Empirical evidence and reason demonstrate that Sam Harris is an arrogant ass

Omer Aziz wrote an article critical of Sam Harris. So, as he likes to do, Harris invited Aziz to a “debate”. Without even considering the content, we can conclude that Harris is a dishonest clown. Take a look at the conditions he set:

So I accepted his offer and every onerous condition that came with it. Once again, all the terms were set by him: I would have to read the essay word for word, he could stop me whenever he wanted, I could not record the talk, and Harris reserved the right not to air it if it was “boring”—a standard to be defined only by him, and only after the fact.

They talked for four hours. Then, later:

A few weeks later, I was surprised then to find the following email in my inbox:

I just listened to our recorded conversation, and I’m sorry to say that I can’t release it as a podcast. Even if I took the time to edit it, I wouldn’t be doing either of us any favors putting it out there. The conversation fails in every way — but, most crucially, it fails to be interesting.

Better luck next time…

Sam

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Saying nothing with a bunch of words in a big-name journal

Francis Collins made a triumphant declaration about his plan to “end sexual harassment”! Hooray!

Only…it was initially published in a closed-access journal, Nature (the article has since been opened up). And, say, Nature is a UK journal — why is the head of the NIH publishing his grand proposal to end all harassment in NIH supported institution there? It struck a lot of people as weird and tone-deaf.

And then I read the “article”. Rarely have I read something so empty outside of administrative memos from high-ranking academic bureaucrats. It’s truly impressive. The physicist will be jealous that the biologists have managed to create the most perfect vacuum known to humankind.

Here it is, sprinkled with a few annotations from yours truly.

As the leading US government funder of scientific research, we at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) are deeply concerned about sexual harassment in science (Nature 529, 255; 2016). With the help of colleagues in government, academia and the private sector, the NIH aims to identify the steps [Isn’t “aims to identify the steps” kind of an empty way to say “do something, but we don’t know what”?]necessary to end this in all NIH-supported research workplaces and scientific meetings.

In September last year, we restated our expectation that organizers of NIH-supported conferences and meetings should assure a safe environment, free of discrimination (see go.nature.com/zmukk8).

Over the next few weeks to months, we plan to work with governmental, academic and private-sector colleagues to identify potential steps [“we don’t know what”] to translating our expectations into reality. An important first step will be to gather as much data as possible [“we’re going to flounder around for a while, trying to figure out what we’re doing”] to more fully understand the nature and extent of sexual harassment among scientists. These data should guide us in determining what kinds of policy and procedure are most likely to help. [“not that we have any policy, obviously”] We will also work to determine what levers [“We’ll figure out something to kick some butt, but we don’t know what”] are already available to influential stakeholders — us as funders, as well as university administrators and departments, journal editors, and organizers and hosts of scientific meetings.[stakeholders=buzzword for everyone involved. “We don’t even know who we’re going to work on yet”]

We owe this [What do you owe?] to our colleagues and the public, who trust in our ability to make the biomedical research enterprise the best that it can be.

Yeah, that fluff was a great use of page space in a high-ranking science journal. How about sparing us the finger-flapping until you’ve actually got something to say?

D’Souza d’emonizes D’emocrats, again

Dinesh D’Souza is coming back to the big screen, with a new movie called Hillary’s America. It looks like a real loser. Watch for his persecution complex; the trailer includes clips of poor Dinesh in prison, surrounded by angry burly biker-type dudes, and looking rather pathetic. It all began when the Obama administration tried to shut me up, he says. It doesn’t mention that it wasn’t to shut him up, but to punish him for blatant violations of campaign finance laws. It also doesn’t mention, perhaps because it would diminish the drama of those scary gangsta dudes, that his sentence was served on probation. He wasn’t put in prison.

It’s all about those perfidious Democrats. The first words:

Who are these Democrats?

Then come scenes of the KKK and Andrew Jackson and corrupt politicians (didn’t I already tell you that Neiwert had rebutted that lie?), and it ends with the liberals’ dramatic scheme.

What if their plan was to…steal America?

Hang on there, Dinesh. You do realize that liberals already have as much right to America as you do, don’t you? We don’t have to steal it, we just have to share it.

Oh, well. One more movie I can skip.

NO! Don’t do it!

You might think that asking Donald Trump to expose himself is a joke, and it certainly has been treated as comedy.

But now, in all seriousness, Larry Flynt is asking Trump to submit proof.

So far we’ve only had your word that you have a huge penis. But there has been no objective authority who was made a verification of your claim. I am making you an offer that you must not refuse if anyone is to believe you. I have a team of doctors ready to contact the examination required to confirm your post. If you reject this offer, I can only conclude that you’re not the man you say you are and that you’re bragging about your penis size is this Friday at fraudulent as Trump University. Please contact me immediately. Sincerely, Larry Flynt.

So far we’ve only had your word that you have a huge penis. But there has been no objective authority who was made a verification of your claim. I am making you an offer that you must not refuse if anyone is to believe you. I have a team of doctors ready to contact the examination required to confirm your post. If you reject this offer, I can only conclude that you’re not the man you say you are and that you’re bragging about your penis size is this Friday at fraudulent as Trump University. Please contact me immediately. Sincerely, Larry Flynt.

I wish he hadn’t done that. Given the size of Trump’s ego, I’m afraid he might take Flynt up on that offer.

So that’s how they do it

Hope Jahren has an excellent op-ed on sexual harassment in academia. I’ve always wondered how guys have the gall to even start these unsavory relationships, and she shares some of the email she’s received.

The evasion of justice within academia is all the more infuriating because the course of sexual harassment is so predictable. Since I started writing about women and science, my female colleagues have been moved to share their stories with me; my inbox is an inadvertent clearinghouse for unsolicited love notes. Sexual harassment in science generally starts like this: A woman (she is a student, a technician, a professor) gets an email and notices that the subject line is a bit off: “I need to tell you,” or “my feelings.” The opening lines refer to the altered physical and mental state of the author: “It’s late and I can’t sleep” is a favorite, though “Maybe it’s the three glasses of cognac” is popular as well.

The author goes on to tell her that she is special in some way, that his passion is an unfamiliar feeling that she has awakened in him, the important suggestion being that she has brought this upon herself. He will speak of her as an object with “shiny hair” or “sparkling eyes” — testing the waters before commenting upon the more private parts of her body. Surprisingly, he often acknowledges that he is doing something inappropriate. I’ve seen “Of course you know I could get fired for this” in the closing paragraph; the subject line of the email sent to my former student was “NSFW read at your own risk!”

I still can’t quite imagine it, but at least she has now spelled out the obvious warning signs.

And then, sadly, she describes the usual course of events, which is usually denial and blame from all the institutional resources that ought to be helping the student out. Here’s what she advises the women targeted by such behavior:

I teach her to draw strong professional boundaries and then to enforce them, not because she should have to, but because nobody else will. I insist that she must document everything, because someday he will paint this as a two-way emotional exchange. I wearily advise her to stick it out in science, but only because I cannot promise that other fields aren’t worse. And I hope that this is enough to make him stop. But it never, never stops.

Now that’s depressing.

The Ku Klux Klan are left-wing SJWs?

Yeah, I know — that’s absurd. But people are actually throwing around this idea that racism is part of leftist ideology, usually while babbling some ahistorical nonsense about how the modern Democratic party is somehow still the party of segregation, despite the whole southern strategy political move that scooped up all the racists and drafted them into the Republican party. Anyway, David Neiwert debunks the whole “KKK are lefties” baloney with a hefty dose of history and politics.

Moreover, the Klan in every incarnation — its original, its second, and its current, has been a creature of right-wing politics. Consider its current program:

— Anti-Semitism

— Racial separation

— The quashing of civil rights for minorities

— The destruction of federal government power

— Anti-homosexual

— Anti-abortion

— Anti-immigration

Hearing conservatives trying to claim that white supremacists are liberals fills me with the same discombobulating dizziness that hearing religious zealots declaring that atheism is a religion does. Dudes, do you even listen to the words coming out of your mouth?

Policy matters

I admit it. My eyes glaze over on a lot of important public policy issues. It’s especially foggy when you’ve got one group of advocates loudly advocating one position, and another group advocating something different. And then when it’s something remote from my direct experience, like UK public health policy, it’s even harder to focus.

So, for instance, I tried to puzzle out the Health and Social Care Act of 2012, and even the Wikipedia page was too much for me. I got bogged down in the details, and when the occasional name I knew, like “David Cameron”, came swimming out of the murk, they just discouraged me even more from trying to follow along.

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Emotionally invested in despising philosophy

Yet again, people are asking why are so many smart people such idiots about philosophy? I have a different answer than you’ll find at that link. It’s because so many smart people are idiots about psychology. I deal with a lot of atheists, and one of the many flaws in that group that have been coming to the fore lately is the obliviousness they have to their own motivations.

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Brains are so confusing

Do you need a good, basic introduction to Neurodiversity 101? Here you go.

Neurodiversity is, according to activist Nick Walker, “the diversity of human brains and minds – the infinite variation in neurocognitive functioning within our species.”

Basically, it’s a fancy name for the fact that all our brains and minds are unique and individual. Like snowflakes, no two brains and no two minds are exactly alike.

But that’s not enough! The article also points out that within that range of variation there are some brains that work in a way that society finds acceptable — the neurotypicals. I think it’s safe to say I’m a standard neurotypical, which is not to say that some of the workings of my mind are out of sync with the larger culture, but that I can fit in reasonably well in most circumstances. While someone who is neurodivergent in some way might have extreme difficulty with situations that I find not at all stressful, but that does not mean they are somehow inferior.

Shouldn’t all of this be elementary and taken for granted by teachers, and maybe made part of standard training? I ask because I never did, and it’s taken years of gradual awakening to see what’s going on. It’s also because I’m looking over the midterm status of my students and wondering what I can do to reach some of them who are struggling. I know it’s not because they can’t, but because something I’m doing is failing to communicate.

You can all be grateful for tenure

Otherwise, I might have to pursue this alternative career path.

Also, I have to say, that if a professor wants to do porn in their spare time as a hobby, and it doesn’t affect their work, the University of Manchester has no good grounds for carrying out an internal investigation, and I should hope that at the end of it all, they would simply shrug their collective shoulders and recognize that it’s none of their business.