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behaviour and intelligence

  socialist servitude versus independence and responsibility

“I find what is happening incredible - during this last snow episode, Northamptonshire was brought to a standstill. Schools were closed for a week, roads left ungritted to the point that half the town centre shops (and post office) were closed. We had a council that only gritted the A14, and used salt instead of grit, the salt being pretty useless on ice. Few snowploughs out, in spite of that service being contracted out, and in the end, the county council reported that they had been threatened by central government that if they used any more grit/salt/whatever, supplies would be diverted. I don't know if that last part is true or not, but it's like being back at school.

“ Last week local businesses went on TV to request that this never happen again because they lost so much money - no gritters went near industrial estates and they were left trapped in solid ice for nearly two weeks. In Bulgaria right now, which is a very poor, disorganised and corrupt country, they are experiencing deep snow fall, and yet have managed to clear the even the village roads with ploughs. I don't know what is wrong with Nulab, or Britain, but it is something deep and IMHO, terminal.” [Quoted from MikeinCamden]

Consider the difference in France. There, there has been the worst devastation ever in 100 years, or more. Trees are down, probably by the million. Every road, both on the public highways and through the forest, was blocked by fallen trees.

Take a property with a hundred-metre drive, with a one-kilometre public road to the village.

After the storm, there were several large pine trees across and along the drive, trapping the occupants. There were dozens of trees down across the road to the village.

By 6pm, the whole lot was cleared, and the drive had even been crudely levelled. Further afield, every country road was also passable, if not very tidy.

It took eleven days for this property to have some electricity restored. Services and neighbours visited daily and more, to check that the occupants were OK. A generator was eventually offered, but being regarded as more of a nuisance than a help, it went to others.

After eleven days, a one-kilometre set of cables was laid across the fields and forest, reconnecting the property to the mains at the village. It then took more than four weeks to bring heavy equipment in, clearing the route of the aerial electricity line, ’til then still smothered by fallen pines. Everywhere, both on the roads and in the forest, there are convoys of machinery cleaning up. Some clearing will take months, and rehabilitating the forest could take decades in places, yet France is not what I would call highly efficient.

Two weeks to clear snow and ice from British factory estates indeed!

One problem is that so many are used to being supplicants of socialist governments, while another is so many living in towns haven’t the slightest idea of how to take care of themselves. Why didn’t the factory estate prepare? Why didn’t they clear their own area?

In my view, it’s for the same reason people avoid doing anything much useful in the UK. That is, the government will interfere. Where’s your licence? Where’s your health and safety cert.? Can we tax you?

Over-crowding is not good for people. It lowers initiative. It increases aggravation. The noise is too loud. This is my garden, how dare you get your ball back? Etc.

Most government power comes from the ability to say no, not from enabling independence. Socialism hates independence. It’s ‘untidy’. It limits government control.

Look at the Jade Goody show. A country of voyeurs, not a country of actualised, purposeful, active individuals. Just a country with no life, peeping through other people’s keyholes.

Socialism is a mind killer.It destroys everything it touches. Britain is among the most centralised pseudo-democracies in the world.

“Eco-friendly Mongolian-style yurt to be 'torn down as too far from shops”
“The owners of an eco-friendly Mongolian-style yurt, which lies hidden away in a remote valley, face being forced to take it down because it is too far from the shops and there is not enough parking.” [Quoted from telegraph.co.uk]

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#socialist_servitude_230209"

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interesting series of short interviews around a book on deleterious effects of immigration on the poor

First lecture:

“Mark Krikorian explains why "mass immigration is fundamentally incompatible with a modern society." ”

34:52 mins

Topics of other lectures:

• “Mark Krikorian presents the fiscal case against immigration.
• “Mark Krikorian details the dangers of trans-nationalism and multiculturalism.
• “Mark Krikorian describes how mass immigration causes “a serious erosion of sovereignty.”
• “How do we solve our immigration problem? Mark Krikorian has the answers.”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#immigration_and_poor_120209"

sweet mongolian custom - the auroran sunset

“You may take it for a fact that, when there are two men of whom one has had a male child who has died at the age of four, or what you will, and the other has had a female child who has also died, they arrange a marriage betwen them. They give the dead girl to the dead boy as a wife and draw up a deed of matrimony. Then they burn this deed, and declare that the smoke that rises into the air goes to their children in the other world and that they get wind of it and regard themselves as husband and wife. They hold a great wedding feast and scatter some of the food here and there and declare that that too goes to their children in the other world.”
[p.102, The Travels, Marco Polo]

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#mongolian_custom_090209"

enforcing un resolutions

“The UN's protracted and unhappy battle to ban smoking inside its New York headquarters doesn't exactly encourage confidence in its ability to enforce its will anywhere else. The fug of smoke sat heavily in the delegates' lounge of the Security Council (a great name for a bar) but denser still in the basement "Viennese Café" - though not enough to obscure the no-smoking signs - just yards from where Arab League leaders tried to thrash out an agreement before the mullahs bashed them at Friday prayers.”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#un_resolutions_150109"

on religion and self-control - evolutionary advantages of self-control

“His professional interest arose from a desire to understand why religion evolved and why it seems to help so many people. Researchers around the world have repeatedly found that devoutly religious people tend to do better in school, live longer, have more satisfying marriages and be generally happier.”
—
“As early as the 1920s, researchers found that students who spent more time in Sunday school did better at laboratory tests measuring their self-discipline. Subsequent studies showed that religiously devout children were rated relatively low in impulsiveness by both parents and teachers, and that religiosity repeatedly correlated with higher self-control among adults. Devout people were found to be more likely than others to wear seat belts, go to the dentist and take vitamins.”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#religion_selfcontrol_100109

does stupidity have any lower bound?? (no. 1)

We’re not going to make it easy to win our competition!

“Armed with his Canon 5D and his new Lensbaby lens, photographer Duane Kerzic set out to win Amtrak’s annual photo contest this week, hoping to win $1,000 in travel vouchers and have his photo published in Amtrak’s annual calendar.

“He ended up getting arrested by Amtrak police; handcuffed to a wall in a holding cell inside New York City’s Penn Station, accused of criminal trespass.

“Kerzic says he was hardly trespassing because he was taking photos from the train platform; the same one used by thousands of commuters everyday to step on and off the train.

“ "The only reason they arrested me was because I refused to delete my images," Kerzic said in a phone interview with Photography is Not a Crime on Friday.

“ "They never asked me to leave, they never mentioned anything about trespassing until after I was handcuffed in the holding cell."

“In fact, he said, the only thing they told him before handcuffing him was that "it was illegal to take photos of the trains." ”

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#train_photos_090109

enough if you can just leave world a little better than you found it

In answer to a question on why a person should be ‘good’:
It’ll be a long time before society and individuals could not do with improving themselves.

It’ll be a long time before society and individuals could not do with improving themselves.

Long ago, I worked out that one did not need an external motive to be ‘good’. It is simple enough to decide that I am not a dog and I am not inclined to act on that level, despite the fact that so many do. Or, as Nero Wolf would put it, “It is a matter of self-esteem”.

“He sighed,"if it could be managed to keep one’s self-esteem without paying for it."
"Just so, our best efforts. The strongest obligation possible for a man with self-esteem."

Or as Chekhov put it, loosely translated,
The man of genius plants the acorn even though he will never see the oak tree full grown.

the web address for the article above is
https://www.abelard.org/news/behaviour012009.php#improving_the_world_070109

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© abelard, 2009, 07 january
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