Firing Wall

Did Che really say this ?
Did he practice what he preached ?
where does this thinking lead to in the future ? ?
Does one rule by terror ?
Is this what he meant ? ?

"To send men to the firing squad, judicial proof is unnecessary...These procedures are an archaic bourgeois detail. This is a revolution! And a revolutionary must become a cold killing machine motivated by pure hate. We must create the pedagogy of the The [Execution] Wall! (El Paredón)" --Ernesto 'Che' Guevara

Critical Thinking, Theory, whose standards?

 I do wonder about the definitions or rather just how others are using the definitons, particularly when they have an agenda. It means for me a lot more thinking to try and get to the facts and throw out the rubbish, ( without throwing out the baby in the bath water), which simply can be tiring  understand, sort out, and then explain.

Just bear with me as I try to understand all these definitions and issues and question my comprehension.

Of course it begs just what is my agenda??

http://www.criticalthinking.org/pages/three-categories-of-questions-crucial-distinctions/482

Three Categories of Questions: Crucial Distinctions

Many pseudo critical thinking approaches present all judgments as falling into two exclusive and exhaustive categories: fact and opinion. Actually, the kind of judgment most important to educated people and the kind we most want to foster falls into a third, very important, and now almost totally ignored category, that of reasoned judgment. A judge in a court of law is expected to engage in reasoned judgment; that is, the judge is expected not only to render a judgment, but also to base that judgment on sound, relevant evidence and valid legal reasoning. A judge is not expected to base his judgments on his subjective preferences, on his personal opinions, as such. You might put it this way, judgment based on sound reasoning goes beyond, and is never to be equated with, fact alone or mere opinion alone. Facts are typically used in reasoning, but good reasoning does more than state facts. Furthermore, a position that is well-reasoned is not to be described as simply "opinion." Of course, we sometimes call the judge's verdict an "opinion," but we not only expect, we demand that it be based on relevant and sound reasoning. Here's a somewhat different way to put this same point. It is essential when thinking critically to clearly distinguish three different kinds of questions: Those with one right answer (factual questions fall into this category). What is the boiling point of lead?  Those with better or worse answers (well-reasoned or poorly reasoned answers). How can we best address the most basic and significant economic problems of the nation today?  Those with as many answers as there are different human preferences (a category in which mere opinion does rule).Which would you prefer, a vacation in the mountains or one at the seashore? Only the third kind of question is a matter of sheer opinion. The second kind is a matter of reasoned judgment — we can rationally evaluate answers to the question (using universal intellectual standards such as clarity, depth, consistency and so forth). When questions that require better or worse answers are treated as matters of opinion, pseudo critical thinking occurs. Students come, then, to uncritically assume that everyone's "opinion" is of equal value. Their capacity to appreciate the importance of intellectual standards diminishes, and we can expect to hear questions such as these: What if I don't like these standards? Why shouldn't I use my own standards? Don't I have a right to my own opinion? What if I'm just an emotional person? What if I like to follow my intuition? What if I don't believe in being "rational?" They then fail to see the difference between offering legitimate reasons and evidence in support of a view and simply asserting the view as true. The failure to teach students to recognize, value, and respect good reasoning is one of the most significant failings of education today.
(Paul, R. and Elder, L. (October 1996). Foundation For Critical Thinking, Online at website:www.criticalthinking.org) --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory In philosophy, the term critical theory describes the neo-Marxist philosophy of the Frankfurt School, which was developed in Germany in the 1930s. Frankfurt theorists drew on the critical methods of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud and has at its heart a criticism of ideologyand the principal obstacle to human liberation.[2] Critical theory was established as a school of thought primarily by five Frankfurt School theoreticians: Herbert Marcuse,Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Walter Benjamin, and Erich Fromm. Modern critical theory has been inluenced by second generation Frankfurt School scholar Jürgen Habermas as well by György Lukács and Antonio Gramsci. In Habermas's work, critical theory transcended its theoretic roots in German idealism, and progressed closer toAmerican pragmatism. The concern for a social "base and superstructure" is one of the remaining Marxist philosophic concepts in much contemporary critical theory.[3] Whilst critical theorists usually are broadly defined as Marxist intellectuals[4] their tendency to denounce some Marxist concepts, and to synthesise Marxian analysis with other sociologic and philosophic traditions has been attacked as revisionism, by Classical,Orthodox, and Analytical Marxists, and by Marxist-Leninist philosophers. Martin Jay said that the first generation of critical theory is best understood as not promoting a specific philosophical agenda or a specific ideology, but as "a gadfly of other systems".[5]

Pope and Papacy allegiances

http://islamversuseurope.blogspot.co.nz/2013/02/a-negro-counterjihadist-pope.html#comment-form

I have edited some needless comments.

One good thing about the election of the new Pope is that we can be fairly sure it won't be a Muslim. In this day and age, though, can we be absolutely sure?

Labels: Catholic church, Pope, Vatican 

global warming questions

http://joannenova.com.au/2013/02/peer-review-failure-science-and-nature-journals-reject-papers-because-they-have-to-be-wrong/

ExWarmist

February 13, 2013 at 5:24 pm · Reply

Hi AndyG55,

I disagree, I strongly suspect that John Brookes has learnt many things since coming to this site, such as,

[1] The tropospheric hotspot is the fingerprint of man made global warming, and the key indicator of +ve feedback to increasing concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere and that it is missing.

[2] That (most?) CAGW sceptics accept that CO2 in the atmosphere has a warming effect, and that it is a reasonable (but unproven) working assumption that CO2 increase in the atmosphere is due to human industrial emissions.

[3] That increasing CO2 emissions in the atmosphere is good for the biosphere, and could be a net benefit for human society.

[4] That a well formed scientific hypothesis is in principle falsifiable, and that it should provide specific, measurable predictions about future events that can be tested with empirical evidence.

[5] That climate models are not empirical tests, and that climate models have poor skill at predicting the future, which implies that the climate models are loaded with false assumptions about how the climate system actually works.

[6] That there is a PR campaign around Man Made Global Warming that is disconnected with the actual empirical science, but the PR campaign has the louder voice than the empirical science.

[7] That funding for CAGW adherents far outweighs funding for CAGW skeptics.

[8] That (most unhappily) the UNFCCC has a definition of climate change that has nothing to do with actual climate descriptors such as temperature, humidity, etc,

I could go on.

The challenge for John (as I see it – and I could be wrong), is the cognitive dissonance between his abstract, intellectual understanding of the above points, and his visceral, emotional need to subjugate himself to a higher authority.

Communism values

http://ibloga.blogspot.co.nz/2007/01/ayatollah-khomeinis-fling-with-four.html

This is also the problem we see in Communism. Communism values equality of resources (not equality of opportunity), over free will, and inevitably, Communism has led to the enforcement of equality of assets through coercion.
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another part in the same debate that was above the above comment
"...stop blaming the religion and the majority of its people on the actions of a few."

Do you think we should also stop blaming the Nazis for the Holocaust? After all, it was only a tiny, tiny portion of all Nazis that raided their houses, threw them on trains, lured them into the "shower rooms" and pushed the Zyklon-B buttons.

It's the same with the Muzzies - they can't EVERYBODY be blowing up infidels ALL the time - do you understand the word "logistics"
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part of another comment, same debate
In the long run, I do have hope, but I'm sorry, I do not have hope for them in the short run.

It seems obvious to me that, when a person studies history, he will find that great civilizational changes are rarely, if ever, brought about without great violence.

I often point to the successes of the American wars against Germany, Japan, and the American South, as examples of how massive violence actually seemed to have to be used to effect change. Violence wasn't the only thing that needed to be used, but massive violence was the mechanism which brought about submission, which resulted in the United States then being able to force its will on the people's of those three cultures. 

In each of those cases, the United States stepped in in the aftermath and rewrote Constitutions and forced change in the foundational ideologies by banning the teaching of the previous ideology outright.

We were as cruel ideologically in the aftermath of the war as we were physically cruel during the course of those wars.
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You may wonder why, if I know about Itjihad, and if I think it is a positive thing, then why do I talk about Islam with so little nuance.

The answer is because I think Islamism, from what I have read, and I've read alot, is dominant throughout almost all the Islamic world.

I think we are past the time for nuance. When it is time to go to a debate, you bring notes, and references. When it is time to go to war you bring a gun.

Guns have very little nuance about them.
It will be a very sad day that comes to pass, and to paraphase Churchill, the sooner it is bought to a head then the less damage and cost to people.