tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post3170729615125976395..comments2024-03-14T11:09:32.759-05:00Comments on Falkenblog: Charles Murray Reiterates WillpowerEric Falkensteinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07243687157322033496noreply@blogger.comBlogger32125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-21912966042521786132012-02-07T19:32:15.700-06:002012-02-07T19:32:15.700-06:00@ International Evidence wrote: "simple stati...@ International Evidence wrote: "simple statistics from similarly developed Northern European countries put a dampener on his "losing my religion" hypothesis, and also to his "children out of mawwage are baaad" thesis."<br /><br />Can you point me in the direction of those? Thanks!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-82719594735176802352012-02-07T10:27:52.242-06:002012-02-07T10:27:52.242-06:00"Mercury said...
Algerdo: I would say they do..."Mercury said...<br />Algerdo: I would say they do stand on their "<br /><br />The anger is what I was talking about. "Shaming" is remaindered woman talk (no one is angrier than a remaindered woman. Epistemological studies show..). Not coming from a place of strength in any case. Do people with conservative lifestyles need a bogeyman to fill out the picture (Satan, Mexicans, Huffpo, whatever)? Does that tension help keep the structure standing? What happens without it?Algerdidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-7413744436237601812012-02-07T05:25:20.313-06:002012-02-07T05:25:20.313-06:00'epistemological' studies? Spoken like a ...'epistemological' studies? Spoken like a true social scientist.Eric Falkensteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07243687157322033496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-2572316900174542232012-02-06T22:33:55.407-06:002012-02-06T22:33:55.407-06:00Tel: Mind you, most sociologists seem to struggle...Tel: <i> Mind you, most sociologists seem to struggle with statistics *SHRUG*. What can you do? </i><br /><br />Do you have any data to substantiate that claim? Epistemological studies show that social sciences (and specifically sociology) have been tightly linked to quantitative methods since Quetelet and Comte. For example SPSS was one of the first available statistical software package in 1968 and was specifically targeted for social sciences.<br /><br />On the other hand you are certainly struggling with statistics. As every gambler knows you can be wiped out or you can break the bank. Also try thinking about luck events as random walk shocks and you might arrive at a different conclusion...<br /><br />And at the end of the day it is precisely statistics that defeat Eric's fallacious theses: it can easily be verified that the children of hippie college graduates with bourgeois virtues are more likely to have a higher income than the children of poor uneducated willpower-lacking parents.Débilenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-89009092833614892642012-02-06T04:47:48.529-06:002012-02-06T04:47:48.529-06:00...on their abilities, which are highly driven by ...<i>...on their abilities, which are highly driven by bourgeois values.</i><br /><br />Huh? What are you trying to say here? How do you define an 'ability'? Then please explain how you think "abilities" are "highly driven by bourgeois values".ehnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-37330088697373435482012-02-04T05:17:52.214-06:002012-02-04T05:17:52.214-06:00Nice article Eric. Keep up the good work.Nice article Eric. Keep up the good work.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-60317038519963566832012-02-03T18:56:44.849-06:002012-02-03T18:56:44.849-06:00http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/v21/meri...http://www.ncsociology.org/sociationtoday/v21/merit.htm<br /><br /><i>"In The Meritocracy Myth, we do not suggest that “merit” is a myth. Rather, we argue that meritocracy the idea that societal resources are distributed exclusively or primarily on the basis of individual merit is a myth. It is a myth because of the combined effects of non-merit factors such as inheritance, social and cultural advantages, unequal educational opportunity, luck and the changing structure of job opportunities, the decline of self-employment, and discrimination in all of its forms."</i><br /><br />Anon#5, would that be the sort of sociology professor you were thinking of?<br /><br />By the way, I do accept that luck is involved in success, but as any gambler knows, over time luck works equally for you and against you. The fact that outcomes are stochastic does not in any way reduce the importance of good strategy. Mind you, most sociologists seem to struggle with statistics *SHRUG*. What can you do?Telhttp://lnx-bsp.net/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-64792541934164675152012-02-03T10:50:24.231-06:002012-02-03T10:50:24.231-06:00Algerdo: I would say they do stand on their own as...Algerdo: I would say they do stand on their own as a beacon but it is that much harder for the lost and struggling sailors (to continue your analogy) to see them through the fog generated by many of the socio-economic elite - who advocate views and support government actions that de-emphasize the very virtues and “best practices” which they themselves have closely followed in their own lives and which are often largely responsible for their success in the first place.Mercurynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-61730029557073455722012-02-03T10:18:01.067-06:002012-02-03T10:18:01.067-06:00"including the willingness to shame people wh..."including the willingness to shame people who do not have them"<br /><br />If the fruits of your living are so sweet surely they can stand on their own as a beacon.Algerdonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-90616298563311786402012-02-03T08:05:55.123-06:002012-02-03T08:05:55.123-06:00mischaracterize my views into straw men and whack ...<i>mischaracterize my views into straw men and whack them down</i><br /><br />I apologize Eric. Straw men caricatures suck. They're almost as bad as literature professors who hate the nuclear family and preach that hard work is pointless because success in life is 100% due to luck.<br /><br />Seriously, I'm sorry your parents were hippies.Anonymous #5noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-24079592112102853672012-02-02T23:14:13.570-06:002012-02-02T23:14:13.570-06:00"They considered discipline, such as that req..."They considered discipline, such as that required by drilling exercises, to be deeply destructive, and education was simply about figuring out how to release the genius that exists in all of us"<br /><br />There is this best selling book called "The Element" by Ken Robinson precisely about that. Tells people how horrible and outdated school is today, and how it kills the genius in each of us. And goes on to show the examples of many celebrities that found their "element" and did well without or despite school, mostly in arts. <br /><br />For every drop out turned rock star or billionaire entrepreneur, there are probably thousands of others who thought school wasn't good enough for them either, dropped out and did fk all with their lives, and now live on welfare and blame capitalism. None of those guys get interviewed in the best selling book. All you get to see is the Paul McCartneys. And this is a highly recommended book.B. A.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-51577450553696304112012-02-02T22:31:32.491-06:002012-02-02T22:31:32.491-06:00The 'Greatest Generation' built things lik...<i>The 'Greatest Generation' built things like Hoover dam and created a country of unprecedented prosperity and universal education; then, as if to prove that failure is endogenous, raised the greatest generation of naive, self-absorbed whiners in the History of Man.</i><br /><br />Are you serious? What do you make of the unprecedented advances in science (let's just take for example the ones in the medical field)? Or are you just generalizing your predicament?Leonoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-91515803077036330622012-02-02T17:40:27.138-06:002012-02-02T17:40:27.138-06:00'...not that I seem to be making any progress ...'...not that I seem to be making any progress here.'<br /><br />Maybe another approach, say abandoning the boxing the compass of logical fallacies.Patrick R. Sullivannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-91815062258840701302012-02-02T17:14:56.128-06:002012-02-02T17:14:56.128-06:00Eric,
Right on... great blog post.
I believe I...Eric,<br /><br />Right on... great blog post. <br /><br />I believe I have a better perspective on childrearing via my own grandchildren, and it's very clear to me that "traditional" values must be taught, and taught with vigor.<br /><br />Regards,<br />Michael<br /><br />PS- When we have a President that demonizes success we've reached a major low as a society.Michael Meyershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16897177627300304126noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-35215507153242037262012-02-02T15:08:38.188-06:002012-02-02T15:08:38.188-06:00anon #5: It doesn't do you any good to mischar...anon #5: It doesn't do you any good to mischaracterize my views into straw men and whack them down, it won't change my mind, I won't waste time responding to your rambling critique, and doesn't help you understand people like me or our arguments. I suppose you do it to convince yourself you have refuted someone forcefully--with wit and sarcasm like John Stewart!--but fooling yourself to get satisfaction is only detrimental to yourself. Aspire to better things.Eric Falkensteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07243687157322033496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-42779320898819690162012-02-02T14:10:48.089-06:002012-02-02T14:10:48.089-06:00Right, that was pretty incoherent. I mean to say ...Right, that was pretty incoherent. I mean to say that the current level of financial distress has nothing to do with an international housing bubble that made a large number of people on Wall Street very wealthy, and everything to do with too many beatniks and not enough Horatio Alger stories.<br /><br />Oh, and to the extent that the finance sector is responsible for any bit of the current economic slump, it's only because a do-gooder liberal government that tried to help minorities forced them to implement bad policies.<br /><br />Now I'm making perfect sense. The only externalities in life are created when the profit-seeking entertainment industry imposes hippie values on a population too stupid to understand their own interests.Anonymous #5noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-5999216744857823382012-02-02T13:46:20.078-06:002012-02-02T13:46:20.078-06:00Good grief. *sigh*Good grief. *sigh*Mercurynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-65915318969335669982012-02-02T13:22:59.334-06:002012-02-02T13:22:59.334-06:00I mentioned per capita incomes in the 1960s. I be...I mentioned per capita incomes in the 1960s. I believe the median real income also rose by about 30% during that decade.<br /><br />Regarding the credit crisis, our blog host has repeatedly argued that market participants had no way of predicting the housing crash, even as he blames government policies for predictably creating economic disaster. This isn't a matter of drawing a line at some point, this is just doublethink.<br /><br />Speaking of doublethink, I always thought of Hollywood as a creature of raw capitalism whose moral sense is constrained by its bottom line, no more or no less. Isn't capitalism good? If some Hollywood mogul makes millions selling crap to the masses, isn't he simply a hardworking striver who creates jobs? Why do you envy and hate him for his success? If you don't like his movies, why don't you make your own movies and defeat him in the marketplace?<br /><br />Oh right, because we can imagine the people in Hollywood as artsy liberal elites living in expensive Manhattan apartments and drinking fancy wines. As opposed to the good elites (private equity guys or oil executives) who represent all that is noble in America. Because the reason Manhattan apartments are so expensive has nothing to do with Wall Street (good guys) and everything to do with New Yorker intellectuals (bad guys). Oh, and did I mention how liberals love to demonize their opponents?<br /><br />There's just so much obvious circular reasoning... not that I seem to be making any progress here. Eric recently had a post about how you didn't need any evidence to win a discrimination lawsuit. Fascinatingly he needed no evidence to believe this claim. Double standards everywhere.Anonymous #5noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-86832436046840965792012-02-02T12:51:55.515-06:002012-02-02T12:51:55.515-06:00@Anon#5 - At one point the risks associated with e...@Anon#5 - At one point the risks associated with easy credit looked like a reasonable price to pay for getting less successful groups of people over the hump into the more affluent, "stakeholder" category. It also allowed messy cultural issues to be side-stepped since the raw data showed that in past decades at least home ownership=wealth building.<br /><br />Now, not so much but the political Left dominates the group that is still pushing for even more easy consumer/mortgage credit.<br /><br />Most of the better and important aspects of American culture were still very much intact post-Roosevelt (ie. The 1950’s). If this were not the case then California movies and TV wouldn’t mock and savage this era so relentlessly.<br /><br />Also, “per-capita incomes” is the key there. Take a look at the real buying power of middle class incomes and it’s not so pretty.Mercurynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-61197960516683066832012-02-02T12:22:14.834-06:002012-02-02T12:22:14.834-06:00However, the sooner inevitable collapse comes to p...<i>However, the sooner inevitable collapse comes to pass the better since the number of people who still remember what things were like before the culture, government and economic incentive structure deteriorated…is only going to get smaller and smaller.</i><br /><br />How old are you? FDR was elected 80 years ago.<br /><br />OMG IT'S TOO LATE.Anonymous #5noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-69942527295254978542012-02-02T12:08:55.317-06:002012-02-02T12:08:55.317-06:00The fact is that the mercantile class has been loa...<i>The fact is that the mercantile class has been loathed throughout history</i><br /><br />Thank you. "You cannot serve both God and Mammon."<br /><br />I'm fascinated by the fact that Eric thinks that America peaked in the 19th century, and that the 1960s -- a period in which real per capita incomes increased by more than 30% -- were a horrible period of economic decline.<br /><br />History is marked by both egalitarian and non-egalitarian ideals. This allows sloppy thinkers to ascribe all good things to one set of ideals and all bad things to the other while laboring under the illusion that they are observing real patterns in the world.<br /><br />Theoretically a careful thinker could measure ideology and economic growth and quantify the causal impact of one on the other. Such a thinker wouldn't mistake lazy stereotypes for actual insight though.<br /><br />This reminds me a lot of the housing bubble narratives perpetuated here. While the going was good, the bubble was proof of how financial innovation was a great boon to all mankind. When things popped and the economy plunged into recession, suddenly the dirty government intervention in the housing market was so blindingly obvious. That's the convenient thing about living in a mixed economy -- something good happens, credit the rich; something bad happens, blame the government.<br /><br />But this isn't an ideology that is impervious to facts, it's simply hard-headed scientific thinking, sir!Anonymous #5noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-43514493789329781412012-02-02T10:48:42.447-06:002012-02-02T10:48:42.447-06:00The catalyst around the corner is Keynesian induce...The catalyst around the corner is Keynesian induced monetary collapse and the subsequent economic fallout that will follow. We’re in so deep at this point that no political superman can fix our many and massive systemic problems and failures. And as long as the culture/government continues to reinforce all the crap outlined in this post there will be damn little bottom-up pressure for (it hurts to say it)….change. However, the sooner inevitable collapse comes to pass the better since the number of people who still remember what things were like before the culture, government and economic incentive structure deteriorated…is only going to get smaller and smaller.<br /><br />How do we bring about collapse sooner rather than later? Why, vote Obama in 2012 of course. Let’s make inauguration 2013 the last participation trophy ever!<br /><br />Another possible outcome is that technology continues to allow for and support further deterioration, stratification and tribalism in ways similar to those speculated by Neal Stephenson back in 1995: http://www.amazon.com/Diamond-Age-Illustrated-Primer-Spectra/dp/0553380966Mercurynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-36407094976269384262012-02-02T09:09:28.341-06:002012-02-02T09:09:28.341-06:00I think tiffany jewellery is stalking you...I think tiffany jewellery is stalking you...paulnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-56967355481059527192012-02-02T08:35:57.936-06:002012-02-02T08:35:57.936-06:00It is human nature to think, "NOW, we are com...It is human nature to think, "NOW, we are coming to a crisis." The fact is that the mercantile class has been loathed throughout history, and yet it has managed to do pretty well in spite of that. Perpetual hand-wringing about how things are so different and dangerous now gets to be boring after awhile.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7905515.post-84113273026541052802012-02-02T07:22:27.191-06:002012-02-02T07:22:27.191-06:00Consider that at the height of America's growt...<i>Consider that at the height of America's growth, the most popular form of fiction lionized were Horatio Alger stories, which lionized initiative and material prosperity.</i><br /><br />What sort of fiction was popular at the height of America's critical thinking?Anonymous #5noreply@blogger.com