The Fluid Dynamics of Pill Popping

This is a very silly question that I've been obsessing about for weeks. It's possible I've even written about it before, though I can't find any trace of that. It's a question that simultaneously feels so basic that science has to have an idea about it, but also I can't think of a single practical application that would prompt anyone to study it.

Let me lay out the scene.

I have a bottle of pills, from which I take one pill each day. To do this, I tilt the pill bottle and "pour" one pill out onto my hand, then return the bottle upright and place it back on the shelf. Other than this, I don't shake or mix the pill bottle in any way.

When the pill bottle is close to -- but not quite -- empty, I get a new bottle. At this point, I pour the remaining pills from the old bottle into the new bottle (again, without otherwise mixing or shaking). So if I had 10 pills left from the old bottle, and 90 pills in the new bottle, the new bottle now has 100 pills (including the 10 "old" pills poured over the top). Then I start the cycle again of taking one pill a day.

Here's my question: on average, how long do we predict it would take me to consume all of the "old" pills (assuming I don't vary my routine)?

One answer is that the order of the pills being poured out is essentially random (I have an equal chance of "selecting" any given pill), and so the answer of how long it will take me to pour out the ten old pills is the same as the answer for any randomly selected ten pills. But it seems wrong to suggest that the order is in fact random -- the fact that these pills were specifically placed on the top of the pile of pills should mean that they have a higher likelihood of being poured out first (right?).

So another answer at the opposite end of the spectrum would be that since the old pills are at the top of the pill bottle, they should be the first ten pills that I consume (or close to it). Something like that is the intention of pouring them onto the top of the pile. But this also strikes me as unlikely -- intuitively, I feel like the act of pouring does not necessarily result in the "top" pills necessarily being poured out first. It does some mixing on its own. More broadly, when I imagine the physical act of the pile of pills cascading down the side of the pill bottle into my hand, it's very easy for me to imagine pills that were not on top skipping ahead and getting into my hand first.

In short, I suspect that I should pour the "old" pills more quickly than the new ones by some indeterminate factor -- more quickly than random selection, less quickly than "they'll be the first ten". It's a question, in essence, about the "fluid dynamics" of pills, which is a concept that tickles me for some reason.

This actually would be pretty easy to measure in concept: give each pill a number, instruct research subjects on my routine, and then have them mark down the number of the pill they pour out each day. But has anyone actually investigated this? On the one hand, it feels like utterly pointless knowledge. On the other hand, scientists love finding out about the properties of random subjects!

Anyway, for anyone working in a germane field, this is a free research proposal for you. Have at it.

Academic BDS Comes to China

The Guardian has an interesting article about a scientific journal editor, David Curtis, who stepped down from his post after his attempt to implement a boycott of Chinese academics was rebuffed by his publishers. The direct precipitation of his resignation appears to be a mix of two things: first, that he was prevented from publishing an article he co-authored raising the specter of a China boycott, and second, that he had of his own accord begun implementing a policy of rejecting all submissions by Chinese academics due to "the complicity of the Chinese medical and scientific establishment in human rights abuses against the Uyghurs." (The latter decision was denounced by the journal higher-ups as a violation of policies forbidding national origin discrimination).

It is not clear whether the figures involved in the call to boycott Chinese academics are involved in the BDS campaign against Israel. I can imagine them being sympathetic; I can also imagine them being people who thought BDS against Israel was absurd precisely because we should be starting with more serious violators like China and decided to put their money where their mouth was (a quick google search didn't reveal any particular links between Curtis and BDS, whether favorable or critical).

I have been banging the drum about the likelihood that BDS (or BDS-style tactics) will at some point stop "singling out" Israel and make itself apparent as part of activists' toolkits addressing other countries and controversies. And indeed, this particular iteration seems highly reminiscent of the earliest days of anti-Israel BDS (not only because it is originating in the UK). The flat ban on submissions by Chinese academics is identical to how academic BDS began -- the earliest significant academic BDS "move" was a decision by a British journal editor to demand the resignation of Israeli colleagues from her editorial board because "I can no longer live with the idea of cooperating with Israelis as such." Nowadays the BDS movement has made gestures at moving away from pure nationality-based discrimination in favor of allegedly targeting only "institutions, not individuals"; I suspect if the China BDS movement gains legs it will begin making a similar pivot (though, as with the Israel case, I also suspect that the new standard will often be honored primarily in the breach).

But what does the potential emergence of a China academic BDS movement mean for the future of the Israel academic BDS campaign? The core personnel are going to be different -- partially because different people have different interests, partially because the Israel BDS movement has more than its share of tankies who think the entire Uighur issue is western imperialist claptrap. Nonetheless, there will likely be some overlap, and the fact that BDS is being promoted in other cases will do more to legitimize it as a legitimate option even as there may be disagreements about whether a BDS style campaign is properly applied to this or that case. So in that sense, any successful mainstreaming of the China BDS campaign will likely help bolster the Israel one even if the principal actors are different people.

On the other hand, the development of "BDS" in the China context, precisely because it offers a comparator case and can falsify the "singling out" hypothesis, also is likely to generate new norms which will serve to modulate and regulate the Israel case as well. While Curtis' proposal is drastic -- no submissions from any Chinese academics, period -- it is supremely unlikely, given China's integration into global academia and knowledge-production, that a BDS movement of that form will gain any traction. Far more plausible is the implementation of considerably more narrow and targeted measures -- particular institutions or projects that are inextricably bound up in human rights abuses that directly (and not just by association) taint the specific academic work emanating therefrom. And particular will likely actually be particular -- it will not be tenable to use sweeping notions of complicity or culpability to drag in every single Chinese university or institution (the main mechanic by which "institutions, not individuals" reverts back to "individuals").

This is part of what I've been saying when I suggest that social movements, BDS including, "moderate as they mainstream." The more BDS becomes a general tool of social activism rather than an Israel-only one-off, the more it will adjust itself to adopt standards that actually can be plausibly generalized to a range of cases, and while extirpation of all Israelis from the global community is at least a conceivable social goal, extirpation of all Chinese nationals (or all nationals of all countries whose governments are implicated in significant human rights abuses) is not.

Put differently, to the extent people start thinking seriously about applying "BDS" to the China case in a manner that is plausible and scalable, the equilibrium that will be set will be one that likely will not countenance flat bars on academic participations by persons of a particular nationality, nor "institutional" proscriptions that amount to doing the same thing, but may accept narrowly-tailored measures targeted at specific wrongdoers. And -- insofar as China would be used as a comparator case to justify measures in other states as well (namely, Israel) -- there is a decent chance that these norms will translate over to the Israeli case as well. It won't happen without a fight, and you can be sure that the old-guard will continue to insist on the more fundamentalist version. But I do think that's the most likely trajectory.

Yes, I'm Alive

A couple of days ago, I wrote a column for Haaretz on the Netanyahu-facilitated merger of the far-right Jewish Home Party with the neo-Kahanist Jewish Power party. Since -- back in the 1980s -- prominent members of the Jewish community (including leaders of the AJC) analogized Kahane to Louis Farrakhan, and since we've all over the past year or so gotten very adept at declaring what one's obligations are when a Louis Farrakhan enters our political orbit, I suggested that it was "put up or shut up" time for Jewish community groups that regularly take stances on Israel-related issues.

Anyway, I sent the column to my editor Wednesday afternoon, so it could run Thursday morning. Then I did a bit of work, and then I tried to go to sleep.

Only to realize that somehow, all of the sudden, I was experiencing one of the worst head and chest colds I've had in my life.

It was frankly astonishing how fast it snuck up on me. I'd love to tell a story about how I pushed out this column with my last bit of strength before succumbing -- but actually I felt pretty much fine all of Wednesday afternoon into the evening. It just felt like a light-switch -- one moment I was fine, and the next it's 4 AM and I haven't even gotten a wink of sleep because my entire face is more congested than a Bay Area freeway.

The immediate upshot was that I basically wasn't able to follow any conversations that might or might not have occurred over my column. I was able to write a quick update when the AJC finally did release a statement on Jewish Power (they had not written one at the time it was published, and had indicated they would not be commenting) -- which really was my last gasp of energy, and after that I ended up staying in bed until 5:30 PM (yes, PM).

Anyway, I'm finally feeling a bit better (a lingering cough seems to be the long tail of this whole ordeal). So what did I miss?

Well, let's see: the White House is considering appointing William Happer to a climate change committee. Who is William Happer?

"The demonization of carbon dioxide is just like the demonization of the poor Jews under Hitler," Happer said on CNBC. "Carbon dioxide is actually a benefit to the world, and so were the Jews."

"Just like" it. You know, I've heard of Jews being dehumanized by being compared to animals, or even vermin. But this must be the first time we've been reduced to the level of a gas molecule.

In conclusion, I kind of want to just go back to sleeping all day.

Afghan Girls Robotics Team Allowed To Compete in US; Supervillain Origin Story Foiled

When I read that an all-girls robotics team from Afghanistan had been denied a visa to come to the US and participate in a robotics competition, my first thought was to fume about the injustice of it.

My second thought was to be perplexed at the logic. Even if you're a raging Islamophobe, surely you recognize that "six Muslim girls who are experts in robotics and have an ax to grind against America" is the start of a supervillain team, right? Why play with fire?

But the story appears to have a happy ending. Apparently at the intervention of President Trump, consular officials have reversed their decision and the girls will be allowed to come to America for the competition. Which is the right decision, and good news.

Kudos to President Trump (with appropriate discounting for the degree to which President Trump's rabidly anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim policies were responsible for the initial exclusion).

Breitbart-Approved Experts Continue to Agree: Breitbart is Full of Shit

Breitbart, the conspiratorial far-right website that starting in 2017 will more-or-less become the official media outlet of the Donald Trump administration, ran a story the other day crowing about supposedly plunging temperatures disproving global warming -- citing a video clip from the Weather Channel as proof. The Weather Channel itself was less than thrilled, and just posted this epic-quality smackdown titled "Note to Breitbart: Earth Is Not Cooling, Climate Change Is Real and Please Stop Using Our Video to Mislead Americans."

As someone who also was once approvingly cited as an expert by Breitbart in an article which ludicrously butchered said area of expertise (critical race theory), I relate to this. Keep up the good work, Weather.com.

B.o.B.'s Pro-Flat Earth, Pro-Holocaust Denier Diss Track

So this happened. The rapper B.o.B. put out a diss track targeting Neil DeGrasse Tyson for the mortal sin of noting that the earth is, indeed, round. The track, titled "Flatline" (get it?), also contains quite a few other conspiracy theories, including a shoutout to Holocaust Denier David Irving and the lyric "Stalin was way worse than Hitler/That’s why the POTUS gotta wear a Kipper."

For the most part, I find this more amusing than anything, though I am worried that I may not be able to listen to my two different versions of "Haterz Everywhere" guilt-free anymore. I do want to briefly point out two things, though:

(1) It's amazing how conspiracy theories hang together, and how the Jews always get roped into them. Flat earthism is nuts in its own right, but there's no inherent reason to think its adherents should have any particular views on Jews. Yet of course it is entirely unsurprising to hear Jews pop up here.

(2) The Gawker post actually doesn't mention the Holocaust denier thing at all (they do allude to there being more conspiracy theories in the lyrics other beyond belief in a flat earth). To be sure, pointing that out might kill the buzz of "haha, B.o.B is so stupid and ridiculous, beefing with Neil DeGrasse Tyson." Flat earthism is just dumb, but it doesn't really hurt anyone; anti-Semitism is more of a killjoy. Still, it strikes me as unlikely that other overt forms of racism or intolerance would pass by similarly unremarked-upon. The distinction, I feel, is that pointing out anti-Semitism -- even in such clear terms -- is considered to be gauche. It isn't something that we should keep a critical eye on and interrogate when we see it, it is something that we're all too sensitive towards and should be more willing to let slide.

Now to be sure, I'm not particularly threatened by this musical track (frankly, associating Holocaust denial with "Earth is round" denial is doing me a favor). So in a functioning deliberative space regarding anti-Semitism, I wouldn't really mind simply laughing this incident off. Indeed, (as much as a performative contradiction as this is) I don't think there's much more to say about B.o.B.'s Holocaust denial other than to snicker at how idiotic he's being. But it still stands out to me that it wasn't mentioned at all, and I think that failure is reflective of something worth pondering about.

How To Turn #IStandWithAhmed Into an Anti-Obama Attack

The big viral story of the day is a Muslim teenager, Ahmed Mohamed, who built a homemade clock, took it to school to show his teachers his engineering prowess, and was promptly arrested for bringing a "bomb". The case smacks of racial profiling and Ahmed's heartbreaking statement vowing "never to take an invention to school again" has really hit home the emotional and practical depths of his treatment. The President has joined the chorus of condemnations and invited Ahmed to the White House., and Kevin Drum wonders if this might be something so obviously outrageous that even Republicans have to follow suit.

Even conservatives can't really defend what happened here. On the other hand, they can hardly agree with Obama, can they? What to do?

Please. This is easy. First of all, the statement of Irving's mayor (previously most-well-known for engaging in hysterical Islamophobia in an attempt to ban religious mediation), or that of the school district, is the perfect conservative response: no direct attacks on Ahmed, but stressing the importance of public safety and reporting suspicious threats, and congratulating authorities on being "vigilant" towards any "threats". It's basically how Republicans react to cases of police brutality when they can't gin up a decades-old theft conviction or an embarrassing Facebook photo mugging for the camera: vague indication that it sucks for the victim, overridden by the importance of trusting and deferring to the authorities.

But honestly, that's still only scratching the surface. The real opportunity comes from that invitation for Ahmed and his clock to come to the White House. Because when he arrives, obviously the Secret Service is going to check his bag, because that's what they do. And then somebody -- my prediction is Breitbart -- will crow about the naked hypocrisy of Obama condemning a local school district from taking the same precautions that his own security detail demands.

That's how you go pro in anti-Obama hackery.

UPDATE: BOOM! I called it:

#IStandWithAhmed Didn't s.o. mail battery-powered socks to VP Gore once? Secret Service saw a bomb and attempted a controlled demolition.

— Richard5832 (@richard5832) September 16, 2015

HUD

Technology often does cool things. But it is particularly exciting when technology makes real a classic sci-fi trope. And while we're still waiting on flying cars, Google may be bringing us glasses fit with a heads-up display, able to stream information about one's surroundings in real-time.

Yes, it'd actually probably be really weird, and yes, there are serious privacy implications if people are wandering around with hidden, constantly-recording cameras built into to their eyeware. But come on! A heads-up display! Just like everyone has dreamed of since they played Halo (or Goldeneye, or Doom ... age yourself appropriately)! If it doesn't give me the option to have a red box bracket my conversation partner with "target acquired", I'll be sad.

Magic Pills of Darkness

New Hampshire State Rep. Jeanine Notter (R) has a novel argument for why health insurance shouldn't cover birth control: It causes prostate cancer.

In case we're unclear: Birth control? Almost exclusively taken by women (e.g., the pill, IUDs, Nuvaring, etc.). Prostate cancer? Only occur in men, because men, unlike women, have prostates. So unless those be some magic pills women be popping, the odds that birth control causes prostate cancer is very, very slim.

The Zionist Space Conspiracy Continues

At trivia last week, one of the categories was "Conspiracy Theories". We debated just putting down "Jews" for every answer. I mean, what are the odds it'd be wrong?

Of course that being said, everyone knows that the lunar landing -- if not the moon itself -- is just one large Zionist conspiracy. The team of Israeli scientists seeking to make Israel the third country to land a probe on the moon by the end of 2012 is clearly just trying to cover their tracks.

(Title references this post).

Putting the "Buster" in "Mythbusters"

Oops:

One of the zany experiments staged by the "Mythbusters" television show nearly turned into a suburban tragedy Tuesday afternoon in Dublin when the crew fired a homemade cannon toward huge containers of water at the Alameda County Sheriff's Department bomb disposal range.

The cantaloupe-sized cannonball missed the water, tore through a cinder-block wall, skipped off a hillside and flew some 700 yards east, right into the Tassajara Creek neighborhood, where children were returning home from school at 4:15 p.m., authorities said.

There, the 6-inch projectile bounced in front of a home on quiet Cassata Place, ripped through the front door, raced up the stairs and blasted through a bedroom, where a man, woman and child slept through it all - only awakening because of plaster dust.

The ball wasn't done bouncing.

It exited the house, leaving a perfectly round hole in the stucco, crossed six-lane Tassajara Road, took out several tiles from the roof of a home on Bellevue Circle and finally slammed into the Gill family's beige Toyota Sienna minivan in a driveway on Springvale Drive.

That's where Jasbir Gill, 42, who had pulled up 10 minutes earlier with his 13-year-old son, Manvir, found the ball on the floorboards, with glass everywhere and an obliterated dashboard.

Since thankfully nobody was hurt, I'm free to marvel at the incredible "my poor meatball" trajectory of this cannon shot.

Call Him Crazy

TPM and I had the exact same reaction to Jon Huntsman's "call me crazy" tweet ("To be clear. I believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. Call me crazy."). Specifically: He's running for the GOP nod, and he just tweeted that. If the shoe fits....

The Cultural Cognition of Climate Change

A new paper coming out of Yale's Cultural Cognition project (led by Professor Dan Kahan) is getting some blogger buzz. Unfortunately, it's for all the wrong reasons.

Folks are seizing on the finding that more scientifically-literate respondents are less likely to believe that Global Warming represents a serious threat. This is true, but overstated -- the difference between high- and low-literacy respondents is extremely small. Kahan et al use it to refute the presumption that greater scientific education is likely to cause the average person's views on global warming to converge on the scientific consensus on the matter, but that's all.

Rather, the real action is that increased scientific-literacy increases the divergence in opinions on the matter amongst members of groups whose narratives predispose them to look with more favor on the scientific-consensus about climate change (that it is dangerous) versus those whose cultural narratives instruct them to view that consensus skeptically. Over the course of several experiments, Kahan et al have divided persons along two axes -- hierarchical/egalitarian, and individualist/communitarian. Persons with egalitarian, communitarian outlooks -- hypothesized to be favorable to believing claims of dangerous climate change -- were more likely to say climate change is dangerous, and this belief rose moderately as scientific literacy increased. Persons with hierarchical, individualist outlooks -- forecast to be skeptical of climate change data -- were accordingly less likely to view it as dangerous, and this risk-assessment dipped sharply as scientific-literacy increased (that the hierarchical, individualist risk assessment fell by considerably more than the egalitarian, communitarian one rose is what accounts for the small negative association between levels of scientific literacy and belief in the dangers of global warming). This is the main conclusion of the paper -- not about how scientific literacy impacts one's assessment of climate change risk (at least not directly), but whether scientific-literacy diminishes the salience of one's prior social narratives. And the answer was not only, "no", it was "no, increased scientific literacy enhances the polarizing impact of these priors."

This finding is part of a larger set of conclusions formed through the Cultural Cognition project's research -- to wit, that increased information does not create consensus amongst politically polarized groups (by directing everyone to the "right" outcome), but rather fosters divergence as each side is able to access bits of fact and information that help them create a coherent narrative that binds together their preferred value priors with experiential data. Discussing other research by Professor Kahan and his cohors, I wrote:

Providing additional facts and information doesn’t cause policy convergence, it causes policy polarization. The reason is that most fact patterns contain narratives, inferences, and interpretations which plausibly can be deployed to support diverse policy positions. Facts, alone, can never by themselves tell us anything about fundamentally value-based policy judgments, even under ideal deliberative conditions. People accordingly interpret the information they receive in manners which support their prior dispositions, only now they feel more comfortable in these beliefs because they have “facts” to back them up. Given this latent ambiguity, there is no incentive to agree, and lots of psychological incentives to latch on to friendly fact stories in order to preserve ones preexisting beliefs.

So persons already predisposed to believe in global climate change, upon gaining more information, have more access to bundles of facts and arguments that help buttress and amplify that belief. But persons predisposed to disbelieve in climate change, in turn, also have more access to arguments and facts that support that worldview as they become more informed. Presumably, less-informed voters -- while still likely to adhere to their predispositions, are more likely to stake a more relatively moderate path, as they have fewer narrative resources at their disposal to explain away counterarguments (and thus are more likely to admit some level of doubt in their beliefs).

There might be, in other words, an intractable barrier facing fact-based democratic policy-making in situations where the underlying policy question is normatively polarizing. The presumption was always that greater education -- greater grasp on the facts -- would overcome these divides as people discovered what the best policy option is. But Kahan's work has thrown a serious wrench in this presumption -- as it turns out, normative interpretation governs factual interpretation, not the other way around. At best, we could hope that direct experience might modify norms (if New York does end up under two feet of water, that might convince some climate change skeptics). But that's pretty drastic, and doesn't give us that much hope for normal policy disputes.

Silly Studies

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) has a list of federal studies he wants to strip funding from. The Wall Street Journal labels the studies in question "silly-sounding research", and it's obvious that Issa -- who, though evil, is no idiot -- selected them as examples of ridiculous, wasteful government programs. Here's a taste:

AMENDMENT NO. 417: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used by the National Institutes of Health to study the impact of integral yoga on hot flashes in menopausal women.

AMENDMENT NO. 418: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used by the National Institutes of Health to examine the potential impact of a soda tax on population health.

AMENDMENT NO. 419: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used by the National Institutes of Health to research the use of marijuana in conjunction with opioid medications, such as morphine.

AMENDMENT NO. 420: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used by the Department of Health and Human Services to study condom use skills in adult males.

AMENDMENT NO. 421: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used by the Department of Health and Human Services to study the concurrent and separate use of malt liquor and marijuana among young adults.

AMENDMENT NO. 422: At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the following:

Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used by the National Science Foundation to study whether video games improve mental health for the elderly.

Is it just me, or are all of these interesting studies? I think it's pretty relevant if video games improve mental health amongst old people. I think we probably want to know the effects of drug and alcohol use amongst our citizen. It's probably pretty valuable to know the rates and effectiveness of condom usage, insofar as we don't like the spread of STDs and unwanted pregnancies. If yoga helps reduce the negative impacts of hot flashes, or a soda tax would improve population health, that's valuable information!

Obviously, one can say simply that we need to cut back on scientific research during a budget crunch. I'm not sure I agree -- I think scientific research and study is the backbone of our economy, and essential to maintaining American dominance in the global marketplace. But as examples, not of discretionary programs we can cut if we have to, but of foolish bureaucrats wasting government resources on frivolity -- I'm unconvinced.

So Easy, a Bacterium Could Do It

Next time you fail to solve a Sudoku puzzle, prepare to be more humiliated than usual.

This Can't Be Happening

A new study out finds that the children of lesbian couples actually turn out better than those raised by heterosexual couples (fun fact: the baby whose picture graces the CNN story is adorable). I'd be interesting in seeing what variables the researchers controlled for (particularly income). Nonetheless, I find hilarious the response of outraged conservatives who can't stand the fact that science doesn't back up their prejudices:

"You have to be a little suspicious of any study that says children being raised by same-sex couples do better or have superior outcomes to children raised with a mother and father," [Concerned Women for America's Wendy Wright] said. "It just defies common sense and reality."

"Common sense" is silly enough here, but "reality"? The whole point of a study like this is that it tells us what "reality" is. All Wright is showing is that her beliefs are unfalsifiable. The point isn't to protect children, the point is to protect Wright's ability to maintain her prejudices with as little cognitive dissonance as possible.

It's a Pirates Life for Me, Maybe? Roundup

Yes, yes -- these roundups are the epitome of lazy blogging. Sorry. I'll snap out of it eventually.

* * *

Big Labor pushes through majoritarian democracy.

I was waiting for the first person to argue that two straight female SCOTUS nominations (making for three of nine female justices total) equals a de facto exclusion of men. Thanks, K-Lo!

A mild surprise in West Virginia, as centrist Dem Alan Mollahan (D) goes down in the primary to an even more conservative candidate.

Seattle police officer taped beating a Latino robbery suspect (who turned out to be entirely innocent, not that it matters).

Ta-Nehisi Coates on why Obama's anti-X-box-ism is genuine.

Andrew Sullivan's haywire gaydar re: Elena Kagan is really starting to piss me off.

Recently defeated (at the GOP nominated convention) Utah Senator Bob Bennett (R) is in no rush to decide his next move.

If you're a Republican in Alabama, believing in science is a smear.

Primitive Minds

I was doing some reading yesterday on the science of emotions, and at one point in the course of discussing certain 18th century views on the subject, the author noted a division traceable to the controversy over whether the brain and mind were united or split. This debate, he said, still had some salience today. And I snickered a bit at that -- oh, the West and its preoccupation with the classics. Of course the mind and brain are united -- where else would the mind come from? The inability to abandon the idea that the mind floats free of the brain was, I thought, just a symptom of Western thoughts propensity to assign validity to a concept for no more reason than Descartes said it.

Then later in that same reading, the author mentioned a patient that was referred to him (a neurologist) from a group of psychologists, and observed that the very fact that we distinguish between neurology and psychology is itself a relic of this brain/mind divide mentioned above. And that gave me pause -- because I do find that split very intuitive, but I have trouble characterizing it in ways that don't resort to parceling out the mind from the brain. The closest I could come is saying that neurology deals with physical trauma, scarring, lobotomies, and the like, while psychology deals with chemical imbalances (such as in some forms of depression). But this doesn't seem to leave much room for psychotherapy regarding, for example, traumatic experiences and things like that -- ideas which I would characterize as firmly psychological but do not feel particularly neurological.

So -- egg on my face. Guess I'm one of the Luddites.

The Physics of Space Battles

One of the coolest sci-fi-esque articles I've read in a long time.

God and Country

From a piece about the failure to treat veterans for combat-related PTSD and other psychological disorders:

[Paul] Sullivan was working as an analyst at the Veterans Benefits Administration in Washington in early 2005 when he was called to a meeting with a top political appointee at the VA, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy Michael McLendon. McLendon, an intensely focused man in a neatly pressed suit, kept a Bible on his desk at the office. Sullivan explained to McLendon and the other attendees that the rise in benefits claims the VA was noticing was caused partly by Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who were suffering from PTSD. “That’s too many,” McLendon said, then hit his hand on the table. “They are too young” to be filing claims, and they are doing it “too soon.” He hit the table again. The claims, he said, are “costing us too much money,” and if the veterans “believed in God and country . . . they would not come home with PTSD.” At that point, he slammed his palm against the table a final time, making a loud smack. Everyone in the room fell silent.

Mr. McLendon now denies saying those words, but continues to assert that PTSD is "a made-up term" which "is not a diagnosis based on empirical evidence, but rather . . . it is an artificial construct erected by a vote of selected psychiatrists."

It's amazing to see how the profoundly anti-scientific bent of the Bush administration destroyed so many policies, and in this case, betrayed the trust of our nation's soldiers. I continue to be utterly awe-struck by the audacity of it.