The Kobe rumors

This blog has certainly enjoyed wearing out various trade scenarios for one Kobe Bryant, and the plausibility of one coming to fruition has never seemed higher. The leading candidate remains the Chicago Bulls, with rumors having the Lakers asking for Deng, Gordon, Thomas and Noah, and the Bulls and Kobe rejecting it - Kobe can reject it because he has a no-trade clause, and can turn down a deal if he deems it leaves his new team too depleted. The Bulls Paxson is known for playing hardball, and despite the media fit if it happens (imagine the Chicago Tribune headlines when it turns out they turned down getting MJ version 2), I halfway suspect they won't make the deal. The most plausible version may involve salary cap chicanery that has PJ Brown sign and traded with a 1-year contract (but never having to report for work as a Laker) along with 2 or 3 of those 4 youngsters.

If Kupchak is dumb and feels he has to deal Kobe to the Eastern conference, the Wiz and Gilbert Arenas look like the most likely deal; Kobe is thereby reunited with his friend Caron Butler. I think that is likely the worst deal the Lakers could make. But if Kupchak gets smart and trades for the best deal instead of insisting on sending Kobe East, new possibilities arise. The Mavs are one - while they won't swap Dirk, their love affair with Devin Harris won't get in the way of a deal. But salary cap restrictions mean a deal gets a bit complicated - the most plausible looks like Josh Howard plus Devin Harris plus some crappy bigs (Dampier, Mbenga) for Kobe + Radmanovic (whose snowboarding exploits and big contract make him a prime trade candidate for Lakers brass). The Mavs would still have Diop, Dirk, Stackhouse, Kobe and Jet Terry, plus various other bench parts, so this looks doable.

But my favorite deal (from a Laker standpoint) rumored so far is with the Suns, with Kobe heading to the Valley of the Sun for Barbosa, Marion, and the Suns-owned Hawks #1 pick in 2008. (It works under the cap). If I'm the Lakers, I can't imagine they'd get a better deal than that - not even from Dallas. And Phoenix would solve their Marion-Stoudamire standoff and give Nash some fearsome weapons. But, no bench. Could Phoenix win the title by playing Stoudamire, Diaw, GHill, Bell, Kobe, and Nash and almost no one else? I'd love to find out, for both their sakes and the Lakers.

fearless NBA predictions 2007-8

NBA predictions 2007-8:
Eastern Conference (ranked by playoff seed):
TEAM PROJECTED RECORD PROJECTED DIV. FINISH

1. Detroit Pistons 56-26 1st in Central
Sheed looks motivated, their bench may well be better, and they play well together. Plus, they won’t have to cover for CWebb on D.
2. Chicago Bulls 52-30 2nd in Central
I suspect the roster will change before Jan 2008, as I expect Kobe to become a Bull before New Year’s. How that will kill their chemistry will not become completely clear until the playoffs.
3. Boston Celtics 48-34 1st in Atlantic
The Big 3 will mostly mesh well, but Pierce and Allen may have health and/or chemistry issues by season’s end, and their weak bench will doom them in the playoffs. I expect Big Baby Davis to deserve major rotation minutes by then….
4. Atlanta Hawks 45-37 1st in Southeast
The shocker: someone has to win the division, and here they are, led by all-star Joe Johnson and the deepest team in the division. Al Horford will deserve the award, but with Durant’s pub will probably finish 2nd in ROY voting.
5. Cleveland Cavaliers 50-32 3rd in Central
LeBron will coast through a good portion of the schedule again, and his supporting cast is another year older, mostly a bad thing. Plus, Varejao remains unsigned… so my expectations are coming down a tad.
6. Miami Heat 44-38 2nd in Southeast
The Heat are an tough to predict this year, as the health of their big 2 and the chemistry issues with Ricky Davis multiply uncertainties. Still, the team is better with Davis taking A. Walker’s minutes, and Shaq and Wade should both play 50-60 games. In the weak East, that gets them in.
7. Orlando Magic 43-39 3rd in Southeast
Not a fan of R. Lewis or J. Nelson, but D Howard looks like he’s becoming a true beast. That plus getting something from Redick and Turkoglu should assure a playoff spot.
8. Toronto Raptors 43-39 2nd in Atlantic
They overachieved last year, but have a roster that should still play well together. Absent serious injury problems (esp to Bosh), I think they make it.
----out of playoffs:
9. New Jersey Nets 38-44 3rd in Atlantic
Vinsanity will coast with his new deal, RJeff will clang jumpers and/or get hurt, and Kidd will wish he had Olympians to pass to and will probably push behind the scenes for a trade.
10. Charlotte Bobcats 37-45 4th in Southeast
I agree with Hollinger – if Sean May didn’t get hurt, they’d have made the playoffs. Losing Adam Morrison helps, sad as it is to say. But GWallace is likely to get hurt at some point, dooming their playoff push.
11. Washington Wizards 35-47 5th in Southeast
Selfish gunners with no D, but older and slower and recovering from surgery. Yuck.
12. Milwaukee Bucks 35-47 4th in Central
Bad chemistry from the PGs who wanted to go to Miami in free agency, but stayed because of money/ restricted status. Plus, Yi (the bust) will play rotation minutes and kill them – cf Adam Morrison last season. That offsets improvement from Bogut.
13. New York Knicks 34-48 4th in Atlantic
The Knicks should be able to score, just because the NBA doesn’t call 3 seconds much and Curry and Randolph will do plenty of damage down low against the league tendency towards smaller, quicker bigs. But that same tendency will exacerbate their already lamentable defense, and their overrated guards (Marbury, Crawford, etc) may melt down if required to feed the post nonstop. By season’s end, it could be ugly in the media and on the team.
14. Indiana Pacers 29-53 5th in Central
The Pacers have a slow roster with trouble shooting and a big man who doesn’t want to be there and thinks he’s better than he actually is. And though I like Jim O’Brien, he’s no Rick Carlisle as a coach. Pain awaits.
15. Philadelphia 76ers 23-59 5th in Atlantic
As it becomes clear that Andre Miller is their best player, but well past his prime, and Iguodala merely tantalizes, this becomes the go-nowhere team for the next 5 years.


Playoffs: Miami upsets Boston and Orlando knocks off Kobe’s Bulls in the first round, joining Detroit and Cleveland. Detroit and Miami make the Eastern finals, where in a shocker, DWade makes a case that he deserved KG’s MVP trophy and the Heat have one last hurrah in the Finals.

Western Conference (ranked by playoff seed):
TEAM PROJECTED RECORD PROJECTED DIV. FINISH
1. Dallas Mavericks 59-23 1st in Southwest
They’ll slip from 67 wins, but remain the best regular season team in the league. Dirk will lose MVP to KG, but will have another fabulous season.
2. Houston Rockets 58-24 2nd in Southwest
Adelman’s been a great regular season coach, and Scola is a nice pickup. PG could be an issue, but they have multiple options there. Assuming McGrady’s back specialist keeps doing his magic, they look like a terrific team.
3. Phoenix Suns 54-28 1st in Pacific
The league is beginning to adjust to their style, and with their penurious owner’s personnel expulsions, their depth is now tissue thin. If the Stoudamire-Marion envyfest isn’t resolved, it could be a tough season, and I think their title dreams left with Nash’s bloody nose and the suspensions in last year’s playoffs.
4. Utah Jazz 50-32 1st in Northwest
Kirilenko will either be happier or traded, and Ronnie Brewer’s emergence will stabilize their 2-guard situation. Even if Boozer misses 20 games, they look like the class of the Northwest. If he misses 60, though….
5. San Antonio Spurs 56-26 3rd in Southwest
I think this is the year that some of the triumvirate of Parker/ Ginobili/ Duncan miss some serious time, although I expect them back healthy for the playoffs – and the veteran Popovich will be fine with that.
6. Denver Nuggets 47-35 2nd in Northwest
Questions galore: will Camby, Nene and Kmart stay healthy? Will AI and Melo shoot them into or out of more games? And can they find a decent PG?
7. Golden State Warriors 45-37 2nd in Pacific
Nellie’s show has Biedrins improving and good possibilities on defense, as (with the exception of Monta Ellis) their rotation players can all switch the pick and roll without mismatch problems thanks to their big guards/ swingmen. As long as Baron Davis stays healthy (admittedly a large conditional), I think they’re playoff bound.
8. Los Angeles Lakers 41-41 3rd in Pacific
The Lakers have depth, and are soon to be even deeper with the multiple players coming to town for Kobe. Once those fellows arrive and Kobe leaves, the pall will lift and the Lakers will make a late playoff push to come from behind to grab the 8th seed, led by new stars Luol Deng and Joakim Noah.
----out of playoffs:
9. New Orleans Hornets 39-43 4th in Southwest
Chris Paul should be an offensive juggernaut, and Chandler a defensive force. Unfortunately, they don’t have enough else to put them into the playoffs, and will rue the contract they gave Peja every day until it ends.
10. Memphis Grizzlies 38-44 5th in Southwest
A healthy Spanish tandem, a terrific young PG combo in Lowry and Conley, and Miller’s marksmanship from 3 – what’s not to like? Defense. But they should play entertaining ball under Phoenix transplant Iavaroni, at least.
11. Seattle SuperSonics 33-49 3rd in Northwest
Their young bigs are theoretically healthy, and you would think losing Lewis and Allen as swingmen would improve their D, however much it hurts their offense. You’d be wrong, as Durant will be a sieve. But he’ll score and board a bit (18 and 7 look about right) and get the ROY in a developmental year of what figures to be a long career in the great wet Northwest – or so the good citizens of Seattle hope.
12. Portland Trail Blazers 28-54 4th in Northwest
No Oden, Roy is hurting, and… they have four or five PGs and little interior defense. In 5 years they should be really good, but this year will be tough.
13. Sacramento Kings 26-56 4th in Pacific
The Kings have some good players – Martin, Artest – and Miller has reported in his best shape in a while. That said, they still may play the worst D around – well, except for the two teams still below them. Which are:
14. Los Angeles Clippers 24-58 5th in Pacific
The Clips looked like an old and selfish team last year; a year later, they lost their best player by far and otherwise did nothing to improve, and even didn’t address the player-coach locker-room cancer, letting Maggette fester all offseason, As he enters free agency next summer, think he’ll worry about anything but gunning? Their only hope is Elton’s early return, but he likely will never be the same player as before the Achilles snapped.
15. Minnesota Timberwolves 20-62 5th in Northwest
The Wolves went 32-50 with Garnett, and should not be better without him. Well, actually, they might on offense – but their defense should be sufficiently horrid as to overwhelm any offensive improvement - especially as the refs don't let youngsters get away with much on defense. But now, they have hope for the future – it was the right move, even if it came a year or 2 too late.

Playoffs: Dallas, Houston, Phoenix and the Spurs win the first round as expected. Dallas takes out the Spurs in an epic 2nd round, and Houston whips the Suns. And home court proves huge as Dallas whips the Rockets in 7 in the conference finals, setting up:

Finals: The rematch, Mavericks against Heat! Mark Cuban promises to have a team of retired refs analyze every call DWade gets as the series begins. The Mavs run Shaq ragged and hack him relentlessly, and sweep the first two; Miami gets 2 /3 at home, and the Mavs finally win the title in game 6 back home. Dirk is Finals MVP and lets all who questioned him have it with both barrels in the postgame news conference.

Regular season: MVP – KG. ROY- Durant.

Comments?

A-Rod, the franchise owner?

This report gives Yankee fans a reason to worry even as their grasp on a playoff spot is almost assured: Apparently, A-Rod's agent, the notorious Scott Boras, is involved with another deal - the sale of the Chicago Cubs. And the rumor going round is that A-Rod will declare free agency and sign with the Cubs, for a contract worth $300 million dollars and a share of the new ownership stake in the Cubs!

Short of Steinbrenner deciding to sell A-Rod a piece of the Yankees, this looks like a hard deal to beat; so this may be the last opportunity for Yankee fans to boo A-Rod as one of their own. I'd love to see A-Rod and Mark Cuban own the Cubs - unless he'd rather buy the Braves, that is.

Offense spreading?

College football is back, and quite exciting too - perhaps in part because scores seem to be on the rise; Oklahoma wins and averages 63 a game (!), and Louisville has perhaps the best passing QB in the land in Brian Brohm, throwing for 555 yards and 4 TDs in his last game - and losing. The famed 'black shirt' defense of Nebraska gave up 40+ for the second game in a row, the first time so doing in what seems like forever - and to Ball State! Even poor old Notre Dame, an offensive joke this season, scored two offensive TDs - and was still blown out, as its defense joined the crowd of those allowing over 30 points.

Recent years have shown the SEC as the best conference (followed by the Pac 10 - the Big 10 is now vastly overrated, and the Big 12 is top-heavy), and the big disparity with everyone else is on defense; the SEC annually has several teams in the top 20 on defense in raw stats, and even more if you adjust for strength of schedule.

One reason for the offensive explosion and SEC defensive dominance: the spread of the the spread offense, as popularized by Urban Meyer at Utah/ Florida and now many others. It makes team speed on defense more important than ever - and more particularly, skill in pass coverage and speed rushers.

The spread carves up zone defenses (played by slower, bigger defenses) by spreading them out and working the seams, and typically only the SEC (and a few other programs, like USC, Oklahoma or Texas) has the kind of athletes that can play effective man coverage on defense and also have front 4s that can rush the passer without blitzing. The return of the running QB (which gives the running game an option look, and/or an extra blocker) also helps offensive production a lot. Mike Vick would've accomplished much the same in the NFL, if he could've 1st, passed accurately, and 2nd, stayed out of trouble. But it will come, I expect. Be prepared for Pat White, Tim Tebow, Jake Locker and their ilk to be both running and passing in the NFL in a few years, revolutionizing the pro game as well.

Putin's provocations

First, Putin appoints a new prime minister seen as a mere placeholder, bypassing the two favored candidates; an action which completely upsets all the assumptions about succession and raise doubts that Putin will step down as President next year, as the current Russian constitution requires.

The same week, Gen Alexander Rushkin, Putin's deputy chief of staff, announces they have just dropped the 'father of all bombs', twice as deadly as the largest US bomb (the so-called MOAB), which, due to nanotechnology, has a core temperature twice that of the US bomb; Rushkin claims that where it explodes, "All that is alive merely evaporates." But some experts think they faked the videotape of the explosion - why, no one knows.

So we have a leader who likely has ordered political assassinations using radioactive polonium, who has subverted the rule of law and the political process, and even sidelined his main intra-party competitors; and has made many menacing comments and over the past year done many things (highlighted in some previous alarming posts) to make Russia an obvious military threat to its neighbors and the world again. In terms of his dangerousness to US interests, he makes Saddam look like a Boy Scout. But Bush has 'looked into his soul' and discovered we have nothing to worry about...

And we know to just trust Bush's judgment on these things.

Update: At least a few in the media have noticed. But CNN et al. continue to ignore Russia unless polonium poisoning is involved.

Greenspan's shocker about Iraq

It's difficult for any revelation to startle about the multifaceted debacle now called the war in Iraq (which includes a civil war, anti-terrorism raids, battles for Kurdish independence, attempts by Iran to undermine Iraqi sovereignty, and who knows how many other conflicts). But Alan Greenspan's new memoir turns the trick - in it, he claims that it's a shame the it was "politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil”.

Or more specifically, Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the security of oil supplies in the Middle East - and Bush wants those secured (for his friends in Big Oil) more than anything. As long as the terrorists pose an ongoing danger to Iraqi refineries and their US-compliant officials, it seems Bush's main purpose for the war remains in danger, and hence our troops will not withdraw. We may be there to provide security, all right - but not for ordinary Iraqis, of whom we are now responsible for killing more than 1 million since 2003. Instead, it's their oil wells that must be secured...

And the Iranian oil wells may have to be secured next. Get ready for more bombs!

When does personhood begin?

Personhood, properly understood, is not a species-specific concept; to believe otherwise is to commit the intellectual sin of speciesism, as well as ignore the raft of science-fiction shows as well as the work on AI that demonstrate the intellectual possibility (if not yet the physical actuality) of non-human persons.

That being said, not all humans are persons - fetuses, for example, are clearly not - rather, they are potential persons; beings which, if their developmental changes go well, will eventually become persons, but do not have such status yet. Analogously, my students are potential college graduates, but not actual college graduates; they have begun a process that, if all goes well and certain changes occur (like passing my class!), will result in their attaining the status of college graduate; but they do not have such status now, and may never do so, if things do not go well.

It is clear that the abilities which one must attain in order to become a person are mental; no body type or specific physical ability, like walking or eyesight, are required. An ability to pass the Turing Test - to convince an interlocutor that one could communicate indistinguishably from a normal human adult - seems sufficient, but perhaps not necessary. The kind of mental autonomy that we consider required for moral responsibility - for holding a person responsible for their actions - seems a better bet for a necessary and sufficient condition. Let's call that agency - the capacity for the rational exercise of free will.

Given the 'ought implies can' principle of ethics, along with the principle of alternative possibilities, a person can thus be defined as a being that has two or more courses of action open to them, and has rational control over which of the courses of action they pursue.

So when do humans make the transition from potential personhood to full fledged personhood? Under normal circumstances, at the age of two; and recent research has reinforced the finding that toddlers of that age have a social intelligence (of the sort required for such agency) missing from our most intelligent species relatives, chimps and orangutans.

So a normal neonate is not a person, but a normal two-year old has become one. One becomes a person (no matter what the species) when one becomes an agent. And although it is certainly conceptually possible to have members of many different species demonstrate agency, at the moment, only one species has convincingly demonstrated what it takes to be a person - Homo sapiens sapiens. (Although it is VERY interesting, to me anyway, to speculate on whether Neanderthal man had what it takes - I tend to believe (s)he did, and so two different species of persons co-existed for a while - perhaps until our species wiped them out, perhaps even eating them.)

So while I doubt very much that any extraterrestrial persons exist, it isn't because they are conceptually impossible - not at all. Rather, it's because I suspect that once persons evolve in any particular biosphere, they rapidly destroy themselves and the ecosystems required for their survival. In other words, I suspect many species across the Universe have attained personhood in the past - and none of them have lasted, or else we would be aware of them (or members of them!) now. It is the nature of intelligent civilizations to destroy themselves. Alas, that's another version of the Argument for Doomsday - from the Fermi Paradox. Hopefully I'll publish it in more detail soon... before it's too late!

Team USA recap

A little belatedly, a quick recap of Team USA's mostly successful summer of FIBA qualifying for the 2008 Olympics, and a suggestion about what they should do next summer:

The basics you likely know: the team went undefeated, and was never seriously challenged. In their closest game, their second-round match vs Argentina, they led by 15 (28-13) at the end of the first quarter - and the same margin at game's end. That game revealed the potential weakness of the team; at the end of two hard weeks of playing a game nearly every day, the team looked tired and was outscored the second half, despite the Argentinean star Luis Scola being in foul trouble and barely playing after that blowout first quarter.

The team had far better defensive intensity than past national squads, and their 3-point shooting was improved as well. If they continue that, they may be unbeatable - but Argentina gave a game while missing 5 current or former NBA players (Ginobili, Nocioni, Oberto, Herrmann, and Pepe Sanchez). And Spain, Italy, France and other Euro squads are also laden with NBA talent, and Greece beat the last USA squad with an advanced pick and roll game the US defense still struggles to stop. The depth of Team USA should make them better positioned to prevail at the ends of games and play better and better deep into a tournament in which games are played every day, and less talented teams must play their starters nearly 40 minutes every night. But the USA oddly seems to play worse in second halves - and this goes back to their losses over the last several competitions.

Hence, my suggestion: NBA players are psychologically used to playing 32-36, or even 40, minutes a game, but are used to playing tired on 'back to backs', much less when they have to play 3 or even 4 nights in a row. And easy way to make the Olympic schedule more like an NBA one would be to divide the roster into 3 groups of 4, and have 2 of those groups (8 men) play each game, while the other group of 4 gets the night off. That way, no one would ever play more than two nights in a row, and the team would truly be the freshest when it came to the games that really counted at tourney's end.

Here's how I'd divvy the roster up - first, from this summer's roster:
Group 1: Howard, LeBron, Kobe, Kidd
Group 2: Amare, Melo, Redd, Billups
Group 3: Chandler, Prince, Miller, DWilliams

That also corresponds to their pecking order in status. But I suspect Chris Bosh, Dwayne Wade, and less certainly, Elton Brand (if healthy), Chris Paul, and perhaps Shane Battier or Joe Johnson will make the team next season. So here's my projected groups, based on my expectations for next year's roster:

Group 1: Howard, LeBron, Kobe, Kidd (the same)
Group 2: Brand, Melo, DWade, Billups
Group 3: Bosh, Amare, Redd, DWilliams

Bosh would bump up to group 2 if Brand isn't healthy. Group 1 would be the fastbreak specialists, group 2 is better in the halfcourt, and group 3 would provide a shooter, 3rd PG, and size. If they use this roster with my proposed rotation, with group 1 and 2 playing against the toughest opponents, I suspect they could waltz to the gold. In any event, I think Team USA fails to take full advantage of its depth, and some system like mine should be instituted to help avoid another upset in 2008.

A Doomsday Device? Really?

My favorite film, Dr. Strangelove, is the tale of a rogue US general launching an accidental nuclear war, and the errors of command and control that result in one bomber not being recalled, even after everyone realizes it was all a mistake. The grim joke at the end of the movie, however, is that the USSR has built a 'Doomsday Device', so that if any nuclear attack on them is successful, they will automatically detonate numerous cobalt-jacketed hydrogen bombs all around the planet, releasing enough deadly fallout to render the Earth uninhabitable for humans for 93 years. Nothing can stop the device, once activated.

But surely this is all just a fantasy. As Dr. Strangelove himself says in the movie, what's the point of a Doomsday Device if you keep it a secret? Presumably no one actually wants the end of human life on Earth, so the only point of building a Doomsday Device is for its deterrent effect - and it can't have any deterrent effect if your enemy doesn't know of its existence!

Alas, we have reason again to think that reality is stranger than fiction. There's reason to believe the Soviets have built such a device, and have recently taken steps to reactivate it. Or more properly, they never deactivated it, and may be upgrading it. The claim: a system named Kosvinsky exists inside a mountain in Russia, able to communicate via VLF radio, which could work even during the massive radiation of nuclear fallout, and would coordinate and launch all Russian nuclear forces after an initial strike. This and more are part of a new book by P.D. Smith detailing the severity of the risk of all-out nuclear war using such a 'superweapon', whether started accidentally or otherwise.

The further rumor: Nuclear launch risk specialist Bruce Blair intimates that Bush's recent requests for a nuclear 'bunker-buster' bomb, supposedly for Iraqi or Iranian nuclear facilities, may actually have the Kosvinsky system in mind. And Putin has eagerly made clear that Russia's nuclear bombers are back in the air, saying “Our pilots have been grounded for too long. They are happy to start a new life.”

In short, Russia appears to be actively preparing for nuclear war, and has never been too keen on safeguards against accidental launch - preferring a certain counterattack, and a last-chance Doomsday machine that means the rest of the world will lose a nuclear war if they do. The Doomsday clock is at 5 minutes to midnight; I increasingly worry it should be closer.

The gods work in mysterious ways?

How does Pat Robertson et al. explain this one? Bunky Bartlett said he made a deal with his gods - let him win the Mega Millions lotto jackpot, and he would begin teaching Wicca fulltime. Amd guess what? He won.

Like all the other falsifications of the core beliefs of fundamentalist Christianity, this will no doubt be shrugged off and never mentioned. It simply shows how much the Christian religion has turned into a socio-political unfalsifiable ideology, rather than the all-encompassing worldview of the past that supposedly makes factual, testable assertions. Fundamentalist Christians are supposed to look condescendingly at those who treat the Resurrection of Jesus, or the Virgin Birth, or multitudinous other miracles as anything other than literal historical fact. They are supposed to be on the side of Elijah against the prophets of Baal, in which only those who believe in the true God have their prayers answered - and believers in false Gods have their prayers fall on deaf ears, unanswered, doomed to die at the hands of those who are the winners of the divine experimental method.

If so, why aren't they all Wiccans today? Christopher Hitchens explains it very well.

Jimmy loves John, and thoughts on competition

From the Kansas City Star:

"Jimmy Carter stops short of endorsing John Edwards, but calls him a candidate “whom I really admire.”

More: “I can say without equivocation that no one who is running for president has presented anywhere near as comprehensive and accurate a prediction of what our country ought to do in the field of environmental quality, in the field of health care for those who are not presently insured, for those who struggle with poverty.”

Of course, I couldn't agree more. Edwards' health care plan has successfully split the baby, by having an expanded version of Medicare available to all, but without that program being mandatory - so private insurers still have every chance to compete on price and coverage, but every citizen is covered, one way or another. It's an experiment that can help resolve the conservative canard that private business is always more efficient than government bureaucracies at providing the same services. In fact, China and Russia are already disproving that claim daily, as government businesses there routinely outperform private competitors in what is termed "state capitalism". Government bureaucracy has gotten a bad name because monopolies, whether private or public, breed sloth and poor management. The breakup of AT&T heralded an amazing growth in telecommunications in the US, and many believe Linux and Macintosh have far better operating systems than any version of the Windows monopoly. And so likewise for public businesses - think how much better the US Mail has gotten since Fedex, UPS, et al. came into being.

Our higher educational system, widely acclaimed the world's best by impartial rankings, is testament to the value of such competition - private and public colleges compete for students and much else, and the result is excellence unmatched elsewhere. And such public-private competition could also end the ravages of unemployment, corruption, and wage inequality, if allowed to flourish. More on that in a later post on the fundamentals of business ethics.

Bombing Iran?

Given the complete and utter debacle in Iraq - a fine book about it was aptly titled Fiasco - it beggars the imagination that we are actively planning a massive bombing attack on Iran that would (in theory) reduce the entire Iranian military apparatus to rubble in three days.

Verily, though, it appears we are; but surely we are leaking word of this proposed attack as a feint, a bluff, a threat of the stick in order to get Iran back to the carrots of the negotiating table, and get the IAEA inspectors back to their nuclear plants and achieve a diplomatic solution, right?

If some of those at the front lines are reading their tea leaves correctly (and telling the truth), then no - it's no feint; it's all too real, and we are at a stage much like Iraq in early 2003, in which the military decision has already been made, and the only question is the exact timing. According to this diary, all the "Air Operation Planning and Asset Tasking" have already been completed - all the targets inside Iran have been carefully selected, given a priority, and even the specific aircraft, bases, carriers, missile cruisers and so on have already been assigned their missions. The only query left - when does it begin?

The diary notes that officers and senior commanders who raised doubts about striking Iran have recently all been replaced. I am wary of trusting anonymously sourced testimonials from frontline military sources on future plans, but the source here sounds all too believable, and even admits she could be compromising a secret attack - but doesn't care, as she senses it is morally questionable, contrasting it to morally clear missions in Kosovo or helping tsunami victims.

If this is all a bluff, Bush is a better poker player than I think. So, I suspect it is not a bluff. Instead, look at where things are headed: Benjamin Netanyahu, a prominent Israeli politician who has repeatedly compared Iran's President Ahmadinejad to Hitler in 1938 (and helped persuade fundamentalist Christians that the US would be nuked right after Israel), has recently and easily won the race to lead Israel's hardline Likud Party, making him the favorite to become the new Israeli prime minister.

The result: the Israeli military now has a new spy satellite specifically designed to track the Iranian nuclear program, and the combination of Netanyahu's popularity and the apparent decision of the US to bomb has the current prime minister, Ehud Olmert doing - guess what? Well, in an article in Germany's Bild newspaper, Olmert compared Iran's president with Adolf Hitler for calling for Israel's destruction! Hmmm - I sense a rhetorical trend, and to Israeli ears, there's only one thing to do to someone who threatens a new Holocaust - and it's not containment or negotiations.

The context makes it even clearer: the remarks were published a day after the U.N. nuclear watchdog said Iran had failed to observe a deadline for halting uranium enrichment activity. And that's not all: Olmert went on to say:

"The West - above all under the leadership of the United States - will ensure that Iran under no circumstances comes to possess unconventional weapons.The president of the United States is a very brave man who understands that very well."

Putting 2 and 2 together, I'm guessing it is too late for Iran to have a peaceful end to its uranium enrichment activity. The Israelis now even have a new spy satellite that will help the American bombers do their jobs - and it just became operational. I'm guessing we will have a three-day war in Iran before the New Year - and no one knows what the terrible fallout of that will be. Only that it will take Iraq off the lead on the news!

Virtue ethics and the best candidate for President

From the perspective of virtue ethics, the worst moral dilemmas arise when people of virtue find themselves caught in situations in which the institutions in which they play their assigned roles are themselves corrupt; so that acting virtuously in your role, doing what you ought to be doing for the good of the institution, nonetheless detracts from the good of society. That is, what is good for you and the institution that defines your role, is simultaneously bad for the larger society in which you and your institution play a role.

Everyone understands this when we say that being a deadeye shooter helps one function excellently as a hitman for the Mob, but nonetheless your excellence in that role is not virtuous for the larger society. But the Mob is widely perceived as an illegitimate institution (Tony Soprano notwithstanding!), and so this is not a true moral dilemma. A truly calamitous moral situation is when an institution widely seen as moral, or the guardian of public morality, occupies such a negative role in the health of the body politic. And so the most grievous institutional evil is the moral failure of government - to have a government so wedded to corruption and pursuing its own agenda at the expense of the commonweal that even its virtuous members find themselves constantly tempted to do things that will advance their personal fortunes, but be terrible for society at large. Horribly, this now describes the US government. A true leader will face this and identify it as the crucial problem to be solved - the rest is all details.

One man running for President has done so; one is brave enough to say the following:

"Real change starts with being honest -- the system in Washington is rigged and our government is broken. It's rigged by greedy corporate powers to protect corporate profits. It's rigged by the very wealthy to ensure they become even wealthier. At the end of the day, it's rigged by all those who benefit from the established order of things. For them, more of the same means more money and more power. They'll do anything they can to keep things just the way they are -- not for the country, but for themselves."

That man's name is John Edwards. You should read the entire speech, recently given in New Hampshire; and then you should write him a check and tell him he has your vote. Those in power don't wish you to think hard about the culture of corruption, not when they benefit from it so much.

They also wish to trivialize the campaign and make nonsense of the true concepts of hypocrisy and concern for the poor. They wish to use the tools of media manipulation, fear, and false and mendacious advertising to twist you away from the truth - that their corruption continues only as long as you don't notice and don't put up a fight.

A real 'candidate for change' will have to be one who refuses to allow the accumulation of power and money by those in Washington upstage the search for truth and accountability. He or she must be one who can say (and act upon) the following:

"Politicians who care more about their careers than their constituents go along to get elected. They make easy promises to voters instead of challenging them to take responsibility for our country. And then they compromise even those promises to keep the lobbyists happy and the contributions coming.

Instead of serving the people and the nation, too many play the parlor game of Washington -- trading favors and campaign money, influencing votes and compromising legislation. It's a game that never ends, but every American knows -- it's time to end the game.

And it's time for the Democratic Party -- the party of the people -- to end it."

Only one candidate is willing to say this - John Edwards. Please support him.

Facts, values, and ethics

Query: Is there a clear distinction between facts and values? Do we have a world of hard facts about physical objects on one hand, and a wealth of intangible, fuzzy claims about 'values' on the other? Can 'values' just be whatever we want, or can they be different for different people?

Let's ask this a different way: Are value-statements clearly true or false (a view called cognitivism)? Notice this is a separate query from that of whether or not we can ever know that a value claim is true or false – you must answer the first question in the affirmative to have any chance of answering the second affirmatively.

The belief in an objective morality – involving a confutation of ethical relativism – depends on answering the first query in the affirmative. In other words, it depends on (at least) some values being facts. Hence, an inquiry into objective ethics already assumes a position in what’s called meta-ethics – the process of deciding between different ways of justifying moral judgments, which are made on basis of reasons.

The belief in an objective morality normally corresponds to a metaethics of moral realism (the idea that moral claims correspond to an external moral reality, independent of the individual or society). Here are some other possible metaethical views: Nihilism is the view that no way of justifying moral judgments is possible, because moral facts don’t exist. Contrast that to moral relativism (moral facts are relative to the individual (subjectivism) or a society/ culture (cultural relativism). Or emotivism – moral claims are simply disguised emotional attitudes/ outbursts. And so on.

Ethics is not merely an intellectual tool; its use (and misuse) informs many roles and jobs in our society. There are 4 basic types of moral investigation, or applying reason to morality:

Social Scientists – usually engage in descriptive ethics, describing the moral codes of a group, usually without passing judgment on their rightness or wrongness – e.g., a sociologist, or anthropologist, or some psychologists.

Casuists – apply ethics to concrete situations, usually to attempt to achieve some goal; they offer adjudication, defense, advice, enforcement, and a whole host of other activities related to a moral code for specific situations. Such casuists obviously include lawyers, but also judges, police, social workers, psychiatrists, therapists, teachers, and others.

Moralists/ Hortatory specialists – these people specialize in exhorting/persuading people to adopt certain moral rules or codes, or to adopt a certain way of life as better than others – they include ministers, politicians, and advertisers.

And finally, there’s what I do (and am doing right now), the:
Ethical theorist – who engages in critical examination and evaluation/ invention of ethical theories; they specialize in meta-theorizing - judging which systems can best render rational moral judgments. They evaluate the rational defensibility of various theories of ethics, and hence primarily engage in metaethics, or act as a philosopher of ethics. The primary focus is not directly on what one ought or ought not to do, but how to rationally justify whatever claims are made about what one ought or ought not to do. Of course, if the most rational ethical theory is the correct one, an ethical theorist will also have considerable practical information about what one ought to do, as one means of testing the metaethical virtues of competing theories. But the focus is on whether particular ethical theories (such as virtue ethics or utilitarianism) are true or false, and not on the practical issue of whether or not you should, say, give to charity.

So what ethical theory is the best – the truest? Or is it all relative? Stay tuned…

More on church-state separation

While on the topic of the separation of church and state, the concept has the potential to be a panacea for many other problem issues besides gay marriage. Here's one: Taxes.

You see, unlike any other charitable organization, churches are allowed to engage in religious discrimination, political fundraising, private education, and a host of other activities that are banned from receiving tax dollars (or sometimes even legal permission) for any other type of organization. A non-profit organization that engages in hiring discrimination based on religious beliefs, tries to instill those beliefs in impressionable children, and serves as a fundraiser for one political party would never be allowed - unless it called itself a church.

Most egregiously, these churches receive tax dollars both directly (under Bush's 'faith-based organization' slush fund for his supporters) and indirectly, by having their revenue stream be tax-free; in fact, their income qualifies as tax-deductible for those who fund it!

The separation of church and state, properly enforced, would acknowledge that churches are a business, with income, and should be taxed like any other private business and legislated like any other private business. That would include a legal responsibility against hiring discrimination in any non-BFOQ endeavors - i.e., they cannot discriminate against non-members when they hire teachers or janitors or cooks or accountants. They could only discriminate towards their own religious beliefs in a BFOQ situation - say, when hiring a new minister.

I am in favor of school competition and a limited voucher system experiment, but only if there is an exclusion for religious schools - no tax dollars should go to support a religion and the inculcation of its doctrine in young minds. In practice, as most schools receiving vouchers are Catholic or evangelical Protestant, that would effectively undermine all current programs - and just as well, as the teaching of religion is persuasively argued to be a far more insidious and important form of child abuse than the better known molestations by Catholic priests.

Gay marriage - a political solution

Gay marriage is one of those contentious issues in which one side feels strongly, but has no philosophically trenchant argument for their position - but it conforms to tradition, so is widely heralded. Whereas a significant minority make a compelling philosophical argument based on equality of rights, but are seen as undermining the established order and spreading immorality!

So how to finesse it? In some ways, it is like the civil rights movement - rational ethicists know what we should do, but how to sway public opinion to do the right thing? (This is aside from the further parallel with laws against mixed-race marriages that were one of the many Jim Crow laws the civil rights movement overthrew. As a further aside, the ability to get people to do the right thing when it is unpopular is a fair preliminary definition of leadership).

Ultimately, most people do want to do good - or at least have others perceive them as good - and so this is an issue in which moral suasion is required; thus, moral philosophers have an immediate role to play, in presenting convincing arguments for gay marriage and refuting the lame counterarguments that are raised.

My friend Dan has blogged about an old idea of mine (which he independently raised) for solving the problem; I thought I would enlarge on our shared idea here, with specific suggestions for how a politician could successfully frame it in these contentious times. The short version: make marriage an exclusively religious ceremony, and make civil unions an exclusively governmental function; so civil unions are the only thing recognized by the state, and are required for the state to recognize a legal union. Of course, this already de facto occurs in the requirement of a 'wedding license' for a marriage to be valid. As a matter of equal rights, any couple - gay or straight - would be eligible for a civil union, whereas it would be up to individual churches whether or not they wanted to perform the private ceremony of marriage for a couple.

Here's the way a politico could frame it:

'I am in favor of upholding the constitution, which this Administration has done so much to harm and subvert. A key principle of our constitution is the separation of church and state. Religious tolerance is a principle that goes back to the Founding Fathers, and our government is supposed to make no law respecting the establishment of one religion, or its peculiar emphases, over all the people; while simultaneously allowing any such private religion to flourish, according to the convictions of its own adherents, without thereby becoming the law of the land.

Gay marriage is an issue in which the separation of church and state has failed. Some churches (such as the Southern Baptists) refuse to allow gay marriage; others (such as the Unitarian Universalists) wholeheartedly endorse it. As a sacred institution, I wholeheartedly endorse the ability of any denomination to decide for itself whether or not to allow gay marriage. No church should be forced to endorse or officiate a ritual it finds repellent. But the religious divide on this issue also means that to legislate either the acceptability or non-acceptability of gay marriage is immediately to offend one religion or another.

As marriage is primarily a sacred, religious institution, the solution is simple: Get government out of the marriage business. The state has an interest in furthering the integrity of families and encouraging the good of its citizens, especially children; it also has an abiding interest in guaranteeing the equality of all citizens under the law. Gay couples are allowed to be parents, and repeated studies have shown that having two committed parents in the home helps children. Hence, the state has an interest in providing for legal civil unions for all couples, with full legal rights - and responsibilities. The state in fact has an obligation to provide such opportunity for civil unions for all its citizens, under the duty of equal treatment under the law. Hence, the existing system of requiring a wedding license for legal union should be turned into a federal requirement of the availability of civil union for any couple, gay or straight, regardless of religious affiliation. It would then be an entirely private religious matter whether or not any particular church wished to supply an accompanying religious ceremony of marriage to commemorate and sanctify the legal bond. '

Or in slogan form: "Marriage for the the religious, civil unions for all"

Some polls indicate civil unions would already be somewhat popular, dependent on how the issue is framed; but (to my knowledge) no one in the mainstream discourse has framed it as above. Why can't Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton or John Edwards say this right now? Spread the word!

The Guvernator's 'fiscal conservatism'

A program that has helped thousands of mentally ill homeless people avoid the cycle of hospitalization, jails and street life - a program that more than pays for itself in saved prison and hospital costs, to say nothing of the lives it enriches - is cut from the California budget.

What's saved? A tax break for yacht owners, that costs almost as much. After all, Senate Republican Leader Dick Ackerman owns a yacht... and we all know who the state should help more, yacht owners or the mentally ill homeless.

And make no mistake - this was a line item veto by Arnold. He knew well what he was doing. Any hope he would be a centrist force for the general welfare, as opposed to yet another captive of Republican special interests, further disappears. He fits right in with the national Republican party's movement to loot the public treasury of our hard-earned tax dollars for their own enrichment.

Perhaps it's time for another recall.... yea, even a Total Recall!

Libertarians - becoming Dems?

Libertarianism is a political philosophy that holds that property and liberty are the only fundamental rights, and those are to be interpreted as negative rights: they merely require others not to interfere with one as they choose to exercise the right (or not); they never require the active assistance of others. A libertarian thus believes helping others is not a duty, but charity. Your duty is not to interfere with others as they use their property, as long as they don't interfere with you. Robert Nozick's 'night watchman' state is perhaps the best known development of this philosophy in the 20th century.

Libertarians accordingly value very small government, believing most taxes are simply the theft of one's property by the government. They are anti-paternalistic; they would abolish the government agencies that tell us what to do or restrict our liberty to use our own property. So the FDA, the DEA, the Department of Education, the Department of Transportation, etc - all would disappear under a consistent libertarian regime. If you want to drive, pay for the roads yourself; if you want to use drugs, you're free to do so (as long as you don't harm others); if you want to engage in dog fighting with Michael Vick, go right ahead (as long as you use only dogs you properly own).

Libertarians have traditionally joined the Republican Party when they seek actual power (they have their own party, but it holds no high elected office). Ron Paul is probably their best known politician - a libertarian who joined the Republican party so he could get elected to Congress, and is now running for President - and has appeared on both the Daily Show and the Colbert Report, so breaking through into a modicum of the popular consciousness.

Libertarians have usually joined the Republicans because traditionally that was the party of smaller government spending and power - the party that emphasized, as traditional conservatives did, that government, like all humans, is flawed and is liable to abuse the power it holds, so it's best not to give it any more than necessary, in order to preserve liberty.

Reagan talked this way in 1980, but in fact considerably raised government spending. Much of that was due to a defense spending spree, and libertarians can countenance that, so many swallowed Reagan's increases; but they were not happy, and led the charge to ensure that Gingrich's ingenious plan to recapture Republican control of Congress, the 1994 'Contract With America', would trumpet smaller government and cutbacks in federal spending, as well as balancing the budget.

Gingrich's Contract was successful in getting Republicans control of the House, but once in power, the Republicans soon proved even more adept at deficit spending than Democrats, effectively lying to their libertarian supporters. Clinton presided over balanced budgets and even a surplus, but as soon as Republicans gained control of both the legislative and executive branches in January 2001, deficit spending soon hit all-time highs. Much of this (as under Reagan) was supposedly justified by defense spending (especially after 9/11), but in fact the Republicans have turned this into a partisan kleptocracy and plutocracy of the highest order. And the war in Iraq, a clear violation of libertarian principles (Ron Paul opposed it from the start), is simply the best means for the widespread looting of the federal treasury by criminals with Republican connections, aided and abetted by the current administration.

Libertarians value social liberty as well as the economic liberty of laissez-faire capitalism, so they have always co-existed uneasily with the religious fundamentalists within the Republican Party. So, those libertarians who actually want to have power and/or vote for a winner, look at the two parties and ask: which is now closer to my ideals - the party which has always emphasized social liberties and is the last to actually achieve balanced budgets and opposes military conscription and corruption, or the Republicans? The result: many libertarians are becoming Democrats - and the change in 2006 election results shows it. In the libertarian-leaning West, the Democrats made significant gains in traditional Republican strongholds - as e.g., Jon Tester, running on a largely libertarian-friendly platform, won election to the Senate from Montana - as a Democrat.

As the nation as a whole grows richer and markets better regulated and personal freedoms more precious than the question of where the next meal is coming from, I suspect libertarianism will become more and more popular as an ideology. The party that embraces it more thoroughly should thereby gain and retain power - and at the moment, that looks like the Democrats.

Yum!

Today Michelle and I ate again at the Art Cafe and Bakery, on the edge of downtown SLO in the Creamery. Next to an art gallery, the place is quirky and fun, and the owner and chief baker, Donna Nozzi, was an engaging proprietor. I had a scrumptious roast beef and cheddar sandwich on an absolutely divine horseradish Parmesan bread, which also comes with delicious fresh fruit; Michelle had the house specialty, the 'O'riginal curried chicken sandwich, and a large salad including shaved almonds and fresh greens.

Why make note? Well, it is one of our new favorite places to eat, and there's a backstory - it almost went out of business a few years ago, until Oprah found out about it, deemed the curried chicken sandwich the best ever, and wrote a check that saved the business. And so a tale was born - the place now boasts a large painting of Oprah on one wall - and lots of other art as well. Last year the original owner, Margaux Sky, finally quit, but Donna Nozzi took over and keeps using the same recipes.

So if you come to SLO, the Art Cafe is one great place to go. Who knows, you might even see Oprah herself... but don't count on it. Now, I wonder if Lindsay Lohan ate there when she was in town... nah, probably not; I didn't see any cocaine residue!

Torture of American whistleblowers in Iraq

The war in Iraq has hit its latest in the "I don't believe it" category: Navy vet Donald Vance, working for a reconstruction contractor in Iraq, witnessed illegal arms sales (helping us understand how over 190,000 weapons could go 'missing'), and reported the crimes (with documentation) to an FBI office in Chicago, because he didn't know who in Iraq he could trust.

The result: the US military detained and tortured him, for 97 days.

WTF? Why isn't George Bush, Congress, EVERYONE outraged and busy doing something about this? Why is the Justice Department refusing any investigation or even comment? Why are the criminals running things? And what will we do about it?

This war has eroded the moral capital the USA has built up ever since the fine words of Thomas Jefferson et al. in 1776. It may prove a turning point in the long-term recruitment of terrorists who will soon have access to true WMDs. For we have undermined the kind of international cooperation among many different nations that will be required to prevent biological and nanotechnological weapons from spreading. And so they will spread, and people will act on their grievances, with ever more sophisticated technology.

I suspect it is the beginning of the end - of us all.

Idiocy, taken for granted

'No child left behind' is the mantra of the Bush education program - an emphasis on simple tests (with the inevitability of teachers being evaluated thereby 'teaching to the test') and a simplification of the learning process, taking both the joy and the rigor out of it.

That tendency is bad enough, but the real problem is the way in which standards and expectations are being dumbed down to give an appearance of success - while failing to challenge the above-average students. In the desire to make sure that 'no child is left behind', we have made school too easy for the talented kids, and ignored the overwhelming power of peer pressure on learning. Our 20th century economical prowess was based only partially on widespread literacy - many other countries have it as well. The prime mover was our intellectual elite - American universities and their students as the best in the world. Between increasingly onerous immigration policies and the dumbing down of American primary and secondary schools, our intellectual leadership may soon be a thing of the past, with horrible consequences for us all.

Don't believe me? To quote from Newsweek:

"... why did the federal government quietly decide last year to drop out of an international study that would compare U.S. high-school students who take advanced science and math courses with their international counterparts?

The study, called TIMSS (Trends in Mathematics and Science Study) Advanced 2008, measures how high-school seniors are doing in algebra, geometry, calculus and physics with students taking similar subjects around the globe. In the past, the American results have been shockingly poor. In the last survey, taken in 1995, students from only two countries—Cyprus and South Africa—scored lower than U.S. school kids."

The short answer: we pulled out because we are likely to do even worse in the next round. We lag our developed countries in math and science because excellence therein is not rewarded, and having kids who kick ass in math and science is no longer a priority - at least, not as much as making sure many have a mediocre grasp of the subject, soon to be forgotten.

To become a world leader in educational attainment, we must get the incentives right, for both teachers and students. When our educational establishment/ government (and teacher's unions) reward those teachers with subject mastery who demand a great deal of their students, and when we as a culture decide our educational institutions should lionize those students who have high academic achievement (as opposed to, say, athletic achievement), then our schools will become great again. Otherwise, look forward to a world in which intellectual and physical capital - and hence power - moves increasingly to Asia, and the US becomes one more faded empire of history.

Trade Kobe, now

KG's in Boston, Jermaine O'Neal is overrated and not coming anyway, and Kobe still wants out of LA.

So, let him. It seems clear that if the Lakers wait a year to deal him, they will get less - re the Iverson and KG trades, in which teams traded too late and got less back. And keeping an overrated ballhog who doesn't want to play with his teammates and can force his way out in a year strikes me as disastrous.

So here's a trade that works under the salary cap (as of August 27) and I think the Bulls would make: Kobe for L. Deng, Ty Thomas, J. Noah, Ben Gordon, and T. Sefolosha. The Bulls would still still start Hinrich, Kobe, Nocioni, Joe Smith, Ben Wallace, with C. Duhon, V. Khyrapa, Adrian Griffin, Jameson Curry, Aaron Gray, and others they could still pick up - there are more than the usual number of cheap free agents left - off the bench. They would vitiate their depth, but their starting 5 would be fearsome.

The Lakers get multiple great pieces for a bright future. As a matter of fact, I think the 2007-8 Lakers will have a significantly better record if they make this trade than if they keep Kobe - to say nothing of further down the line. It's time - trade Kobe!

Best argument for the existence of God

The best argument for the existence of God -- from maximal creativity and ethical requiredness

suppose God is maximally great and creative, and supplanting POE and other counters as follows.

And suppose we have free will in sense of being able to cause things which god foresees but cannot stop – god must either create the universe which contains those things, or not create it, but once created, cannot interfere further.

Next, assume aggregative utilitarianism is true – the act is morally best which maximizes utility, where utility is understood as the balance of good over evil; more precisely, utility= total good minus total evil produced by the action

Then it follows that to be good Itself, God logically would choose to create all PWs in which good outweighs evil, to maximize net good in the multiverse.

So, God would create the BPW, but also many other PWs in which evil exists, down to those in which net good-evil is barely above zero. (Details of measure theory and how to determine smaller and smaller positive but non-zero measurements are interesting here, but don’t crucially affect the overall argument).

Accordingly, we could in fact choose differently, but in every case in which our actions did not tip the cosmic scale to net evil, another universe would have been foreseen and created by God – cf. the MWI of QM. So no surprise (re measure theory?) to find ourselves in a universe in which considerable evil exists – the majority of universes within the mutiverse are like that, and very few have little or no evil. It apparently remains meaningful to attempt to act so as to change things – that’s part of better universes which God will have created, and if we did not so act, it is possible the universe could have a negative utility and so not exist. (Problems with fatalism and choice may undermine this, but it has certainly seemed plausible to many theodicists).

So, we have a timeless or hypertime multiverse in which all our decisions are already foreseen but not directly caused, except for concurrent creative activity – i.e., those which led to net evil were never created and so are non-actual. This is the best attempt to account for free will, real evil, and rebut the problem of evil (POE) and still have a morally defensible and powerful, creative force as God.

Objections: this is not real free will/ morality, because of fatalism/ causal impotence; or a timeless god is unintelligible. Or there is no evidence for other universes, so belief in them is a gross violation of Occam’s razor.

But the most weighty objection to the argument in my mind is the assumption that utilitarianism is true – and in particular, the aggregative utilitarianism that presumes that it is better to make a multiverse with much evil contained therein, as long as the total good outweighs it, versus making a single universe with no evil whatsoever. The total good would be less, no doubt, than in the multiverse; but aggregative utilitarianism violates a rule that I think a truly omnibenevolent Creator must obey: first, do no harm.

More objections to aggregative utilitarianism as an ethical theory in a later post….

Doomsday and Bostrom's Simulation Argument

Many futurists believe that we will soon enter a ‘posthuman’ phase of civilization (often called, somewhat misleadingly, the 'Singularity', although it has nothing to do with black hole physics). Becoming posthuman will have profound implications for us all. These futurists typically assume that the phenomenon called Moore’s Law will continue for the enhancement of computing speed for the medium-term future, and also assume a philosophy of mind that makes strong AI possible – involving the belief that minds are simply incredibly complex algorithms, and minds are ‘substrate-neutral’ or 'substrate-independent' – that is, those algorithms currently run on hardware called ‘brains’, but in principle could run on other hardware, such as a computer. If these beliefs are true, it is clear that computers will be capable of human-level minds within the next 20 or 30 years, and will have minds that dwarf our ability to comprehend them a short while afterwards. These computer superminds will even be able to simulate reality; and a good enough simulation, given substrate neutrality, is indistinguishable from reality itself.

So we will become posthuman at some point in the coming century. What does that mean? Well, let’s define a ‘posthuman’ civilization as one that is able to simulate an entire world in a way largely or entirely indistinguishable from reality. That is, for posthumans, the distinction between virtual reality and ‘real’ reality begins to disappear. The computing power required for this is truly stupendous, but it is a finite number, and if the futurist assumptions are correct, our civilization will have such powers in well less than one hundred years!

The philosopher Nick Bostrom has advanced an argument that we have good reason to believe we actually inhabit such a simulation right now. His argument is a few years old, but its publication in the NY Times has made it far better known, so I’ll give just a quick recap:

Bostrom argues that one of the following three propositions is almost certainly true:

(1) the human species is very likely to go extinct before reaching a “posthuman” stage;
(2) or, any posthuman civilization is extremely unlikely to run a significant number of simulations of their evolutionary (‘world’) history (or variations thereof – ‘ancestor-histories’);
(3) or, we are almost certainly living in a computer simulation.

Bostrom indicates that under certain plausible assumptions, option 3 is the most likely. Unless our posthuman descendants are much more ethically circumscribed than us, the desire to run ‘ancestor-histories’, or counterfactual histories, will be great – just imagine the historians wanting to see what would have happened if the Nazis won WW2, or even you just wondering what would have happened if you’d married that high school sweetheart (or not, as the case may be). The temptation to run a large number of such simulations thus strikes me as overwhelming.

Further, if our universe is a simulation, it explains several oddities nicely – for example, why relativity and quantum mechanics can’t be meshed (QM because there must be some lower level of granularity in the simulation, relativity for making things flow smoothly within the simulation – though both can’t be ‘real’).

And it explains the strange applicability of the anthropic principle well – the idea that so much of what we observe, particularly the otherwise inexplicable physical constants such as the fine structure constant, the ratio of the gravitational force to electromagnetic forces, and so forth – why they all appear to be "rigged" so as to create conditions favorable to the origin of life in general and we humans in particular. They are so rigged because the universe is a simulation designed with us in mind!

But then, why were things that way in the original universe, which we're now simulating? Was it a simulation, too? There’s an infinite regress problem, one that we simulated beings could never solve. After all, who knows what things are like in the fundamental level of reality… whatever that is.

But there’s a problem – or two. First, one of Bostrom’s other options is that all intelligent civilizations self-destruct before they become posthuman. That, unfortunately, is completely compatible with all our evidence. In particular, it would explain Fermi’s paradox – if ETIs exist, where are they? Perhaps we’re in a simulation that didn’t bother with aliens – but why not? It wouldn’t be much more expensive to add them in. So, Occam’s razor suggests that any intelligent aliens that ever existed never made it to posthuman stage.

Worse, suppose we are in a simulation. In that case, we are well on the way to becoming posthuman ourselves – being able to run our own ( let's say third-level) simulations, within our own second-level simulation. But simulating even a single posthuman civilization looks to be extraordinarily expensive in computing terms. If so, unless our upper level simulators have nearly infinite resources, then we should expect our simulation to be terminated when we are about to become posthuman – that is, when we are about to become simulators ourselves.

So, either we are doomed never to reach the posthuman stage – in which case it’s Doomsday soon – or our simulation will be terminated as soon as we do so – in which case, it’s Doomsday soon. Either way, this simulation argument brings us depressingly closer to the conclusion that it’s Doomsday soon. I think the best counterargument actually claims that philosophers like John Searle are right and the futurists are wrong about the philosophy of mind underlying strong AI and posthumanism. If they’re right, I think it’s Doomsday soon. If not Doomsday by simulation shutdown, perhaps it will be by the rise of the machines – superhuman robotic intelligences, who supersede and destroy us. Stay tuned for the next Doomsday installment….

Team USA vs Team CSA?

I love historical counterfactuals – what if Europe had not appeased Hitler in 1938? (Or given Germany a less onerous treaty ending WW1?) Or what if Britain had won the American revolutionary war?

Or, what if the Confederacy had won the Civil War (or as some in my home state call it, the ‘War of Northern Agression’!) The usual counterfactual studied is something along the lines of – how long would it have been until the CSA abolished slavery (common guess – 1890s/ early 1900s). But in keeping with this blog, I have a very different counterfactual in mind – what would Team USA in hoops look like, if it didn’t have any players from the 11 states of the Confederacy?

That is, let’s compare a hypothetical Team CSA to a remnant Team USA. To qualify for Team CSA, I’ll say you had to be born or play high school ball in one of the 11 Confederate states – college doesn’t count. And we can start with the actual Team USA to begin – it turns out 12 members of the penultimate squad practicing in Vegas this summer don’t hail from the Confederacy, so we can make that our hypothetical Team USA:

Carmelo Anthony (Denver Nuggets); Shane Battier (Houston Rockets); Chauncey Billups (Detroit Pistons); Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers); Tyson Chandler (New Orleans Hornets); Kevin Durant (Seattle SuperSonics); Kirk Hinrich (Chicago Bulls); LeBron James (Cleveland Cavaliers); Jason Kidd (New Jersey Nets); Mike Miller (Memphis Grizzlies); Tayshaun Prince (Detroit Pistons); Michael Redd (Milwaukee Bucks);

Starters: Chandler, LeBron, Melo, Kobe, Kidd
Bench: Battier, Durant, Miller, Prince, Redd, Hinrich, Billups,

Not much size, so for the 2008 Olympics, they would no doubt sub Elton Brand (team member, but currently hurt) for Durant. Otherwise, this appears plausible.

For Team CSA, there are 4 current Team USA members that would thus be part of our hypothetical Team CSA:
Dwight Howard (Orlando Magic); Amaré Stoudemire (Phoenix Suns); Chris Bosh (Toronto Raptors); Deron Williams (Utah Jazz).

To fill out the roster, I add these players who hail from the Confederacy, and have been on Team USA in the past, or were invited to Team USA tryouts this year:
Joe Johnson, Chris Paul, Kevin Garnett, Tracy McGrady, Shaquille O’Neal, Vince Carter, Josh Howard, Shawn Marion

That gives us the following team:

Starters: Shaq, Amare, KG, TMac, Deron Williams
Bench: DHoward, Bosh, Marion, Joe Johnson, Josh Howard, Vince Carter, C. Paul

The take-home: I think the CSA team would crush the USA, particularly off the bench. If the old Shaq is around, the CSA would be unstoppable on offense, and even if he barely plays, the other bigs on the CSA easily trump the USA bigs (and that’s without guys like Jermaine O’Neal or Ben Wallace even making the squad!). Kidd is a great distributor, but no one else is for Team USA – and Chris Paul and Deron Williams give the CSA a great young 1-2 punch at PG. Kobe, Melo, and LeBron may be the three most overrated players in the league – I fear the real Team USA may lose this summer or next because of their inability to share well. TMac, Joe Johnson and Josh Howard have shown in their NBA careers that they can be ideal complimentary players, however. In short, team CSA looks like a better team.

So while in reality the South will not rise again, if they ever split for basketball purposes, the South would kick some ass, methinks.

Biological doomsday

The odds of the extinction of the human race occurring because of biological warfare (or accident) grow each and every day. Why? Because research and development of potentially lethal viral and bacterial pathogens continues, and the political and social conditions contributing to their release get worse and worse, not better.

Consider the fall of 2001; not long after the terror attacks of 9/11, there were the anthrax mailings that nearly paralyzed the postal system and killed a few people. The FBI investigated, they terrorized a scientist, Stephen Hatfill, who worked for USAMRIID (in Fort Detrick, Maryland) on circumstantial evidence, and even drained a pond in which he was alleged to have stashed the evidence in the end, and found ... nothing. In the end, they arrested... no one.

Why? Some conspiracy theorists believe it is because the anthrax terrorist could not be prosecuted, because the terrorist was a government official with evidence of US violations of the 1972 Convention on Biological Weapons, which states that it is illegal to "develop, produce, stockpile or otherwise acquire" such weapons.

Some of the alleged violations include the very weaponized anthrax used in the 2001 attacks, which were identical to a military grade and may have violated the biological weapons convention. Other alleged violations include the army's

"plan to test live microbes in "aerosol chambers" at the Edgewood Chemical Biological Center, also in Maryland. So does its development of a genetically modified fungus for attacking coca crops in Colombia, and GM bacteria for destroying materials belonging to enemy forces."

The upshot - either the US military, or some other government organization, continues to carry out biological warfare research, on organisms with potentially massive lethality. Compare that to known Soviet violations - in 1992 Russia made an official declaration of its past biological weapon activities, including work was done at Sverdlovsk (now Ekaterinburg) and other cities on mass production and dispersion as a weapon of biological agents. At the Sverdlovsk facility, the lab screwed up containment of their weaponized anthrax in April, 1979, with a result of (admitted) deaths of nearly 70 people downwind, and dead sheep for a distance of 50 kilometers. And non-state terror groups are willing to attempt biological warfare as well; Aum Shinrikyo wished to do so, but found sarin gas easier to use.

Now, with al-Qaeda and other terror groups discovering the power of asymmetric warfare, it seems only a matter of time until a member of such a group finds that biological warfare is one of the easiest means of attaining their aims. The technology for doing so becomes cheaper and more accessible all the time, and all that would be needed is someone with the appropriate training. And we know al-Qaeda can recruit doctors, so recruiting a research virologist shouldn't be much harder.

Making things worse for both state and non-state actors is the rise of genetic medicine made possible by the Human Genome Project. Before long it may be possible to genetically engineer pathogens that attack only certain genomes - making ethnic/ genetic 'cleansing' all the more plausible. But a counterattack, or a mutation, could make such an organism lethal not only to one's enemies, but one's own tribe/ oneself. And, through malice aforethought or accident, it seems inevitable that, if research on highly contagious and lethal organisms continues, it will eventually be let out. A bioweapons doomsday is extraordinarily plausible; to stop it will require overwhelming surveillance and/or ethical controls on primary research. I rank it second only to nanotechnology as an existential risk to humankind.

Have a great day!

Fixing the NBA, part 1

The NBA had extremely poor ratings for its marquee event, the Finals, and has had a tumultuous offseason, with the specter of organized crime and thrown games or at least point shaving / adding - and the possibility that more refs or even players were involved - hanging over the Tim Donaghy scandal, at least until all the facts are out.

So the NBA is in dire need of a makeover. KG and Kobe trade rumors will divert attention from the underlying problems for only so long, after all. And the man in charge, David Stern, seems to have lost some of his luster; one of his biggest fans, Bill Simmons, who used to write that Stern should be President, now compares him to a near-senile Red Auerbach, and says if the summer brings no changes, then it's time to '[take] away the car keys.'

So how to fix the NBA? Let me start with just one problem, and address others in later posts. First, the draft:

The very idea of the draft strikes me as immoral - the kind of thing that should be illegal. Aside from the odious connotations of slavery raised by elderly rich white men 'owning' young black men, determining their working conditions, their pay, and indeed their opportunity for employment in their chosen field, there's more to dislike: it violates the right to choose one's employer, taken for granted in labor relations in all other businesses besides professional sport.

Imagine you, a hotshot young med school grad, knowing there are numerous places around the country that would love to employ you - and being told instead that your 'rights' were owned by, say, the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN - and if you didn't want to move to their nice little burg and endure their godforsaken winters, well, you can just forget about being a doctor. Oh, and previous doctors likewise forced to labor there have bargained away any ability for you to determine your pay - you can accept what the Mayo Clinic is offering, or you can forget about being a doctor. At least, a paid doctor.

Naturally, there would be an uproar, marching in the streets, protests over the injustice involved; surely the defenders of free market capitalism would be apoplectic at so many of their most cherished principles being annihilated. Funny, then, the silence over sports league drafts. Certainly the athletes are well compensated despite being denied their most elementary bargaining rights - is that it? I doubt it; well-paid doctors would still scream bloody murder if this system were instituted. No, residual racism and an undue respect for tradition seem the more likely culprits.

But change involves the art of the possible; so while I think the draft should be abolished (and replaced with free agency for all, every year, doing away with both trades and long-term contracts), I will stick with something that could actually happen in my suggestions here. Just remember, for me what follows is a distant second best.

Given that the draft will continue, the most serious problem with it is the phenomenon of early entry, in which 22 year old (or older) seniors are drafted alongside callow 18-19 year old freshmen, making comparative evaluation an even trickier business. Allowing youngsters into the NBA also hurts the league in two other ways (at least): it weakens benches, in that youngsters who are 'projects' and whom the team control for 4 seasons are drafted and kept, over older players who have less 'projection' but are better players NOW. So the quality of play is hurt by early entry, at least as it exists now. The introduction of the minor league NBDL and the ability of teams to option players mitigates this, but only partially.

The second way it hurts the league is through compensation issues - players know they hit their large, long-term paydays only after they have been in the league long enough to qualify for free agency, so they have every incentive to begin that process as early as possible, both to get to free agency at a younger age and to maximize their number of opportunities at free agency throughout their career. Teams hence have to pay major cash to players at young ages, or lose them, and hence are making mammoth money judgments under far more uncertainty than would be the case if they could wait a bit longer. Suboptimal asset allocation results - in layman's terms, busts get a big payday too often.

Given my preferred solution is a non-starter (no draft, free agency for all every year, with Bird rights to go over cap to re-sign players who had been with their team 3+ seasons - to help with continuity) - well, what's second-best?

Here's my suggestion: Make the draft eligible to anyone (removing possible legal problems that deserve a suit by some 18-year old soon). But dictate that anyone who enters the league before they are 21 (or their college class graduates) is ineligible for a multiyear contract or slot money - they must be paid as a free agent, and are automatically free agents again after one season. But they cannot sign a long-term contract until they are 21 - no matter when they entered the league.

This rule, if put into force, would greatly reduce the undergraduate 'project' early entry problem. An early-entry player would be like a one-year 'street' free agent, and the team would have no additional incentive (in terms of keeping that player for the future) over a similar veteran. Indeed, less, for the vet could sign a multiyear contract if he exceeded expectations. A LeBron could still declare straight out of high school, but he would be property of the team that drafted him for only one season. Hence, he would only be drafted if it was worth it for that year, not because of future expectations for his greatness.

The result: better benches and players in the league, and the free publicity (and scouting, with attendant diminution of risk) that the NCAA hype machine provides would likewise make rookies far better bets, and far better known and loved, once they actually entered the league. And the few exceptions, like a LeBron, would engender even more publicity as teams vied to acquire his services a season at a time, especially as he entered his age 21 season and the prospect of signing him long-term.

In short, this would be a remedy for much of what ails the draft process. Mr. Stern, I wish you were listening....

Ranking NL offenses by road scoring

Perceptions in baseball are funny things; pundits on Baseball Tonight look at the Padres and see their pitching is ranked first in the league, but their offense is near the bottom, and say that the Pads need offensive help, and their great pitching is the key to what winning they do. Trades are endlessly discussed to remedy these perceived shortcomings, as the talking heads assert the Pads need to pick up a hitter, whereas the young Diamondback offense is coming along, and they need more pitching to stay in first.

The pundits seem to be oblivious to park effects, alas. As a result, most of what they say is stupid, and even flat out wrong. The best way to show this is to find a way to eliminate park effects - there are a number, but the simplest quick one is simply to look at road scoring. Park effects are almost entirely washed out over the course of a season on the road, so much fairer comparisons of team strengths and weaknesses can be gleaned from such data.

So without further ado, the NL team road scoring, in runs per game, through August 9:
(Gaps are an attempt to indicate the relative differences between teams – the top 2 are much better than #3, which is much better than #4. But #s 9-11 could easily change in a single game, they’re so close).

1 Philadelphia 5.39

2 Atlanta 5.25


3 NY Mets 5.03


4 Florida 4.79

5 San Diego 4.71


6 Milwaukee 4.52

7 Colorado 4.46

8 Cincinnati 4.43

9 LA Dodgers 4.39
10 Houston 4.38
11 St. Louis 4.38

12 Chicago Cubs 4.35

13 San Francisco 4.28


14 Pittsburgh 4.05

15 Washington 3.95

16 Arizona 3.83

Lessons: Arizona looks like a decent offense only because of their home park, which is a hitter’s paradise; they actually have the worst offense in the league, but (contrary to reputation) the best pitching in the division, and Brandon Webb is making a persuasive Cy Young case. They need help with hitting, not pitching, to stay in first!

Conversely, the Padres actually have a solid offense, 5th in the league; Petco serves to disguise just how good their offense is (and likewise makes their pitching appear much better than it actually is). They may regret trading away part of their bullpen in Scott Linebrink, perhaps mistakenly believing their pitching is better than it actually is.

To a lesser extent, the same overvaluing of their pitching is true of the Giants and Dodgers – but the Dodger offense truly has become woeful as well, and trading Betemit and keeping Nomar at 3b may keep them out of a playoff berth.

On the other hand, the top 4 offenses are all in the NL East! Again, this is disguised by Shea Stadium and Dolphins Stadium being severe pitcher’s parks, and Turner Field being mildly so, but these offenses can rock! The addition of Teixiera to the Braves and the loss of Utley by the Phils may presage a change in the top 2 spots. Now, if Atlanta could only find some bullpen help, they could easily be the favorite to win the East title yet again…

And Milwaukee is (slightly) the best of a sad bunch in the Central. But despite ROY Ryan Braun, they are trending the wrong way. But the Cubs lost Soriano, and the Cards offense has sunk to Astros level - yikes! Jim Edmonds is about done, and Scott Rolen looks unlikely to ever return to all-star status. (But at least Pujols is heating up, Cards fans - behold the next Stan Musial). Nonetheless, the Central remains a sea of mediocrity or worse - and I still maintain that 6 teams from the NL East and West will have a record at least as good as the Central winner. (Not that that will stop them from perhaps winning the World Series, as the 2006 champion Cardinals can attest!)

More NBA flashbacks...

Is it 1995 all over again - Shaq and Penny together in Florida? Yes, it seems - the Heat have signed Penny Hardaway to play for them next season. Perhaps Pat Riley has been channeling Danny Ainge too much, or simply got desperate when Mo Williams, Michael Pietrus, and the other guards targeted this offseason failed to sign. But it can't be exactly a ringing endorsement of the free agents available when retired, washed-up vets are signing contracts in front of them.

Say, is that Michael Jordan working out in Chicago? Who says three retirements is enough....