Paul M Peterson

Aldert Vrij, from the journal Law and Human Behavior, says, speaking of a recent study

“We hypothesised that the responses of pairs of liars would correspond less with each other than would responses of pairs of truth tellers, but only when the responses are given to unanticipated questions. Liars and truth tellers were interviewed individually about having had lunch together in a restaurant. The interviewer asked typical opening questions which we expected the liars to anticipate, followed by questions about spatial and/or temporal information which we expected suspects not to anticipate, and also a request to draw the layout of the restaurant. The results supported the hypothesis, and based on correspondence in responses to the unanticipated questions, up to 80% of liars and truth tellers could be correctly classified, particularly when assessing drawings.”

In other words, you can sniff out a group of liars by assessing the overall variety in their responses to the same question.

This is the reason both presidential candidates generally avoid question and answer town hall type meetings unless they can plant audience members who ask them scripted questions.

(Photo courtesy of lightproofbox)

“When a man lies he murders some part of the world”- Merlin from Excalibur

While researching this post, which was going to be about the consequences of lying, I found that almost everything written on the subject was about parenting. Articles about how to get your child to stop lying abound. It is obvious why: parents need help keeping their offspring honest, so they have a high degree of curiosity on the subject.

In as much as the parent-child relationship is a metaphor for the relationship between authority and the ruled, this exclusivity of content reveals an interesting bias. Why shouldn’t there be a manual for children to help them cope with a lying parent? Why is there so little attention paid to the psycho-social needs of children, workers, patients, students, voters, parishioners, prisoners, soldiers and suspected criminals in the face of the absurdly gargantuan quantity of lies coming at them from their parents, bosses, doctors, teachers, politicians, preachers, jailors, officers and sheriffs. The former are part of a dependent class that the latter seeks to control.

This is where the noble lies of society and culture come in. Any one seeking to write a manual which helps the dependent classes cope with the realities of modern life necessarily undermines the authority of the latter classes. And, in the case of children at least, it might just be more humane to encourage their ignorance by making up fantasy explanations for hardships of life.

It has been two weeks since Barrack Obama has won the presidency. The right wing is already on the attack and Nancy Pelosi is already eager to concede any mandate. With friends like these, who needs enemies?

Rush Limbaugh has already cast doubt on Obama’s mandate and Nancy has admonished Obama to “bring people together to reach consensus” and that a “new president must govern from the middle”.

The reality is Barrack Obama has a very concrete mandate and it is a four part-er. First, fix the economy. Second, end the war in Iraq. Third, promote clean energy and energy independence. Fourth, reform the health care system.

Easier said than done, right? In all likelihood not all of these goals will be met. However, the good news is that they are to some extent intertwined. Progress in one area will affect the others.

The whole of the punditocracy now concerns themselves with how Barrack, a president they never thought they would have, should govern. I hope Barrack simply ignores them. They do not have the requisite skill in lateral thinking necessary to solve any of these very large problems.

Warning: Watching this video too many times may stimulate some viewers to jump off buildings in the attempt to fly. Massively freaked video tripology is on display below. This is a pretty good simulation of psychedelic sensory perception, if you ate the brown acid tabs at a city cafe in mid-afternoon.

Stare at it four about ten minutes and you will be hypnotized! It is beyond kaleidoscopic. It is a swirling, vibrating mass of sound and color. The only thing this video cannot capture is the experience of having millions of thoughts stream through your consciousness simultaneously. That aspect of the experience is why people consider psychedelia to be visionary. Relax, surf the waves of chaos. As you watch, keep in mind the wise words of Willy Wonka: “We are the music makers; We are the dreamers of the dreams”

(Video Courtesy of jjccccc)

This video is so weird watching it causes abdominal cramps and head twisting. It has a dorky synth banjo soundtrack that is kind of funny.

I think I met this dude before. It was after summoning the Gods of Darkness and Strife (nudge, nudge, wink, wink). This is so grotesque. He looks like a down syndrome troll with impacted molars. What does it make you think of?

(Video Courtesy of lazermatt)

in the video below, Rhodes scholar and Rodan mimic, Ted Nugent articulately utilizes reasoned debate and enlightened dialectic to expound upon his position regarding the regulation of assault rifles. Just Kidding. Actually, this douche nozzle wields a presumably loaded assault rifle, calls president elect Obama a “punk” and invites him to “suck on it,” before a crowd of grunting, knuckle dragging, crap flinging neo nazis. Considering that Obama is protected by a veritable army of secret service agents and that making a verbal threat while showing evidence of the physical ability and motivation to carry out said threat is felony assault, this may not have been the smartest career move the nuge has made. He may be cutting his next album in a SHUE unit in federal prison. Good going, Ted!

(Video Courtesy of pentm450)

Proposition 8 is the one of the worst propositions I have seen passed in California, in my lifetime. Proponents of Prop 8 played to the stupidest fears of the voter, the Homosexuality will be taught in schools, etc. Reality check: Being gay is not contagious. I have a number of gay friends and I have never been even remotely interested in having sex the way they do. There is no excuse for stigmatizing a group of people and then selectively removing their rights. The precedent set by Proposition 8 weakens equal protection under the law. This is more important than whether or not little billy finds out what a BJ is.

This is embarassing to me as a Californian. Aren’t we supposed to be above all of this shit?

you can support the effort to overturn Proposition 8 by signing the petition.

(Video Courtesy of TheRealNews)

Before George Bush

After George Bush

I voted for Ralph Nader in 2000. I support most of the causes that he purports to care about. Watching his slide into irrelevance has been a sad, confusing experience. The video below was found on Wonderland or Not’s Post-Election Notes. On the day Barrack Obama won the presidency, most of the right wing talk radio commentariat were polite, conciliatory and respectful of the historic nature of this win. I have to give them recognition for that because they were in no way obligated to recognize or respect anything. Ralphie, on the other hand, had an awful lot to saym in the video below.
Ralph Nader, I will never support anything you do again. Go to hell.