We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
These people are playing with fire. It is political, but probably enabled by ignorance. The countless crazy fantasies of youth can be sort-of interesting to some, but adults are supposed to be the ones with intact reality-testing. Grown-ups with decent reality-testing are the only buffers against the really hard and dangerous realities of life.
Peterson, for one thing, has a knack for framing large topics. That is a job of a teacher (or a preacher). He offers the listener a big frame, a map, in which to fill in the details. That is something which is difficult to do on one's own without expertise.
In my career as a student, I had a couple of History teachers and profs who never set the frame: Battle of Thermopylae? What, when why, how, and why should I care? Plenty of reasons to be interested, but it wasn't told so it was disembodied information.
Peterson's hypomanic lectures teach Psychology, Anthropology, Politics, Religion, Mythology, History - they are interdisciplinary explosions. It's all from the tragic, fierce, fact-facing view of the world.
With things around now like The Great Courses, and Peterson, for examples, any curious person in the world can get a high-level university education if they want it. Cliche though it is, a formal education is just a door to further learning for those who want it.
We'll continue to post Peterson's explosions, and to urge our readers to try out some of The Great Courses as alternatives to TV.
In this piece, he focuses on IQ as a limiting factor in pursuing goals, but makes the more important point that personality factors are likely more important in life choices and career success. Unfortunately, he ignores certain factors, like passion and interest but this is just a short segment.
Fact: 50% of Americans have below average IQs, so it's not too hard for Watters to find these people. Both political parties compete hard for their votes.
Photo is a large Gneiss ledge, a remnant of the great snow-capped mountain range which ran through New England in the distant past
Mrs. BD and I are in hiking mode now, especially with the cool Spring weather. (We have only been mostly casual or urban hikers in the past, but we're getting more serious now to the point of a visit to the big sale at REI for waterproof hiking gear.) We picked a steep, deep woodsy 5-miler on Saturday as a warm-up.
In New England, deep woods means relatively mature hardwood with a high canopy. Occasional Hemlock groves. Not very much understory. Whether that is due to deer or just the nature of things I don't know. I do know the Indians hated the understory, and often burned it out. Mature hardwood forest doesn't host a lot of wildlife except streamside. There are some warblers and other things up in the canopy which you can hear but not see without hassle. When there is a powerline cut, suddenly there are lots of birds. Edges, streams, and marshes are where most of the life is.
Birds seen or heard in the deep woods: Wood Pewee, Ovenbird (lots of them), Robin (yes, Robins are woodland thrushes), Wood Thrush, Veery, Rose-Breasted Grosbeak, Scarlet Tanager, Prairie Warbler, Flicker, Downy Woodpecker.
RURAL AMERICA IS THE NEW ‘INNER CITY’. It's difficult to maintain the vision of pastoral innocent wholesomeness. Non-tourist rural areas are rapidly becoming creepy. There is no fix for this evolution.
The Trump backlash was a slap in the face to most, utterly unexpected because they simply don’t even acknowledge that a world exists outside of their gated communities, the suburban soccer moms and Whole Foods customers have no clue that they just destroyed the entire coal industry or put people out of work as they hurry to Pilates. Given that ignorance, Trump was a political asteroid impact, the most unlikely and devastating thing many of them had ever seen as he crashed into their world. The anger from them is one of class, the upending of their perceived social status by someone so beneath them as to not even warrant an opinion. It is difficult to put this concept into words if you have not experienced those social circles, the level of outrage would be akin to a janitor walking into an Exxon Mobile board meeting and overruling the entire table of executives.
The anger is palpable within the Beltway and it’s coastal fiefdoms, which is understandable. The idea that someone who shakes parmesan from a can contravened the wishes of those who can taste the difference between serrano and iberico Jamón is simply unacceptable...
Donald Trump has been given a great gift in that his gaffes are seen by most Americans in the context of an obsessed and unhinged Democratic-media nexus. He is pitted against a new fusion party of media elites and aging political functionaries, who all believe that America should operate on their norms, the norms of Washington, New York, Hollywood, and Malibu — all places that symbolize, to most Americans, exactly how the country has gone wrong.
The Crossfit Games are like the Olympics of general fitness. Contestants have to be generalists, not specialists. Each year, they vary the events. For example, for 2017 there will be no barbells, just sandbags instead. It's a race, too. Speed, endurance, strength, power. Pure Sparta.
Seems like a wild and crazy event. Some highlights from 2016 -
I have to admire the outstanding fitness of these guys and gals. Crossfit is actually mainly for ordinary people. Those are the pros. These sorts of events always remind me of the Upper Class Twit of the Year Tournament. Everybody wants to excel at something
4:12 Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that is taking place among you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.
4:13 But rejoice insofar as you are sharing Christ's sufferings, so that you may also be glad and shout for joy when his glory is revealed.
4:14 If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the spirit of glory, which is the Spirit of God, is resting on you.
5:6 Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you in due time.
5:7 Cast all your anxiety on him, because he cares for you.
5:8 Discipline yourselves, keep alert. Like a roaring lion your adversary the devil prowls around, looking for someone to devour.
5:9 Resist him, steadfast in your faith, for you know that your brothers and sisters in all the world are undergoing the same kinds of suffering.
5:10 And after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, support, strengthen, and establish you.
A decade ago, in a moment of excessive candor, Watson referred to the (statistically true) lower average IQ of black Americans. He probably had some bad experiences, but there is no shortage of less intelligent white people in the world either. Half of white Americans have below average IQs and many of them sport college degrees.
Anyway, the warnings are out there. You can be blackballed in academia, and in life, so keep your disappointing experiences with race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, etc. to yourself and to your friends like everybody does. Lie if you have to. Thus experience and facts are driven underground.
Jordan Peterson, in one of his Youtubes, said "The alternative to free speech is tyranny." In Watson's case, as in Charles Murray's case, the consequence of free speech is being blackballed which is a sort of extra-legal social tyranny with financial consequences. Watson would be a very wealthy man if not for his indiscretion.
Fast is, there are plenty enough intelligent, energetic, and competent people out there of all colors and ethnicities. Statistics do not apply to individuals or to the task at hand, but only at the macro level.
My ethnicity is dumber, statistically, than Ashkenazi Jews and East Asians. I can see that, experientially, in my life. My competitive self is disappointed, but I am ok with it now. IQ is not the most important factor in success or life happiness anyway: it's just one of several limiting factors in high-complexity work. I know my limits.
In fact, I think I have seen more people with average IQs achieve their life dreams than I have high IQ people. It's just in different areas of endeavor. Depending on the area, any of these can be life- limiting factors: IQ, social skills and social graces, solid judgement, stick-to-it-iveness, stress tolerance, self-discipline, energy and drive, integrity and loyalty, articulateness, curiosity, dutifulness - and more. IQ, like height, is a life factor which can't be improved by effort.
A friend tried to email an iPhone pic of the Barred Owl snoozing on a branch right off his deck, but the photo didn't come through. Regardless, this is my favorite local owl.
While we usually think of the Barred Owl as a species of the lowlands, and the Great Horned as the similar nighttime predator of the uplands (mice and rabbits get no rest in this world), the Barred can be a regular forest bird. A couple of weeks ago, I heard one every early morning in Georgia in the piney woodland.
We have had a pair nesting in a thick Hemlock grove on a rocky hillside above a flood plain at the Farm for many years. They use an old crow or hawk nest, not a nest hole.
The thing with owls is that it is great fun to see them, but even more fun and weird to hear them. If you are listing birds, hearing is as good as seeing.
Speaking of owls, no pair of Screech Owls have chosen my $45 Screech Owl nest box, and I am disappointed because it is perfectly situated. And at the same time I have seen them use Wood Duck boxes on tiny islands in the middle of ponds, which seems stupid and almost guaranteed to drown the chicks.
Crazy thing about Barred Owl: The experts want to kill thousands of them in the Pacific Northwest because they are "competing" with Spotted Owl. That is how some environmentalists think: Destroy the village to save it. It's like they want to kill immigrants with a slightly different color. Fact is, the Spotted is a west coast variant of the Barred. They interbreed, thus different races, same species.
I am all in favor of trying to destroy invasive species which threaten a stable, precious ecosystem (eg Burmese Python in Everglades, or Australian Pine in Florida and the Bahamas. "Invasive" usually means introduced by man, not critters and plants moving on their own.
I can think of one bird species that moved to North America: The Cattle Egret, blown over to the New World by hurricanes from Africa. They found their niche and fit right in.
Some man-introduced plants never become invasive in the sense of dominating an existing ecosystem. I am thinking of things like the Norway Maple which shades many urban streets, the Norway Spruce, - and the apple. Nobody complains about the occasional wild apple "escape" growing in a brushy forest edge. Some new species dominate, some just fit in unobtrusively and harmlessly.
Killing a Barred Owl is a sin unless you intend to dine on it.
The more matters we push down to the state level, the less Red America and Blue America will have to quarrel about. And given how nasty our quarrels currently are, this seems like it would come as a welcome relief for almost everyone.
Tenure in higher ed is gradually being squeezed out by academic administrative greed. Ironically, however lefty academia is, money is their motivation. Like any other business, they want the best product at the lowest cost. Non-for-profit is no different from business, since administrators took over the thing.
Tenure will only endure where it is least justifiable; in unionized government schools: The End Of Teacher Tenure?
Tenure, I suppose, used to be a substitute for high salary, but that no longer applies. Guaranteed job plus high salary plus great benefits no longer exists in the real world. Outside government jobs, that is. Why is that?
Maybe the southern Indigo Snake can sometimes look like a black snake.
They are all wonderful, large critters and all can climb, but the Racers less so. They tend not to be wanderers, with home ranges of only around 30 acres so they know their way around. Naturally, they prefer rodent-rich home ranges, but they will always raid bird nests for eggs or babies in the Spring.
The Black Rat Snakes seem to prefer a mixed habitat with woodland edges, fields, plenty of brambles, and a pond, stream, or marsh.
Is that a frightening photo? Only if you identify with the baby birds instead of with the hungry snake. Or is it strangely sexual? Why are gals so often afraid of snakes while guys find them interesting?
Learning
It Was ‘No Picnic,’ but All Nine Bond Brothers Signed Up for World War II.
At Zero Hedge, 
A friend tried to email an iPhone pic of the Barred Owl snoozing on a branch right off his deck, but the photo didn't come through. Regardless, this is my favorite local owl.
Need a stuffed ostrich? Get
There are several black-colored snakes in the US. Notably, the