Resigning Psychologist: Anti-Racism Replaces Science at the Academic Excellence National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC)

Russell Warne has resigned from NAGC. He explains:

[A] recent turn of events has made me unable to continue to be part of NAGC. On July 14, 2020, the organization’s board announced its “Expanded Vision for NAGC.” This document is the board’s plan “to confront systemic racism and advance equity for Black students in gifted education.” While I support diversifying gifted programs and providing educational opportunities to children from all demographic groups, this document sacrifices open scholarly inquiry on the altar of social justice activism.

Continue ReadingResigning Psychologist: Anti-Racism Replaces Science at the Academic Excellence National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC)

Tower Grove Park in St. Louis: A Way to Celebrate Each Other Despite COVID

I'm repeatedly falling in love with Tower Grove Park, which is a short walking distance from my home in the near south side of St. Louis. At the TGP website, one can read: "The mission of Tower Grove Park is to be an exemplary, well-preserved and well-presented, wooded Victorian park of international significance . . . " Absolutely true.  I took these photos tonight to offer you the opportunity to see why I tend to exude over the top when talking about TGP.  The sun was setting as I took these photos; there is no time of day when this park fails to inspire.  I avoided invading the privacy of the people in these photos, but even total darkness is not a reason to leave for many of them.

While COVID keeps wearing us down, a newfound appreciation for magic places like TGP is a silver lining: People from the surrounding neighborhoods are increasingly celebrating this park. I never seen so many families using the park. Friends gather at a distance under the gazebos or on picnic blankets. It is a sacred place of peaceful celebration. No matter what day it is, I am likely to think of that classic Chicago tune, "Saturday in the Park." It is impossible to walk through TGP without soaking in upbeat social vibes from a vibrant melting pot of people representing numerous languages and demographics. I speak for all of my neighbors when I say: This upbeat diversity is why I live in this neighborhood.

That TGP serves as such a respite from COVID is not a surprise. TGP's 289 acres are covered with more than 7,000 gorgeous trees. You can easily and safely social distance from many hundreds of people in such a vast area. BTW, Central Park in NYC is 840 acres, which is smaller than the biggest park in St. Louis, Forest Park, with 1326 acres.

I try to get at least one long brisk walk every day in Tower Grove Park. I also tend to do some of my writing on a park bench or under one of the many gazebos. Along with my own photos, I'm going to include a compilation of sketches by a lithograph company called Compton & Dry, which created a detailed drawing of the City of St. Louis in 1875, probably with the assistance of some balloon flights. In this compilation, you can see that TGP had been laid out before any of the houses in the surrounding areas were built. This is city planning at its best, thanks to a man named Henry Shaw, who donated this land to the City of St. Louis in 1866.

That's it for now, my Ode to Tower Grove Park. I hope that you too are finding relief from COVID, at least once in a while, by reconnecting with your community at your neighborhood parks.

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Video Games: Empty Digital Calories

Joe Rogan nails it re video games. They are dangerous because they are way too much fun.

They are digital opium. And then you look up from your game console several years later and you realize that you threw a big chunk of your life away. You could have been working on your real life. I know of several relationships that were distressed or destroyed because the guy couldn't or wouldn't walk away from video games.

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Senator Ted Cruz Invites Eric Weinstein to Diagnose the United States

It is critically important for you to watch this one-hour video, "The Verdict," Hosted by Senator Ted Cruz. If you are thinking "Why the fuck would I want to see any show hosted by Ted Cruz, you are a big part of the problem, because on this show (released July 23) Cruz has reached far from his comfort zone, inviting Eric Weinstein as a guest. If you are worried about the future of the United States, I guarantee that you have an hour for this.

I follow Eric Weinstein on Twitter and on the "Dark Web" because he is consistently brilliant. I found this video on Weinstein's Twitter feed. I didn't quite know what to expect if you put Eric in the same room as Ted Cruz, but it was riveting, and I respect Cruz for giving Weinstein lots of space to present ideas that are highly critical of both the left and the right. The resulting conversation was not out of any typical political playbook and it offers promising new ways to conceptualize intransigent national conundrums.

Topics included the abject failure of both political parties. The rise of the Maoists on the Left. The fact that the moderates of the two dominant parties need to jettison their extremes and come together. "WTF happened in 1971?" The fact that "rent-seeking" (the practice by which the source of one's wealth is non-productive) has destroyed national growth; the resulting economic stress is exposing social pathogens that have always been around, but they are now more visible. The modern media as Shakespeare's character of Iago, poisoning our national dialogue at every turn. "Russell Conjugations" (referencing Bertrand Russell). Our failure to practice "Critical Feelings" (as opposed to critical thinking) ("Most of our feelings are not OUR feelings, but feelings that we inherit through daily programming, convincing us that those people that think differently than us are evil." The failures of universities. The lies about immigration that are a cover-up to a scheme to exchange citizenship for free university labor. That a successful national response to COVID-19 should have been a "layup," and what this failure says about us (our entire leadership class of both parties is "unworkable").

[Ted Cruz]: How do we get from Othello to midsummer night's dream?

[Eric Weinstein]:

The key issue is that we have to start talking about our own failures. What I hope you've heard is that I'm willing to call out the Left, the right, and the libertarian. The libertarian problem is that it doesn't work to pretend that we're all atomistic. We see that with respect to contagion and masks and the like. Arnold Kling has this beautiful description. He says that you have three Groups: progressives conservatives and Libertarians. Libertarians are animated principally by hating coercion, progressives are animated principally by hating oppression, and conservatives are principally animated by needless loss of hard-won traditions and gains over past generations. The answer is that any sensible person should want to make sure that they're optimizing among the three, and not to become part of a simplistic situation whereby they so hate coercion or so hate oppression that they lose sight of the entire picture and therefore lose the plot of the American Project.

Continue ReadingSenator Ted Cruz Invites Eric Weinstein to Diagnose the United States

How to Become an Award-Winning Woke Researcher Overnight, and Why this is a Terrible Thing for Civil Rights in America.

How to become an award-winning Woke all-star author instantly, and why the success of this pranking-seeming project is a terrible thing for civil rights in America. Special Honor to physicist Alan Sokal for pioneering this approach to pouring sunshine on nonsense. James Lindsay, Peter Boghossian and Helen Pluckrose did the hard work to make this happen.

Continue ReadingHow to Become an Award-Winning Woke Researcher Overnight, and Why this is a Terrible Thing for Civil Rights in America.