DISQUS

I am actually a little impressed with the minimal movement by Bush for the second throw. He barely needed to duck to avoid getting hit .. and he barely ducked. No wasted or exaggerated movement at all.

Two things:

http://www.istartedsomething.com/20060915/the-zune-box/

Also, take a look at the video from within your new FOB pages. See if it makes you think differently about the design of your pages.

Yep .. recently I had my first experience of using a credit card at a cash register and not having to sign. I asked and was told that they (this particular store) didn't need the signature if the total was under $25. I have no idea how long this practice has been going on since I don't usually use a credit card for that sort of purchase.

@ TIMM,

I'm not sure if this is what Daniel is getting at or not, so I'll speak only for myself, but it seems to me that the labels that are thrown around in political discussions are often worse than useless. For example, the word "conservative" doesn't mean the same thing to everyone who uses the word. Ditto for the word "liberal." But, the problem is deeper than that. Even if two people can agree on precisely what they mean by these terms, most people aren't going to fit EITHER definition. It makes far more sense to me to do what Daniel is doing here. Rather than defining himself with a quick label, he has written a brief description of his values. Those couple of hundred words are FAR more descriptive than any label could ever be.

It seems that a good preface to a discussion on political perspective is an understanding of where the participants are coming from .. what their core values and beliefs are, and "I'm a conservative" isn't sufficient. In the months leading up to the recent election I was involved in a lengthy e-mail discussion with a group of friends from my undergrad years. There were times that a couple of us asked others to define what they meant by certain words (because it was clear that they weren't using the same definition we were). Though they were slightly offended that we seemed to be accusing them of something, we simply felt that it was important that we understood what people meant when they said things (to avoid misunderstandings). I think that this is what Daniel is attempting to do.

--

As a side note directed at nobody in particular, I find the discussion going on lately about whether the country is center-right or center-left to be silly. While it's clear that most people are NOT at the extremes of the political spectrum (are there really only two extremes?), I don't believe that the terms of center-right and center-left are well defined.

That's quite well written, Daniel. I'd be interested to hear where Tim's values differ. Mine don't quite mesh with those you've stated, but there's quite a lot of overlap (perhaps 90%).

On a similar vein...

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10108609-71.html

Well, rather than write what I was going to write, I'll just save time and say that I agree with Lars. I just don't see how this is even a slight improvement on life as we know it. It's not something I envision myself using, and I can't imagine it being popular for a very wide audience. Yes, as you say, you could turn it off, but why turn it on? On the other hand, technology advances at an incredible pace and there's no way to know what the capabilities will be in 20 years .. or what sorts of things will become such a part of the world that we'll wonder how we ever did without them. The internet itself is one such thing today, but a big difference between the internet as it is generally used today and the future you envision is the lack of privacy and the level of intrusiveness in your future. Those are two HUGE strikes in my book, but perhaps that's just me getting old.

That's meaningless stuff. For one thing, we have NO idea how many people they talked to. The fact that they can confuse a few people on the street doesn't prove anything.

The techniques that were being used by the interviewer were not random .. they're a fairly standard sort of verbal slight of hand. Sadly I'd be willing to bet that you could get similar responses from people favoring EITHER candidate in just about ANY race. In particular, you could have gotten the same sorts of responses from people on both sides of the 2004 election. In that election, it would have been absurd to conclude that the people held their position because of the race of their candidate. Why is it appropriate to make that conclusion THIS time based on the same evidence?

I'm not suggesting that there weren't people who voted for Obama because of his race. I'm suggesting that this clip doesn't imply it.

Some of the Christians will say that the abortion issue outweighs everything else. They may then vote for McCain/Palin in spite of the other things. But, actually, I think that even before Obama entered the race, many Christian groups made a split from the far right .. and decided that Bush's promise of Compassionate Conservatives had fallen short and that compassion needed to get back in the equation somehow. Additionally, many who are anti-abortion recognize that Obama's social policies may help reduce the number of abortions (in part by reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies).

That said, I think that you're right that the rabid McCain/Palin supporters (a group that does NOT include all devoutly religious people) would find it difficult to embrace the teachings of Jesus. I'm not convinced that they'd answer your argument in the way you suggest .. so .. I'd not put words in their mouths. I'd be curious to hear what they had to say.

The latest is that she belittled research on fruit flies as an absurd waste of money while saying that she'd increase funding to help children with special needs. Unfortunately for her, some important discoveries on autism came from .. that's right .. research on fruit flies.

The McCain claim that Obama is Socialist is not entirely about the progressive tax structure. It's the fact that those at the very bottom tier (some of those who pay ZERO taxes under the current plan) will actually get a tax REFUND. To be clear .. if you get a tax refund it's because you've paid too much throughout the year .. so you get the overpayment refunded (but your net tax payment for the year is certainly POSITIVE). The Obama Tax Plan has a Tax Credit which results in some people having a net tax payment that is NEGATIVE. That is, it's not that they pay zero taxes and have all their withholdings (if any) refunded. They get MORE than that amount refunded. So, the IRS takes some of its receipts from the wealthy and gives it to the poor. This is what the McCain campaign was equating to socialism: Refundable Tax Credits.

Unfortunately for McCain, his OWN plans include Refundable Tax Credits. In particular, his health care plan has just such a Tax Credit. The campaign was (dishonestly in my mind) trying to imply that this idea was new to Obama (Tax Credits are not new) and that McCain would never do such a thing.

But, to be fair to McCain .. the argument was NOT (only) about the progressive tax structure.

@Daniel,

I'm not getting anything from the link you provided so I don't know what you're talking about in the granular differences. (Unless you mean the two states that do not have an all or nothing approach to electoral votes. The polls in those states gather information in such a way that calling that granularity is just as possible as calling the likely winner in one of the other states.)

Also, the point is that the popular vote is NOT the important part. We had an election not so long ago in which the winner did NOT get a majority of the popular vote (Gore won the popular vote by 0.5 % and lost the electoral vote by 1%). The way the system is set up, it is the electoral college that is the important part.

@Timm,

You're right about how it is. In ANY state (except Nebraska and Maine) the loser gets nothing .. even if they come VERY close in the popular vote. California is the largest state, but it's not the only state that can swing an election. Ohio and Florida have played pretty big roles in recent elections even with VERY small differences in the popular vote within those states. (Also, California has the LEAST number of electoral votes per person since that number is skewed to small states.)

There are arguments on both sides of the electoral college issue .. and we heard a lot of discussion in 2000 when the popular vote winner didn't win the electoral vote, but (obviously) that discussion died down. (At the time the Republicans weren't clamoring for change.)

Short answer: The winner of the election is selected by electoral votes, so there is (finally) a focus on electoral votes. Statewide polls give us an idea of who will win the popular vote in each state and thus give us an idea of who will win the electoral vote in that state. We use THAT information to predict who will win.

I'm stunned to see this question from you. I've argued for years that the polls that talk about the nationwide popular vote are meaningless and kept saying that what we needed to look at was the electoral college. With the internet becoming a primary news source, it becomes easier to devote the time and space to doing this right.

One issue is that the national polls are too small to give good predictions within individual states -- they don't poll enough people in each state. Any given day will have SOME new state results but not fresh results for ALL states. So, these sites (fivethirtyeight.com is being very careful about methodology) are gathering those state results, and making predictions for each state based on those local polls. Most of the sites draw a line somewhere (above 50% + the margin of error) and say that if a candidate is above that line then they are likely to win that state. They typically draw two lines so they can say "below the first line = tossup, between the lines = leaning, above both lines = likely victor". Fivethirtyeight actually goes a bit further. He takes the polling information (size of the lead, margin of error) and uses statistical analysis to turn it into a likelihood of winning the popular vote in the state (and thus the likelihood of winning the electoral votes from that state). He then runs repeated simulations (I think he runs 10000 simulations each time he updates the polling data - which he does daily). Each simulation looks at each state and "tosses a coin" Heads OBAMA, Tails MCCAIN. Of course the probabilities are not 50-50. They are determined by the polling data. So, for example if polling data shows that there is a statistical tie in a state, then Obama will win (about) half of the simulations for that state and McCain will win the rest. If polling data shows that Obama has a 60% chance of winning a state, then he will win (about) 60% of the simulations for that state and McCain will win the rest. If data shows that McCain has a 100% chance of winning a state, then he'll win all 10000 simulations for that state.

Anyway, he simulates elections in this way for each state and then tallies the electoral votes. He then repeats this 10000 times. In this way he is calculating the likelihood that Obama or McCain will win the election. The numbers in the graphic you included indicate that Obama won an AVERAGE of 354.4 electoral votes in the 10000 simulations he ran most recently. McCain won an AVERAGE of 183.6 electoral votes. Further, Obama won 96.3% of those simulations and McCain won 3.7%.

PS It is quite rare that an electoral college voter doesn't do what they have pledged to do.

PS fivethirtyeight has a FAQ link (upper left of front page). He answers your questions.

Actually, I have no problem with the campaigns decision to spend $150,000 on clothes and make-up if they choose to do so. I would just comment that anyone who doesn't criticize this but DID criticize John Edwards' haircut is a hypocrite.

Daniel, you know who the core experts in this field were in 1994? I see no assertion on the page you linked to that this list represents the core set of experts in the field. It doesn't even assert that they are all experts in intelligence or intelligence testing. (What exactly do they consider a related field? Do we know?) I certainly can't pretend to know the core experts in that field in 1994, but there are certainly more experts in the study of intelligence (and intelligence testing) than those few names that appear on that list. For example (and at the risk of giving them undue publicity) take a look at: http://www.petitionproject.org/
There have been AT LEAST two mass mailings to university professors across the US and Canada (one more than 10 years ago and one last year -- I got the mailing last year) of the article that is referred to on this site. Science and math professors at the school I was at laughed this off (there was a request to sign the petition). They have gotten an impressive NUMBER of people to sign on, but a MUCH larger number chose NOT to sign on. And MANY of the people (perhaps most) (perhaps nearly all .. we don't know) who DID sign on are NOT experts on global warming. Their signing the petition means NOTHING about which side is more correct on the issue. It is also possible that people who signed on in the first mailing (over 10 years ago) have changed their mind since they signed on. In any case, SCIENCE doesn't work by collecting names.

The same things can be said about the list of names at the end of the article to which you linked. It's 14 years old and has a small number of supporters. My recollection from those years is that "The Bell Curve" was pretty widely dismissed by experts, but like you, I'd be delighted to see more recent information.

Well, first of all, the article you cite came out more or less immediately after the book (the same year - 1994). A rather important response to "The Bell Curve" came out in 1995. It's called "The Bell Curve Debate." But this too is (I'm sure) rather dated by now.

Second, the list of people that you find astounding is actually extremely short. You can get a list of scientists THAT long who don't believe in evolution. This doesn't make them right. (In any case, scientific truth isn't measured by the number of people on one side or the other of an issue.)

IQ tests are supposed by some to measure INNATE intelligence. That you can study for an IQ test (and improve your score) seems to me to indicate rather strongly that it measures something else. Given that it doesn't measure innate intelligence, it strikes me as absurd to talk about racial averages (at least in the context in which such averages are typically used).

Cultures that place a higher value on education have higher IQ's. Given that study increases IQ scores, this doesn't seem at all surprising to me .. and CERTAINLY doesn't imply causation in the direction HIGH IQ -> VALUES EDUCATION. There are school principals and teachers who used "The Bell Curve" to justify their lower expectations for minorities. Of course I know that you'll not support that use of this information, but it's been used that way by some (perhaps no longer ... we can only hope).

I'm even more concerned that she'd disqualify someone based on his name.

nice.

Well, let me put it this way. I don't think that the Elvis argument would convince ANY religious person that they've been kidding themselves all these years. They would argue (rightly) that it isn't the same thing at all. As the religious speaker said, he is not making a scientific claim. Elvis is demonstrably dead. Religion is not demonstrably false. That's a pretty big difference. The Elvis argument is ludicrous and there are enough similarities for the juxtaposition to be humorous (thus the laughter), but it doesn't follow that religious speakers argument is ludicrous.

I'm not suggesting that any religion is "The Truth" (certainly they can't ALL be!), but I'm suggesting that the "Elvis lives" argument isn't the argument that proves anything false. The skeptic had a much bigger opening (which I would have been interested in seeing pursued) when the religious speaker talked about religious people living in harmony with things (though he was careful to talk about HIS experience with certain human beings). I think that this would have been a much more interesting discussion point than the simplistic (and easy to shoot holes in) Elvis argument.

Actually, I think that this religious speaker's explanation of his philosophy and experiences are hard to dispute so easily. The skeptic's assertion that the claims were scientific was simply false. (There's a separate philosophical question about what - if anything - constitutes metaphysical truth.) It is true that claiming that Elvis is alive carries with it a certain price, but it is also true that MANY beliefs carry a similar (though likely smaller) price. A belief that all men are created equal is not looked upon favorably in all parts of the world (or even in all parts of the United States). A belief that a candidate's given name ought not disqualify them from public office is not universally held. These are beliefs, but are not subject to scientific scrutiny. We can argue whether or not they ought to be held by enlightened individuals, but it's not a scientific argument. In my mind, religious beliefs fall into exactly the same category.

I don't see the skeptic as winning this argument .. not least because the religious figure laughed along with the Elvis example.

To be clear, I meant the commentary that was part of the video (though I do think that you'd reach more people if you let facts speak for themselves when they need no explanation or pre-assertions).

IMHO, the commentary was unnecessary and self-destructive. The people who will decide the election are those in the middle and they're going to take these examples more seriously if they're not accompanied by what appears to be partisan-based accusations of stupidity. Just let the clips speak for themselves.

@Brooks

I thought that Obama was simply not letting McCain get away with the false accusations that he's been using in his campaign events and ads.

I agree with what Jason wrote .. and I too noticed the strong similarity between what Obama said and your point recently that UNLESS we give negotiation an honest try, then we're not going to have the support of our allies .. and if we do and it doesn't work, then military would be a last resort and other countries would be more likely to support us.

On the Palin subject, even those on the far right are getting nervous. The link below is to an article on the National Review online (a Conservative publication -- in case you weren't already aware).

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MDZiMDhjYTU1NmI5Y2MwZjg2MWNiMWMyYTUxZDkwNTE=

I'm not sure if you've heard this episode of This American Life or not. It does a GREAT job of explaining what led to the housing / mortgage crisis. It's all about a Giant Pool of Money.

http://www.thislife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1242