Can Rihanna “Save” Chis Brown? Should she?

I think we all know people who are in love with someone who has a damaged psyche.  Should they try to help the people they love?  Setting aside for a moment the fact that since they love these damaged psyches they will be compelled almost certainly to try.  The question I’m getting at is whether it might actually be kind of dumb to make the effort.

I don’t have a deeply thought out theory or anything on this one.  I’m just “wondering out loud” so to speak.  Take Rihanna as an example.  So she’s famous, wealthy, successful in her career, and based on the media portrayal anyway has the world at her feet.  She managed to fall in love with Chris Brown who it turns out has an anger management issue and/or abuse in his background that leads him to a place where he is willing to beat the crap out of her.  Now, I’m not saying I don’t get it that relationships can be frustrating and none more so than a romantic one.  Maybe Rihanna is even a psycho in her own right.  Smacking a woman around just doesn’t make sense though.  It is like beating up a kid… there just isn’t any need.  There’s no threat there.

Back to the point.  ”Why is she wasting her time on this guy?” we could ask.  Part of that perception is how easy it would appear to be for her to find another suitably famous and good-looking boyfriend out in the media world.  Isn’t the same question relevant for everyone though?  Sure, we’re not picking from media darlings but odds are that a friend of yours who is trying to save their drug-addicted girlfriend, abusive boyfriend, suicidal pal, etc. could relatively easily find another person of comparable social station to fill the role.  I’ve got this theory that it is out of a weird sense of ego.  It isn’t that the love is so deep for these people.  It is that we don’t want to live with ourselves after “giving up on” them or “abandoning” them.

It seems like people hold this fear that if they don’t save the person in question then no one will.  That might even be true.  Well, what are the odds of success in the save attempt?  It would appear that the odds aren’t very good at all.  Sure, Chris might stop smacking women around someday.  It will probably take him working his way through several though.  It might even require advancing age to tone down his youthful male aggression somewhat too.  Can Rihanna actually make a difference?  I doubt it.  His mother maybe can.  Rihanna can’t.  In fact she probably makes it worse since his mind has already painted a big target on her head.

It’s actually probably selfish of her (or YOU) to try and save this damaged individual in your life.  Offended by my selfish assertion?  How much of your energy will it consume?  How much of your time?  What are the odds of success?  Why are you really doing it?  I think you’re doing it so you won’t feel guilty.  Well, that time and energy you are throwing away to easy your own guilt could be much better spent spread across all the other people in your life and yourself.  In fact, strengthening yourself and increasing your ability to give to those you care about who actually DO benefit from it and putting your energy into projects which contribute to the world ought to be the highest priority.

Are you ripping yourself off as well as everyone else you know just so YOU won’t have to deal with admitting that someone is probably a lost cause or at the very least not truly your responsibility?  That is selfish.  So, here’s my advice for Rihanna even though she won’t follow it and my advice to all those people trying to save someone out there.  Stop being so selfish and get back to doing the truly important stuff of living and moving forward with those around you who are ready.  Leave the lost souls and broken minds to the clergy and professional counselors who actually know what they are doing.  If your target isn’t willing to go to a professional than you are truly wasting your time anyway.

Do People Actually Get WORSE At Life?

So I was recently playing poker at Commerce Casino with a friend of mine from Seattle.  As we watched people come and go it became pretty clear that there are a very large number of older people playing who are really grumpy, rude, and unhappy.  While I’m sure the location had something to do with it, I’ve noticed the same thing elsewhere.  Driving down the freeway, sitting in a restaurant, going to a movie, etc.  It seems as though the youth of our society are generally the happiest members with a steady decline in numbers of happy people the older we get.  His observations of the people in the Pacific Northwest weren’t any better.

Being that way in progressing years seems to be the opposite of how I feel about my own life.  In general, I’m pretty convinced that I’m constantly learning and improving my ability to interact with other people, be successful in the relationships I value, and in general I’m just getting better all the time.  (At least psychologically… physical measures are a bit less forgiving.)  The evidence all around me would seem to indicate that what I’m convinced of isn’t true.  It looks to me that if I measure success as being happy, I’m actually getting worse at it than better!  Now, there are a lot of other ways to measure success certainly but it seems fair to say that if I’m “better” at living and managing my life that I should be happier as a result.  I should have better, stronger relationships with less conflict.  I should be more efficient and better at knowing what I like and what I don’t.  I should be getting better at living my life in line with my talents and away from my weaknesses.

Don’t get me wrong…. I’m a happy guy!  In general I think I have the opposite mental illness of depressed folks.  I feel good even if there isn’t any particular reason to.  A random blue sky or something will make me smile.  That stated, when I remember the last time I laughed until I cried it’s been a while.  And the time before that was also “a while”.  I think that those rounds of hysterical laughter are getting farther apart.  Maybe that is natural as we mellow out but…  I don’t really want them to be so far apart!  So what is the deal?  Do we have to be so serious?

On a related note, in my mind I’m getting more clever all the time about how to manage my time, motivation, goals, and all that stuff.  However, if I look at  my real-world performance, the facts don’t really bear it out.  I’m pretty much the same guy I always was!  Where did all those valuable little life-lessons go?  Why is it still hard for me to go exercise somedays?  Shouldn’t I have caught on to the REALLY clear cause/effect implications of the decisions I make around fitness since I’ve had all these extra opportunities to see what happens?  I mean, between myself and friends I’ve gotten to see all kinds of improvement and decline at various times.  No mystery how it works!  Why doesn’t that make it easy to do what I know is the best?

So a long string of questions.  When I look around at society it seems like despite our feelings that we are getting better all the time, it looks like the opposite is the case.  We let ourselves go physically, we manage to ruin perfectly good relationships with other people, we stagnate at jobs and fail to pursue our dreams, etc.  What’s the deal?  Now, there are certainly exceptions to the overall trend and I aspire to be one of them.  Apsiring to be one of them and actually doing it are two different things entirely.  The full aisles at book stores of self-help tomes are a testament to that.

So what is the deal?  Are we actually getting worse at living while feeling the whole time like we are getting better?  I don’t really get it…

Republicans Should Be Glad They Lost

Oddly the people who should be the most excited about the loss by John McCain and Palin in the presidential race are the Republicans!  Here’s why…

Go back to the mid 1990’s when Bill Clinton was president.  At the time, things in the US were in general improving economically, the Soviet Union had just collapsed, democracy was spreading further around the world than ever before, and there were warm fuzzies all-around for the most part.  All of which was great news unless you happened to be a Republican politician or strategist.  (For regular Republican citizens, the above was all good news.)  How could the Republican party hope to wrest governmental control away under these kinds of circumstance?  (Essentially the opposite of what made it nearly impossible for a Republican candidate to win this time around.)

Well, they came up with an idea.  They would “make a deal with the devil”.  They sold their souls to the religious right in exchange for a significant block of voters who would vote as instructed.  And it worked!  Alas, it was like taking a loan from the mob to start a business.  Just because the business is open and you thought you paid off the debt, you still have a very, very bad business partner.

In the old days, the Republican party stood for several different things.  For example, government should be as small as possible in order to do its job and not attempt to manage the lives of citizens.  Financial policy should be geared toward long-term growth and strength instead of short-term reactions and fixes.  The power of government should be carefully limited and guarded against.  (Thus the original support of the right to bear arms.  It wasn’t hunting!)  Hard work should be rewarded.  And, of course, generally conservative attitudes toward social issues such as sex before marriage, etc.

After the deal with the religious right though, the Republican party didn’t stand for most of these things any more.  Just the last one.  In the minds of its party members it still stood for all of the ideals, but in actual fact and governing behavior it didn’t.  The religious right had obtained too much power and over-ruled attempts by the party to do anything that didn’t focus on social conservatism and the right’s particular brand of foreign policy driven by religious dogma.  Economic conservatism was reversed.  Massive spending ensued.  Libertarian-style ideas about the government not being involved in the personal lives of citizens went out the window.  Now it was time for the government to save the people from themselves and push them back toward the right’s version of morality.

With the other voices within the Republican leadership weakened and largely ignored, bills like the Patriot Act were passed.  Huge steps away from the core beliefs of the party were made.  (And, in my opinion, huge mistakes that will be hard to undo.)  Even the opposition to socialism faded.  Huge distributions were made from industries that made money to those that didn’t.  Subsidies of all kinds multiplied.

Many Republicans still hold on to the original ideals of the party.  And that is good.  The current loss in every phase of government should be strong enough to dislodge the hold the religious right has had on party leadership.  A “new” direction will be sought by the party and that direction is very likely to be a return to its roots.  The things that made it a successful party in the first place.

Just to show how far the party has strayed from where it started consider that Abraham Lincoln was the first president for the Republicans.  Lincoln was a hard-core abolitionist who believed deeply that all people should have equal rights regardless of race, religion, beliefs, etc.  It even appears likely that Lincoln was a gay man.  It’s a little unsettling to think that many of today’s Republicans would NOT vote for Lincoln if he magically was running again.

So, this loss is an opportunity for the Republicans to get their party back from the extreme right that has exerted so much influence over the last 15 years.  If McCain had won, the party might have slid so far to the right that it would never be able to recover from the extremely negative stigma it has been acquiring.  Remember, the Republican party came into existence due to the death of the Whig party.  It IS possible for major political parties to become so damaged they can’t function anymore.  Even as it stands now, much of the country and the world sees a pretty terrible person when they hear the word “Republican”.  The Republicans have a lot of work to do to rebuild their brand image.  They are lucky they lost this election.  It isn’t too late for them yet to recover and once again be a viable contributor to our nation.

Gay Marriage

I’m in California and one of the items being voted on in addition to the presidency on November 4th is an amendment to the constitution of the state to say that gay couples can’t get married.  The reason for the push is because a state court ruled that there wasn’t anything in the constitution forbidding it, therefore it was illegal to discriminate the right to marriage based on sexual orientation.

There appears to be more ads for this issue than for the presidential hopefuls in the state!

So I’ve been thinking about gay marriage.  And I’m confused.  Maybe you can help me out.  Quite frankly I don’t understand either side.  Or more accurately, it is difficult for me to figure out why anyone cares very much either way.

The first side I don’t get is on the gay side.  If civic partnerships and the like have the same rights in a legal sense, why the fixation on the term “marriage”?  Is it that the rights aren’t actually the same?  If they are, then who cares whether you get a title?  Of course, comedians have come out with lots of jokes along the lines that “gay people should have the right to be as miserable as the rest of us” but seriously, marriage is hardly the utopian dream it is described as!  Why fight so hard for what appears to be just a semantic thing?

I don’t get the other side either.  Two of the main points for the anti team is that there is a need to defend the sanctity of marriage and to protect families.  Huh?  The term sanctity makes me think of a religious meaning to marriage.  Many religious believers appear convinced that a marriage with a member of the clergy present is what makes god get involved to join two souls for all eternity.  I don’t really see god being bound by the California state constitution so if god doesn’t agree with a particular marriage, I would think it isn’t very complicated to just not do his part and ignore the whole thing.  Seems odd to me that anyone would be worried about defending the spiritual or mystical side of the thing since that is god’s territory and certainly he can do whatever he wants.  (Or she, or budda, allah, vishnu, or whatever version you happen to believe in.)

I don’t understand the protect families part either.  Protect them how and from what?  If two lesbians or gay guys get married I don’t really see a connection to any other family.  Families appear to need some sort of protecting considering how many of them split apart every year but I don’t see what gay marriage has to do with it.  I mean, even if the law went the other direction in the name of fairness and said no one can be married, I wouldn’t throw my wife out of the house!  I just can’t figure out a connection.  I did see a little blurb warning with alarm that teachers in school would have to change the curriculum to teach that marriage could be between any two adults.  Why is that a bad thing?  (Or a good thing?)  It is pretty clear to me that young kids generally adopt the views of their parents and when they get older the views of music videos and pop culture.  School seems to be ignored for the most part!  I don’t know about you, but I don’t think it would have affected me at all if that was how things were when I was growing up.

So anyway, I don’t get either side.  Why does the gay community care so much?  In the end, it seems to me that it doesn’t hurt anybody else if a gay couple can sign a marriage certificate and get the legal benefits and penalties of marriage like straight people, and since they seem to really want to be able to do that, I can’t really think of any reason why they shouldn’t be able to.  It isn’t going to change my marriage at all.  Would it change yours?  I’m pretty sure god can handle any cosmic ramifications to the roommate situation in heaven…

If you understand this better than I do please enlighten me.  It all looks like a bunch of noise when there are things like war, poverty, disease, etc. to worry about instead.

Could We Put Our Brain In A Computer?

As humanity progresses in our ability to understand biology and computing, we will probably get to the point where we are able to read brain data.  I’m not sure how much harder it will be to write information to a brain but I suppose it is probably only a matter of time before we figure that out too.  How much bigger of a step would it be to transfer a human brain entirely to a computer?

I’ve been chewing on that lately and I think it is actually a huge leap which may not be possible.  At least not in the sense of retaining a recognizable personality.  The reason I’ve been thinking along these lines mostly has to do with biology and not information.

Recently, I spoke with someone who as a result of medication had been affected dramatically in terms of their emotional moods.  That got me thinking about how much chemistry affects our moods and viewpoints.  Certainly the hormone cycle of women is famous but men certainly have their own version.  The way we see the world, react to information, and even our capacity to focus is affected.  Beyond that, think of the environmental factors that affect us.  I’m a little different on a gray cloudy day than a sunny bright one.  Or when I’m hungry.  Or right before (or after) a little nookie.

So if I put my brain in a computer, all that biologically related stuff would disappear.  All that would be left would be (I think) pure processing power without the variations created by life.  (Assuming of course that emotions could be copied for the most part.  If not then we are even further from being ourselves.)  Anyway, for some people that might be an improvement if they are the type that continually self-destructs every couple of months due to psychological weaknesses but for the rest of us, I think we would lose a real part of who we are.

“Personality” is such a hard thing to define.  It encompasses so many different areas.  That stated, we’re really pretty sensitive to it in people around us.  If someone is just a little off we can quickly tell and ask them about it.  I have to imagine the transition into a computer would be a bigger change than anything we do naturally.

All that stated, I’m not sure I could turn down the chance to have my brain stuck in a computer.  If I was given the chance to “be” a submarine, airplane, or spaceship how could I say no?  Especially given that once I was digitized in theory I could be copied and do all three at the same time.  I wonder if I could combine multiple sets of experience later into one mind?  I suppose there isn’t any reason my biological brain would have to be destroyed to make a copy for a computer.  What if I could live my life normally but send a version of my mind off on a totally different mechanical adventure and then plug the memories into my original mind?

Pretty weird to think about.  I think “The Matrix” might not have been that far off…  Though it seems pretty unnecessary to stick a metal rod into our heads.  I’ll be curious to see how these kinds of things progress over my lifetime.  Right now we are pretty rudimentary.  About all we can do at this point is control a computer mouse with electrodes in a brain.  We can’t even bolt on a calculator yet so there is a long way to go!

Maybe we’ll end up with psychological vacations like in “Total Recall”.  So many possibilities…  Just thought of a weird one.  What if you could stick your consciousness into a robot body temporarily and then get it back later.  Could I email my brain to a robot shell in Thailand and spend the day scuba diving and then email it back in time to go out with friends in the evening and tell them about my “trip”?  Would there be a whole industry of “body rentals” like we rent cars on vacation?

I think I’ve gone on long enough…  It’s a strange world we’re headed toward!

Impressed by McCain and Team

You know, I have to give McCain and his team credit.  For them to have made the race appear to be close for this long is a testament to their ability to impact voters and use the media.  Really, really impressive work.  At this point it is looking like Obama has won.  It would require a major gaff or skeleton in Obama’s closet to turn the tide and if Hillary’s people couldn’t find anything during the much longer primary I doubt McCain’s will either.

Let’s take a look back in time… When the presidential race was getting going, Republicans had gotten crushed in congressional races nationally, were blamed for a war nobody liked, and were sitting on a tanking economy that most people blamed them for.  The confidence of the US population in government was (is?) at an all-time low.  Into that steps McCain who has been a senator for decades and is firmly entrenched as a Washington insider despite the “maverick” marketing efforts.  In theory, he didn’t stand a chance.  Perhaps in reality as well.  So against that backdrop, how incredible is it that he and his team were able to work against all of that and make it look close for this long?

Certainly the media helps.  Even in sports the media finds a way to make it seem like the worst team has a shot against the best because it sells so much better.  I’m sure that played a role here too…  Even with that though the McCain team really shined.  Maybe they even have a trick or two left…

One of the things that they have consistently done well is to find a way to make some news.  For a while there they were out of the limelight and all the attention was on Obama.  In response to that, they did anything they could think of to keep John’s name in the media.  They said crazy stuff, they named a total head-scratcher as VP, they did the “suspend the campaign” gimmick…  and it all worked!  They clearly have a good read on the US media and population in general.  While they won’t win the election with it, they will be much closer than they would have been if they had tried to “stick to the issues”.  They didn’t stand a chance given the hole they were in there…  So they tried this.

It’s probably not a good sign for the country that this kind of strategy was effective because it means we’ll see more of it.  Probably from the Democrats in 4 years when the nation is busy blaming them for what is likely to be a slow economic recovery or further decline.

I’m not sure how a democracy is supposed to work when it comes to elections.  I mean, I get it that people vote, etc. but it is tricky isn’t it?  Especially in a country where the voter turnout hovers in the low 50% range.  What is to keep Oprah from winning or some other popular but utterly unqualified person from winning?  I suppose that is why we have parties and the electoral college system and all that.  On the other hand the party system and electoral college plan contribute to lower turnout.  If you are in NY why bother voting?  Obama will win that state.  If you are in Texas, same thing.  McCain has it and that is that.  Your vote literally doesn’t matter.  “But what if everyone thought that way?”.  They won’t.  With the electoral college, as long as 50.01% of a state votes for a particular candidate it is the same as if 100% did.  That’s why your vote doesn’t matter.  Now a person in a swing state… different story.  They might actually have the vote that makes it 50.00001% one way or the other…

Anybody see how to make this better?

 

Thoughtfan

Moral Hazzard, Bailouts, and Us

Some quick math…  The population of the United States is 301,139,947.  Well, at least that was the estimate in July of 2007.  So, if you happen to be a US taxpayer and are reading this, congratulations!

Your share of the $85 billion bailout to AIG: $282.26

Your share of the proposed $700 billion aid plan for banks: $2324.50

I’m not saying I think those two things are a bad idea.  (Or a good one.)  We are confidently assured that failure to act would lead to catastrophe which may, or may not, be true.  We have a problem though.  Economists call it “moral hazzard” and what it means is these kinds of bailouts in the past and again in the present get factored into the decision-making of companies and increase the likelihood we’ll need them again.  It’s no different than being a little more careful if your car insurance has expired.  Major corporations in some sectors believe they have a form of insurance that will bail them out if thing get too bad.  No guarantees…  Lehman tried hard to get bailed out.  The thing is, they THOUGHT they would and acted accordingly.  No one plans to fail.  No one plans to have a car accident.  However, when you know you will shoulder the repurcussions alone, it makes a difference.  You are more cautious.

So, it has been argued that free markets have gotten us into this mess and we need more government regulations to avoid a repetition.  That is partly true.  The other part is that government involvement also makes these things more likely.  I’m not saying I know the answer.  I’m just saying that we have a pendulum that swings between a little and a lot of regulation and it keeps changing directions at either end because we decide that one or the other is to blame for the latest catastrophe.

I don’t know how much my share will be for the idiot down the street who lied on his mortgage application to get a loan for a house he KNEW he couldn’t afford but hoped would go up.  He also KNEW that bankrupcy would only last for a few years before his financial life was back in order so it was worth the risk.  So, the 300K that dissappeared in the house value that he’ll never even be asked to repay will be paid by… us.  Not even the bank that gave him the loan.  Nice…

In light of how things are playing out both the buyer and the mortgage lender turn out to have acted logically.  That does not bode well for the future…

The Bizarre Dichotomy of Female Self-Esteem

This post is probably not going to make me many friends but this topic has been on my mind lately.  I’m not sure how to organize my thoughts on this one so I’m just going to jump right in and start.

Most of the women that I know have an overly negative view of their own physical attractiveness.  The sociological causes for this have been pretty well documented and tend to blame magazines and media for setting impossible to achieve standards.  I think a less-mentioned cause is that many women spend a lot of energy trying to hide their weak points and highlight their strengths.  (Which, I might add, is perfectly logical.)  The downside to that approach is that they feel a bit like a fraud even when being complemented on how good they look.  It’s like their dirty little secret that they aren’t nearly as hot as they seem.  If you are female and reading this, rest assured you are beautiful.  Even if just by averages.  Roughly half the planet is male which puts all women in the top 50% just due to body hair issues.  Anyway, I kind of get the low self-esteem part of female psychology and I think women do too and we all sort of look at it as a sad tragedy of our modern lifestyle.

So here’s the other side of the dichotomy.  While the majority of women seem relatively certain that they are less attractive than they really are physically, I find that most of them (and their friends) over-estimate how attractive they are as relationship partners.  That’s really the part I’ve been thinking about.  For all the talk of how superficial we men are, women, despite thinking they are physically not so great, are sure that we superficial guys would be lucky to have them.  Clearly there is something odd going on.

I think it comes down to supply and demand.  Dating economics.  Speaking in generalities, a given person can get a date and/or sex partner at will in the US.  The question is the quality of that date.  That is what makes it tricky.  A bar scene, while admittedly pathetic in nearly every regard, makes a good proxy for the discussion as it pertains to society as a whole.  So take a bar.  Sports bar, high-class lounge, or geriatric bridge club… it doesn’t really matter.  It is essentially safe to assume that a significantly higher percentage of the guys are willing to sleep with a woman in the bar that same night than women with the same mindset.  In addition it has been readily proven that the average male has less stringent criteria than the average female in this regard.  The net result, is that when it comes to a one-night-stand or even random flirtation scenario, women generally can go up-market compared to their true position among rivals and guys tend to have to go down-market.  It isn’t surprising for an average girl to temporarily land an above-average guy but it doesn’t go the other direction nearly as often.

The result of this dynamic is that women over-estimate the quality of mate that they actually line up with in greater society.  They question all these dates that don’t lead to relationships.  Only “losers” want to get more involved with them not the “great” guys they can only get a couple dates with.  Mystery solved ladies.  Those guys are out of your league in real terms.  Why does it always seem like you are more into the relationship than your boyfriends?  You probably are.  Odds are you are working to hold on to a relationship that shouldn’t really exist and your partner knows intuitively that they are getting the bad end of the bargain.  It’s not nice but there it is.

It’s like everyone has a social score between 1 and 100.  Depending on the situation you can get a temporary bump to your score but in the end, the scores really need to line up for things to work long-term.  When women wander into a bar they get a 10 point or so bonus while men drop by the same.  A French guy who finds himself in the US gets a 10 point bump while an American guy in Japan gets a bump there.   A blonde female in India is like +30.  Now, certainly there is room for personal taste and preferences, etc. but unless your tastes are really peculiar, there are a bunch of competitors who like the same things you do and the dynamics work out similarly. 

There is one final thought that does make things a bit more difficult.  The above all applies from a supply/demand perspective.  There is a problem though.  I don’t think the scales are actually the same.  It is like women go from 0 to 100.  While men go from -10 to 90.  I honestly think women are a bit better wired to function as a couple than men are.  So in a way, that perception that women should be able to land a better guy than they have in the past is right.  Except that the rest of the women are in the market too.  Sadly 100 could very likely equal 90.  A 50 woman probably “deserves” a 50 man but unfortunately he can get a 60 woman so she is left with a 40.  If all the women demanded only men that match up, the top 10% would be perpetually single and they aren’t going to settle for that.

I’m sure we can all come up with examples that run counter to his argument but I believe it is a case of the “exception that proves the rule”.  The reason that exceptions stick out is because they run counter to the overall trend.  It’s a cruel twist of fate.  Blame it on biological prerogatives or god’s twisted sense of humor depending on your metaphysical taste.

Oh, and one last note that is kind of random…

While I’m at it, I have something to get off my chest for both men and women though more typically its women saying this sort of thing.  Don’t imagine that “having so much love to give” makes you a catch.  It doesn’t.  It makes you human.  It just qualifies you to enter into a relationship in the first place.  I’m sure your love is very precious but so is everyone else’s so shut up about it already!  You don’t score points for not being a robot!  In fact your arrogant belief that your capacity to love is larger than “normal” people is a sure sign that you are neurotic and self-centered.  You get -5 points for that…

Thought For Global-Warming Skeptics

I’ve bumped into a few people who are convinced that global warming is not caused by human activities.  I don’t seem to meet anyone who doesn’t think global warming isn’t happening, just those who debate its cause.  So I’ve been thinking about that.  I think in order to be honest I have to admit that some of the arguments presented for why global warming is not caused by human activity seem pretty strong.  (I haven’t fact-checked most of the claims though so it could be total BS that sounds good.)  On the other hand the arguments for why global warming is caused by us are also very strong.  Strong to the point that the vast majority of scientists who work in the field and produce work which is actually reviewed and fact-checked have come to the conclusion that we are, in fact, the cause.  (Or at the very least making it worse.)

So here is my thought for the skeptics.  Let’s say for the sake of argument that the evidence you have for global warming being a natural process is solid.  The evidence on the other side of the debate is also solid.  Given the risk, wouldn’t prudent caution argue that we should curtail our potentially harmful activities until we are absolutely sure that they aren’t a problem?  While increased costs for energy will certainly cost lives in developing countries, the potential impact of climate change is far greater.  Even if I wasn’t sure whether my high cholesteral was caused by genetics or diet, I would still improve my diet.

Actually that isn’t a bad analogy.  In general, a healthy diet brings with it an array of benefits in addition to hopefully improving a person’s cholesterol level.  There are a wide array of damaging environmental impacts which stem from the use of fossil fuels in addition to the alleged climate change.  Most are air quality related as smog, etc. but coal mining operations as well as oil drilling have their own issues.  The geo-political issues are well documented at least as far as oil is concerned.  So, if the changes required to reduce our emmissions based on the global-warming argument would have positive benefits even if they some day were proven to not play a role in climate change, isn’t it still better for almost everyone?

Maybe I am missing something important in the argument for holding the view that human activity is not contributing to the changing climate.  What is the big gain for humanity in deciding that the status quo doesn’t affect the climate and that current changes are natural?  Is it just to be right as a contrarian?

I don’t get it…  I just can’t see how erring on the side of caution and changing our behavior could be considered a mistake.

What Does it Mean to do “Good” Through Business?

I’ve been chewing on the title question a lot lately.  I’m not sure what the answer is.  Like many people my immediate image is of some sort of environmentally correct business working to help fight poverty or some other such noble cause.  Perhaps that is clearly good.  (I suppose it depends on how successful the company is.)

What about the owner of a Subway franchise?  They certainly help people by feeding them healthy food instead of typical fast food.  On the other hand, given the success of Subway, if that particular owner had not purchased and opened a location, some other person almost certainly would have within the same market.  Subway doesn’t have much trouble selling franchises.  So does that owner do “good”?  I’m not sure.  If the world would be in the same place without you, what have you done?

Another example is a dentist.  They spend all day helping people.  Inherently “good” right?  Well, if that particular dentist wasn’t working, patients would simply go to the one across the street.  So, while the profession is clearly necessary, any particular dentist isn’t necessarily doing “good”.  They are breaking even in a way since they don’t bring anything to the table beyond any other dentist.  And does necessary mean good?  Trash collectors are necessary.  Does that mean they do good by doing their jobs?  Probably.  What about divorce attorneys?  They are necessary for society as we know it so… good?  Used car salespeople?  Meter maids?  It starts getting tricky.  Necessary=good?  I’m not so sure we get automatic credit like that.  What about a person working in a land-mine factory?  Or simply a bullet manufacturer?  Good?  Bullets are important for the police, military, hunters, and anyone who would like to be able to shoot someone else.  They ARE necessary but does it make producing them good?

I’ve kind of got this theory percolating in my head but I haven’t thought it through all the way.  What if “doing good” can only be done in 2 ways?  The first is by creating a new product, process, or knowledge that once created is added to the sum total of humankind’s understanding of the world or ability to live in it and thereby the entire species is lifted.  The second would be through doing something that others also do but using more of the proceeds or the relationships involved to positively affect lives more than the an average owner would.  So, for example, our Subway owner doesn’t actually do good until that owner develops their employees more than other Subway owners.  (Or does something above and beyond what other Subway owners do.)  If it is the same as any other person who opened the same place, no good is done.  It is just breaking even.

This concept makes sense to me in general but quickly gets confusing.  Let’s say a rough block in a city buys $20,000 a month in heroin from drug dealers.  Imagine dealer A and dealer B run neighboring blocks and standard dealer practice is to retain all earnings.  If dealer B uses $1000 per month to buy food for the poorest in the community, they are doing good by my previous logic.  Another dealer who took over their position would quickly stop spending that money so the presence of that person is making a positive difference that wouldn’t otherwise exist.  If dealer B chooses not to be a drug dealer and instead opens a Subway franchise and follows standard Subway business practices, he essentially just did a bad thing.  He went from a position of positive contribution to a neutral.  He lost ground.

I’m not certain I belive the preceding paragraph to be true, but it sort of shows where the logic leads if followed to strange places.  Somewhere in here there is a valid point.  My thinking gets particularly confused around cash flows that are going to exist no matter what.  The revenue per block in heroin is a good example.  I don’t know the real numbers but let’s say it is 20K per month per dealer.  If a given dealer quits or not doesn’t change anything.  20K is off to dealers somewhere.  It can go to the dealer who does something good or not but it will go.  Can there be a good drug dealer?  Or are they all bad by definition?  If so, how do I reconcile the fact that a dentist can contribute nothing that wouldn’t have existed without them and be considered good but a dealer who gives out $1000 a month in groceries that wouldn’t have been given out is considered bad?  Brazil has some real trouble with this kind of issue and dealers in Favelas.

Perhaps it is a moot point to think about this at all.  It got on my mind though…