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how to think like a photon

Discussion in 'Fred's House of Pancakes' started by hyo silver, Mar 14, 2009.

  1. Stev0

    Stev0 Honorary Hong Kong Cavalier

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    Yet you still keep insist on talking, so I have no choice but to keep making fun of your posts.

    Also, I was referring to how during the last election neocons were all soiling their diapers going "OH NOS! MEAN OL' OBAMA IS GOING TO NEGOTIATE WIV TERRORISTS!"
     
  2. hyo silver

    hyo silver Awaaaaay

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    I said photons, not morons.
     
  3. Mjolinor

    Mjolinor New Member

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    If you believe that you will be given eternal life in paradise by dying then, to you, there is no sacrifice.
     
  4. ufourya

    ufourya We the People

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    Tom, you are quite correct about the difficulty of separating emotion from thought. But let's look a little deeper into your example. I think if rather than calling the terrorists' acts cowardly, the word 'dastardly' had been substituted, we would have been better served. But we would have missed out on some of the examinations of what constitutes courage and cowardice.

    People were, indeed, castigated for citing the 'courage' of the suicide-terrorists, but I think 'nearly lynched' for saying less than you did is pure hyperbole.

    That said, consider these comments:

    “[W]e do not find courage with Atta and his team who sought death but with Beamer, Glick, Green, and others on Flight 93 who fought for life.”

    Psychiatrists like me have occasionally been asked whether, given their knowledge of human mental life, they would hold that the September 11 suicide bombers were as courageous as the firemen who died in the Twin Towers, or the passengers on Flight 93 such as Todd Beamer, Jeremy Glick, and Don Green who fought back. I’ve learned that two things are usually assumed by that question.

    The first assumption is that when in the course of some plan or action a person gives up his life, then the act is courageous by definition. Thus, so the argument goes, courage is the capacity or disposition to overcome natural fears and put aside personal concerns in the pursuit of some aim or goal. Thus Mohammed Atta and Todd Beamer were equally courageous, just fighting for different aims. And, after all, each is celebrated as a hero by his family.

    The second assumption is that psychiatrists have some special way of identifying the deeper, authentic mindsets advancing human behavior and thus, knowing more, can appreciate and even admire more. Under this assumption, psychiatrists should understand and even salute the saying “One man’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter.”

    I’ve come to appreciate that the initial question on courage derives from a misapprehension of just how psychiatrists draw conclusions and make sense of human behavior. And perhaps describing how at least this psychiatrist approaches these issues might help dispel such misapprehensions and bring light to what counts as evidence for any judgment in our field.

    Psychiatrists, in looking to make sense of a human behavior, begin not with some assumptions about meaning in general but at the actions themselves, and then at what is known about the mental state motivating the actors. Judgments about the value and virtues displayed in the behavior, what can be lauded as coherent and honorable in the circumstances, and especially whether a psychiatrist would encourage similar actions, all follow such assessments.

    So, would this psychiatrist see Mohammed Atta as a man who in a bad cause behaved heroically even as Todd Beamer and Jeremy Glick did in their efforts? Following the rule, looking first at the behavior itself, psychiatrists would lay out the details distinguishing the behavior of the protagonists.

    Atta, along with several knife-wielding, muscular accomplices, implemented a studied and practiced plan of deception that took advantage of the trust of airline personnel to slip disguised as innocent travelers onto aircraft filled with men, women, and children. Soon into the flight they sprang upon these defenseless people, commandeered the aircraft by cutting the throats of stewardesses and pilots, and then deceived those remaining into believing that a non-deadly plan was in place. This was so that without interference they could pilot them all to their deaths by plowing the planes into buildings also filled with unsuspecting people going about their morning business.

    What I’ll call the Beamer group, on the other hand, had that day no thought of needing their skills and energies for any purpose other than to travel quietly to their destinations. The events they confronted were thrust upon them with little information other than cell phone communications informing them of the likely deadly aims of their captors. With little time to think, with no more weaponry than their own physical endowments, and with the realization that their chances of living through the efforts were small, these men fought their armed captors for the control of the aircraft and brought it crashing down in an empty field rather than into a populated city building.

    Certainly at the level of description — the story level, let’s call it — there is not much difficulty in identifying important and meaningful distinctions in these stories. One group used deception and vicious, concealed weaponry to waylay the unsuspecting; the other used open opposition and bare knuckles to fight what amounted to an ambush. The first group intended to kill as many people as they could (including themselves); the other intended to rescue as many people as they could (including themselves). When one puts deception, disguise, and indiscriminate slaughter beside vigorous retaliation by unprepared men, the rightful place of heroism and courage is easy to discern.

    What about the ideas motivating the Atta group? Those men did, after all, put their lives at forfeit for them. Does not commitment to death for an idea count as courage?

    Of course, psychiatrists do not customarily affirm that something like courage and vigorous virtue is active in suicidal behaviors of any kind. Rather, we note that suicidal behaviors customarily are actions resting upon incoherent views and derive from influences on the subject in the form of mental disease or illusory social influence.

    The best example recorded of the suicidal state of mind promoted by illusory influence was the mass suicides at Jones­town, Guyana, where Jim Jones used several elements of social pressure — isolation, claims on loyalty, predictions of common disaster — to get more than nine hundred people to sacrifice not only their own lives but the lives of their children in a mass act of self-poisoning. They essentially complied with the will of a malevolent leader. The incoherence of their ideas, rather than their calm surrender to them, drew psychiatric attention. Courage was seen amongst the few who strove to escape from the deadly plan and resist the ideas that were killing their friends.

    What, then, can be said about the minds of the terrorists who struck on September 11? We know quite a bit about them, especially about Mohammed Atta, their leader. His state of mind was far from that of a devoted Mohammedan eager to begin a just war. Rather, he was an individual with complex emotional responses to the West, where he found both behavioral latitude and economic prosperity. He indulged in drinking and consorting with women and saw that his power of resistance to these temptations was weak. At the same time he noted that the social, economic, and technical achievements of the West far exceeded what would be expected from his world and culture. He feared the power of Western know-how, and he was tempted to enjoy some of its forbidden fruits.

    These conflicts of attitude and assumption produced in Atta the mental state that Joseph Epstein in his fine book Envy called resentment. Atta resolved them through an aggressive and pitiless plan that gave him the satisfaction of attacking what he both feared and despised even as it took his life. Psychiatrists have a term for those who take up ideas shared by others and transform them into ruling passions that drive their behaviors: they are victims of an “over-valued” idea, and so are coerced by a kind of insanity that blinds them to the meaning of their behavior and its lack of judgment, proportion, prudence, and value.

    Contrast that state of mind — resentment and the coercion from an over-valued passion — with the mind states in the Beamer group. Their aims and actions emerged from the circumstances they faced and their sense of responsibility for its outcome. With little time to plan, they tried to thwart the aims of their opponents. Realistic conceptions and life-sustaining motivations brought them partial success and the gratitude of their countrymen.

    Psychiatrists thus bring something more than a “hurrah” to the assessment of behaviors by offering both a full description of them and a consideration of the mental influences that provoke them. When questions concerning virtues such as courage and justice are under consideration, psychiatrists seek to discover how these virtues are expressed in the actions and are represented in the deliberative minds of the actors themselves. In this way we do not find courage with Atta and his team who sought death, but with Beamer, Glick, Green, and others on Flight 93 who fought for life.

    .....

    Dr. Paul McHugh is now the University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is the author of more than 150 papers and four books. Try to Remember: Psychiatry’s Clash over Meaning, Memory, and Mind (Dana Press) is his most recent.

    Now, ask yourself, Tom, is the suicide of a young person courageous or cowardly? Is it any less or more courageous or cowardly if it involves killing innocent people - take the perpetrators of the Columbine massacre for example. They took their own lives, no? Were they cowards? Yeah, I think so.
     
  5. ggood

    ggood Senior Member

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    Wow, great post and interesting psychological analysis. Try fitting that into a 15 second sound bite. I agree most suicides and irrational abominations such as occurred this last week in the U.S. and Germany are ultimately irrational and cowardly, since it suggests the individuals (in their own minds) could see no other solutions to their own failures or the seeming impotence of their lives, or in the case of Atta, of their political or religious cultures. The tricky part is still in that area of whether particular ideas are over valued, and whether rational alternative actions seem to be available. In my opinion, Atta was both irrational and cowardly on that score, but unfortunately there are plenty of people in his same cultural milieu who disagree with me and cannot see the alternatives or find meaning in their lives in any other way. The essentially feudal or tribal lords have ruled so long in the middle east, it is is hard for people there to respect anything other than the power of the gun. Hence their frustration.

    The West for its part can do more to discourage oppression, encourage alternatives, and reduce the sources of legitimate grievance (e.g., Palestine). The details of that are what I assume the new administration is grappling with now, by trying to reach out more. There are Israelis and Palestinians we never hear of in the Western media who are trying to stand up for peaceful resolution, just as in Ireland (where an embrace of an over valued idea is still going on, though with far less popular support). For their part, the Middle Eastern and Islamic cultures are in strong need of an intellectual and political renaissance, to throw off the shackles of feudalism and Wahabism. Persons of strong character and clarity of mind need to propose ideas and create alternatives. However, beware of hidden despots. I can still remember talking to Iranian students after the fall of the Shah, who couldn't see one form of oppression was about to be traded for another.
     
  6. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    You are confusing intent, and your moral evaluation of it, with the questions of bravery or cowardice.

    Ufourya's excellent post notwithstanding, a dastardly crime (and we have no argument that the 9/11 attacks were dastardly) can be executed in a brave manner.

    There is a cultural/political issue here, as well. Americans tend to see themselves and their country as a bastion of freedom and good will, but we have a 60-year history (since we took over from the Brits) of imposing tyrannical dictators on the people of the Middle East, and the West in general has been doing so for nearly a century (since the end of WW II). We have also for 60 years been the principal funder and weapons supplier for Israel, which in a tit-for-tat war has massacred Palestinians at roughly ten times the rate at which militant Palestinian groups have massacred Israelis.

    You seem to think that the definition of "cowardly" is an act whose intention is to hurt people. Ufourya analyses the terrorists as mentally ill people taking a cowardly way out of a painful life. But others would see it as a fight against an oppressor in the face of desperate odds. The act was dastardly in that it intentionally killed innocent people. But giving up your own life for something you believe in, however misguidedly, is not a cowardly act.

    I am not defending them. They deserved to suffer abominable torments for what they did. But they were not cowards.

    A coward is someone who drops bombs from the safety of an airplane on other people. A coward is someone who, from the safety of the White House fabricates lies to foment a war that serves no purpose other than to enrich his cronies.

    As for the people in the 4th plane, who fought the hijackers, I will assert that their action was neither brave nor cowardly: Once they understood that the intention of the hijackers was to kill everyone on the plane, they fought from desperation: knowing that not to act was certain death, they had nothing to lose by fighting back. It is not bravery to act when you have nothing to lose. (But it is not cowardice either.)

    Can so few people understand that it is possible to act bravely in a despicable cause? Or that the people of the Middle east have good reason to be angry at us for imposing dictators on them while spouting empty words about freedom?
     
  7. qbee42

    qbee42 My other car is a boat

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    Daniel, thanks. You saved me a lot of typing. Cowardly typing at that, judging from the above definitions.

    As for hyperbole, I am guilty as charged. I use a lot of that. Those nearly "lynched" were not really close to death, they were only destroyed professionally and ostracized socially.

    Tom
     
  8. ufourya

    ufourya We the People

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    I think we can safely say that your emotional response outweighs a rational look at some of these events. While the U.S. supported Iran's Shah Pahlavi, for instance, he was not 'imposed' upon his people. He succeeded his father who was deposed by the British and Soviets. Whom else have we 'imposed' upon the hapless Middle Easteners? Have we imposed upon them ALL of the rulers? What we have done - through Democrat and Republican administrations alike - is support those rulers we thought best allowed us to follow our national interests. Have there been mistakes? By all means, yes.

    It seems that your interpretation of the Israeli/Arab problem colors your view. I think this is where your idea that Middle Easteners 'have good reason to be angry at us' has its origin.

    The U.S. did not found the state of Israel. Yes, we support it. It is the only established democracy in the region. Iraq (by the way, have you noticed we won that war?) may or may not develop into a functioning democracy, but it won't be for lack of President Bush's efforts. Bush is another emotional point for you.

    By the way, we ARE a bastion of freedom and good will compared to every other country on earth. (This is where I, as an immigrant, get emotional.)

    But, hey, now that Obama is President, everything over there is going to be okay. We'll sit down and chat with all to resolve the world's problems. We can stop worrying.

    Now we turn our attention to how cowardly or brave we are as a nation. Our new Attorney General, who defended President Clinton's pardon of the cowardly FALN terrorists, says we are in many ways 'a nation of cowards.'

    Sigh.
     
  9. ufourya

    ufourya We the People

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    Who, for example? I see Bill Maher now more than ever.
     
  10. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    The west created most of the present-day nations of the Middle East after WW I, without regard to the ethnicities of the regions. For example, the Kurds were divided, and their land given to three different new countries. And the House of Saud was installed in Saudi Arabia so we'd have a friendly despot to buy oil from. The U.S. did not put the Shah into power, but it gave him weapons with which to oppress his own people and prevent free elections. When he was finally overthrown, the U.S. gave him sanctuary.

    Exactly! We have done what we thought best for our interests. And those "mistakes" have cost the lives of countless people in those countries.

    Although the U.S. did not found the state of Israel, it does give Israel more aid than any other country, principally in the form of weaponry. And although Israel is "democratic," it is a deeply racist democracy, where Palestinians are treated as second-class citizens and deprived of many basic rights. Even certain categories of Jews are treated badly, as was my grandfather when he went there in hopes of living out his life in "our homeland."

    You have a peculiar definition of winning a war. Iraq is now in a state of chaos and is a haven for al Qaeda.

    This is just plain silly. Are you telling me that Canada and Sweden and Germany and Spain and Japan, and many other countries in the world are not free, democratic countries? You're beginning to sound pretty jingoistic here.

    Your attempt at satire gives you away as just another disillusioned Republican. Of course President Obama is not going to make everything right with a wave of his hand. But at least he's going to bring thoughtful consideration of facts into the decision-making process, which is a breath of fresh air after eights years of religious bigots enriching themselves by waging a war on the wrong country. (It was Afghanistan, not Iraq, that was hosting al Qaeda!)
     
  11. PriusSport

    PriusSport senior member

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    That IS thinking like an electron. Now why don't you try to think like a positron?
     
  12. Jeannie

    Jeannie Proud Prius Granny

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    My understanding is that bravery is acting in spite of fear. From that viewpoint, the people on the 4th plane who fought back acted bravely.
     
  13. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    Most lemmings are like that. Whatever political, corporate, or religious enterprise they belong to, once you attempt to make them think outside their very narrow worldview, it's like scraping nails on a blackboard

    You're old enough to remember blackboards, right? I usually get a Deer In The Headlights look when I use that line on folks younger than 25-30

    If I were you, to maintain peace in the family, avoid any and all discussion of politics, religion, or anything else bound to upset your sister. You can pick and choose your friends, your family is pretty much "assigned."

    The two simple choices are: accept them for all their foibles, or never talk to them ever again.
     
  14. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    I wasn't even asking her to think outside her box. I was just asking her to understand why I think the way I do.

    "I don't mind that you think I'm wrong. But I want you to understand why I think as I do."

    The above statement simply holds no meaning for her. She cannot grasp the concept. And I suspect that many here on PC cannot either.

    This is in fact what my mother, my aunt, and I do. We do not mention these subjects to my sister, and we ignore without comment or reply her frequent inflammatory comments. It took me a long time to learn to let these things pass.
     
  15. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    Let's not forget that we have become so soft, fat, and lazy, incompetent, and corrupt - especially in our brains - that any expression of rational thought is a waste of air. You get that Deer In The Headlight look from 90% of the folks you mention anything rational to

    I'm not going to offer any more comments on 911 than this: in an era of metacube n-dimensional data analysis, non obvious relational awareness, orbital keyhole surveillance at <50 cm resolution, and the very real existence of folks who don't like us ....

    To even PRETEND that a "ragtag" group of "cowards" could have pulled off such a stunt is nothing short of laughable. Not only was this a very well planned, highly engineered and modeled attack, it took advantage of the fact we have become dumb as a box of rocks

    Like all this recent hysteria over North Korea and the dreaded EMP bombs. Gee-zus cah-rist ... we've known about this phenomena since the early 1950's! And people are thinking about it NOW?!

    A smart immigrant by the name of Dr. Nicholas Christofilos predicted the EMP effects. Dr. Christofilos was compared to Nikola Tesla as an eccentric but brilliant guy. He apparently had quite a lot of influence in the government as a top secret project, Project Argus, was launched in late 1958 in the south Atlantic Ocean, not too far from the tip of South Africa

    Argus should be considered an "exoatmospheric" test. The results from this testing were so alarming, that the next round of tests scheduled in the Pacific were tailored for exoatmospheric effects. These were the Fishbowl series of Operation Dominic

    The Starfish Prime 1 MT test, about 250 miles above Johnston Island, disabled radio communication throughout the Pacific basin, including troposcatter. The ionosphere was completely disrupted. The EMP effects were particularly pronounced throughout the Hawaian islands

    One result of the Fishbowl series of tests was the realization that the newly completed DEW, Pinetree, and Mid Canada line radar stations would be rendered blind and useless after a single high altitude EMP event. Not only would the radar systems be subject to jitter and blackout, but the only communications was by troposcatter, itself severely effected by EMP

    However, the radar bases were maintained for over 20 years before being abandoned. The value of DEW and SAGE plummeted to zero almost overnight, once the results of the Fishbowl series were compiled. But it's hard to explain to taxpayers that your fancy-schmancy 60 billion dollar system - in 1960 dollars - became a doorstop overnight

    Actually, many of the detailed test results from Fishbowl are still Classified. One can surmise the modeling and behavior of prompt radiation in the Van Allen Belt, but the details are censored

    Dr. Christofilos also was key in developing Project Sanguine, the ELF communication system for submarines. Sanguine is still Classified
     
  16. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    So .. it was cowardly when British and American bombers carpet bombed Dresden? How about when the Luftwaffe bombed London?
     
  17. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    :pound:

    I blame it on the booze
     
  18. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    It all depends on perspective

    If you win the war, then everything you did - no matter how barbaric and vile - is ok, is "justified"

    If you lose the war, then everything you did was automatically barbaric, vile, wrong, etc
     
  19. jayman

    jayman Senior Member

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    Yes, precisely. At a certain point, you're better off just not getting involved

    On a few topics, we are 180 degrees apart. Yet I still respect your point of view, and I'm fairly certain you still respect my point of view

    Where arguments become bizarre is when, oh, certain forum members happen to accuse me of cowardice because I would not use a firearm to defend a neighbor's property.

    Cute, I was the one who spent 10 years in the Army, but suddenly I'm the "coward." Of course, neo-cons also were quick to label returned veterans - sometimes missing an appendage - as "cowards" if they adopted an anti-war stance

    But I digress

    No matter what sort of fight you're involved in, you have to remain rational. Would I risk the legal mess of killing a burglar just to protect some property? No, of course not. Now, if that burglar also had my neighbor's little girl by the throat, that's a different matter. I'd sacrifice my life to ensure her safety.

    But not over a plasma tv, thank you very much

    Yet we have some forum members who think that just because they own a firearm, they're suddenly a wild west gunslinger. That attitude almost always ends in tragedy

    Well, if it helps you feel any better, Daniel, most families have these sort of issues. Unless you want to permanently disown the entire bunch, you have to learn when to zip it at family gatherings.

    At such gatherings, I always have a very tight, forced smile on my face, inwardly counting the minutes until I can get the hell out of there
     
  20. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    I have done things that I was terrified to do. I do not consider myself a brave person. But I understand your point, though I think it would apply equally to the terrorists and to the people who fought them on the 4th plane.

    Someone above suggested that the terrorists were not brave because they were not afraid to die because they were convinced that as martyrs they'd go to heaven. But in Israel, would-be suicide bombers who failed to detonate their bombs, have been captured and studied at length, and it seems that while a religious belief can overcome fear of death sufficiently to propel a person to suicide, the fear is still there, and is strong.

    I'm not entirely sure that the words "cowardice" and "courage" have any real meaning. I am a thoroughgoing coward, but I've jumped out of a "perfectly good" airplane at 10,000 feet, and I've climbed a hiking route that I was really not capable of negotiating myself, and I've jumped into the water from a height of 4 or 5 feet (something which, for entirely irrational reasons, terrifies me), and I've climbed the rigging of a tall ship at sea, rolling with the waves, and I've protested against nuclear weapons in ways I knew would get me more than a little jail time.

    Sometimes you're just more scared of not doing something, than of doing it.

    Perhaps "cowardice" and "courage" are just empty words used to manipulate people into doing things they would not do otherwise, and to make heroes out of one class of person and villains out of another class of person.