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 Even the worst dog is more honest than the best person.

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Political Party Affiliation

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Martin Niemöller . Keep that name in mind as you read. More about him later. You can look up anyone’s political party registration at O.U. if you have their name and town (Norman for example) or county (Cleveland County) here: https://voterrecords.com/voters/ok/1 I think we are holistic and cannot be fully understood without systemic appraisal and context. So, for instance, it is good that it is public information about which political party a person is registered to. I do not think that political values can be separated from life choices or even academic interpretations of phenomena such as war, peace, the economy generally, gender issues, environmental policies, immigration, poverty, religion, education, the family, healthcare, law enforcement, judicial appointments… What people decide to study is itself a clear indication of interest (not disinterested objectivity). Of course, we scholars (I hope) try to find reliable truth about issues, even inconvenient truths. Unfortunately, ...
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Addendum (More details and opinions if you are interested)

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I started this little biography by mentioning my hometown of Marion, Ohio, and the Tecumseh factory where I worked and where my sister had been a union steward. While I was in college, the Tecumseh plant ended up moving to Mexico. Pollock Steel, Marion Power Shovel (made the crawlers for the Apollo rockets and the shovels that dug the Panama Canal), Dresler, Fischer Body, Eaton, the Erie Lackawanna turntables, et cetera… all closed. Several really nice downtown hotels that had operated since the 1920s, all closed. The last one, the 5-star Harding Hotel, was saved by community efforts. It was finally converted to elder housing. Honda opened a plant nearby in Lima, Ohio, and Marion got a Yutaka plant that makes the gas tanks for the Hondas. My sister ended up a security guard at that plant. She took me through it. All the managers were from Japan. It was completely automated. It was eerie, a factory filled with robots moving by themselves. Fewer than 30 workers operated the entire plac...
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Art Around the Globe

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 As promised in "About Me" in my website here is a tiny sample of art from around the world today.  There is so much great art happening I can never do it justice. But for a taste, feast your eyes. ASIA AFRICA LATIN AMERICA                                       
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Here are a couple of papers that should enlighten you more than most. One is hard to find... on purpose. Some folks you have to watch like a hawk. Especially those who fancy themselves to be messiahs. Fabulists. Here’s an article placed “strategically” in a fourth-rate predatory “journal” that publishes garbage literally 10 days after being received (can you say, review?) for a few hundred dollars. No way a decent journal would be willing to publish such an atheoretical diary. I also noticed the author did not put this one on his vitae. Hmm.  In it, it comes close to slandering colleagues in the name of “organizational communication” scholarship. IRB? The victims probably will not see it. That’s why it is placed in a backwater venue. So why bother? So they can get a little tingle every time they meet the unsuspecting victim, thinking “I fucked you good, and you don’t even know it.” Reminds me of Bill Cosby. It’s a double insult.  I’ve got a few blades in my back too. Beware of...
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Ethics

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  ETHICS   Lost in all the instruction across campus except perhaps in philosophy… the virtues. But over my 30+ years of teaching, I have refused to ignore certain teachings the classical masters considered most important, even as they have been discarded by others. Are they “subjective,” and therefore obsolete? Our theories presume, often uncritically, ideals that we think we should strive for such as “competent communication.” If all you strive for is “functional fitness,” then the notch you wedge yourself into is presented to you as a fait accompli. There is no reason for you to be, except as a plastic medium for filling holes. Piety, obedience, submission were not virtues for the Classical thinkers. For Confucius maybe but not Socrates. Ethics in science? Science presumes honesty in reporting outcomes. Humility in accepting results that disagree with your predictions. These constitute nobility. The virtues are essential to understanding the values cultures manifest and...
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Not the Smartest on the Planet Anymore

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Checkmate: We Ain’t the Smartest Thing on the Planet Anymore: What Does that Mean? The Rapidly Diverging Mind on the Planet More than a quarter of a century ago (at this writing, Spring, 2023) the reigning world chess champion fell to a computer. Since then, A.I. has only gotten a lot "smarter."   This is a pic of IBM’s Deep Blue defeating Garry Kasparov in 1997. This was the first time a reigning world chess champion had been defeated by a computer under tournament conditions. Checkmate.    Typical confusion.  I read and taught Ray Kurzweil’s book  The Singularity is Near  (2005) in a grad seminar long ago. Now I see people claim that “the singularity” is upon us.  They say this as a description of Artificial Intelligence surpassing humanity. But that’s not what Kurzweil was talking about. Rather he was talking about humans achieving immortality by fusing with machines and leaving their biological bodies to rot. So that’s one thing. Forget about “th...
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GRE costs

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 I was part of a discussion some months ago about helping foreign students with the costs of taking a GRE test and application fees for graduate college.  Because of the costs, some argued that the GRE requirement for application and admissions should be either optional or completely eliminated.  I argued that the GRE, though limited as a predictor of graduate school success was still useful and that it is perhaps the only measure that would be common across all applicants, and is, therefore, valuable for comparing applicants who are competing for a finite number of full-ride tuition scholarships and assistantships.  One person (a very nice and well-intentioned individual) argued that the GRE requirement was unfair because some of us did not understand how poor other countries are and that, for instance, the cost of taking the GRE in her country was the equivalent of one month of her father's professorship salary.  Impressive rhetoric.  But then I thought a...
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  “His” or “The Trophy” Knowing I was vulnerable. He leaned forward. Looked me in the eyes. The moment of predation had arrived. I looked back through tears. Gently. Concerned. Carefully. Not to startle. Knowing he was about to suggest something wicked – a betrayal. Deceit. Ambush of defenseless, unawares friends. “I have a plan for you.   A program. We’ll get organized. A schedule. Simplify.” All was outlined. And with those whispered words, close to my face, to my heart, I was saved… and my freedom gone. My integrity vanished with my will. I’d throw in with a malignant force.   In that moment… of my surrender… I became his. I was devoted. This is how the door closed against the gales of life outside. Blissful. To be the devoured. How I was corrupted. And once turned, I couldn’t change course. My freedom… gone. I’d mistaken what he offered to me as freedom. It was the opposite. It was an iron clamp of commitment, a box with no exit. Henceforth, my abode. Once I’d jumpe...
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