Random links
- The Small Increments of Change
- William Wilberforce voted for slavery... or was he the leader of the abolitionist movement? Some thoughts on the small steps he voted in favour of along the path towards Britain's banning of slavery and how that might apply in other areas.
- Quebec’s election promises will cost us all
- On Quebec election campaigns promising more spending on social causes while drawing from equalization payments. It notes promises like tuition freezes (despite having the lowest tuition in North America) and more doctors (despite have significantly more doctors per capita than the net-contributor-to-equalization provinces).
- Surprisingly Good Evidence That Real Name Policies Fail To Improve Comments
- "In 2007, South Korea temporarily mandated that all websites with over 100,000 viewers require real names, but scrapped it after it was found to be ineffective at cleaning up abusive and malicious comments (the policy reduced unwanted comments by an estimated .09%)."
- *Science Left Behind*
- Per Tyler Cowen: "the subtitle is Feel-Good Fallacies and the Rise of the Anti-Scientific Left. I agree with many of the particular claims in this book, and also I find those undervalued in broader intellectual discourse." He objects to the tone seemingly to single out the political left in this case, but overall it would seem that the anti-science elements of the political right seem to attract more attention right now - perhaps an unbalanced book can help to create balance? That of course assumes that those on each side of the political debate read the thing... probably little chance of that happening though. I do like the quote he found though: "…despite what some progressives will contend, the purpose of this book is not to demonize all progressives. We just want to demonize the loony ones."