Leveraged Intelligence

5 Hour Jimmy Leg Solution

Now, every so often, I get the Jimmy Leg at night and Carol has to kick me out to the couch or go herself.  Do you really think this stuff would help me?

This guy had a great comment on the 5 Hour Energy drink reviews:

normally, by 1:45pm i start to get the heeby-geeby’s, the jimmy leg,cold flashes and profuse sweating, around two, i usually take 2-3 key bumps of decent quality Pablo in rapid succession, this takes care of the temp. extremes, then around three – three thiry, 2 keys of blow with 4 keys bone white smack from Wan of Chinatown. this gets me to the train, the train to my house, then i chase the dragon for the rest of the night. now last week, i swapped my first two keys of blow with 3 bottles of pomegranate 5 hr stuff. works well up to my three thirty speedball(s) Then WHAM! im working circles around anybody near me, i can answer ANY crossword puzzle q’s and at the same time, flip a morgan dollar across my knuckles on my right hand! All this while doing Electrical work in a heavy industrial setting. This stuff turned me into a process control ”GURU”. The nights arent as good as the daytime, but hey> we work for the weekend right? thats another article altogether. Tank you Innovation Ventures, LLC. youve got a customer for life, you can do a study on me, too if you give any of the pomegranate away for study, send it this way!
Read more: http://www.rateitall.com/i-863544-5-hour-energy.aspx#ixzz0xeOoUc2C

Half Truths

Welcome to a new Friday offering for the Loose Blogger Consortium, a wild, thoughtful, rambunctious, creative group of free spirits – all listed in clickable links on the left – who are just a joy to read.  Each Friday, we take a common topic and post on it more or less simultaneously.  Not everyone can post every Friday, but there are going to be some great posts out there to enjoy.

Of course, I want you to read this one first …

Truth is really hard to pin down with a definition.  Look at this from Wikepedia:

Truth can have a variety of meanings, from the state of being the case, being in accord with a particular fact or reality, being in accord with the body of real things, events, actuality, or fidelity to an original or to a standard, truth "behind" everything, the ontological truth. In archaic usage it could be fidelity, constancy or sincerity in action, character, and utterance. Various theories and views of truth continue to be debated among scholars and philosophers. There are differing claims on such questions as what constitutes truth; what things are truthbearers capable of being true or false; how to define and identify truth; the roles that revealed and acquired knowledge play; and whether truth is subjective, relative, objective, or absolute.

These types of definitions of truth itself, we usually leave to Philosophy.  Even though we can’t easily pin truth down and philosophy may seem a bit ethereal to the reader, truth in some sense is essential to almost all of our considerations.  Try to deny what I just said without telling me it is not true!

Truth is very powerful – and the definer of truth holds a mighty tool … or weapon … in her or his hand!  Where there is power, there is temptation.  Where there is temptation, the potential arises for corruption.  However, because of the need for action in the world, we don’t usually define truth philosophically, we usually define it through techniques, institutions and leadership.  Let’s take a look at a few of these.

Religion usually tries to give us unassailable truth, Holy Truth.  Yet, even here not all truths codified as laws are equal and this is why Christ railed against the Pharisees, telling them, "Woe to you teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices — mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law — justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel" (Matthew 23:23,24) 

It is often due to the belief in competing “unassailable” truths that causes so many to lose sight of the camels entering their gullets leading to destruction of their fellow man and their world rather than uplifting anyone or anything to the divine.

Sales and Marketing are the economic siblings of these other methods.  You have a need.  No, listen, you have a need – let me show you.  I  have a solution that fulfills that need.  I’m telling you the truth.

Sales are necessary, for we live in a world of commerce.  As the consumer, it is up to you to be responsible for determining what you actually DO need, not simply what you are being told you need.

Debate tournaments require alternation between arguing one side of an issue then the other as the participants progress through the tournament.  Competing “truths” ultimately lead the participants to realize that in the big picture of the proposition being considered, they are alternating between half truths, that the whole truth obviously contains both sides they argue.  It would be kind of fun were there some way to apply some fuzzy logic to their scores; but, of course, the debate is hardly won simply with logic.

A trial is somewhat the same, with an attorney arguing for a client and avoiding as skillfully as possible arguments that contradict their position.  They are trying to elevate interpretation of provided evidence, testimony being part of that evidence, to the level of truth in the jurors’ minds.  The jurors sit as judges of truth.  The difficulty is, of course, that the wealthier clients have access to more skilled attorneys, giving their half of the truth a whole lot better chance.

This also is the main method of our public presentations by Congress.  They debate on the floor, but most of the time it is not really to convince one another, it is to convince the public to put pressure on the other side.

Observation and Reporting is another approach to truth, the approach supposedly being used as not only part of scientific data gathering, but also by journalists using various media.  As soon as a scientist or a journalist has a vested interest in the outcome, the observation is potentially tainted!  At that point, they may become conscious or unconscious promoters of specific outcomes.  Science best achieves the best outcome with control subjects and double-blind observations where neither observer nor observed can possibly connect the dots at the point of observation.  That is not an approach that can be applied to journalism, obviously, and we rely to a large extent upon the integrity of the journalist.

Commentary is really a journalistic cousin of observation and reporting.  The journalist’s perspective is added quite openly and can be considered as such.  Unfortunately, the compartmentalization of reporting and commentary, the compartmentalization that prevents the contamination of purpose and opinion, is becoming less and less observed as news media compete more and more for money via ratings and advertising on a 24/7 stage!

Charismatic Leadership tends to cast an aura of truth.  Danger Will Robinson!  Quite often we believe not what was said, but WHO said it.  Up to a point, that is necessary, for we haven’t the expertise, resources or time available to observe all evidence firsthand.  All that we can do is keep our eyes and our minds open and watch out for signs of adoration in ourselves that can be blinding and examine all evidence we can garner.  In other words, when it comes to charisma, be as aware of yourself as of the leader!

It is equally damning to reject their presentation simply because they are charismatic.

Propaganda had a brutal master, the Nazi Information Minister, Joseph Goebbels!  Read some of his views of truth and be chilled:

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

“Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play.”

“Intellectual activity is a danger to the building of character”

“Whoever can conquer the street will one day conquer the state, for every form of power politics and any dictatorship-run state has its roots in the street.”

Propaganda did not disappear with the Third Reich!  It still has many adherents although most don’t reach the level of Nazi ruthlessness.  We will all agree that propaganda is still out there in abundance and we even will agree that it sprouts wherever there is power to be gained.  The tough part is that we will disagree about which part is truth and which part propaganda!

Art.  Don’t forget art.  Just because you don’t have words for it doesn’t mean it doesn’t fill out truth.  This is an original artwork, Foxes by Franz Marc (on the left) next to a reproduction of it that Carly did in art class (on the right):

After each student copied the original of their chosen artist, they were asked to do the Mona Lisa in the style of that artist!  Look at the result Carly produced!

That teacher, Tracy Michelson, is magnificent!  TRUE art.

Individual Research and Education is probably the last, best hope.  The conclusion I come to is that truth can only be decided by the individual and I encourage each and every one to stay on top of issues the way only you can.  It is better that we have aware people informing themselves as best they can than that information be squelched or censored.  It is a messy path filled with bumps and potholes, but it sure seems to beat anything else.  The danger is selling yourself on a half truth, not trying to cover all the bases at all and then ignoring new input.  Be sure you can argue the opposing viewpoint(s), even if you only think they are 35% true.  One of the great inoculations against half truths seems to be input from a variety of sources!  It takes courage to discard beliefs in the face of new knowledge, especially if you seem to be alone in doing so.

Don’t always be alone, though.  One of the essential parts of finding truth is what you share with friends and loved ones – even when you are wrong!!

Fuzzy Logic … is a Good Thing!

Say what?!!  Just what kind of lever are we trying to apply to intelligence here???

Fuzzy logic is a recognition that truth is not just polar extremes.  In other words, most truths are not absolutely 100% true in many real world instances, just as falsehoods are not.  The world has shades of color and of gray.  Simple ones and zeros do not map many ideas and systems that we try to formalize.

What do I mean by formalize?  Well, as a programmer, this is the typical truth table that I would deal with:

Let me explain the table.  If I make a proposition, that proposition is either true or false in our example.  So, we have two propositions, P and Q, that we are making.  I know Shackman and Deb personally.  I know their heights approximately and let’s say that I decide that if their height is greater than 5 feet 9 inches (about 175 centimeters) that it is true the person is tall, false if they are of lesser height.  Therefore, my first proposition (P) is that Shackman is tall.  My second proposition (Q) is that Deb is tall.  In this case, P = True and Q = False.

Reading through our table, we notice the first two rows have P = True.  The second row also has Q = False.  Therefore, if I say that Shackman AND Deb are tall, that will be False as we read going to the right under P and Q.  If I say that Shackman OR Deb is tall, that will be True reading to the right under P or Q.

Now, let’s throw Maynard into the mix (have you guys ever noticed that throwing Maynard in always leads to complications??).  I am not sure whether, by our criterion, Maynard is tall or not.  Let’s say he is not tall just to irritate him.  Well it doesn’t matter when we ask whether Deb and Maynard are tall or whether we ask whether Deb or Maynard are tall – it would be false in both cases.

However, it doesn’t tell us very much about their heights, does it?  This is kind of the way people talk, but not quite.  If someone asked me about Deb and Maynard and Shackman’s heights, if I knew their heights a bit more precisely, I might say Deb is about 5’3”, Maynard is about 5’9” and Shackman is about 6’3” or so.

That is infinitely more satisfying and shows us the real world much more accurately, but how do I formalize a truth table for that???  Let’s throw in Deb’s hypothetical grandson, Billy as the shortest person we will consider and Kareem Abdul Jabbar as the tallest.  Well, Fuzzy Logic comes to the rescue when we start setting up truth tables.

Person    Height    degree of tallness
--------------------------------------
Billy     3' 2"     0.00
Deb       5' 3"     0.52
Mayo      5' 9"     0.65
Me        5' 10"    0.67
Shackman  6' 3"     0.77
Kareem    7' 2"     1.00

Notice that we have taken the smallest extreme available and said that = 0.  The largest extreme available = 1.  Everything between is a percentage of that.

How did I get that Mayo was .65?  Well, 7’2” = 86 inches.  3’2” = 38 inches.  The range of heights is 86 – 38 = 48 inches.  Maynard is 5’9” = 69 inches.  69 – 38 = 31 inches which is 31 inches / 48 inches up the range of the scale.  In other words, it is 65% true to say that Mayo is tall in our example, while it is 77% true to say that Shackman is tall.

If I ask whether Shackman AND Mayo are tall, I take the minimum value and say that it is 65% true that Shackman and Mayo are tall.  It is 52% true that Mayo, Shackman and Deb are tall.

If I ask whether Shackman OR Mayo are tall, I take the maximum value and say that it is 77% true that Shackman or Mayo is tall.

If I want to speak to the truth of the idea that Mayo is NOT tall, I say that it is 1 – .65 or 35% true that Mayo is not tall.

This is pretty simplified, but it works.  A more practical example would be determining the truth of the idea that Maynard is tall and old … but setting old on a scale puts ALL of us too close to a truth value of 1!

Editor’s Note: I will be using this as a bit of a reference later in the week! 

Aggressive Ignorance Abounds!

“The truth is incontrovertible, malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end; there it is.”~Winston Churchill

Right you are, Winnie!  Yet, generation after generation, ignorance mounts its attack, ever waiting to attack from the backwoods of fear where thought never penetrates.  Angry, perverse … it attacks.

This is one of the more outrageous modern examples I’ve seen.  The Conservapedia coughed up this misleading piece of work: http://conservapedia.com/Counterexamples_to_Relativity#cite_note-10

To a non-physicist, or to an armchair physicist like me, the arguments seem fairly sophisticated.  However, to a real physicist, it seems less so:

http://physics.about.com/b/2010/08/17/conservativesandeinstein.htm?nl=1

Take this opening salvo and footnote connected to it, bolding added by me:

The theory of relativity is a mathematical system that allows no exceptions. It is heavily promoted by liberals who like its encouragement of relativism and its tendency to mislead people in how they view the world.^[1]

↑ See, e.g., historian Paul Johnson’s book about the 20th century, and the article written by liberal law professor Laurence Tribe as allegedly assisted by Barack Obama. Virtually no one who is taught and believes Relativity continues to read the Bible, a book that outsells New York Times bestsellers by a hundred-fold.

A similar attempt was made by the Nazis to discredit Einstein’s work, unsuccessfully, because he was a Jew.  Now, it appears that he is to be discredited because he supports liberals and is somehow associated with Barack Obama.  I, for one, was taught and believe Relativity, yet I continue to read the Bible.  I am also aware, because of my training in the Theory of Relativity, that it is not really about the relative at all, but rather about the totally irrelative, fixed, spacetime continuum.

These hatchet jobs should not go unnoticed or without objection, not because Einstein or Einstein’s theories are sacrosanct, but because these are not truly attacks on those theories, they are attacks on a cultural and political perspective based upon misinterpretation that is almost wholly intentional.  History is replete with these types of attacks on scientific thought.  Ultimately, they fail as long as people continue to pursue knowledge and do not give in to intimidation.

What does it come down to if you really want control?  You make those who believe a point of view out as anti-Bible, anti-Church, opponents of God.  It is a very old strategy.  Just ask Galileo.

Tears

This is a Friday Loose Blogger Consortium topic brought to us by Grannymar.  Tough subject of which I’m sure many of our bloggers will do it justice and I encourage you to make the rounds by clicking their links on the left side of this form. 

Some are busy with life activities right now, so be patient.  It’s still summer in the Northern Hemisphere.

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It never used to happen to me all that easily – this crying thing – but part of the maturing of a man in our culture is to drop his guard a bit, to allow a more sensitive vulnerability.  It came to me full force in my involvement with the high school choir in which my daughter performed.

It wasn’t so much the scenes with pathos in their musicals even though the kids performed with amazing interpretation for their ages.

No, it was their singing and the marvelous music itself.  It moved – and moves – me in ways hard to explain.  I don’t know how many times I would film their performances and be surreptitiously wiping tears from my eyes.

I’ve become like Pavlov’s dog.  Gather those kids together for a performance now, have them sing, and I’m sure I’d start leaking.

Next Friday, I will be doing another type of filming, for I’ve been asked to film the performance of Masonic Scottish Rite for James’ grandfather’s memorial.  It will also be a military funeral, I believe, but am uncertain.  I hope they don’t play taps.  Taps tears me up … in both meanings of the word. 

Life was easier with young bravado.  It was also less fulfilling, more emotionally impoverished.  Tears are sometimes the price of admission.

Human Response to the Mind Control Attacks

Like so many human responses, it solves nothing – but it makes our followers feel better.

So … Minds Are Being Controlled …

The title seems so obvious as to be ludicrous.  But … what is doing the controlling other than political and religious manipulators, gangs, the media and corporations?

Read the following:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38747237/ns/technology_and_science-science/

You won’t sleep well tonight.

So This Is Why!

I offered to cut Sebastian’s hair in the garage and the relatives wouldn’t let me.  Now I know why … 

Readers Note: This week’s offerings are being tossed in ahead of time, because we are out of town for the week.  However, thieves beware, for my brother-in-law is staying at the house.  And, we have a watchturtle!

Corporate Encouragement of the Good Life!

Media

A Friday Blogger Consortium topic brought to us by Ginger.  It’s a good topic, one that allows a group of creative minds virtually unlimited creative and analytic directions.  Almost like these people were members of the media …

… which, of course, they are.  The Consortium readership may not total in the millions – unless you count Grannymar’s readers – but that doesn’t stop us from opining about a multitude of topics and, since you are reading it, it is information consumed.

Definition of Media by YourDictionary.com: The dictionary defines media as all the means of communication, as newspapers, radio, and TV, that provide the public with news, entertainment, etc., usually along with advertising. Essentially, that means almost anything can be media as long as it is watched.

Actually, that is slightly inaccurate.  The last line should be as long as anyone consumes its information.  The fact that you read what we write and that we enjoy presenting ideas to you is, I think, a very positive thing.  In fact, many of the consumers of the information are purveyors themselves, for many of the blog readers are blog writers.  More than at any earlier time in history, media are interactive, quite often two-way.

Rick Sanchez at CNN has been doing this for a considerable stretch of time, trying to use social media as part of his news input.  He actually follows Twitter during the show, used to have Tweets displayed along the bottom of the screen in a running marquee, and tried to use Skype dialogues as live entries from viewers for awhile (see: http://www.levintel.com/first-live-cnn-chat-streamever/, an experiment that I was involved with).

The difficulty with both is that a new level of responsibility is placed on both sides of the communication that interactivity has created.  If we as viewers are giving live input to the news person, are we now creating news rather than observing it?  If the news person doesn’t react to our opinions, what is the point?  But, if he or she does, is this a tainting of unbiased reporting?  Does the news person have the tendency to want to play to the audience more and forget objectivity at times?

Even as bloggers, how much information do we feed that is misleading, because we have not fully researched what we are saying?  Well, as long as you know this is really an op-ed source and don’t take us too seriously – and from your responses, I don’t think we too much to worry about on that front, LOL – it is pretty harmless and actually good fun.  Some of it even thought provoking.

But, for the professional media … well, it makes me a little nervous.