Friday Ephemera

Oooo… this would make nice addition to David’s art collection.
And if one episode of saving the planet with art isn’t enough, it’s a whole series!
Our tax dollars at work.

According to The Lancet, which may well be read by your own doctor, white people must “unbecome white.” They must “eliminate whiteness altogether.”
Because, obviously, “whiteness is badness.”

Because, obviously, “whiteness is badness.”
Wow. Start with something that happened in 1963 in the deep South, then leap ahead to…

Situating his analysis within the political landscapes of Missouri, Tennessee, and Kansas, Metzl explores how white Americans arm themselves with guns or votes…

…as if the same thing is still going on. We’ll ignore the fact that Missouri, Tennessee, and Kansas hardly represent all of ‘Murkan wypipo, but how dare they “arm” them selves with votes ?
The author of this silly book is a shrink and a sociologist, so we are in trouble right there, but he evidently overlooked demographics of state and city government in those states because they are not exactly the KKK (for example, the guy is from Kansas City, you think he might have noticed the wypipo have voted for three black mayors in the last 30 years), so evidently for a bunch of racists their aim is bad.
The good news, besides Sailer effectively fisking this tripe, is things like this review are generally found by accident as the readership of The Lancet, JAMA, and NEJM, while unfortunately not asymptotically approaching zero, is getting there because of nonsense like this, and probably the only ones to have read his book (which basically appears from his site to boil down to “guns and orange man bad”) are his unfortunate students who were forced to.

“eminent hysterian”
🙂
“So here goes:”
Wait. Is that the title, or the book?
“Sets dial to ‘autotuned smut.’”
I’m trying to think of a witty response, but f*** it.

The sources for that Lancet article are fascinating. A weird mix of studies that show at least some understanding of the scientific method and tenth rate sociology that basically consists of a string of politically motivated assertions. No distinction is made between the two.
It really is amazing how stupid doctors can be when they wander off their specialist subject. Just take a look at the NHA party in the UK – its candidates have a legitimate claim to be intelligent educated people (and Phil Hammond also stood for them). Yet their policies are just ante-diluvian lefty pap.
For all the stuff about how wonderful STEM degrees are, there’s two things that don’t seem to be emphasised enough:
1) To become an expert is to specialise and to specialise is to neglect. Very few people are experts on more than one thing.
2) You didn’t invent the scientific method. You use it because other people developed it, painstakingly, and you shouldn’t assume you will apply it to a subject you’re new to.

You didn’t invent the scientific method. You use it because other people developed it, painstakingly, and you shouldn’t assume you will apply it to a subject you’re new to.
Too many believe their degrees convey a certain amount of exclusive magic.

Now for something completely different … beware belly laughs.

Darleen, I’m going to show that to Mrs. Fourth, who is currently bugging me to visit shelters to “look at” dogs. I’ve had several pooches, she has not. And this despite her knowing that our house has more than the normal quantity of auto body filler paste in sections of the exterior woodwork (a side effect of my last dog).