Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Mad Scientists
http://www.city-journal.org/html/eon2007-07-11lh.html ^ | Lee Harris

Posted on 07/11/2007 9:41:55 PM PDT by ventanax5

This Enlightenment model, which has worked quite effectively in Europe and the United States, as well as in other parts of the world, has always relied on an advanced elite that brings learning to the masses through universal secular education. Many have hoped that Muslim nations would adopt the same model, with the same results. A minority of Muslim technocrats, who had received Western-style scientific educations, would help lead the Middle East into the modern era. They, too, would be eager to transcend their own narrow cultural perspectives, and to join other like-minded men and women across the globe.

But if Westernized technocrats like the Glasgow terrorists and the London bombers can enthusiastically embrace radical Islam, what group is left that can bring about the modernization of the Middle East?

(Excerpt) Read more at city-journal.org ...


TOPICS: Editorial; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: islam; jihad; leeharris; science

1 posted on 07/11/2007 9:41:57 PM PDT by ventanax5
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: ventanax5
I suppose I will be playing devil's advocate here, but consider that in America we not only have doctors whom kill people, that's their profession and we pay them to do it.

Why should a medical degree magically transform the Muzzies into life-loving pacifists?

2 posted on 07/11/2007 10:08:01 PM PDT by explodingspleen
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: explodingspleen

I understand your devil’s advocate position. I have no problem with a Jewish or Catholic or Baptist doctor. I understand those religious viewpoints, and they are completely consistent with medical care and the sanctity of human life.

I have read some parts of the koran (note the intentional lower case). I intend on reading all of it and the commentaries related thereto.

So far what I have found is that the tradition is to convert through the sword or otherwise subjugate. There is no question/answer/question search for the truth tradition. In Islam Mohammed has explained everything.

A “devil’s advocate” I understand originated in the canonical tradition of the Catholic Church. The Jewish religion has its long tradition of seeking knowledge through questioning and observation. There is a respect for the truth. And, in Jewish history, there is Miamonides.

To answer your point: if you have no faith higher than science (those few in the US who paricipate in assisted suicide), or your faith is one that claims it knows all (Islam) then your practice of medicine will follow in accord with those beliefs.


3 posted on 07/11/2007 11:14:52 PM PDT by bajabaja
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

“This Enlightenment model, which has worked quite effectively in Europe and the United States...”

With the number of Americans polled saying they don’t believe in evolution, I’d say the Enlightenment has not even reached, much less worked, in the United States.


4 posted on 07/12/2007 12:19:34 PM PDT by gcruse (Let's strike Iran while it's hot.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: gcruse

With the number of Americans polled saying they don’t believe in evolution, I’d say the Enlightenment has not even reached, much less worked, in the United States.

Enlightenment?! Where?

The anthropic global warming issue is, in reality, that there is no significant anthropic global warming effect. It's a non-problem.

The real problem is that it's a fabricated problem. An illusion of a problem. A boogieman. Complete with false guilt hopefully being embedded in people's minds. Pack the bags, we're going on a guilt trip. 

It's a monstrous waste of capital, energy, time and human resources. Talk about stupid. The global warming hoax is massively stupid. Injustice has been deemed just.

The establishment of institutionalized irrationality, its days are numbered. Perhaps then mass enlightenment will come.

The above is an excerpt from the following...

Light at the end of the tunnel.

The pendulum has finally begun to swing the other direction It's now moving away from irrationality, deception and dishonesty and moving forward into honesty. First it's bowling over the democrat/liberal/left. Picking off the low hanging fruit first. 

With it's sights set beyond the republican/conservative/right nothing will withstand its building momentum that feeds on all manner of errors, irrationality, criminality, mysticism and deception.

Primarily business is about creating solutions and solving problems. In business, eliminating irrationality increases efficiency. The Law of Accelerating Returns is that technology and information advance exponentially. Errors and irrationality are rejected and great advances accrue. 

Free-market competition -- to the extent that it hasn't been politically constrained -- demands increased efficiency.

Now consider virtually all politicians, bureaucrats, many news media reporters, journalists and academics increasingly inject irrationalities into their work rather than minimize it. It's slow suicide. Look at the under performing stocks of the main stream print-media. Take notice of how blatant and transparent MSM's accusations are becoming. Their frequency increasing too. Gasp... gasping... for air.

By contrast, people that create and produce technologies hold real power because they minimize the input of irrationality to maximize efficiency. 

The War of Two Worlds is Upon Us

Up-righting an upside-down anti-civilization where injustice is proclaimed justice. Where the ends justify the means. And voting for the lesser of evils is intended to beget evil.

By making oneself more valuable to other people a person increases their own value. From high risk entrepreneurs and venture-capitalist angels to dishwashers and janitors making themselves valuable to others they increase their worth. When they go shopping for super-computers and groceries they become more valuable to those businesses.

They're all value creators. Probably ninety-nine percent of people don't initiate force, threat of force or fraud against anyone or their property.

Now consider what it is that politicians and bureaucrats do. They create laws and regulations. 

There's a reason they're called lawmakers. They churn out laws and regulations like automaker Ford pumps out trucks.

But do we need an assembly line for churning out laws and regulations? The vast majority of which are laws and regulations that themselves legitimize -- via legal authority -- the initiation of force, threat of force and fraud. 

As all persons have the inalienable right to use force in self-defense, government has not only a legitimate ethical use of force in self-defense, for over a hundred years congress has assigned government a monopoly on the initiation of force, fraud and coercion.

Lawmakers are always at the ready with new "must have" laws and regulations. Always quick to save the day and spare value producers from running themselves, their free market, and society headlong into destruction.

HA! Who are they trying to fool?!

What is the probability that the value creators and value producers will try to harm their own free market and or its participants? They're averse to the initiation of force and fraud.

So who is being hoodwinked?

Apparently, at least half the population. People fooled into believing the ends justify the means. But what are the ends when the means -- voting for the lesser of evils -- especially when each person thinks their candidate is the lesser evil -- leads to an evil end?

Voting for the lesser of evils always begets evil. The ends don't justify the means. (Think about those two sentences together -- they can't be reconciled.) The ends justify the means only when the ends are intended to be evil. But somehow I don't think voters intend an evil end to come from their vote.

The lawmakers' assembly line is a long list of special interest groups lined up on K Street. Stretching throughout the mainstream media and academia. 

(Save for talk radio which is becoming mainstream. You know the MSM doesn't like what they're hearing on talk radio and reading, watching and listening to on the WWW. )

It seems all is about politics and political correctness. Honesty and integrity be damned.

Publicly traded corporations have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders to maximize profits. Political expediency has the CEO supporting lawmakers and regulators as well as academics and the MSM that champion laws and regulations that will hinder its competition or give itself special tax consideration and the like, and thus give the corporation an unfair advantage. An advantage born from the irrationality of coercive law/regulation. 

The CEO wins and so do the shareholders. The free market loses competition and the net effect is a lower standard of living. It's the opportunity cost. What would the competition in the market have produced had it not been cut off?

The anthropic global warming issue is, in reality, that there is no significant anthropic global warming effect. It's a non-problem.

The real problem is that it's a fabricated problem. An illusion of a problem. A boogieman. Complete with false guilt hopefully being embedded in people's minds. Pack the bags, we're going on a guilt trip. 

It's a monstrous waste of capital, energy, time and human resources. Talk about stupid. The global warming hoax is massively stupid. Injustice has been deemed just.

The establishment of institutionalized irrationality, its days are numbered.

The value producer and value creators advance technology exponentially. This has happened throughout history despite the parasitical elites leeching off the value creators and producers. Now with technology at the knee curve its effects are much more noticeable. Increasingly effective.

At its core a science/business/free market relationship is one of eliminating errors and irrationality. The opposite of what politicians, bureaucrats and parasitical elites in general do. They fabricate problems born of irrationality and foist them on the value producers and their free market. 

Mark parasitical elites for future deletion as they are irrational errors that exponentially advancing technology will render obsolete.

Exponential advancing technology is a live wire running throughout science business and the market economy. Eventually arriving at its goal: a definitive free market competition. An upright civilization..

It's the politics of the ends justify the means. Parasitical elites only feel remorse when they get caught. Thus they must protect themselves from having the spotlight of honesty shine on them. Pretty much the same as all criminals.

Even though honesty outlives dishonesty in the long run, most parasitical elites will have leeched off the value producers and be long gone before the value producers realize what really happened. Until recently, between the MSM and academics, real history seldom sees the light of day.

But that's been changing. Fast!

The ends don't justify the means. Voting for the lesser of evils always begets evil. Stop enabling parasitical elites. 

It's your creativity, productive work and free market that the parasitical elite would perish without your support. You produce more than you consume. They consume way more more than they produce.

Politics is not the solution. Politics is the problem.

Who wants a higher standard of living? A better lifestyle? Quit playing by their rules. 

Begin the transition with voting each and every incumbent out of office. Shine the spotlight of honesty on them like you did with the shamnesty immigration bill. Like what's happening to the global warming hoax.

Value Destroyers
versus
Value Producers

Up- righting an upside-down anti-civilization where injustice is proclaimed justice. Where each day brings a person one day closer to unnecessary death. An unnecessary sad day for all value creators. On the other hand, for value destroyers, death is their saving grace -- everyone's, even their own. Especially their own. But it's the opposite for value producers. The adjective unnecessary has profound meaning for them.

To be continued...


5 posted on 07/12/2007 6:50:42 PM PDT by Zon (Honesty outlives the lie, spin and deception -- It always has -- It always will.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

A wolf in sheeps clothing is still a wolf.

Can’t change a leopards spots..

Those maxims have a basis.


6 posted on 07/12/2007 6:58:31 PM PDT by TASMANIANRED (Taz Struck By Lightning Faces Battery Charge)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5; Lando Lincoln; neverdem; quidnunc; .cnI redruM; Valin; King Prout; SJackson; dennisw; ...
Lee Harris:

...It was at the University of Glasgow that the great Adam Smith taught. Like the other members of the Scottish Enlightenment, Smith believed in the power of education to free men and to improve human prospects. In his masterpiece, The Wealth of Nations, Smith argued that the state should educate the working classes not simply because it was the right thing to do, but also because it was prudent. For Smith’s close friend, the philosopher David Hume, an ignorant multitude was a dangerous multitude, because ignorance bred both superstition and fanaticism. A practical, universal education, grounded in the scientific or experimental point of view, was the best means of assuring the peace and stability essential to a nation’s prosperity and security. Those educated in science could learn to live in harmony with one another.

This Enlightenment model, which has worked quite effectively in Europe and the United States, as well as in other parts of the world, has always relied on an advanced elite that brings learning to the masses through universal secular education. Many have hoped that Muslim nations would adopt the same model, with the same results. A minority of Muslim technocrats, who had received Western-style scientific educations, would help lead the Middle East into the modern era. They, too, would be eager to transcend their own narrow cultural perspectives, and to join other like-minded men and women across the globe.

But if Westernized technocrats like the Glasgow terrorists and the London bombers can enthusiastically embrace radical Islam, what group is left that can bring about the modernization of the Middle East?


Ouch!

This ping list is not author-specific for articles I'd like to share. Some for the perfect moral clarity, some for provocative thoughts; or simply interesting articles I'd hate to miss myself. (I don't have to agree with the author all 100% to feel the need to share an article.) I will try not to abuse the ping list and not to annoy you too much, but on some days there is more of the good stuff that is worthy of attention. You can see the list of articles I pinged to lately  on  my page.
You are welcome in or out, just freepmail me (and note which PING list you are talking about). Besides this one, I keep 2 separate PING lists for my favorite authors Victor Davis Hanson and Orson Scott Card.  

7 posted on 07/13/2007 1:13:06 PM PDT by Tolik
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Tolik
"...It was at the University of Glasgow that the great Adam Smith taught. Like the other members of the Scottish Enlightenment, Smith believed in the power of education to free men and to improve human prospects..."

Hmmm ... Andrew Carnegie also ................... FRegards

8 posted on 07/13/2007 7:55:50 PM PDT by gonzo (In Florida, inmates make cigarettes in jail that I buy, and I can go to jail for smoking one! WTF?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson