A brilliant (if long) piece by Drew Weston

Does Your Language Shape How You Think?

An amazing story about how languages do shape how we think. And it's not just Whorf recycled.

If you speak a Guugu Yimithirr-style language, your memories of anything that you might ever want to report will have to be stored with cardinal directions as part of the picture. One Guugu Yimithirr speaker was filmed telling his friends the story of how in his youth, he capsized in shark-infested waters. He and an older person were caught in a storm, and their boat tipped over. They both jumped into the water and managed to swim nearly three miles to the shore, only to discover that the missionary for whom they worked was far more concerned at the loss of the boat than relieved at their miraculous escape. Apart from the dramatic content, the remarkable thing about the story was that it was remembered throughout in cardinal directions: the speaker jumped into the water on the western side of the boat, his companion to the east of the boat, they saw a giant shark swimming north and so on. Perhaps the cardinal directions were just made up for the occasion? Well, quite by chance, the same person was filmed some years later telling the same story. The cardinal directions matched exactly in the two tellings. Even more remarkable were the spontaneous hand gestures that accompanied the story. For instance, the direction in which the boat rolled over was gestured in the correct geographic orientation, regardless of the direction the speaker was facing in the two films. …

For instance, some languages, like Matses in Peru, oblige their speakers, like the finickiest of lawyers, to specify exactly how they came to know about the facts they are reporting. You cannot simply say, as in English, “An animal passed here.” You have to specify, using a different verbal form, whether this was directly experienced (you saw the animal passing), inferred (you saw footprints), conjectured (animals generally pass there that time of day), hearsay or such. If a statement is reported with the incorrect “evidentiality,” it is considered a lie. So if, for instance, you ask a Matses man how many wives he has, unless he can actually see his wives at that very moment, he would have to answer in the past tense and would say something like “There were two last time I checked.” After all, given that the wives are not present, he cannot be absolutely certain that one of them hasn’t died or run off with another man since he last saw them, even if this was only five minutes ago. So he cannot report it as a certain fact in the present tense. Does the need to think constantly about epistemology in such a careful and sophisticated manner inform the speakers’ outlook on life or their sense of truth and causation? When our experimental tools are less blunt, such questions will be amenable to empirical study.

"Brother can you spare a dime?"

Krugman has this video on his blog. It's a great song.

Your religion affects what you see.

From Science/AAAS | Editors' Choice : 27 August 2010; 329 (5995).

Colzato et al. have looked at the linkage between religious upbringing and visual perception in three … populations—neo-Calvinists in the Netherlands, Roman Catholics in Italy, and Orthodox Jews in Israel—and found that adherents of each of these religions differed from atheists of the same cultural background. The Calvinists, whose tradition emphasizes the role of the individual, showed greater visual attentiveness to local features, whereas the big picture perspective was favored by Catholics and Jews, whose traditions stress social togetherness.

Collective thinking

From Science/AAAS | This Week in Science: 27 August 2010; 329 (5995).

When two people peer into the distance and try to figure out if a faint number is a three or an eight, classical signal detection theory states that the joint decision can only be as good as that of the person with higher visual acuity. Bahrami et al. (p. 1081; see the Perspective by Ernst) propose that a discussion not only of what each person perceives but also of the degree of confidence in those assignments can improve the overall sensitivity of the decision. Using a traditional contrast-detection task, they showed that, when the individuals did not differ too much in their powers of visual discrimination, collective decision-making significantly improved sensitivity. The model offered here formalizes debates held since the Enlightenment about whether collective thinking can outperform that of elite individuals.

"Free Trade"

Dean Baker has a nice piece on "so-called free trade."

The Washington Post has a front page article telling readers that the debate over the Korean 'free trade' agreement is actually 'a dispute over free trade itself.' The Korean trade agreement is not in fact a 'free trade' agreement. It does not free trade in many areas, for example it does little to reduce barriers to trade for highly paid professional services, like doctors and lawyers' services. The deal also increases some barriers to trade, most notably by increasing copyright and patent protection.

The proponents of the deal use the term 'free trade agreement,' because 'free' has a positive connotation which they hope will help sell the deal politically. They do not use the term because it is true.

Similarly, it is absurd to claim that the United States is having a 'dispute over free trade itself.' There are no prominent public figures who support free trade. Genuine free trade would eliminate barriers to trade in all goods and services. In areas where these barriers are greatest, like health care, free trade could have an enormous impact in improving living standards and reducing inequality since prices in the United States are so far out of line with prices in the rest of the world.

Instead, the trade agenda of the United States had been about reducing barriers to trade in manufactured goods with the purpose of putting non-college educated workers in direct competition with much lower paid workers in other countries. The predicted and actual result of this policy is to reduce the pay of non-college educated workers, thereby increasing inequality in the United States. This is a policy of one-sided protectionism. It has nothing to do with 'free trade.'

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Monetizing Emma

Monetizing Emma: the genius trust

Neat T-Shirts

by Amorphia Apparel

A cute Target protest video

It goes on a bit too long. I would have stopped after about 2 minutes.

I doubt that I'd have the guts to do that. Can you imagine this happening at your local Target?

Click here to sign a MoveOn anti-Target petition.

More corporate shenanigans

From
Courage Campaign | Stop Anthem: Sign the letter demanding they stop blocking implementation of the health care law

Anthem Blue Cross made headlines earlier this year when they proposed a whopping 39% rate increase for their health insurance policies. Now they're trying to stop the implementation of the federal health care law here in California.

Anthem Blue Cross is going all-out to fight the implementation of the federal health care reform law here in California. While the public’s attention is elsewhere, Anthem is fighting to kill the bills that would set up the state-based “exchanges” that are the heart of the health care law.

If Anthem gets their way, they’ll make it difficult for you to get affordable health insurance. They’re counting on you to stay silent as they once again destroy reform.

We're not going to let that happen. That’s why the Courage Campaign is joining with Wendell Potter to deliver a letter to the new president of Anthem Blue Cross, Pam Kehaly, to demand that she and her company stop trying to undermine the health care reform law in California. Will you add your name to the letter now?

Dear Ms. Kehaly,

We're paying attention. We're not going to let you get away with your efforts to undermine the federal health care reform law.

We demand that you and Anthem Blue Cross drop your opposition to AB 1602 and SB 900, the bills that set up the state-based health insurance exchange that is at the heart of the new law. We want the state of California to manage these exchanges, negotiate for affordable rates, and provide Californians with the affordable health care that the federal law offers.

We are not going to rest until every California has affordable health care. And that begins with passing these bills to implement the federal law.