Seven Big Economic Lies
Do tax cuts for the rich trickle down to the rest of us? And does taxing the rich hurt the economy? Is Social security a Ponzi scheme? Robert Reich, Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton, presents his list of seven popular-wisdom economic claims that are untrue. Feel free to debate.
Silk Road (The Website With Every Illegal Drug Imaginable For Sale) Is Hiring
Adrianne Jeffries notes that Silk Road is one hot startup, for BetaBeat:
No publicity is bad publicity: Silk Road, the illicit online marketplace that came to light after Gawker’s Adrian Chen announced you could buy any drug imaginable there with Bitcoins, has been booming after increased awareness due to a rash of alarmist press coverage.
Drugs! Anonymous currencies! Hackers! Our children! But gradually Silk Road, and to a lesser degree Bitcoin, faded from the stage, largely because most people couldn’t understand how to use them. Silk Road can only be accessed using the anonymous network Tor, and you should probably know a thing or two about encryption before you buy anything.
But as we learned via a few Bitcoining Betabeat readers, Silk Road is doing really well—well enough to expand its anonymous team. “Silk Road is currently hiring a database expert and a customer support team member,” writes one reader. “On top of the ordinary ‘describe…
Gingrich’s Path To Statehood For A Space Colony
Wondering if the Constitution still applies when gravity does not? Newt Gingrich believes so. Buzzfeed dug up Newt’s 1981 bill laying out rules of governance for a future 20,000-person U.S. colony on the moon or Mars. At the moment he’s being bashed from all sides for this, but I think it’s fantastic:
Yesterday Newt Gingrich revealed his “weirdest idea ever” — to provide a path to statehood for a hypothetical lunar colony.
With the help of the skilled research librarians in the Library of Congress Law Library, BuzzFeed tracked down the bill, which Gingrich called the “Northwest Ordinance for Space,” or formally the “National Space and Aeronautics Policy Act of 1981.”
“The Congress declares that the United States is committed to the expansion of free people and free institutions into space,” the bill stated, calling for an array of near earth and solar space travel vehicles to be completed by 2010.
It also called for…
America’s Bad Girlfriend: Mossad Agents Impersonate CIA To Foment Trouble In Iran
Another sad one. I think everybody’s had a Crazy Girlfriend at some time in their youth. It’s all thrills and drama before you’re mature enough to realize that the untraceable charges for men’s clothing on your cedit card and cryptic messages on your answering machine are signs of a deep, deep feeback loop of Daddy Problems, self-loathing and manipulation. Unwitingly you’ve signed yourselves up to play the roles of abuse victim/avenger and rescuer/cuckold.
Few of us have had totally ideal childhoods, but self-aware people usually get past this stuff by the time they’ve graduated college. The scipts get more and more alike and the Law of Diminishing Returns kicks in.
If you’re altruistic types you’ll try to talk through the whole thing rationally before retreating to your separate corners in order to get your heads together. Ideally you’ll be able to part on friendly terms, but more often there are some undignified…
Low Intelligence & Conservative Beliefs Linked To Prejudice & Racism
It took a team of crack scientists to reach this shocking conclusion, reported at Live Science via Yahoo News:
There’s no gentle way to put it: People who give in to racism and prejudice may simply be dumb, according to a new study that is bound to stir public controversy.
The research finds that children with low intelligence are more likely to hold prejudiced attitudes as adults. These findings point to a vicious cycle, according to lead researcher Gordon Hodson, a psychologist at Brock University in Ontario.
Low-intelligence adults tend to gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies, the study found. Those ideologies, in turn, stress hierarchy and resistance to change, attitudes that can contribute to prejudice, Hodson wrote in an email to LiveScience.
“Prejudice is extremely complex and multifaceted, making it critical that any factors contributing to bias are uncovered and understood,” he said.
Controversy ahead
The findings combine three hot-button topics.“They’ve pulled off the trifecta of controversial…
The 8 Most Obnoxious Internet Commenters
I’m a combination of #8, #5, #6, #3 and #2. Which are you? (Don’t lie now, all Disinfo commenters are at least one.) Via Cracked:
Under every video on YouTube or Break, and under every story on Digg or even right here on Cracked, there is a mini-culture that forms down in the comment section. The hit-and-run nature of the comments means it’s fertile ground for some really annoying personalities to thrive.
These are the eight commenter personality types you’d most like to avoid, but can’t because they’re freaking everywhere.
#8. The Non-Believer
Typical Comment: “FAKE! Did you see how that guy exploded just BEFORE he hit the tree. Fake, don’t waste my time.”
Who Are They? They like to think of themselves as the jaded skeptic in a world full of gullible sheeple, determined to be a flickering light of truth in a dark internet full of lies and fake viral videos. “No one could really fart on…
How To Be A Dictator
In the Economist, political scientist Alastair Smith explains, in a series of simple tips and instructions, how you too could successfully bend an entire nation to your cruel will:
It doesn’t matter whether you are a dictator, a democratic leader, head of a charity or a sports organisation, the same things go on. Firstly, you don’t rule by yourself—you need supporters to keep you there, and what determines how you best survive is how many supporters you have and how big a pool you can draw these supporters from.
You can’t personally go around and terrorise everyone. Our poor old struggling Syrian president is not personally killing people on the streets. He needs the support of his family, senior generals who are willing to go out and kill people on his behalf. The common misconception is that you need support from the vast majority of the population, but that’s typically not true.…
Pieces Of Planet Mars Landed In Africa Last Summer
Obviously, the best result from inspection would be (additional) evidence of Martian lifeforms. Via the Globe and Mail:
Scientists are confirming a recent and rare invasion from Mars: meteorite chunks from the red planet that fell in Morocco last July. The fireball was spotted in the sky six months ago, but the rocks weren’t discovered on the ground until December.
The last time a Martian meteorite fell and was found fresh was in 1962. All the known Martian rocks on Earth add up to less than 240 pounds. This is an important and unique opportunity for scientists trying to learn about Mars’ potential for life. So far, no NASA or Russian spacecraft has returned bits of Mars, so the only Martian samples scientists can examine are those that come here in a meteorite shower.
Scientists and collectors of meteorites are ecstatic, and already the rocks are fetching big bucks because they are among…
Personality Disorders To Be Removed From Psychiatrists’ Bible
Via ScienceDaily:
A newly published paper from Rhode Island Hospital reports on the impact to patients if five personality disorders are removed from the upcoming revision to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, 5th edition (DSM-5).
Based on their study, the researchers believe these changes could result in false-negative diagnoses for patients. The paper is published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry and is now available online in advance of print.
The DSM-5 Personality and Personality Disorders work group made several recommendations to change the approach toward diagnosing personality disorders. One of those recommendations is to delete five personality disorders as a way to reduce the level of comorbidity among the disorders. The ones originally slated to be removed include paranoid, schizoid, histrionic, narcissistic and dependent personality disorders.
More recently, the Work Group recommended that narcissistic be retained. Lead author Mark Zimmerman, M.D., director of outpatient psychiatry at Rhode Island Hospital, points out, however, that no…
‘Magic Mushroom Therapy’ Clinical Trials May Begin This Year In U.K.
We may be just a few years away from going to our neighborhood pharmacies for our monthly supply of medicinal mushrooms. From the Independent:
Magic mushrooms could one day be prescribed for depression after Professor David Nutt, the controversial sacked government drugs advisor, claimed research on healthy volunteers proved what a mistake it was to abandon therapeutic psychedelic drugs more than 50 years ago.
The first clinical trial into magic mushroom therapy could start by the end of the year after two small studies suggested the active chemical, psilocybin, had a profound affect on key regions of the brain.
Professor Nutt’s team, at Imperial College London, hope to test the hallucinogen on depressed patients who have not benefited from antidepressants or behavioural therapy.
Psilocybin would be infused into their bloodstreams before a psychotherapy session, tailored to elicit positive memories. If funding is approved by the Medical Research Council it would represent a major step…
Let’s Be Clear, Ron Paul Fucking Sucks. Here Are 20 Reasons Why
Before admirers of Representative Paul go crazy, I didn’t write this post (or the headline) and I don’t endorse it (neither does disinformation), but I am interested in your well argued debate as to whether or not the little red umbrella author is right about any (or all?) of his points:
Every single one of the candidates currently running for the Republican nomination is a walking disaster. But one of them, Texas congressman Ron Paul, seems to be getting a disturbing amount of support from liberals. Mostly that’s because his nut-job libertarian views happen to not sound so nutty on a handful of issues. He wants to end the War on Drugs. He is against the death penalty. He would not support a constitutional ban on gay marriage. He was opposed to the War in Iraq and wants to end all American military intervention abroad. All of that sounds pretty good to…
Warning: This Site Contains Conspiracy Theories
I am sure this question posed by Evgeny Morozov on Slate, “Does Google have a responsibility to help stop the spread of 9/11 denialism, anti-vaccine activism, and other fringe beliefs?” will be quite provocative for readers of Disinformation. As Evgeny Morozov writes on Slate:
In its early days, the Web was often imagined as a global clearinghouse — a new type of library, with the sum total of human knowledge always at our fingertips. That much has happened — but with a twist: In addition to borrowing existing items from its vast collections, we, the patrons, could also deposit our own books, pamphlets and other scribbles — with no or little quality control.
Such democratization of information-gathering — when accompanied by smart institutional and technological arrangements — has been tremendously useful, giving us Wikipedia and Twitter. But it has also spawned thousands of sites that undermine scientific consensus, overturn well-established facts, and…
Believe It Or Not: 7 Facts You’re Not Supposed To Know About Religion
[Site editor's note: the Huffington Post recently published some excerpts from the new Disinformation title 50 Things You're Not Supposed To Know: Religion, authored by Daniele Bolelli.]
Religion is one of those big taboo topics that many people are terrified to touch: too afraid that others will question their religious loyalties and just as afraid to step on the minefield that is the overhyped sensitivity of some believers.
And this is precisely why it is so much fun to talk about it.
People, after all, live and die in the names of religious values, so the stakes of what we are playing with couldn’t be any higher. And yet, few fields can make many human beings as unwilling to face the evidence as religion. It is exactly because these ideas are so central to their lives that they don’t want anyone to plant doubts in their minds.
If this is you—if you are afraid of tackling contradictions,…
Happy Amnesia, I Mean, Australia Day!
I am an Australian (for the time being: citizenship now being reviewed, I’m sure) and I endorse this message from Juice Rap News:
So, with prejudice and pride, let our freaky flag of racism fly over the crumbling ruins of indigenous history!
Blood Runs From Sewers In Polish Town
A pretty good reminder that meat is murder, society is built on barbarism, et cetera. Via the Telegraph:
Residents of Koscierzyna, a small Polish town, called in the police and ambulance service to investigate after blood began streaming out from under manhole covers. After bubbling out through holes in the covers, the blood formed a river of red that flowed along a road in the Polish town forming large bloody puddles.
An investigation revealed that the blood had come from a meat processing plant and had seeped onto the streets because of a blocked drain.
“There are two schools on the street where a large amount of blood was flowing,” wrote one angry resident on a news website. “The blood was also heading towards a local market. When you consider public health this situation is appalling.”
People also questioned as to how the blood had managed to leave the meat processing plant without any…
The Sinister Vision Of Street View
9eyes is one of the best collections of Google Street View screenshots, providing a haunting glimpse of the world we live in, culled from all seven continents and presented without context. Are all of these real? Some of the strangest entries can be confirmed as legitimate.
Boy’s Eyes Glow In The Dark, See In Night Vision
Is he a “starchild”? Part-alien DNA seems like the most rational explanation for this:
A boy has stunned medics with his ability to see in pitch black with eyes that glow in the dark. Doctors have studied Nong Youhui’s amazing eyesight since his dad took him to hospital in Dahua, southern China, concerned over his bright blue eyes.
Dad Ling said: “They told me he would grow out of it and that his eyes would stop glowing and turn black like most Chinese people but they never did.” Medical tests conducted in complete darkness show Youhui can read perfectly without any light and sees as clearly as most people do during the day.
Massive Solar Storm Hits Earth
Rerouting airplanes isn’t a big deal, but could there be dangers from the radiation? Doug Cameron reports for the Wall Street Journal:
Delta Air Lines Inc. said Tuesday that it was rerouting some transpolar flights between Asia and the U.S. to avoid the impact of the largest solar storm in almost a decade.
The Atlanta-based carrier said some flights to Detroit from Hong Kong, Shanghai and Seoul took a more southerly routing on overnight flights, though a spokesman said planes flew faster to keep schedules intact. Tuesday departures from the U.S. were expected to follow similar routes.
A rare solar flare erupted late Sunday night resulting in a solar radiation storm today, according to NASA. It’s the strongest such storm since September 2005, according to NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center.
Airlines occasionally reroute transpolar flights as a precautionary measure during big solar storms, with radiation levels heightened…
