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#certainty

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WIST Quotations

A quotation from Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Men are idolaters, and want something to look at and kiss and hug, or throw themselves down before; they always did, they always will; and if you don’t make it of wood, you must make it of words, which are just as much used for idols as promissory notes are used for values.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809-1894) American poet, essayist, scholar

Article (1872-05), “The Poet at the Breakfast-Table,” Atlantic Monthly

Sourcing, notes: wist.info/holmes-sr-oliver-wen…

#quote#quotes#quotation
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Chuck Darwin

Experts warn the type of catastrophe Houston has just suffered
— a combined #power #outage with a #heat #wave
— is a scenario that cities and states are unprepared for.

“I don’t think it’s likely
— I think it’s an #absolute #certainty,”
said Brian Stone,
a professor and director of the Urban Climate Lab at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

“I think it’s an absolute certainty that we will have an extreme heat wave and an extended blackout in the United States.”

The Washington Post analyzed the risks of a prolonged, citywide blackout coinciding with a more severe heat wave.

The results show that such a heat wave
💥could kill between 600 and 1,500 people in the Houston metro area over five days.

With the power grid working normally, the same heat wave would lead to around 50 deaths.

To estimate the number of deaths, The Post created a statistical model that follows a peer-reviewed study from 2023 with some simplifying assumptions.

The analysis incorporates detailed models of how indoor heat exposure would rise in a blackout, developed by Amir Baniassadi, an expert on environmental health and indoor heat at Harvard Medical School.

washingtonpost.com/climate-env

The Washington Post · Hurricane-fueled blackouts could devastate Houston and other U.S. citiesBy Niko Kommenda, Shannon Osaka, Simon Ducroquet
Public
Futurist Jim Carroll

Daily Inspiration: "Chasing success? Be fast, bold, disruptive, focused, certain, flexible, anticipatory, and young at heart!" - Futurist Jim Carroll

Two days ago, I found myself in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, where I was the closing keynote speaker for the annual meeting of Protein Canada. (The song by the Guess Who might resonate in your mind!)

The organization is at the forefront of industry efforts to position Canada in the fast-emerging global plant-based protein industry. There is no doubt that we are seeing a seismic shift in consumer behavior as new dietary alternatives take hold, as global food demand continues to increase, and as new forms of opportunity and disruption envelope the industry.. built around these themes.

After taking them on a tour of trends and opportunities, disruptive ideas, and innovation, I closed with this slide, which is one of my Daily Inspiration posts from a few years ago.

Think BIG! Your future will thank you for it!

#Success #Innovation #Boldness #Disruption #Focus #Certainty #Flexibility #Anticipation #Agility #Future

Original post: jimcarroll.com/2024/09/daily-i

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guyjantic has moved!

I stopped fitting into American #conservative circles a couple of decades ago. One major chafing point was conservative (and religious; I was that) obsession with #certainty, black-and-white thinking, #binary thought about almost everything important, rigid rules for evaluation and deciding that didn't hold up to scrutiny.

Almost every aspect of life is more complex and nuanced--and context-dependent--than can be encapsulated by cut-and-dried, easily-learned rules of thumb.

This is also the reason I sometimes get nasty comments or flat-out rejection from #liberal or #progressive groups. My sense is that, in the 80s and early 90s when American liberals were out in the cold, so to speak, the majority seemed more focused on critical thought. As the movement has grown, and "liberal" has become cool among the young folks, by necessity there has been an increase in people who are liberal because it's cool, there is free food at rallies, everyone they know is liberal, nobody will date conservatives in their high school, etc.

I feel like there are more people (especially online) trying to be liberal by learning and living by proverbs, yes/no rules, and binary perspectives that have a liberal spin instead of similar concepts from the right-wing side of things.

When I point this out, people get annoyed. Sometimes.

Just so you can get annoyed, too, here are some things that are easy to support with rational argumentation or empirical evidence, but will get you a nasty response if you say them in liberal social circles:

- "Obama eroded journalistic freedom and persecuted Chelsea Manning"

- "Some social programs cost more than they are worth"

- "Men are sexually abused by women at rates nearly as high as the other way around"

- [lists names of Democrats who voted for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and for the PATRIOT act]

- "Not all men"

Binary thinking, black-and-white evaluation, living life by rules of thumb, and (most importantly, perhaps) making sure you think and say things that fit with your social group (in person or online) are not ways to make the world better. They lead to turnkey conservatism, with all the problems of that way of thinking.

[Note: Many liberal talking points make sense in a specific context--usually responding to bad-faith arguments by right-wing trolls. I get that. But they lose an awful lot of their rationality in other contexts.]

#criticalthinking#unpopularopinion
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