As people die from pipe line explosions

As people die from pipe line explosionsRand Paul on principle is  blocking legislation thatboth parties favorThis is an act of supreme idiocyThe only principle can be a commitment to lethal endsTo the certainty that the same defects will kill more peopleThis is not governmentIt is dogmatism run amok I cannot believe he will be a two term SenatorThis is worthy of a major bout of nausea 
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Peirce sought to put the pretensions of humanity in their place

"Peirce sought to put the pretensions of humanity in their place when he stated in 1905: 'But the heurospudists [scientists who endeavor to discover] look upon discovery as making acquaintance with God and as the very purpose for which the human race was created. Indeed as the very purpose of God in creating the world at all. They think it a matter of no consequence whether the human race subsists and enjoys or whether it be exterminated, as [in] time it very happily will be, as soon as it has subserved its purpose of developing a new type of mind that can love and worship God better….Remember that the human race is but an ephemeral thing. In a little while it will be altogether done with and cast aside. Even now it is merely dominant on one small planet of one insignificant star, while all that our sight embraces on a starry night is to the universe far less than a single cell of brains is to the whole man.' (Peirce, 1905, ms 1334). - Eugene Halton
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Scientific materialism is the Frankenstein of nominalism

"The broader development of scientific materialism, which animates the sciences today, is the Frankenstein of nominalism, which would destroy anything in the interests of  'pure' research. If science is inadequate for the practice of life, as Peirce saw it, because it is too thin, then aren’t scientists, qua scientists, inadequately developed humans? Perhaps subhuman would be a more accurate term. They can be characterized as subhuman not because of extrinsic reputational or authority incursions into science proper, but because science proper, as is commonly practiced now, is conceived as a schizoid machine." - Eugene Halton
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Big Science in the USA

"Big Science in the USA emerged from The Manhattan Project sucking up to military-corporate money power, utilizing it to make precise discoveries at any cost. The big sciences today function in many ways as the research arm of global capitalism. Is that just a “blip”? How about altering genetic codes for profitable pure research? Don’t block the road of inquiry? Whoops, humans and numerous other species eradicated. A mere short-term fact without consequence in the long run of science?" - Eugene Halton
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Has Associated Content Crashed?

I cannot bring it up at this point. It's had its trials and tribulations. I assume it will be back soon. Will update either way. A number of links to longer pieces there are found here.

UPDATE: It was temporary.

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A non-alarmist approach to climate change

Wedges reaffirmed | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists: "Today's global emissions rate for carbon dioxide is 30 billion tons per year. For the world to emit in 2061 no more than 30 billion tons of carbon dioxide is as difficult a task as I could endorse today, taking into account the salience of other objectives to which I assign comparable importance, including preventing nuclear war, alleviating global poverty, and protecting the planet's biodiversity."

'via Blog this'

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Is less democracy really an answer?

3quarksdaily: Why we need less democracy: "To solve the serious problems facing our country, we need to minimize the harm from legislative inertia by relying more on automatic policies and depoliticized commissions for certain policy decisions. In other words, radical as it sounds, we need to counter the gridlock of our political institutions by making them a bit less democratic."

Taken to its full potential, the word democracy is not a description of a government but of a philosophy in which each person has equal opportunity and the right to fairness in all activities. This cannot be created by political means but by free acceptance of democracy as an ontological value which is universal.

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Remembering a Summer of Freedom

Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement -- Timeline:

A plethora of articles on Mississippi Freedom Summer 1964.

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The most comprehensive of American philosophers

Charles Sanders Peirce Online - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com: "An Essentially Personal Effort to Gather the Links Needed to Pursue an Online Reading of Works by and About Charles Sanders Peirce"

You will find out why at the link above.

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If this is so, half what is said today is gibberish

I Talk Too Fast - Executive Coaching Tip: "No matter how quickly you string your words together, stop at the end of your sentences. The downward inflection and pause that completes a sentence is the indicator that tells our brains to compute the idea, file it away and get ready for the next idea. We need this indicator if we’re to make sense of your words. The easiest way to be sure you’re giving us the indicator we need is to breathe when you end a thought"

'via Blog this'

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Maybe kids should play minus toys

Choking concerns prompt recall of 1.7M toys - CBS News: "(AP) WASHINGTON - More than 1.7 million toy workshop and tool sets from toy-maker Little Tikes are being recalled because of choking concerns. The Consumer Product Safety Commission says the play tool sets have oversized, plastic toy nails that might cause young children to choke."

Or make them up from the things that are around them. Or build them from clay. Or paint them. Or otherwise stop surrounding themselves with plastic accessories with multiple parts that can be ingested or not depending on if they cause you to choke. We have been making up products for at least a century. The world is a choked up midway.

'via Blog this'

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Retrograde Amnesia Reconstructing a Football Player's Life

Ex-Football Player Scott Bolzan's Life Deleted by Irreversible Amnesia After Fall - ABC News: "Ex-Football Player's Life Is Deleted by Retrograde Amnesia"

Revealing video after a reasonably short ad.

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My sales are booming

BEYOND CREED - Stephen Rose : IUniverse:

A few dollars is a boom to me. This book will be of help only to those who have wondered what the problem is with the church talk they have been listening to all their lives. And yet who still think there's something behind it that they need to touch somehow.

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A Wall Street Image

Alan Chin at Occupy Wall Street: Nights at Camp Hashtag — BagNews: "Late at night in Zucotti Park, also known as Liberty Plaza, across the street from the World Trade Center site, several hundred demonstrators remain camped out into their second week of the Occupy Wall Street protest. They are largely young, white, and many appear, at first glance, to fit a derogatory stereotype of “hipsters” or “hippies” or any hardhat epithet of choice. As such, they have been branded by The New York Times and other news outlets as being incoherent or worse."

'via Blog this'

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Why do people talk so fast now?

The Technospeed Cultural Overlay - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com:

"The technospeed cultural overlay embraces us all

And has done so for thirty years and more

It accounts for a speed of speech

A speed of movement

A gymnastic bent

An inflection that rises at the end of every sentence"

'via Blog this'

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What's wrong about capitalism that we can't fix?

Business and the Literati > Publications > National Affairs: "Right-thinking people now take it for granted that, in criticizing business, American literature has saved (or at least elevated) the nation's soul. But after a century of slander, that assumption needs revisiting. In so doing, it is worth examining the process through which our literati have framed the way we think about capitalism, and especially those who practice it. How did our culture come to hold the image of the businessman that it now does? Which literary works and authors have had done the most to shape that (mostly negative) image? And in this casting of the entrepreneur as villain in America's morality tale, which culture has been exposed as more corrupt — that of American business, or American letters?"

'via Blog this'


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Woman, touch that wheel and you get ten lashes

Flogging sentence for Saudi Arabian woman after driving 'beggars belief' | Amnesty International: "The sentencing of a Saudi Arabian woman to 10 lashes after she drove a car demonstrates the scale of discrimination against women in the Kingdom, Amnesty International said today.

“Flogging is a cruel punishment in all circumstances but it beggars belief that the authorities in Saudi Arabia have imposed lashes on a woman apparently for merely driving a car,” said Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Deputy Director Philip Luther. "

'via Blog this'

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Destination Wall Street

The Revolution Begins at Home: A Clarion Call to Join the Wall Street Protests | Activism & Vision | AlterNet: "At some point the number of people occupying Wall Street -- whether that's 5,000, 10,000 or 50,000 -- will force the powers that be to offer concessions. No one can say how many people it will take or even how things will change exactly, but there is a real potential for bypassing a corrupt political process and for realizing a society based on human needs, not hedge fund profits. "

'via Blog this'

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With all due respect Christie is

Gov. Chris Christie Keeps Political Fans Guessing - NYTimes.com: "Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey failed to address intense speculation about his presidential ambitions on Tuesday night during a foreign policy address at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California."

With all due respect Christie is

A walking time bomb

His explosive character is a function

Of what we call physical proclivities

The man was hospitalized this summer

Not knowing what the matter was exactly
We all live on borrowed time

When he says he is not ready

He is saying I do not know if I am up to this

He isn't

He should have a heart to heart with Nadler
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Nano Memory

New 'FeTRAM' is promising computer memory technology: "This diagram shows the layout for a new type of computer memory that could be faster than the existing commercial memory and use far less power than flash memory devices."

'via Blog this'

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Do you feel free?

'Taking Liberties' — New Book on What We All Lost After 9/11 | American Civil Liberties Union: "Patriot Act amendments let the government spy on Americans using a Cold War era statute designed for tracking the covert activities of Soviet agents."

'via Blog this'

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Was Jesus ever completely serious?

Play is Abba's Way. Play is Being Playful. That's OK - Associated Content from Yahoo! - associatedcontent.com: "Play celebrates our lives. Was Jesus ever completely serious? Somber artists say so. We need the Jesus of play more. Play is for children. Jesus said we need to become as children. When children play, Jesus is among them."

'via Blog this'


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All words for G-d lead to I Am I

Abba's Way - Stephen C. Rose : IUniverse:

There is no word that is above all words. Only the sign of freedom which is implicit in I Am I. Words for the divine are accents that imply mindsets. Abba implies the sense that Jesus has of the I Am I.

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Where's the profit in reduced interest rates?

3quarksdaily: Operation Twist and the Limits of Monetary Policy in a Credit Economy: "If the problem with reduced real rates was simply that they were likely to be ineffective, there could still be a case for pursuing monetary policy initiatives aimed at reducing real rates. One could argue that even a small positive effect is better than not trying anything. But this unfortunately is not the case."

Steve's Law: Knowing what people have done is not an infallible way of guessing what they will do.

'via Blog this'

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