy Pelosi.

[Stops to read the referenced article about the study.]

Bingo. Here is the money quote:

“Gebauer and colleagues wanted to know if larger cultural forces contribute to the well-being of spiritual sorts. They turned to eDarling, the European version of dating websites like eHarmony or Match.com. Users of eDarling answer a question in their profiles about how important religion is to them; while setting up their profiles, they also complete psychological surveys asking them how “calm,” “cheerful” and “content” they feel, among other measures of happiness, life satisfaction and self-esteem.”

No doubt in their next study, Gebauer and his colleagues will report the astonishing news that contra all the media reports, there is no epidemic of obesity in America as only two percent of the women on eHarmony report themselves to be “overweight”. Not only is the ridicuous study entirely based on a notoriously unreliable form of self-reporting – it’s a DATING SITE, for crying out loud – but it contradicts many studies based upon more concrete metrics for measuring psychological health, such as alcoholism, suicide rates, and prescriptions for drugs used to treat depression.

Here, for example, is a study that uses the objective measure of hypertension as a metric and directly contradicts the conclusions of the eDarling-based study.

“With the help of a large Norwegian longitudinal health study called HUNT, researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) were able to find a clear relationship between time spent in church and lower blood pressure in both women and men.

“We found that the more often HUNT participants went to church, the lower their blood pressure, even when we controlled for a number of other possible explanatory factors,” says Torgeir Sørensen, a PhD candidate from the School of Theology and Religious Psychology Centre at Sykehuset Innlandet (Inland Hospital). “This is the first study of its kind in Scandinavia. Previous research from the United States has shown that there is a possible link between people who attend church and blood pressure.”

In fact, if we are to take dating site science seriously, we can conclude that there are other, more important factors in making people happy. For example, OKCupid relies on the same sort of self-reporting “science” and concludes that women’s self-confidence increases with weight and age.

“Curvy women pass skinny ones in self-confidence at age 29 and never look back. They also consistently have the highest sex drive among the groups.”

So there is the scientific utopia of which so many secularists dream. Obese and godless old women rutting confidently, and often, with each other. Oh sweet Sappho! Do you understand the significance of this? Do you realize what this means? There is now a scientific basis for Lesbian Dorito Night!

The consequences of post-Christianity

One of the things I find so eminently fascinating about atheist evangelicals is the vast gulf between what they say the believe concerning science and evidence and their observable behavior. The hypocrisy they reliably reveal is not only every bit as great as that exhibited by the likes of Jim Bakker, it’s actually far greater because they engage in it much more often than the average shamed televangelist. Ever since Freud, we have been told that religion is injurious to the individual. Ever since Jean Meslier, it has been asserted that religion is deleterious to society. And we are still hearing this despite the fact that all the evidence, documentary, testimonial, and scientific consistently demonstrates that religion is good for the individual and a significant positive for society.

And yet, despite literally hundreds of years of evidence directly contradicting their blind faith in the benefits of irreligion, evangelical and militant atheists are still extolling the promised wonders of their sexy, secular science fiction society. And they are doing so even as its reality begins to take shape around them:

Lying, adultery, drug taking, breaking the speed limit, drink-driving, and handling stolen goods are all seen as more acceptable than they were at the turn of the century, it suggests. Disapproval of so-called “low level dishonesty” has [decreased] irrespective of social class, income level or education, according to research by Essex University. Integrity levels were slightly higher among women than men but the most significant variation was by age with noticeably higher tolerance of dishonesty among the young.

I’m not sure if it is more amazing or amusing that the academics who produced the report, who are most likely advocates of secularism if not outright atheists themselves, fail to connect the observed phenomenon to the obvious. Instead, they cast around for ridiculous explanations. “We think it is because their role models are not very good.”

And why might that be? The idea that a society can simply abandon one of its central foundations with only minor consequences is absurd on its face. Genetic science has amply demonstrated the powerful limits on environmental modifications to human nature. Atheists can continue to produce a panoply of illogical arguments meant to decouple morality from God, but scientific observation, historical analysis, and thousands of years of philosophical exploration clearly demonstrate that this cannot be successfully done.

Winter is waning

Scott Taylor explains why what was bad in A Feast for Crows and A Dance with Dragons is very likely only going to get worse, assuming that George Martin manages to publish another book in A Song of Ice and Fire:

Writers have a window of ‘perfect’ production, and although it’s much more forgiving than the 4 years of an athlete, it still exists. I mean, there’s a reason you know famous works by authors and yet don’t know what they’ve done in the past 20 years of their lives until their obituary is plastered all over the internet.

There comes a time where you need to retire, you need to hang up your cleats, or in this case, your keyboard, and sail into the sunset. It sucks for everyone, sure, and it’s sad to see them go, and yet isn’t it more horrible to pick up an author’s latest work and think ‘wow, what happened?’ Wouldn’t you rather remember them in the light when their words could do no wrong and each sentence was linguistic gold?

I’m going push my argument with some stats and let you be the judge. Inside these stats you’ll see I’ve included a defining award, and I’ve done this because typically an award showcases the very best of an author’s work, thus, that should be the barometer for the high point of a career.

Let me give some examples:

Michael Moorcock [Born 1939]: Definitive series Elric 1965-1979, Nebula Award Behold the Man, 1967. Prime writing years Age 26-40.

Orson Scott Card [Born 1951]: Definitive series Ender 1985 – Ongoing [but can you name a book after Xenocide, 1991?], Nebula Award Ender’s Game, 1985. Prime writing years Age 33-40.

Stephen King [Born 1947]: Definitive series [Fantasy] Gunslinger 1982-Ongoing, Bram Stoker Award Misery 1987. Prime writing years Age 30-50 [ending with The Green Mile].

Piers Anthony [Born 1934]: Definitive series Xanth 1977-Ongoing [I dare you to name all 36 current volumes!], Award Nebula Nomination A Spell for Chameleon, 1978. Prime writing years Age 32-52.

J.R.R. Tolkien [Born 1892]: Definitive series Lord of the Rings 1940+ [written], Published 1954, Award International Fantasy Award 1957. Prime writing years Age 40-57.

Arthur C. Clarke [Born 1917]: Definitive series Odyssey 1968. Hugo Award 1956 ‘The Star’, Prime writing years Age 40-55.

Robert Jordan [Born 1948]: Definitive series Wheel of Time 1990-Ongoing [Jordan died in 2007 at age 58], Locus Award Nominee Lord of Chaos, 1995, Prime writing years 40-50 [before the wheels came off Wheel of Time].

Isaac Asimov [Born 1920]: Definitive series Foundation 1942, Award Nebula The Gods Themselves, 1972, Prime writing years Age 22-65….

This could go on until the cows come home, but the essence of it breaks down to a set of years that ‘most’ great writers produce their best work, which is typically sometime between age 35 and age 55, a very comfortable twenty year window. Yes, yes, all points can be argued, all dates debated, but remember I’m talking as a whole.

The above is an average, but I believe my point is sound, that being that A Game of Thrones was written in Martin’s prime. Martin was born in 1948, so in 1994 he was 46 which pretty much puts him smack dab in the middle of his prime years. You add 17 years to that publishing figure for the release of A Dance of Dragons and all of a sudden you’ve slipped WELL past your golden creative window to the age of 63 [even the great Asimov was just doing novellas at this point in his life].

It’s hard to argue with his conclusions. There are the occasional exceptions, but I remember being simply confused when I read Caesar’s Women by Colleen McCullough, the fourth in her Masters of Rome series. While I enjoyed the first three, the fourth was almost as if it was written by a different writer. I never read Caesar, the fifth book, and while I did pick up a copy of The October Horse – great title, incidentally – it was almost unreadable from the start and I put it down almost immediately. McCullough was born in 1937, Caesar’s Women was published in 1996, three years after Fortune’s Favorites, when she was 59 years old. This suggests that somewhere between the age of 56 and 59, she lost her ups. Or her fastball, if you prefer baseball metaphors. Regardless, it’s quite in keeping with Taylor’s theory.

This is discouraging as a reader of Martin’s work, but I actually find it somewhat encouraging since the first volume in Arts of Dark and Light will be published while I’ve still got another 15 or 20 years left.

Sic semper pusillus

One would have to have a heart of stone to fail to be amused by the death of this little punk:

A 65-year-old man who was knocked off his bicycle by three teenagers on a Pennsylvania trail shot two of them, killing one, police said according to reports. The Reading Eagle newspaper said the wounded teen, 16, was taken to hospital and the third, aged 15, was taken in for questioning and was later committed to a youth center…. According to police, the 65-year-old was riding his bicycle when the teens knocked him to the ground, the station said. Police said two teens then assaulted the man, who drew his gun and shot them.

What a pity that’s not on YouTube. Can you imagine the expression on the face of the dying little prick? One moment, he thinks he’s a happy-slapping bad ass impressing his friends with a little casual assault-and-battery and the very next moment, it’s game over. For good. Way to go, tough guy.

Concealed carry is certainly one of the more effective means of teaching the little bastards to show the elderly at least a modicum of respect.

BF3: the Alleyway

I like to start out as an Engineer in the Grand Bazaar mission map, equipped with mines and an RPG and the Explosive aspect. Since the armor on both sides usually makes a beeline for each other, I run alongside it and throw out all six of my mines, two near the flag and the other four on the road, then see if I can fire an RPG round or two to help the friendly armor blow up the opposition. I sometimes get blown up along with the AFV or shot down by accompanying assault troops, but usually I can get away with an easy initial kill or two, plus a vehicle disabled or destroyed.

If we’re doing okay, which means we have at least one of the two flags, I come back with Recon if we don’t have the Alleyway or Assault if we do. Assault lets me revive my fellow alleyway defenders while Recon lets me pick off the defenders as the young twitch guys go charging into the teeth of the enemy fire. The important lesson as a sniper is to not use a suppressor, as it reduces the damage you deal out while doing little to conceal your position. I increased my average mission kills by a full kill simply by ditching the suppressor.

Once the enemy gives up on the Alleyway, it’s time to switch back to Recon since the young guys are too impatient to sit around defending. This lets me pick off the solo guys who are trying to steal a seemingly undefended flag. If my side doesn’t get overwhelmed at the start, I can usually count on getting 5-7 sniper kills in the Alleyway alone. And it’s amusing when late in the mission, one of the mines set earlier takes out an AFV. The problem is that unless one Assault or Engineer sticks around to guard your sniping, eventually you’re going to miss someone sneaking into close combat range and getting you with an SMG.

Now that I’ve got access to some better equipment, like the optical sights in the tanks, I’ve steadily increased my expected k/d ratio, from around .25 at the start to 1.3+ now. Last night I even had a stellar 4.0 ratio, complete with a top score and Ace Squad ribbon. Now that I’ve got the Javelin, that should help with the helicopter hunting, and I’ve learned to stalk tanks with mines rather than RPGs.

I think my favorite kill thus far was this afternoon, in a close-fought mission that we ended up losing by just two tickets. After taking out a helicopter with my brand-new Javelin, I came back as an Engineer in the Russian deployment, but since there were no tanks I hopped in a jeep and tooled off down the road. I saw an enemy jeep was flying down the highway towards me and we hit each other with glancing blow. We both spun around facing each other about 50 meters away, almost as if we were jousting.

I hopped out of my jeep while he sped towards me, intending to run me over. I’m sure he thought I was going to try to pick him off before he could flatten me, but actually I had pulled out an AT mine. I threw it down and jumped off to the side as he hit it squarely for an instant kill and vehicle destruction. Highly satisfying.

Dawkins doubles down

I know a lot of people found it difficult to believe that Richard Dawkins’s arguments are as haplessly bad as they are. But every time he speaks out, he reveals that he is both dishonest and as reliably inept as I described in TIA:

“If children are taught, however moderately, that faith is a virtue, they are taught that they don’t need evidence to believe something; that they can believe something just because it’s their faith, then that paves the way for the minority to become extremists. If children are taught that they don’t need to defend their beliefs with evidence, then that does pave the way for extremism.”

He believes that atheism will soon become a more popular framework for people. “There seems to be a correlation with education. It’s certainly true within the US — the more educated people are more likely to give up religion. I’m sure that’s true in India as well,” he says, adding that even US presidents may have been atheists but they’re not allowed to say so or they won’t get re-elected. “I think Lincoln, Kennedy, Clinton, Obama may well be an atheist. Obama’s a very intelligent man. He probably is an atheist,” he says. “There are 535 members in the US congress. Presumably some of them are reasonably educated. It’s inconceivable that only one of them is an atheist. There’s got to be at least 50% of them.”

Being a conventionally clueless academic, Dawkins clearly doesn’t realize that the educational systems across the West are barely capable of teaching children how to read or do math. The idea that it is going to teach them to believe in things only based on evidence is absurd. And the stupidity of the idea is underliend by the fact that it is readily apparent that Richard Dawkins doesn’t even know what “evidence” is! This is a massive blunder and proves that he genuinely is as stupid as his inept arguments dissected in TIA make him appear!

One can only wonder about the logic behind Dawkins’s absurd claim that half the U.S. Congress is atheist. Or what is the evidence upon which he bases this belief, since he presents nothing but a naked assertion. As for Obama being an atheist, everyone knows that’s not true. One can quite credibly make the case for him being a Muslim since he is known to have been one as a child; there is no shortage of documentary evidence attesting to his Islamic heritage. Or one could also make the case that he is a Muslim apostate who converted to Christianity, as he himself declared last year. But where is the evidence that Obama is an atheist? Dawkins offers nothing beyond the fact of Obama’s education.

In trying to claim that all of these men who openly and publicly confessed their belief, not only in God, but often in specific religious theologies, are actually atheists, Dawkins is being blatantly dishonest. This is deeply ironic, given his angry response to those historically misinformed Christians who believe that Charles Darwin converted to Christianity on his deathbed.

A man of the people

Or not, as it happens:

On a scale from 0 to 20 points, where 20 signifies full engagement with mainstream American culture and 0 signifies deep cultural isolation within the new upper class bubble, you scored between 0 and 4. In other words, your bubble is so thick you may not even know you’re in one.

In fairness, I haven’t even lived in the United States for more than a decade. But this result illustrates why I always find it tremendously amusing when insufficiently informed critics attempt to lump this blog in with the conventional conservative Red State crowd.

Anyhow, what do you say about lunch in Davos on Friday, Bertrand?

Curie-Hultgreen Syndrome

I know I’ve mentioned this before, but have you ever noticed that female pioneers appear to have an extraordinary facility for offing themselves whilst engaged in their pioneering?

A woman who defied a driving ban on female motorists in Saudi Arabia has died in a car crash. Another was hurt in the crash in the only country in the world where females are banned from getting behind the wheel.

I have absolutely no doubt that the first woman to walk on the Moon would somehow manage to trip and break her neck. Even if her “Moon walk” was staged on the same film stage that was used for the Apollo “landings”. And the first female NFL referee will probably wind up getting crushed to death the first time she tries to sort out a fumble scrum.

I find it fascinating that female pioneers have a higher “suicide” rate than women who are actually trying to commit suicide.

Sweeping it under the table

Obama is still trying to let the big banks get away with the massive quantities of criminal activity in which they engaged during the housing boom and bust:

The Associated Press reports that a proposed deal could be announced within weeks. Five banks—Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citibank and Ally Financial (formerly GMAC)—would pay the federal government $25 billion. About $17 billion would be used to reduce the principal that some struggling homeowners owe, $5 billion more would be used for future federal and state programs and $3 billion would be used to help homeowners refinance at 5.25 percent. Civil immunity would be granted to the banks for any role in foreclosure fraud, and there would be no investigations.

Once more, we see that there is absolutely no law whatsoever in the USA. There is barely even the pretense of it here. And looking at it from a political perspective, one would think the Republicans could easily ride this issue of tremendous bank-related corruption and abuse of the home-owning public to victory in November except for one small problem: both Romney and Gingrich are as wholly-owned by the banks as is Obama.

If only there was a candidate who wasn’t a banker’s puppet. Surely he would be the ideal presidential nominee under these circumstances!

Excursions in Alpha

I suppose I am definitionally obliged to assume that you’re all going to be fascinated by the news that I am reportedly a narcissist.

A more disputable question is whether the quantity inelasticity of female demand is a better way of explaining the inapplicability of the conventional demand curve to the supply of available men or if ALPHA and BETA men should simply be regarded as two fundamentally different markets. Color me extremely dubious about the latter; a Ferrari may be vastly more desirable than a Hyundai, but at the end of the day, they’re still both cars being sold in the automotive market.

And finally, there is a cursory examination of what some have observed to be the phenomenon of divorced mothers with limited custody losing interest in their children, and how fathers facing divorce might be able to feed and take advantage of it in order to raise their children.