In more dire news, the earth's warming trend is increasing low oxygen zones in the ocean where much sea life cannot survive. Surprisingly (to me anyway), cold water can hold considerably more oxygen than warm water, so the warmer the seas, the fewer livable zones for the life there:
"Continued expansion of these zones could have dramatic consequences for both sea life and coastal economies, said the team led by Lothar Stramma of the University of Kiel in Germany.
The finding was not surprising, Stramma said, because computer climate models had predicted a decline in dissolved oxygen in the oceans under warmer conditions.
Frank A. Whitney of Canada's Institute of Ocean Sciences said, "As oceans lose oxygen, this will reduce habitat for many organisms."
And before anyone dismisses these changes as trivial, note the extreme differences in oxygen that can occur:
"In cold surface water, oxygen levels can reach as high as 300 to 400 micromols per kilogram, Johnson said. A mol of a gas such as oxygen occupies a volume of just under six gallons and a micromol is one-thousandth of that. A kilogram of water is the amount that would weigh 2.2 pounds.
Dissolved oxygen varies widely in the oceans, and sea life becomes stressed when it reaches between 60 and 120 micromols per kilogram.
The researchers found concentrations as low as 10 in parts of the eastern Pacific and the northern Indian Ocean and larger areas in the Atlantic and Pacific were below 150."
Imagine trying to get by on air that had 1/2 to 1/30th of the oxygen you are used to.
I guess we'd all better enjoy our seafood while we can. And notice that climate models predicted these changes in the ocean's oxygen. What did the denialist's models say? Oh that's right, they don't do any.
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Creationists think "Scientific Evidence" Means "Scientists Talking"
It is often said in the reality-based community that all one need do to reveal the scientific illiteracy of ID creationists is let them talk. Here comes Casey Luskin with today's example:
"Bailey charges that "the film is entirely free of scientific content—no scientific evidence against biological evolution and none for 'intelligent design' (ID) theory is given." But last time I saw the film, it featured well-credentialed scientists arguing that natural selection lacks information-generative power and arguing the digitally-encoded information in DNA and highly efficient micromachines and factories in the cell strongly indicate an intelligent cause."
Apparently, to Luskin "scientific evidence" means "scientists talking". No wonder these guys think ID is the scientific equivalent of evolution, and that writing their screeds qualifies as science. They are apparently unaware that scientific evidence is falsifiable replicable evidenciary testing of a hypothesis. Well-credentialed scientists can argue anything they want, claim anything indicates anything they please. Until they get into the lab and, you know, actually put their musings to the test, it's not science.
"Bailey charges that "the film is entirely free of scientific content—no scientific evidence against biological evolution and none for 'intelligent design' (ID) theory is given." But last time I saw the film, it featured well-credentialed scientists arguing that natural selection lacks information-generative power and arguing the digitally-encoded information in DNA and highly efficient micromachines and factories in the cell strongly indicate an intelligent cause."
Apparently, to Luskin "scientific evidence" means "scientists talking". No wonder these guys think ID is the scientific equivalent of evolution, and that writing their screeds qualifies as science. They are apparently unaware that scientific evidence is falsifiable replicable evidenciary testing of a hypothesis. Well-credentialed scientists can argue anything they want, claim anything indicates anything they please. Until they get into the lab and, you know, actually put their musings to the test, it's not science.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Obama, Wright, McCain, Hagee, and Religious Double Standards
As I watch the Obama/Wright flap, I find myself engulfed in mixed emotions. I always enjoy seeing a fool grilled for his foolishness, and the good reverend has certainly provided plenty of that. I've gotten to where I expect a good dose of it from anyone with that title. Who can forget Pat Robertson blaming 9/11 on gays and the ACLU, or claiming he prayed for God to kill people with a hurricane in another state? And yet Robertson's voice is still given considerable respect in our political matters. Ditto for the late ingrate Jerry Falwell, and of course, recent John McCain endorsor, John Hagee, who calls the Catholic Church "The Great Whore", and claimed Yahweh sent Katrina to punish New Orleans for its sins.
Why is that? It's been suggested by some that this is just a small piece of a larger puzzle of racism, particularly with regard to Republicans. It certainly came as a shock to me to learn that there is not a single black Republican congressman or Senator. My shock is not moral, but political. The black population of the US is 12.5% or so and climbing. No black politicians means not much black support, and it's got to be tough to compete with that much of the electorate universally against you. They've had plenty of former congressmen, so what has changed? It is an interesting question.
However, I don't think that this is an issue of racism. The reason the Wright endorsement is a problem for Obama, but the Hagee endorsement isn't a problem for McCain, is because Americans have a great tolerance of lunacy coming from ministers, so long as it is a particular brand of lunacy. Hagee's just happens to the acceptable variety, and Wright's isn't. What's the difference? Wright left out the intermediary: God. He forgot the Golden Rule of American society: statements with "God" in them should be tolerated.
The most absurd statement made in American life today is not that the earth is 6,000 years old, or that zygotes are people. It's that Christians are the persecuted group in society. Fact is, you can pretty much get away with saying anything as long as you blame it on Jesus. Thanking Jesus for winning a boxing match never ever gets the "You think Jesus would help you beat the shit out of someone else" retort it deserves. Praising the same God who apparently decided to destroy your town with a tornado for deciding not to kill YOUR child today is seen as somehow loving and sweet. Deciding that the solution to crime in your city is to wear a sack and have ashes tossed on you is considered sane. So why not Hagee's claim that Yahweh hates fags and New Orleans, or Robertson's claim that Gawd hates the ACLU. After all, none of us are divine, so who knows? Those claims are certainly not MORE deranged than thinking the creater of the universe helped your kick hook inside the uprights for the game-winning football game.
Wright made the mistake of attacking the United States directly, accusing it of being responsible for 9/11, and really, in a basic, animalistic evalaution of the facts, it's the most reasonable (or least loony if you like) thing he said. But you don't do that in our society, not without giving the gods the blame. Nor do you claim government scientists created AIDS to commit genocide. That's real demented thing about all of this. God is supposed to be so omnibenevolent and perfect, whereas the US government has a host of flaws and sins on its record. Yet it is deemed OK,by the most pious and anti-government among us,to blame God for people dying, but not the US government.
Personally I think all the looniness ought to be treated the same. I'd like to see every politician be held accountable for every goofy thing any preacher says in his presence. Let's have a national debate about religious goofiness in politics. Maybe then these politicians will decide that it isn't worth the risk to publicly seek the endorsement of any religious figure. Let's pin every politician down on what he thinks about the anti-evolutionary views of Brother Bubba. If the politicians are going to pander to these nutjobs, let them put their opinions on the public record for all to see. Do you or do you not think the government created AIDS Senator? Do you or do you not think Katrina was divine punishment for New Orleans' sins Senator?
One thing I gave Mike Huckabee credit for was being completely up front about his reality-averse views on evolution. But it surely didn't help his campaign, and I'd like to see every politician who holds equally goofy views, or pretends to do so to gain political support, be forced to say so and share the same fate.
Why is that? It's been suggested by some that this is just a small piece of a larger puzzle of racism, particularly with regard to Republicans. It certainly came as a shock to me to learn that there is not a single black Republican congressman or Senator. My shock is not moral, but political. The black population of the US is 12.5% or so and climbing. No black politicians means not much black support, and it's got to be tough to compete with that much of the electorate universally against you. They've had plenty of former congressmen, so what has changed? It is an interesting question.
However, I don't think that this is an issue of racism. The reason the Wright endorsement is a problem for Obama, but the Hagee endorsement isn't a problem for McCain, is because Americans have a great tolerance of lunacy coming from ministers, so long as it is a particular brand of lunacy. Hagee's just happens to the acceptable variety, and Wright's isn't. What's the difference? Wright left out the intermediary: God. He forgot the Golden Rule of American society: statements with "God" in them should be tolerated.
The most absurd statement made in American life today is not that the earth is 6,000 years old, or that zygotes are people. It's that Christians are the persecuted group in society. Fact is, you can pretty much get away with saying anything as long as you blame it on Jesus. Thanking Jesus for winning a boxing match never ever gets the "You think Jesus would help you beat the shit out of someone else" retort it deserves. Praising the same God who apparently decided to destroy your town with a tornado for deciding not to kill YOUR child today is seen as somehow loving and sweet. Deciding that the solution to crime in your city is to wear a sack and have ashes tossed on you is considered sane. So why not Hagee's claim that Yahweh hates fags and New Orleans, or Robertson's claim that Gawd hates the ACLU. After all, none of us are divine, so who knows? Those claims are certainly not MORE deranged than thinking the creater of the universe helped your kick hook inside the uprights for the game-winning football game.
Wright made the mistake of attacking the United States directly, accusing it of being responsible for 9/11, and really, in a basic, animalistic evalaution of the facts, it's the most reasonable (or least loony if you like) thing he said. But you don't do that in our society, not without giving the gods the blame. Nor do you claim government scientists created AIDS to commit genocide. That's real demented thing about all of this. God is supposed to be so omnibenevolent and perfect, whereas the US government has a host of flaws and sins on its record. Yet it is deemed OK,by the most pious and anti-government among us,to blame God for people dying, but not the US government.
Personally I think all the looniness ought to be treated the same. I'd like to see every politician be held accountable for every goofy thing any preacher says in his presence. Let's have a national debate about religious goofiness in politics. Maybe then these politicians will decide that it isn't worth the risk to publicly seek the endorsement of any religious figure. Let's pin every politician down on what he thinks about the anti-evolutionary views of Brother Bubba. If the politicians are going to pander to these nutjobs, let them put their opinions on the public record for all to see. Do you or do you not think the government created AIDS Senator? Do you or do you not think Katrina was divine punishment for New Orleans' sins Senator?
One thing I gave Mike Huckabee credit for was being completely up front about his reality-averse views on evolution. But it surely didn't help his campaign, and I'd like to see every politician who holds equally goofy views, or pretends to do so to gain political support, be forced to say so and share the same fate.
Monday, May 5, 2008
Phyllis Schlafly and the No Criticisms Lie
Well, Phyllis Schlafly has come out and revealed herself to be a Stein sycophant, without the energy to do even basic research behind the claims of Stein and Expelled, we she just parrots uncritically. There's really no point in going through all the lies again, but there was one new one that caught my eye:
"Stein's critics fail to effectively refute anything in 'Expelled'; they just use epithets to ridicule it and hope they can make it go away."
Excuse me? Has Schlafly missed the blogospheric landslide this film caused? The many many negative reviews, even from conservatives at Fox News and Reason? Can she not find Expelled Exposed, which goes through and refutes, in detail, all of the major claims in the film?
It never ceases to amaze me that conservatives who supposedly support family values, honesty no doubt among them, can lie so shamelessly. Like Ann Coulter before her, Schlafly just turns a blind eye to the substantive criticism out there, proclaims it does not exist, and hopes no one will notice. Do they really think people are this stupid? Are they?
"Stein's critics fail to effectively refute anything in 'Expelled'; they just use epithets to ridicule it and hope they can make it go away."
Excuse me? Has Schlafly missed the blogospheric landslide this film caused? The many many negative reviews, even from conservatives at Fox News and Reason? Can she not find Expelled Exposed, which goes through and refutes, in detail, all of the major claims in the film?
It never ceases to amaze me that conservatives who supposedly support family values, honesty no doubt among them, can lie so shamelessly. Like Ann Coulter before her, Schlafly just turns a blind eye to the substantive criticism out there, proclaims it does not exist, and hopes no one will notice. Do they really think people are this stupid? Are they?
Evolution, 21, the Gamblers Ruin, and Zero Sum Games
One of the favorite fallacious arguments of the evolution deniers is to claim that statistics somehow make it impossible for evolutionary mechanisms to work. Invariably however, their arguments contain fundamental flaws in their assumptions. The most common of these is the assumption that all evolutionary events are independent (Hoyle's 747 in a junkyard), when they are in fact extremely dependent. It can be very tiresome seeing these same lame arguments over and over again, so it is somewhat refreshing to see Sal Cordova make some brand new mistakes in his newest article called Gambler's Ruin is Darwin's Ruin. Unfortunately, it is a tiresomely long piece, containing several subtle errors, the most important being that evolution proceeds in an unwavering, unfailing, line of ascent, instead of one with many failures, and as a zero-sum game. Once one understands this, Cordova's argument collapses.
He attempts to draw an analogy between counting cards in blackjack, as depicted in the Movie "21" and the evolution of species. However, his knowledge of gambling is apparently quite limited, and prone to making ridiculous statements like this:
"The real story behind the movie began with an associate of Claude Shannon by the name of Dr. Edward O. Thorp of MIT. In the Early 60’s, Thorp published a landmark mathematical treatise on how to beat casinos. His research was so successful that Las Vegas casinos shut down many of their card tables for an entire year until they could devise counter measures to impede Thorp’s mathematics."
As a former card counter, I can say this is complete nonsense. Thorpe's system, while no doubt groundbreaking and ingenious, received considerable criticism from other mathematicians, and even at the hyped 5% edge, would still not allow just anyone to walk into a casino and leave a winner on a consistent basis. All the casinos did was move the "cut" in the "shoe" of cards used for play, further from the end of the deck, where the counter's advantage is maximized. They could also "shuffle up" on suspected counters (thus nullifying the count), and as a last resort, being private clubs, they could simply bar the counter from playing. Thorp did not cause Las Vegas card tables to come to a stop.
Cordova further illustrates his ignorance when attempting to explain what a statistical advantage in gambling means:
"If he has a 1% statistical advantage, that means he has a 50.5% chance of winning and a 49.5% chance of losing."
No, that isn't what it means. That would be the case only in a game that resembled coin flipping, with a win paying the amount of the wager. However, in most Vegas games, such as blackjack, there are several plays, such as splitting hands, doubling down, or getting a blackjack, which pay far more than the wager. The same can be said for craps, the other game Cordova mentions. A player in such games with a 1% edge can expect to win, on average, 1% of the amount of his wager, per play. He will most certainly NOT expect to win 50.5% of his plays as Cordova suggests.
So right away Cordova reveals that he doesn't understand the basics of the subject of his article. He also doesn't seem to understand the concept of Gambler's Ruin, which he also tries to tie to evolution. The Gambler's Ruin refers to when a gambler loses the last of his stake, goes broke, and can no longer gamble. This comes into play for professional gamblers because no matter what advantage you have, there is still a nonzero possibility that you will run into a long enough streak of bad luck or mistakes to exhaust your funds, or "bank". Thus, such gamblers use statistical analysis to determine the size of a bank they need to keep their probability of ruin sufficiently low given the edge they have and the wagers they will place. For example, a blackjack player with a 3% edge and wagering $5 a hand would need a bank of about $275 for a probability of ruin of 5%.
How does any of this apply to evolution you ask? Well, Cordova attempts to draw an analogy between the gambler's bankroll and the population of biological organisms with new genetic variation:
"The problem is that a selectively-advantaged traits are still subject to random events. The most basic random event is with whether a parent will even pass down a gene to a child in the first place! Added to that problem is the nature of random events in general. A genetically advantaged individual may die by accident, get consumed by a predator, etc.
And the problem gets worse. Even if selectively advantage traits get spread to a small percentage of the population, it still has a strong chance of being wiped out by the sum total of random events. The mathematics of gambler’s ruin helped clarify the effect of random “selection” on natural selection...Darwin was absolutely wrong to suggest that the emergence of a novel trait will be preserved in most cases."
But Darwin never suggested that, and modern evolutionary theory certainly does not say that. Cordova is criticizing the old, flawed, single unbroken line version of evolution, which no one supports today. In doing so, he is erroneously applying the ruin theories of gambling to a single evolutionary line, rather than the entirety of life. In his view, showing one line would die out disproves the entire theory. But in evolutionary terms, everything that is alive is part of the genetic "bank". Cordova's analogy is to a single session of a gambler's day, which could, of course, be a loser, not the entire bank.
Evolution is a giant bush with many branches and twigs that did in fact hit their ruin, just as population genetics predicts. Cordova's representations of the views of Darwin, as well as Thorp and Fisher, are simply inaccurate. None of them believed that 100% of creatures born with beneficial mutations would survive.
From there Cordova runs completely off the rails and shows once again that his understanding of evolution is little better than his understanding of gambling:
"A further constraint on selective advantage of a given trait is the problem of selection interference and dilution of selective advantage if numerous traits are involved. If one has a population of 1000 individuals and each has a unique, novel, selectively-advantaged trait that emerged via mutation, one can see this leads to an impasse – selection can’t possibly work in such a situation since all the individuals effectively cancel out each other’s selective advantage."
This contains so many errors it is difficult to know where to start. Most basically, a trait cannot be called "selectively advantaged" in a situation where "selection can't possibly work". This is just basic logic. It is either selectively advantaged or it isn't. Secondly, the selection on these individuals is done by many features of nature, not just each other. Sure, if every individual evolves to be a bit faster, that doesn't do much to change who gets to sleep where in the cave. But it sure does effect who outruns the wolves to the cave in the first place. If you and I both evolve traits that make us outrun the wolves where we couldn't before, there is no "cancelling out". We both win.
Third, and most damningly, his analysis has an implicit assumption of stasis with regard to the environment and the new niches the individuals might fill. This is a common mistake creationists make. If I may go all X-men for a moment, some of these 1,000 individuals evolve the ability to fly, others the ability to exist on less food by processing sunlight, and others develop the ability to breath underwater, there will be no "cancelling out". They will simple go live in places, and under conditions where they couldn't before. Everyone wins.
Extending Cordova's argument to gambling shows the zero-sum flaw inherent in it. It is as if he is saying "If all of you at the poker table improve your skills, it all cancels out, and no one will win any more than they did before." And yes, that is true, but only if they remain at that table, or never go play a different game. The players might take their improved skills and move to play Omaha, or craps, or blackjack.
Evolution is not a zero-sum game, and on that faulty premise lie all of Cordova's shoddy arguments. As usual, we see that the evolution-deniers do not understand the subjects they raise, and are too lazy to research them.
He attempts to draw an analogy between counting cards in blackjack, as depicted in the Movie "21" and the evolution of species. However, his knowledge of gambling is apparently quite limited, and prone to making ridiculous statements like this:
"The real story behind the movie began with an associate of Claude Shannon by the name of Dr. Edward O. Thorp of MIT. In the Early 60’s, Thorp published a landmark mathematical treatise on how to beat casinos. His research was so successful that Las Vegas casinos shut down many of their card tables for an entire year until they could devise counter measures to impede Thorp’s mathematics."
As a former card counter, I can say this is complete nonsense. Thorpe's system, while no doubt groundbreaking and ingenious, received considerable criticism from other mathematicians, and even at the hyped 5% edge, would still not allow just anyone to walk into a casino and leave a winner on a consistent basis. All the casinos did was move the "cut" in the "shoe" of cards used for play, further from the end of the deck, where the counter's advantage is maximized. They could also "shuffle up" on suspected counters (thus nullifying the count), and as a last resort, being private clubs, they could simply bar the counter from playing. Thorp did not cause Las Vegas card tables to come to a stop.
Cordova further illustrates his ignorance when attempting to explain what a statistical advantage in gambling means:
"If he has a 1% statistical advantage, that means he has a 50.5% chance of winning and a 49.5% chance of losing."
No, that isn't what it means. That would be the case only in a game that resembled coin flipping, with a win paying the amount of the wager. However, in most Vegas games, such as blackjack, there are several plays, such as splitting hands, doubling down, or getting a blackjack, which pay far more than the wager. The same can be said for craps, the other game Cordova mentions. A player in such games with a 1% edge can expect to win, on average, 1% of the amount of his wager, per play. He will most certainly NOT expect to win 50.5% of his plays as Cordova suggests.
So right away Cordova reveals that he doesn't understand the basics of the subject of his article. He also doesn't seem to understand the concept of Gambler's Ruin, which he also tries to tie to evolution. The Gambler's Ruin refers to when a gambler loses the last of his stake, goes broke, and can no longer gamble. This comes into play for professional gamblers because no matter what advantage you have, there is still a nonzero possibility that you will run into a long enough streak of bad luck or mistakes to exhaust your funds, or "bank". Thus, such gamblers use statistical analysis to determine the size of a bank they need to keep their probability of ruin sufficiently low given the edge they have and the wagers they will place. For example, a blackjack player with a 3% edge and wagering $5 a hand would need a bank of about $275 for a probability of ruin of 5%.
How does any of this apply to evolution you ask? Well, Cordova attempts to draw an analogy between the gambler's bankroll and the population of biological organisms with new genetic variation:
"The problem is that a selectively-advantaged traits are still subject to random events. The most basic random event is with whether a parent will even pass down a gene to a child in the first place! Added to that problem is the nature of random events in general. A genetically advantaged individual may die by accident, get consumed by a predator, etc.
And the problem gets worse. Even if selectively advantage traits get spread to a small percentage of the population, it still has a strong chance of being wiped out by the sum total of random events. The mathematics of gambler’s ruin helped clarify the effect of random “selection” on natural selection...Darwin was absolutely wrong to suggest that the emergence of a novel trait will be preserved in most cases."
But Darwin never suggested that, and modern evolutionary theory certainly does not say that. Cordova is criticizing the old, flawed, single unbroken line version of evolution, which no one supports today. In doing so, he is erroneously applying the ruin theories of gambling to a single evolutionary line, rather than the entirety of life. In his view, showing one line would die out disproves the entire theory. But in evolutionary terms, everything that is alive is part of the genetic "bank". Cordova's analogy is to a single session of a gambler's day, which could, of course, be a loser, not the entire bank.
Evolution is a giant bush with many branches and twigs that did in fact hit their ruin, just as population genetics predicts. Cordova's representations of the views of Darwin, as well as Thorp and Fisher, are simply inaccurate. None of them believed that 100% of creatures born with beneficial mutations would survive.
From there Cordova runs completely off the rails and shows once again that his understanding of evolution is little better than his understanding of gambling:
"A further constraint on selective advantage of a given trait is the problem of selection interference and dilution of selective advantage if numerous traits are involved. If one has a population of 1000 individuals and each has a unique, novel, selectively-advantaged trait that emerged via mutation, one can see this leads to an impasse – selection can’t possibly work in such a situation since all the individuals effectively cancel out each other’s selective advantage."
This contains so many errors it is difficult to know where to start. Most basically, a trait cannot be called "selectively advantaged" in a situation where "selection can't possibly work". This is just basic logic. It is either selectively advantaged or it isn't. Secondly, the selection on these individuals is done by many features of nature, not just each other. Sure, if every individual evolves to be a bit faster, that doesn't do much to change who gets to sleep where in the cave. But it sure does effect who outruns the wolves to the cave in the first place. If you and I both evolve traits that make us outrun the wolves where we couldn't before, there is no "cancelling out". We both win.
Third, and most damningly, his analysis has an implicit assumption of stasis with regard to the environment and the new niches the individuals might fill. This is a common mistake creationists make. If I may go all X-men for a moment, some of these 1,000 individuals evolve the ability to fly, others the ability to exist on less food by processing sunlight, and others develop the ability to breath underwater, there will be no "cancelling out". They will simple go live in places, and under conditions where they couldn't before. Everyone wins.
Extending Cordova's argument to gambling shows the zero-sum flaw inherent in it. It is as if he is saying "If all of you at the poker table improve your skills, it all cancels out, and no one will win any more than they did before." And yes, that is true, but only if they remain at that table, or never go play a different game. The players might take their improved skills and move to play Omaha, or craps, or blackjack.
Evolution is not a zero-sum game, and on that faulty premise lie all of Cordova's shoddy arguments. As usual, we see that the evolution-deniers do not understand the subjects they raise, and are too lazy to research them.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Acts of God Target Evangelicals
With tornadoes in Virginia destroying homes, and hurricane season right around the corner, it is worth preparing for the claims from the wacky right that natural disasters are the work of the gods. Invariably these claims come with the reasoning that Gawd must be punishing this group or that for their behavior.
It is worth noting something about this reasoning. Tornadoes strike right across the Bible belt, from Oklahoma to Virginia. Hurricanes run along the Baptist Southwest, or into highly Christian Mexico. Yet atheistic (relatively speaking) New England and Canada are spared these fates. It seems the people attributing motives to natural disasters have got it backwards. Whatever is responsible for them apparently dislikes evangelicals. Perhaps the gods are pissed off at having the wrong words put in their mouths all this time.
It is worth noting something about this reasoning. Tornadoes strike right across the Bible belt, from Oklahoma to Virginia. Hurricanes run along the Baptist Southwest, or into highly Christian Mexico. Yet atheistic (relatively speaking) New England and Canada are spared these fates. It seems the people attributing motives to natural disasters have got it backwards. Whatever is responsible for them apparently dislikes evangelicals. Perhaps the gods are pissed off at having the wrong words put in their mouths all this time.
Morris, McGann, and the "What If's" on Iran, and Iraq
While recent polls show the economy ahead as the major issue, the Iraq war, and the candidates' plans to deal with it, will no doubt play a major roll in deciding the next President of the United States. Dick Morris and Eileen McGann have an interesting (and most intellectually impressive by Townhall standards) article on the potential problems the Democratic candidates will have dealing with the "what-ifs" of their plans to pull out of Iraq. M&M argue that the various possible scenarios have not been thought through by the Democrats, and this may not bode well for them in the election compared to McCain's simple position of "win in Iraq".
I must say it is a decent argument, even if you are like me and consider the status quo in Iraq to be far worse than they do. However, I would argue that M&M and the many Americans who hold a similar view have themselves not thought through the scenarios far enough, and make two mistakes. First, they stop short of showing exactly what negative results will result from the various hypotheticals they raise, similar to the way anti-porn activists argue, as if the possibility of harm was the same as actual harm. Second, they overestimate the certainty with which we can expect various scenarios to play out. This is, after all, politics. If it were possible to say "If A, then necessarily B, C, and D", we wouldn't find ourselves in our many economic and military messes. There are always multiple contingencies to consider, as well as unknowns.
"What do the Democrats propose? Obama and Hillary both want to pull out as soon as technically feasible. OK. But what happens if Iran moves into the vacuum and takes over Iraq?"
OK. What if? First of all, there are several steps M&M skip here. If Iran invades Iraq, they are hardly going to be greeted as liberators. There will still be Sunni fighting Shi'a, and Shi'a fighting Shi'a, as there is now. Iraq is not going to suddenly coalesce into the unified nation of "West Iran" just because we leave. They could get bogged down in a similar quagmire to what we are experiencing, or they could just aid one side in the Iraqi civil war, or have some internal problems we're unaware of that would make invading impossible, or a whole host of other possible outcomes. It is not reasonable to talk of this possibility as if it were anywhere near a certainty.
And what, exactly is the danger of this? How, exactly, would West Iran be more dangerous than Iraq? M&M answer:
And what if Al Qaeda takes advantage of the American absence and sets up a permanent base and sanctuary in Iraq, beyond our reach — a situation akin to the Taliban in Afghanistan where they could develop the capacity to hit us on 9-11 in their privileged, protected home territory?
There are many flaws in this question. First, if "American absence" is all it takes for Al Qaeda to set up a base, they have plenty of options now. What real difference would one more make? Second, if the Iranians were super-keen on the idea of having an Al Qaeda base in their territory, they don't need to invade Iraq to have one. They could just invite Al Qaeda into Iran now, except for the third problem. As John McCain keeps forgetting, (haven't we learned our lesson about having a president who doesn't know who's who over there?) Al Qaeda is a Sunni organization. Iran's official religion is Shi'a. Do recall that the Sunni and the Shi'a are the ones doing most of the fighting in Iraq. So on this "what if" the answer is "it's highly unlikely, and even if it happens, it doesn't change much".
"And what if hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who used to work with us start to be killed as happened when we pulled out of Vietnam?"
This is the best "what if" of the bunch, for it is highly likely to happen, regardless of who wins the Iraqi prize, and it has unpleasant moral undertones. But on a pragmatic level, there doesn't seem to be much substance to it. America, sadly, has a history of this sort of thing. We pulled out of Viet Nam, we pulled out of Cambodia, we pulled out of Lebanon, we pull out of Iraq. And the next country we get into a similar situation with will trust us again. It would be cynical if it weren't true.
As for the deaths, we have to compare them to the deaths Iraq could expect if we don't leave, which is substantial. As grisly as the executions that first week might be, is that really so much worse than the annual deaths over a year due to our presence?
"And what if the Iraqi oil falls into Iranian hands, sending the price even higher?"
Ok, but how long would it stay that way? And why are we so sure it will go up? After all, the mess we've made there disrupting what was a fairly stable culture hasn't exactly done wonders for the affordability of oil, so who says a newly stable Iraq, even under Iranian control, wouldn't produce lower oil prices? After all, it is still, in the end, a market, even in Iran. And no one, no one, wants to ask the question of whether higher oil prices, however painful in the short term, might actually be good for America in the long term. After all, the quickest way to independence from foreign oil is independence from oil itself, and what better motivation than $8/gallon gas. There really is no excuse for having a nation as advanced as ours dependent on oil from nations like Iran, and without solar and wind power being commonplace, if not universal. If $8/gallon gas gives us that, give me all you got. Next objection?
"And what if … The list goes on."
Um, OK, but I need more, a lot more. All I see so far are scare scenarios predicted with far more certainty than is justified by the very same people who told us we'd be greeted as liberators, or that the Iraq War would cost $30M, and well, that list goes on and on too.
And at an even more basic level, I think M&M grossly overestimate the intelligence of the average American voter. Let's recall we just spent a couple of excruciating hours watching the Democrats debate lapel pins, whether they each think the other can win, who loves America more, and who did or did not got shot at by snipers. And this election we will no doubt spend a ridiculous amount of time talking about gay marriage, creationism, and abortion. There really isn't much indication that the American public is interested in seeing an in depth analysis of any of the really important issues.
I must say it is a decent argument, even if you are like me and consider the status quo in Iraq to be far worse than they do. However, I would argue that M&M and the many Americans who hold a similar view have themselves not thought through the scenarios far enough, and make two mistakes. First, they stop short of showing exactly what negative results will result from the various hypotheticals they raise, similar to the way anti-porn activists argue, as if the possibility of harm was the same as actual harm. Second, they overestimate the certainty with which we can expect various scenarios to play out. This is, after all, politics. If it were possible to say "If A, then necessarily B, C, and D", we wouldn't find ourselves in our many economic and military messes. There are always multiple contingencies to consider, as well as unknowns.
"What do the Democrats propose? Obama and Hillary both want to pull out as soon as technically feasible. OK. But what happens if Iran moves into the vacuum and takes over Iraq?"
OK. What if? First of all, there are several steps M&M skip here. If Iran invades Iraq, they are hardly going to be greeted as liberators. There will still be Sunni fighting Shi'a, and Shi'a fighting Shi'a, as there is now. Iraq is not going to suddenly coalesce into the unified nation of "West Iran" just because we leave. They could get bogged down in a similar quagmire to what we are experiencing, or they could just aid one side in the Iraqi civil war, or have some internal problems we're unaware of that would make invading impossible, or a whole host of other possible outcomes. It is not reasonable to talk of this possibility as if it were anywhere near a certainty.
And what, exactly is the danger of this? How, exactly, would West Iran be more dangerous than Iraq? M&M answer:
And what if Al Qaeda takes advantage of the American absence and sets up a permanent base and sanctuary in Iraq, beyond our reach — a situation akin to the Taliban in Afghanistan where they could develop the capacity to hit us on 9-11 in their privileged, protected home territory?
There are many flaws in this question. First, if "American absence" is all it takes for Al Qaeda to set up a base, they have plenty of options now. What real difference would one more make? Second, if the Iranians were super-keen on the idea of having an Al Qaeda base in their territory, they don't need to invade Iraq to have one. They could just invite Al Qaeda into Iran now, except for the third problem. As John McCain keeps forgetting, (haven't we learned our lesson about having a president who doesn't know who's who over there?) Al Qaeda is a Sunni organization. Iran's official religion is Shi'a. Do recall that the Sunni and the Shi'a are the ones doing most of the fighting in Iraq. So on this "what if" the answer is "it's highly unlikely, and even if it happens, it doesn't change much".
"And what if hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who used to work with us start to be killed as happened when we pulled out of Vietnam?"
This is the best "what if" of the bunch, for it is highly likely to happen, regardless of who wins the Iraqi prize, and it has unpleasant moral undertones. But on a pragmatic level, there doesn't seem to be much substance to it. America, sadly, has a history of this sort of thing. We pulled out of Viet Nam, we pulled out of Cambodia, we pulled out of Lebanon, we pull out of Iraq. And the next country we get into a similar situation with will trust us again. It would be cynical if it weren't true.
As for the deaths, we have to compare them to the deaths Iraq could expect if we don't leave, which is substantial. As grisly as the executions that first week might be, is that really so much worse than the annual deaths over a year due to our presence?
"And what if the Iraqi oil falls into Iranian hands, sending the price even higher?"
Ok, but how long would it stay that way? And why are we so sure it will go up? After all, the mess we've made there disrupting what was a fairly stable culture hasn't exactly done wonders for the affordability of oil, so who says a newly stable Iraq, even under Iranian control, wouldn't produce lower oil prices? After all, it is still, in the end, a market, even in Iran. And no one, no one, wants to ask the question of whether higher oil prices, however painful in the short term, might actually be good for America in the long term. After all, the quickest way to independence from foreign oil is independence from oil itself, and what better motivation than $8/gallon gas. There really is no excuse for having a nation as advanced as ours dependent on oil from nations like Iran, and without solar and wind power being commonplace, if not universal. If $8/gallon gas gives us that, give me all you got. Next objection?
"And what if … The list goes on."
Um, OK, but I need more, a lot more. All I see so far are scare scenarios predicted with far more certainty than is justified by the very same people who told us we'd be greeted as liberators, or that the Iraq War would cost $30M, and well, that list goes on and on too.
And at an even more basic level, I think M&M grossly overestimate the intelligence of the average American voter. Let's recall we just spent a couple of excruciating hours watching the Democrats debate lapel pins, whether they each think the other can win, who loves America more, and who did or did not got shot at by snipers. And this election we will no doubt spend a ridiculous amount of time talking about gay marriage, creationism, and abortion. There really isn't much indication that the American public is interested in seeing an in depth analysis of any of the really important issues.
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