Curt Doolittle

Author: Curt Doolittle

  • ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT I DIDN”T WANT TO UNDERSTAND My work has led me to this

    ONE OF THOSE THINGS THAT I DIDN”T WANT TO UNDERSTAND

    My work has led me to this conclusion:

    1) Humans must acquire – and acquire all sorts of things.

    2) To acquire among others we negotiate.

    3) In negotiation we justify.

    4) We trade signals to to obtain discounts in exchange for status.

    5) Truth (correspondence) about the real world provides a negotiating advantage.

    6) Truth in social matters would disallow discounts obtained in exchange for status (or other opportunity)

    I will try to expand that a bit, but it isn’t any more complicated than that.

    Some people are much better at justifying than others. (verbal acuity)

    Universalism is a form of justification that makes use of cognitive biases: Caldnin’s “weapons of influence” are means by which we justify (steal) in by taking advantage of cognitive biases.

    Our genes are selfish, They need to be. And selfish genes win.Truth can be an advantage or a handicap. Justification can be an advantage or a handicap.

    If you grasp this then it sort of ruins the whole moral nature of christendom. We are not families. If we treat one another as kin then, some families will be destroyed by other families.

    Cooperation on means is mutually beneficial. But, universalism is a deceptive attack on the excellent and true. It is parasitism.

    If that doesn’t ruin your philosophical day, then not a lot will.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-20 01:26:00 UTC

  • (man stuff) (creepy) Last night, tall, late 50’s, unfit, total lack of shoulder

    (man stuff) (creepy)

    Last night, tall, late 50’s, unfit, total lack of shoulder and chest muscle, clearly sedentary, beta male, with a ‘travel companion’ arrives at the hotel, both with uncomfortable body language. He displays nervous but boyish glee, she the professionalism of a salesperson. While just above average by Ukrainian standards, she’s in the upper 10% of western standards.

    These women can make 800 a month in usual jobs, or a thousand dollars to two thousand dollars or more a day accompanying some guy on trips. In case that isn’t clear, she can make more money on a two week vacation than she can in a whole year in a regular job.

    I mean. I am not against it at all. But the freaking guy made my skin crawl. So my objection is merely empathy for her as a business person. I have spent most of my life in consulting. It’s all too often prostitution – doing what you don’t like, and sometimes what doesn’t need to be done, and once in a while, what shouldn’t be done, for money.

    Now I’m one of those people that won’t do what shouldn’t be done – for money or otherwise. But I have done a lot of things I didn’t enjoy doing.

    Creepy customers are something to avoid – no matter which profession that you’re in.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-19 23:57:00 UTC

  • DECREASES TRUSTWOTHINESS

    http://www.aei-ideas.org/2014/07/whod-a-thunk-it-socialism-is-demoralizing-socially-corrosive-and-promotes-individual-dishonesty-and-cheating/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+aei-ideas%2Fcarpe-diem+%28AEIdeas+%C2%BB+Carpe+Diem%29#mblSOCIALISM DECREASES TRUSTWOTHINESS

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-19 14:17:00 UTC

  • THE DANGER OF POWER A POWER VACUUM (worth repeating) —“Power vacuums are much

    THE DANGER OF POWER A POWER VACUUM

    (worth repeating)

    —“Power vacuums are much worse than abuses of power.”—

    It’s contrary to our psychology, since we tend to get very wrapped up in abuses of power (European colonialism, current Chinese conquest of their region, American policing of the postwar consensus). Especially progressives, but only to a slightly lesser extent, libertarians.

    Power vacuums drastically decrease all opportunity costs in exchange for unpredictable risk. Power structures increase both opportunity costs, and the predictability of risk.

    And history shows that (a) war for control of trade routes is one of the best possible investments you can make after formal institutions of cooperation (trust, property, contract, law, weights and measures), and (b) nearly all peoples will gladly pay risks of expansion of territory and trade route. (c) These changes produce our great conflicts.

    The postwar era, when viewed by historians, will appear as a short term anglo victory after the great european civil wars in which the naval anglo offshoot of germanic civilization, went to war with its army just as did Athens and Sparta, with the same consequences. However, Greece managed to radically transform the world far after its loss of military and economic power.

    Anglo civilization will apparently do the same: fade.

    Unless we choose to change it.

    Cheers.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-19 07:31:00 UTC

  • OUT UNTIL DAWN Dang. Sunlight. That’s dawn. ;). Huh. Everyone is still dancing.

    OUT UNTIL DAWN

    Dang. Sunlight. That’s dawn. ;).

    Huh. Everyone is still dancing. If dawn isn’t a reason to stop then might as well keep going….Apparently we are going to the beach now…. 🙂

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-18 22:03:00 UTC

  • THE NEW WORLD “DISORDER” – THE COST OF POWER VACUUM Flight MH17 and the new worl

    THE NEW WORLD “DISORDER” – THE COST OF POWER VACUUM

    Flight MH17 and the new world disorder – Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/10976498/Flight-MH17-and-the-new-world-disorder.html

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-18 20:34:00 UTC

  • Untitled

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3qkf3bajd4

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-18 19:30:00 UTC

  • VERSION OF THE BUFFET RULE : MANAGERS MUST BE OWNERS. I’ve been saying this fore

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2013/03/01/solving-the-principal-agent-problem-apple-insists-that-executives-must-hold-company-stock/APPLE’S VERSION OF THE BUFFET RULE : MANAGERS MUST BE OWNERS.

    I’ve been saying this forever. The data is pretty clearly in favor of it. And attempts to circumvent it fail.

    The value of outside owners is to make sure you’re not privatizing capital in the business. The value of inside owners is to make sure you have the incentives to produce capital not privatize it. Outside non-owners, inside non-owners are I suppose fine for volunteer organizations. But otherwise Taleb’s argument holds: Skin in the game is the only insurance.

    Free riding is everywhere.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-18 15:19:00 UTC

  • UKRAINE HELP: GOING EAST AND BACK I might need to get a friend into Lugansk in t

    UKRAINE HELP: GOING EAST AND BACK

    I might need to get a friend into Lugansk in the next couple of days, to help a relative, and out a week later. It looks like as long as you’re in a car and without much cargo that it’s not a serious problem. I’m pretty sure I have friends that can make this happen. But if anyone has suggestions I’d like to hear them.

    Thanks

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-18 15:08:00 UTC

  • Reading a piece by Block, and exasperated at the amount of verbal justification

    Reading a piece by Block, and exasperated at the amount of verbal justification as a means of producing overloading (deception).

    Let me help you folks: The first rule of cooperation is “why don’t I just kill you and take your stuff?” Now a weakling might not like that, and a coward might not like that, and a free rider might not like that, but that’s simply a fact. It abuses northern european universalism, which is easily susceptible to overloading and suggestion that implies a breach of the universalist’s assumed trust.

    But that is a mere cultural assumption that can be abused by ghetto pragmatism. Instead, we always have the ability to kill and take your stuff. Why wouldn’t we? Mostly because its either too rewarding to engage in trade, or not worth killing you and taking your stuff.

    Verbal contradiction doesn’t hold any weight when the choice is between whether to kill you or to trade with you. Negotiation is not bound by logic. It’s bound by not doing what the other person will kill you for.

    Source date (UTC): 2014-07-18 15:04:00 UTC