sábado, 31 de dezembro de 2016

Murrray Bookchin

" Starting in the 1970s, Bookchin argued that the arena for libertarian social change should be the municipal level. In a 2001 interview he summarized his views this way: "The overriding problem is to change the structure of society so that people gain power. The best arena to do that is the municipality—the city, town, and village—where we have an opportunity to create a face-to-face democracy."[27] In 1980 Bookchin used the term "libertarian municipalism", to describe a sys...tem in which libertarian institutions of directly democratic assemblies would oppose and replace the state with a confederation of free municipalities.[28] Libertarian municipalism intends to create a situation in which the two powers—the municipal confederations and the nation-state—cannot coexist.[27] Its supporters—Communalists—believe it to be the means to achieve a rational society, and its structure becomes the organization of society."
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Murray Bookchin (January 14, 1921 – July 30, 2006)[5] was an American anarchist and libertarian socialist author, orator, historian, and political theorist. A pioneer in the ecology movement,[6] Bookchin initiated the critical theory of social ecology within anarchist, libertarian socialist, and eco...
en.wikipedia.org

sexta-feira, 30 de dezembro de 2016

Thomas Sowell

Thomas Sowell is that rarest of things among serious academics: plainspoken. This characteristic, a by-product of both his innate temperament and the intellectual courage for...
commentarymagazine.com|Por Kevin D. Williamson

Stairway to Heaven

typus
Typus Mundi   A análise alquímica da letra “Stairway to Heaven”não é uma tentativa para encontrar símbolos e…
rafdaher.wordpress.com

Análise da letra “Stairway to Heaven”

Typus Mundi

A análise alquímica da letra “Stairway to Heaven”não é uma tentativa para encontrar símbolos e parábolas através de um “wishful thinking”, mas uma interpretação da própria estrutura da letra, que segue a mesma sequência das fases da obra alquímica, com os mesmos símbolos utilizados em diversos tratados de alquimistas célebres. Além disso, a ligação de Jimmy Page com o ocultismo é notória: o símbolo que Jimmy Page escolheu para representa-lo foi inspirado no Sigilo de Saturno do Grimório Alquímico Ars Magica Arteficii, de Cardano, um importante alquimista. Page também possuía um grande interesse em Crowley, um dos grandes alquimistas modernos.
There’s a lady who’s sure all that glitters is gold
And she’s buying a stairway to heaven
And when she gets there she knows if the stores are all close
With a word she can get what she came for
A Alquimia é chamada nos tratados dos artífices de “Virgem”, “Dama“, “Senhora”, “Esposa”. Recebe títulos femininos por ser a Senhora do Filósofo, pois vai se acasalar com o “Filósofo” (o Alquimista). A Alquimia não é uma ciência natural (embora envolva parte da ciência natural), mas uma ciência gnóstica, que fornece um conhecimento incognoscível à razão humana.
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Jaxques Barzun

"Barzun's life has, indeed, been a happy, prolonged immersion in a pretty high level of civilization, starting with the circumstance of his birth. His father was a prominent author in that fin-de-siècle France best described by Proust's In Seach of Lost Time. As a mere infant, he met his father's friends, Modernist icons like Apollinaire and Duchamp. After finishing his schooling at the lyceé, Barzun, on his father's advice, came to the United States. This was a rather advent...urous move: As Barzun puts it, "I more or less expected to see Indians and cowboys riding down Broadway." Graduating from Columbia University, he stayed on there, as a professor of cultural history, from 1927 to 1975. Although he was of retirement age, he began a second career by becoming an editorial consultant at Scribners for over a decade. During his tenure at Columbia, Barzun was pretty much at the heart of the New York intellectual scene. He taught a famous "Great Books" class there with Lionel Trilling. Although some critics have assumed, from Barzun's criticisms of modern culture, that he is a conservative ideologue, in reality, he has always followed his own pragmatic vision of things. His first book, Race: A Study in Superstition(1938), predates Stephen Gould's classic book on the subject, The Mismeasure of Man, by almost 40 years, debunking what was at that time the central tenet of conservativism, the myth of the superior race. Since then, Barzun has produced a steady stream of books and articles, for both the popular press and scholarly journals. He's written the standard text on research methodology in the humanities, and he's edited detective anthologies. His book Marx, Darwin, Wagner was, briefly, a bestseller in the Forties. Another book, which opened fire on the conventional wisdom about progressive education, House of Intellect, was a bestseller in the Fifties. My favorite among his books is the essay collection The Energies of Art (1956), which is rather like an introduction to both From Dawn to Decadence's emphasized figures and its pessimistic coda."
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Although some critics have assumed, from Jacques Barzun's criticisms of modern culture, that he is a conservative ideologue, in reality he has always followed his own, pragmatic vision of things.
austinchronicle.com

"Jacques Barzun continued to write on education and cultural history after retiring from Columbia. At 84 years of age, he began writing his swan song, to which he devoted the better part of the 1990s. The resulting book of more than 800 pages, From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, 1500 to the Present, revealed a vast erudition and brilliance undimmed by advanced age. Historians, literary critics, and popular reviewers all lauded From Dawn to Decadence as... a sweeping and powerful survey of modern Western history, and it became a New York Times bestseller. With this work he gained an international reputation.[17]The book introduces several novel typographic devices that aid an unusually rich system of cross-referencing and help keep many strands of thought in the book under organized control. Most pages feature a sidebar containing a pithy quotation, usually little known, and often surprising or humorous, from some author or historical figure. In 2007, Barzun commented that "Old age is like learning a new profession. And not one of your own choosing."[18] As late as October 2011, one month before his 104th birthday, he reviewed Adam Kirsch's Why Trilling Matters for the Wall Street Journal.[19]
"In his philosophy of writing history, Barzun emphasized the role of storytelling over the use of academic jargon and detached analysis. He concluded in From Dawn to Decadence that "history cannot be a science; it is the very opposite, in that its interest resides in the particulars."."
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Jacques Martin Barzun (November 30, 1907 – October 25, 2012) was a French-born American historian. Focusing on ideas and culture, he wrote about a wide range of subjects, including baseball, mystery novels, and classical music. He was also known as a philosopher of education.[1] In the book Teacher…
en.wikipedia.org

A redescoberta do indivíduo

Numa visão do mundo mais organicista e menos mecanicista, como a que está a emergir de muitas áreas da ciência, os princípios do liberalismo e da livre iniciativa são mais importantes do que nunca.
observador.pt|Por Isabel Soares

Entenda "risco"

"In this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes. We learn to read and write but not how to deal with uncertainty: we are risk illiterates. Why do we fear what's unlikely to kill us? Is it true that people are basically hopeless when it comes to managing health and wealth? Some experts have concluded that Homo Sapiens ("man the wise") is a misnomer, and that John and Jane Q. Public need continuous guidance, as a child needs a parent. Against this pessimistic view, Ge...rd Gigerenzer argues that everyone can learn to deal with risk and uncertainty, and that experts can be part of the problem rather than the solution. A democracy needs risk-savvy citizens who cannot be easily frightened into surrendering their money, their welfare, and their liberty. We should begin to teach risk literacy to everyone.
"Gerd Gigerenzer is director at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and director of the Harding Center for Risk Literacy in Berlin. Previous positions he held include Professor of Psychology at the University of Chicago and John M. Olin Distinguished Visiting Professor, School of Law at the University of Virginia. He is also a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and the German Academy of Sciences, and Batten Fellow at the Darden Business School, University of Virginia. He received honorary doctorates from the University of Basel and the Open University of the Netherlands. Awards for his work include the AAAS Prize for the best article in the behavioral sciences, the Association of American Publishers Prize for the best book in the social and behavioral sciences, the German Psychology Award, and the Communicator Award of the German Research Foundation."
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In this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes. We learn to read and write but not how to deal with uncertainty: we are risk illiterates. Why do we...
youtube.com

"Gerd Gigerenzer, director of the Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin, wants us all to be more “risk savvy.” He explores different kinds of risks and the ways we are misled and manipulated by politicians, financial advisors, doctors and others who purport to be looking out for us."

(Visit: http://www.uctv.tv) Gerd Gigerenzer, director of the Center for Adaptive Behavior and Cognition at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in ...
youtube.com

Risco e incerteza

"In the good old times people learned how to read and to write. That's no longer sufficient in the high tech twenty-first century. We also need to know how to deal with risk and uncertainty. And that is what I mean with risk savvy. Here is a simple example. You hear on the weather report that there is a 30 percent chance of rain tomorrow. Thirty percent chance of what? Now I live in Berlin and most Berliners believe that it means that it will rain in 30 percent of the time, t...hat is seven to eight hours. Others think it will rain in 30 percent of the region. Most New Yorkers believe that's all nonsense. It means it will rain on 30 percent of the days for which this prediction has been made, that is, most likely not at all. Many psychologists think that people can't learn how to deal with risk but in this case it's the experts, the meteorologists who have not learned how to communicate risk in an instinctive way that is to say to what class 30 percent refers. Time or region or days? And if you have some imagination you can think about other classes. For instance, one woman in New York said I know what 30 percent means. Three meteorologists think it rains and seven not.
"Now getting soaked is a minor risk. But are we risk savvy when it comes to more important things. For instance, 20 year olds drive with their cell phone glued to their ears not realizing that they decrease their reaction time to that of a 70 year old. Or many Americans, about 20 percent, believe that they are in the top one percent income group. And as many believe they will soon be there. Or take health. So about an estimated one million children get every year unnecessary computer tomography CT scans. And that's really because they're not really clinically indicated. Which is not just a waste of time but also danger to the kids because a CT scan can have the radiation of a hundred chest x-rays and may lead in a small number of these kids later to cancer.
"We deal everyday with risks but we haven't learned how to understand them. And the problem is not simply in the human mind but also in experts who really don't know what the risks are or don't know how to communicate. Or in other areas like if it's about finance or health have interests other than yours. So the key message is this. Everyone can learn to deal with risk. In that case everyone can learn to ask the question probability of what. And second, if you believe that you're safe by your delegating the responsibility of your wellness and health to experts then you may be disappointed because many experts do not know how to communicate probabilities or try to protect themselves against you as in health care as a potential plaintiff. So you have to think yourself. And that's the key message."
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Risk management guru Gerd Gigerenzer explains some of our common misunderstandings…
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quinta-feira, 29 de dezembro de 2016

O intelectual como idiota

Um dos artigos do ano 2016: "The Intellectual Yet Idiot", de Nassim Nicholas Taleb.
What we have been seeing worldwide, from India to the UK to the US, is the rebellion against the inner circle of no-skin-in-the-game…
medium.com|Por Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Sistema político

"It's a standard assumption in the West: As a society progresses, it eventually becomes a capitalist, multi-party democracy. Right? Eric X. Li, a Chinese investor and political scientist, begs to differ. In this provocative, boundary-pushing talk, he asks his audience to consider that there's more than one way to run a succesful modern nation."

It's a standard assumption in the West: As a society progresses, it eventually becomes a capitalist, multi-party democracy. Right? Eric X. Li, a Chinese inve...
youtube.com

"People everywhere are better off living in liberal democracy: that has been the reigning assumption of the western world. But could it be we've got it wrong? If you were one of the world's billions of poor peasants might you not be better off under a system dedicated to political stability and economic growth -- one that has lifted 400 million out of poverty -- rather than one preoccupied with human rights, the rule of law, and the chance to vote out unpopular rulers? Thanks to the Chinese model of government life expectancy in Shanghai is now higher than in New York."

http://www.intelligencesquared.com/events/democracy-china/ From the debate "Western liberal democracy would be wrong for China", filmed at the Emmanuel Centr...
youtube.com


O Unabomber Manifesto

"The two psychological tendencies that underlie modern leftism we call "feelings of inferiority" and "oversocialization." Feelings of inferiority are characteristic of modern leftism as a whole, while oversocialization is characteristic only of a certain segment of modern leftism; but this segment is highly influential.
"10. By "feelings of inferiority" we mean not only inferiority feelings in the strict sense but a whole spectrum of related traits; low self-esteem, feelings ...
Continuar lendo
[This text was sent last June to The New York Times and The Washington Post by the person who calls himself "FC," identified by the FBI as the Unabomber, whom authorities have implicated in three murders and 16 bombings. The author threatened to send a bomb to an unspecified destination "with intent...
partners.nytimes.com

Friedrich Hayek

Mark Pennington on scarcity, order, and coordination
Friedrich Hayek was one of the most influential economic and political theorists of the 20th century. In economics two of his most important contributions…
youtube.com

Raciocínio dedutivo

Criticism, not confirmation
Steven Pinker is a professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University. He conducts research on language and cognition and has…
youtube.com

Física moderna


O desafio da incerteza

" What interests me is the question of how humans learn to live with uncertainty. Before the scientific revolution determinism was a strong ideal. Religion brought about a denial of uncertainty, and many people knew that their kin or their race was exactly the one that God had favored. They also thought they were entitled to get rid of competing ideas and the people that propagated them. How does a society change from this condition into one in which we understand that there is this fundamental uncertainty? How do we avoid the illusion of certainty to produce the understanding that everything, whether it be a medical test or deciding on the best cure for a particular kind of cancer, has a fundamental element of uncertainty?"

You can subscribe to Edge and receive e-mail versions of EdgeEditions as they are published on the web. Fill out the form, below, with your name and e-mail address and your subscription will be automatically processed.
edge.org

Verdade incerta

"Ernst Gombrich interviews Karl Popper on the Channel 4 programme 'Uncertain Truth', 1988."
Ernst Gombrich interviews Karl Popper on the Channel 4 programme 'Uncertain Truth', 1988. Playlist: http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9738F013050B79E2
youtube.com

Ordem mundial

quarta-feira, 28 de dezembro de 2016

Catástrofe climática do século 15

Klimakatastrophe im MittelalterEuropas härtestes Jahrzehnt

Mit dem Winter 1431 begann ein grausames Jahrzehnt: Hunger, Krankheiten und Kriege entvölkerten Europa. Die Ursache: eine erstaunliche Witterung. Die Katastrophe könnte sich jederzeit wiederholen.
© Christian O. Bruch/ laif
INTERFOTO/ Mary Evans

Das Unglück begann mit einem Hochzeitstanz. Nach langer Zeit war die Pegnitz in Nürnberg im Winter 1431/32 mal wieder zugefroren. Eine Feiergesellschaft ergriff die Gelegenheit, auf dem Eis zu tanzen.

Die fröhlichen Menschen ahnten nicht, dass sie den Aufzug einer zehnjährigen Klimakatastrophe erlebten.
Gerade erst war das Leben besser geworden in Europa, zu Beginn des 15. Jahrhunderts. Zuvor hatten Krankheiten die Bevölkerung verkleinert, sodass nun die meisten Leute Arbeit fanden und gutes Auskommen hatten.
MAIS

terça-feira, 27 de dezembro de 2016

Benefícios de beber cerveja

Beer drinking can offer benefits for cholesterol, heart health

By: Devon Andre

Health benefits of beer

Reduced risk of cardiovascular disease: As mentioned, moderate beer consumption can slow down the decline of HDL cholesterol, which is necessary for a healthy heart. If HDL cholesterol levels are low, more LDL cholesterol builds up, which is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease.
Increased bone density: Moderate beer consumption has been linked with an increase in bone density. Low bone density leads to osteoporosis.
Lower risk of diabetes: Beer consumption has been associated with lower rates of type 2 diabetes.
Prevention of anemia: Beer provides the nutrients that help prevent anemia.
Lower blood pressure: Beer drinkers, compared to wine or spirits drinkers, have been found to have lower blood pressure.
Anti-aging properties: Beer is high in vitamins that work to slow down the aging process.
Prevention of gallstones: Because of the effects beer has on cholesterol, it can prevent cholesterol accumulating into gallstones.
Prevention of dementia and coronary disease: Beer boosts good cholesterol, which can help prevent dementia and coronary disease.
Better digestion: Beer can stimulate digestive processes to help improve digestion.
Stress reduction: Beer has been found to reduce stress and promote sleep.
Diuretic properties: Beer can increase urination, which helps remove toxins and waste.
Cleansing of the gastrointestinal tract: Beer is a good source of soluble fiber, which is necessary to promote good health and prevent constipation, so waste can be expelled.
MAIS

Aquífero Guarani


As negociações com os principais conglomerados transnacionais do setor, entre elas a Nestlé e a Coca-Cola, seguem “a passos largos”. Representantes destas…
pensadoranonimo.com.br|Por Redação

Ernst Cassirer

Political rituals "lull asleep all our active forces, our power of judgment and critical discernment, and….take away our feeling of personality and individual responsibility."

Smith discusses the mythological thinking that dominated Nazi ideology, as explained in Cassirer’s book The Myth of the State.

Ludwig von Mises

Ludwig von Mises truly was an intellectual giant among men. He was perhaps the greatest economist of the twentieth century, and a tireless advocate for political liberalism and laissez-faire. Human Action, his magnum opus, stands among the…
mises.org

O futuro de América Latina

Socialism concentrates more power in the hands of the political class
infowars.com

Uma máquina da mentiras

THE NEW YORK TIMES - A Machinery of Lies
With all of the recent accusations that mainstream media outfits like the Washington Post have unloaded regarding what some journalists call “fake news,” a…
lewrockwell.com

segunda-feira, 26 de dezembro de 2016

Thomas Sowell


Even the best things come to an end. After enjoying a quarter of a century of writing this column for Creators Syndicate, I have decided to stop.
creators.com

Minhas "dez leis" agora em chinês

十大经济学基本规律

2016-12-22Mueller凤凰财知道
文/Antony P. Mueller 译/David Wu
Mises.org 授权翻译

在这么多经济学谬论不厌其烦地不停重复的情况下,回顾一些最基本的经济学规律,会对大家有所助益。这里有十个这样的规律,值得我们反复回味。

1、生产先于消费

为了消费一样东西,显然这样东西首先必须存在,然而,刺激消费以扩大生产的观点包围了我们。消费财货可不是从天上掉下来。它们处于被称为“生产结构”的一长串错综生产过程的末端。即便生产一个看似简单的物品,例如一根铅笔,也需要一个各生产过程编织而成的复杂网络。这个网络可以回溯至很久以前,并跨越世界各国和各个大洲。

2、消费是生产的最终目标

消费是经济活动的目标,而生产是其手段。充分就业的倡导者,违背了这个明显观念。就业计划把生产本身变为目标。消费者对消费财货的评价,决定了生产财货的价值。当前的消费来自这个延伸至过去的生产过程,这种生产结构的价值,取决于消费者的当前评价状态以及预期的未来状态。因此,消费者是资本主义经济中生产设备最终的实际“主人”。

3、生产具有成本

没有免费午餐这回事。获得某些看似免费的东西,仅仅意味着别人要为它付出代价。每张福利支票和每笔科研补助金的背后,是活生生的人缴纳的税收。纳税人只看到政府没收了个人收入的一部分,可他们并不知道这些钱是用到谁身上;而政府开支的接受者只看到政府把钱给他们,他们也不晓得政府是从谁那里拿走了这笔钱。

4、价值是主观的

评价是主观的,并且随个人情况而变化。同一物质财货,对于不同人具有不同的价值。效用是主观的、个人的、情境的和边际的。没有集体消费这样的东西。即使同处一室,不同人感觉到的冷暖也不同。同一场足球比赛,对每位观众具有不同的主观价值,这在一支球队进球得分时可以很容易地看出。

5、生产率决定工资率

每时产出决定了工人的每时工资率。在自由劳动力市场上,只要他们的边际生产率高于工资率,企业就会雇用更多的工人。企业之间的竞争,推动工资率达到与生产率相匹配的程度。工会的力量也许会改变不同劳动群体之间的工资分配,但工会不可能改变总体的工资水平。总工资水平取决于劳动生产率。

6、开支既是收入也是成本

开支不仅是收入,而且代表着成本。开支同时是买方的成本和卖方的收入。收入等于成本。财政乘数作用的机理,意味着成本随收入而增加。一旦收入倍增,成本也跟着倍增。凯恩斯的财政乘数模型,忽略了成本的效应。指望公共开支的收入效应而忽略成本效应的政府政策,导致了严重的政策错误。

7、货币并非财富

货币价值在于其购买力。货币是交换工具。一个人的财富是他可获得的日用所需的商品和服务。国家作为一个整体,不可能通过增加它的货币量来增加财富。只有购买力才意味着财富的这个规律表明,即使鲁滨逊在他的孤岛上发现一座金矿,或者一个装满了钞票的钱箱,也不会因此更加富有。

8、劳动不创造价值

劳动与其他生产要素结合创造产品,但产品的价值取决于它的效用,而效用取决于主观的个人评价。为了就业的就业没有任何经济意义。真正有意义的是价值创造。一项产品,要成为有用之物,就必须为消费者带来好处。财货的价值与生产它付出的努力无关。马拉松专业运动员,可不会因为跑马拉松比一次冲刺需要付出更多的时间和精力,就会赚到多于短跑运动员的奖金。

9、利润是对企业家的奖赏

在竞争资本主义中,经济利润是企业修补资源配置错误而赚取到手的额外奖金。在一个没有变化的稳态循环经济中,既没有利润,也没有损失,所有公司获得同等的利率。然而,在不断增长的经济当中,会有变化发生,而对各种变化的预测,则是经济利润的来源。卓越地预测到未来需求的企业,会获得高额利润率而不断成长;那些未能预测到消费者需求的企业家,就必然会面临业务萎缩直至最后的关停倒闭。

10、一切真正的经济规律都是逻辑规律

经济规律是综合先验推理。我们不能凭经验捏造这些规律,因为它们本身是真实的。因此,基本经济规律不需要经验验证。提及经验事实,仅仅起到举例说明的作用,它们并非对规律的陈述。人们可以忽略和违背经济学基本规律,但是无法改变它们。那些民众和政府承认与尊重这些基本经济规律并善加用之的社会,也是表现最好的社会。

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