Maggie's Farm

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.

Our Recent Essays Behind the Front Page

Much Sorry with Delays
Birth, Death and All That Stuff in Between
How to Honor Labor Day, Every Day
My Yom Kippur Miracle (Repost from 2010)
Good intro to fly casting
Peach update, with pie
NYC update
Easy for you to say: To the elites on mass immigration
For NYC on 9/11, Sailors' Snug Harbor
Pickled Peaches
Water Shoes
Labor Costs in U.S.
Your "identity"
Good news about The Great Courses
Uses of Hot Pepper Jelly/Sauce, Chutneys, and Jams
A Saturday Drive to Litchfield County, CT
How to Pick a Kayak
Civilized: Fruit forks and knives
Loads of kayaking on Cape Cod
Psychology Experiments' Questionable Results

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Friday, November 28. 2014

Friday morning links

"Speaking as a person who went and got a degree in creative writing for some fool reason..."


Is Atheism a Specifically Western Phenomenon? Peter Berger - We know atheism in its Jewish or
Christian context, as a rejection of the Biblical God. What would
atheism mean in a Muslim, or Hindu, or Buddhist context?


The Great Thanksgiving Hoax


How do you know someone is a vegetarian? Don’t worry, they’ll tell you within 30 seconds of meeting them


Early-bird shoppers turn out on Thanksgiving


The Long War Between Highbrow and Lowbrow


Shakespeare is pop culture. So is Verdi


Meet the New Warm Fuzzy Payday Lenders


A Feminist Look at Men


A bunch of great greenie quotes - here's one:



 "In Nature organic growth proceeds according to a Master Plan, a Blueprint. Such a ‘master plan’ is missing from the process of growth and development of the world system. Now is the time to draw up a master plan for sustainable growth and world development based on global allocation of all resources and a new global economic system. Ten or twenty years form today it will probably be too late."
- Club of Rome, Mankind at the Turning Point



SCOTUS tackles free speech vs. true threats in Facebook posts



How immigration killed the tax deal - GOP didn't want to aid new class of immigrants; Obama balked.


Obama Offers $3,000 Bonus to Hire Amnestied Illegals Rather Than Americans


Obama to Amnesty Hecklers: 'Sit Down... Nobody's Removing You... I Just Took an Action to Change the Law'


Obama’s Immigration Plan Misses Chance to Increase  A Crucial Group of Visas


Samuelson:  America's Giant Welfare State


Plans for UCLA visit give rare glimpse into Hillary Clinton’s paid speaking career


A cake shop we recommend


The media doesn’t want to avoid another Ferguson.


University Bureaucrat Won’t Let Ferguson Crisis Go to Waste in Trying to Look Busy



 Students can call Counseling and Psychological Services at 993-2380 and speak to a counselor.



Good grief


Most Balanced And Fair-Minded Comment on Ferguson Comes From NFL Player


‘HANDS UP, DON’T SHOOT’ WAS A LIE: Testimony, Evidence Suggests Textbook Self-Defense Shooting


How Far Down Do You Define Deviancy in Ferguson?


Where's the Coverage? Israeli Arabs Prefer Israel to Palestinian Authority

Posted by Bird Dog in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 04:57 | Comments (6) | Trackback (1)

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In Nature organic growth proceeds according to a Master Plan.... Bull. Natural growth proceeds consistent with the forces that impinge upon it, including dozers and chainsaws. There are tons of hard, factual evidence supporting that statement. There is no such evidence supporting the Master Plan assertion. Only religious or quasi-religious (e.g. environmentalist) faith.
#1 BillH on 2014-11-28 11:01 (Reply)
Julia Child said being a vegetarian gives you an excuse to be a picky eater.
#2 shirley on 2014-11-28 12:26 (Reply)
Ah, the Club of Rome. I remember it well. It was the Age of Aquarius but apocalypse loomed dark in the future. Paul Ehrlich, winner of the Nobel Prize for Being Wrong About Everything, told us so.

As a newly-minted FORTRAN programmer with an interest in numeric modeling, I read Limits to Growth cover to cover, including the appendices. It was gloomy, especially the appendix where they talked about playing with the models in order to find some scenario with a survivable outcome. This was rather suspicious - no matter how the inputs were changed, the output was still the same. A couple conclusions rise to the surface: either Humanity was truly and utterly boned, OR there was something wrong with the models.

In hindsight, we know it was all numerical hippy-nonsense. Models are not the territory. Models can help check your understanding of a process. Good models are useful for prediction and playing "What If?", but they are not evidence of anything. By the way, how's that Global Warming thing working out?
#3 SteveS on 2014-11-28 17:45 (Reply)
One gets much more attention proclaiming "We're All Gonna DIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEE if we don't do XZY Immediately!"
#3.1 Sam L. on 2014-11-30 18:43 (Reply)
"What would atheism mean in a Muslim ... context?"

Murder or execution, depending on whether the discoverers of that status decided to take care of the matter themselves or refer you to the machinery of the State.
#4 RonF on 2014-11-28 17:58 (Reply)
In my humble opinion the basic claims of the club of Rome are true. Over 7 billion people on earth and the population increase is excellerating. The large numbers of humans and the large population centers increase the probability of a pandemic of biblical proportions. The probability of a major famine increase with population growth as well. The list of potential problems made worse by an ever increasing population is quite long. I think the mistake that the club of Rome makes is that they believe that they can do something to mitigate this. Let me say that I do agree that there are things the human race could do to make life better for everyone, but understand that most of those things are contrary to our self-interest and history shows that in the end we always choose to not do those kinds of things. Best case is that one group does do the right things to prepare for worst case scenarios and when those worst case scenarios occur some stronger group simply takes what they want from prepared group.
#5 GoneWithTheWind on 2014-11-28 22:42 (Reply)

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