Things That Used to Be Legal

Photo courtesy IslandSunTanningBeds.com

Loyal Stationary Waves reader SM tipped me off to a recent California law passed to protect children from the harmful effects of artificial tanning. (Here's a fun bit of tangential trivia: SM was there when I drank my first can of Red Bull, as described in the last episode of Things That Used to Be Legal.) This new law supercedes the existing California law requiring parental consent be given before a child can use a tanning bed.

It is my belief that every silly paternalistic law that gets placed on the books is the product of some sort of special interest group. But who in their right minds would have a vested interest in placing restrictions on the artificial tanning industry? As The Sacramento Bee reports, "Senate Bill 746, by Sen. Ted Lieu, D-Torrance, was supported by doctors, nurses and the American Cancer Society." 

No word yet as to whether doctors, nurses, and the American Cancer Society have initiated a legal campaign against children getting more than fifteen minutes of sunlight in a day. Of course, we already know what their recommendations are. According to the American Cancer Society, you should limit your exposure to sunlight during "midday," where "midday" is defined to be any time between the hours of 10:00 AM and 4:00 PM.

Naturally, this recommendation includes a link to the Environmental Protection Agency's website.

It took me a sum total of about 60 seconds to trace California's new law to an existing government agency.

I have never used a tanning bed, but I know people who have. As a child, I spent lots of time outdoors in the sunshine, and I continue to do so as an adult. It is possible that I will get skin cancer some day. Can we conclusively say that if I get skin cancer it will be the result of a lifetime of occasional mild sunburns? I suppose so; where else does one get skin cancer?

It certainly wouldn't be caused by sun screen, moisturizer, and other such cosmetic skin care products, would it? Certainly not, because of course such products already fall under federal regulatory jurisdiction, so there is no reason to enact further legislation at this time.

What about the benefits of tanning? Tanning beds were invented by a German scientist studying the health benefits of ultraviolet light radiation on athletes. Ultraviolet radiation is used in phototherapy treatments for patients with acne and psoriasis. While researching psoriasis in my former life as a pharmaceutical research consultant, I once learned that doctors often recommend that patients take some time off once year, leave their medications at home, and get plenty of summer sunlight. There is also plenty of evidence suggesting that UV light exposure suppresses melatonin and aids in the treatment of depression.

In the State of California - and soon the world over - children will, by law, be barred from receiving such treatments with or without the advice of their health care team. Doubtless, this will result in the eventual classification of tanning beds as a medical device, which will mean big money for medical device manufacturers, doctors, nurses, and the American Cancer Society.

Governments do not engage in this kind of legislation "for our own good." They're not thinking about the children. Governments have a desperate need to be needed. Bureaucrats have power, but almost no status whatsoever. As a result, they cannot help but place us in demeaning situations in which we must beg the powers at be to avail ourselves of modern technologies.

At some point, society may freely choose to stop the insanity. In a few years, however, no one will even remember what life was like before tanning beds were made "illegal." All of this will be a distant memory.

Except, of course, that I will remember, and will have made note of it on my blog.

Winter Training: Set An Objective

Five days ago, I initiated a conversation with the universe about winter training. The emphasis of that article was on psychological reasons to take advantage of winter training. Today, I'd like to write a little bit about setting goals for your winter training regimen.

In order to set a good goal, it is important to know yourself pretty well. This is for a number of reason.

First, it only makes sense to set goals that you can trust yourself to pursue. In other word, if you're like me and hate the cold, it is probably not a good idea to set a goal of cross-country skiing three times a week once the snow falls. We all know, no matter how much I profess to want it, I will never get outside and cross-country ski even once this year, much less three times per week. It is an easy goal to achieve for people who will actually do it. For me, it would be pure idiocy.

Second, you have to keep in mind what's important to you. If the most important event of the year is that summertime marathon, that spring trip to the Dominican Republic, that Christmas party, or whatever, then you should structure your training regimen to that event. This is particularly important as it pertains to timing. Starting now, you have some time to organize a regimen that produces results as of a particular date. If you're aiming for something in December or January, you'll want to make sure you dive in right away. If you have a longer time period than that, you can use the first few months to build up some weaker muscle groups, for example, before hitting the more specific training exercises.

Finally, give yourself a break. Don't just put your head down and keep training for your next race. Use the off-season, take advantage of its benefits. Do something different, shake things up a little. Get out of your comfort zone. Mentally, you'll end up in a better place. Physically, your body will respond to the wider variation.

I'm still investigating my next goal. I'll share it with you in the coming days.

How Capitalism Drives Human Health

If you wonder why I place such a high level of importance on capitalism's ability to supply us with health care services, perhaps I can use this Bloomberg new story as an illustration.  

Bloomberg reports that venture capital firms are pulling out of biotech investments and moving that money overseas because the US regulatory process for pharmaceuticals has become so lengthy that waiting that long is no longer profitable for investors. 

Venture capital firms are investing less in experimental drugmakers and medical device makers because of what they say are regulatory hurdles, a survey found.

Almost 40 percent of 150 venture capital firms that responded to the survey have decreased their investment in life sciences during the past three years, the National Venture Capital Association said today in a statement. The same proportion expect to continue to reduce their spending on these companies over the next three years, a potential $500 million loss, the association said.

“The process has gotten to be so long, and the capital required so deep, that it’s becoming more and more difficult to generate venture-type returns and therefore make it worth your while to do it,” said Terry McGuire, co-founder and general partner of Polaris Venture Partners and past chairman of the association, in an interview.

For all the silly moralizing we can do about how producing medicine "shouldn't" be about profit, the fact of the matter is that researchers and investors are different people.

Researchers have a medical and scientific interest in producing innovative chemicals that preserve human life. Despite all of that, their research costs money. Where does the money go? Well, part of it goes to the researcher's own grocery bill. Developing new medicines is a process that literally takes years. Researchers need to eat during that time. They need clothing, they need shelter, they need to pay their families' expenses. They aren't just "greedy," they actually need to survive while they pursue their research.

Another part of the money goes toward purchasing the raw chemicals and machines used in the research itself. So there are basic costs involved here. You can't just whip up a batch of agar and start cultivating "medicine." It takes controlled conditions and highly expensive laboratory equipment that needs to be maintained.
Now, those of you who believe medicine should exist without profit should ask yourselves how those researchers are supposed to cover these costs - which work their way well into the millions of dollars - without the aid of profit-seeking investors. 
Those investors do our society a valuable service by providing venture capital into promising new technologies, such as medicine. Of course, if medicine provides no return on investment, the investors will not invest. Why lose money? Why deprive other valuable new technologies of support and investment? 

Unfortunately, if capitalists stop investing in new medicine, highly refined new medicines will cease to be produced by anyone at all. 

It's a scary thought for someone who yearns to live to see the day when diabetes is cured.

100% of Wars Were Started By Politicians

...just something to keep in mind before they hand out the prize.

Things That Used to Be Legal

Photo courtesy RedBull.com

Today I introduce a new blog feature called Things That Used to Be Legal.The purpose of this blog feature is to attempt to capture a record of things that were legal during my lifetime, which were made illegal during that same lifetime.

Now, I won't be going back in time for this feature, because that would be too big an undertaking. Many things have been outlawed or regulated out of existence during my thirty-two years on Earth. I couldn't possibly pay tribute to each of those things separately. In honor of their former legality, however, I can attempt to keep a record of things made illegal going forward.

Given current governmental trends, I have no reason to believe that one country's or state's ruling is independent of another's. In other words, as soon as one government makes something illegal, the others will soon follow suit. Therefore, I will not wait until the item in question completely disappears before I record it on my blog. As evidence for this, I note that Denmark's new fat tax is currently being debated in Ontario. Suffice it to say, it is only a matter of time before revenue-hungry Ontario Gub-Monkeys follow Denmark's lead.

Red Bull? More Like Red Herring
Today's edition features Canada's recent decision to subject "energy drinks" such as Red Bull to the same kind of regulations "Ethical" class pharmaceutical products face.

What that means in plain language is that it must now be sold in the same location as insulin, Epi-Pens, and the morning after pill.

When Red Bull first appeared on the market, I was in high school. There were all sorts of interesting animated commercials about how "Red Bull gives you wings." People weren't sure what to think about it, in general. I remember one time I played a gig with a band I was in, and the bassist bought us all a can of Red Bull for the show. I had mine afterward. It tasted sweet, I actually quite liked the taste. But there wasn't very much in the can, and I was thirsty.

After drinking it, I felt no surge of energy whatsoever. I didn't actually expect to. I am an avid coffee and soda drinker, and caffeine's impact on me has been very minimal throughout my lifetime. It doesn't keep me awake, it doesn't increase my blood pressure. Occasionally, it reduces the efficacy of my mealtime insulin, but even then it doesn't really impact my body so much as my medication's efficacy.

That one can of Red Bull remains the one and only can of "energy drink" I have ever consumed. It tasted good, but wasn't worth the price, in my opinion. I'd rather buy a larger bottle of cola than a smaller can of Red Bull. It's a personal preference thing.

Over the years, Red Bull gained a following as a cocktail mixer. This makes sense to me because it tastes good, and it's fizzy, like ginger ale, cola, tonic, and other mixers. I never assumed people were mixing it for the effects of the caffeine, so much as because it was something different. When I was a kid, they used to have a soft drink called Jolt that had a lot of caffeine in it, but no one called it an "energy drink." I figured Red Bull was pretty much the same thing. The caffeine content was pretty much all hype.

Over the last couple of years, many news reports have come out about the supposed "dangers" of mixing alcohol and caffeine. Having read these reports, I cannot help but conclude that kids have been binge drinking just as they have for literal centuries. Kids have always been binge drinkers, because they're immature. Red Bull is nothing more than a scapegoat in this case.

It doesn't matter, however. In a few years no one will even remember what life was like before energy drinks were made "illegal" via back-door regulations that supercede the legislative process. All of this will be a distant memory.

Except, of course, that I will remember, and will have made note of it on my blog.

Visualizing Success

Why do some of us have an easier time visualizing success than others?

In The Marathon: Part IX, I discussed certain strategies for being effective when visualizing success.Then, as now, I believe that it's important to have something specific and possible in mind, rather than poorly defined, nebulous goals that only serve to discourage you, because they are unattainable by definition.

I may have done a half-decent job discussing how to express your goals in a way that lends them to attainment, but after discussing the idea of "visualizing success" with a faithful Stationary Waves reader recently, I have realized that some people - for a variety of reasons - may not be well-equipped to visualize success.

Why Can I Do It?
Perhaps the primary reason why it is so easy for me to "visualize success" is thanks to my almost twenty years of competitive sports experience.

I am a big fan of getting children involved in competitive sports, because it is an opportunity to learn a variety of important life-lessons in an environment that is defined to be "not taken so seriously." What I mean is, when we're playing sports, on some level everyone knows that it's "just a game." Because of this, we approach these situations from the perspective that no matter how heart-breaking it might be to lose, or how great it might feel to win, what's really important in life is... pretty much everything else. This is a neat feature of competitive sports because it means children get to experience dizzying heights of success and terrible heartbreak on a "make-believe" level, years before they ever have to experience true success or heartbreak in real-life. This helps them develop the mental tools they need before they need them.

One such mental tool is the ability to see long-range plans as bouts of iterative effort. Children know that they won't hit a home run every time they step up to the plate. But sports help them understand that if they put in the time and effort, and really try, they will be able to hit a home run at some point. When they finally do it, they see that all the hard work paid off. They have learned something invaluable: they have learned how to visualize success over a long period of time and persevere.

Why Can't Others Do It?
Granted, sports aren't the one and only source of these kinds of life lessons. There are many different ways children can develop these kinds of tools and attitudes. However, it can be said in general that those children with more exposure to these life lessons will internalize the tools better than those children with less exposure.

It stands to reason, then, that some of us adults find ourselves without a good internal framework for visualizing success. It becomes more like make-believe, and less like defining what you want and how to get there. If you find yourself to be a member of this camp, what do you do?

Some Tips for Learning How to Visualize Success
First, just like anything else, practice makes perfect. If you never even try to visualize success and write the whole exercise off as silly from the get-go, then - by definition - you'll never be able to do it.

I remember the first time I heard a running coach tell me to imagine myself crossing the finish line in first place. I thought it was silly, definitely. I closed my mind and had a quiet little Chariots of Fire moment in my head. I laughed about it, I didn't take it seriously. It didn't work, either. But after years of learning to visualize more than just a movie scene - to visualize the effort required to achieve something and the steps required to complete that effort - I eventually picked up on it. So it takes some practice.

Second, try to learn from those things in life you actually do successfully. Consider your thought process as you tie your shoes, for example. You hardly seem to think about it at all, but if you slow yourself down and break the process up into its basic components, the process is quite iterative. You see that your shoes are untied, you understand that you want them to be tied... Then, you recall one of the infinite memes by which you learned to tie your shoes, either with rabbits running around trees and into holes, or whatever else.

You have the desire to tie your shoes - that's visualizing success; you know what that looks like. You visualize on some level the steps required to tie your shoes - again, that's visualizing success. Finally, you stoop down and tie your shoes - you succeed.

Well, running a marathon or achieving what you want out of your career isn't all that different, it's simply a question of a longer time horizon and a greater number of steps.

Let the Winter Training Begin

One of the most important - and most entertaining - parts of any training regimen is Winter training.

For the dedicated distance runner, Winter weather conditions can provide a nature-enforced cross-training period. This is a chance to build up some of your neglected muscle groups, such as your upper body muscles and your stabilizers. This is also a chance to take a break from all the pavement-pounding and give your joints a reprieve. These things are an important component of any year-round commitment to fitness. Undertaking the variety inherent in a Winter training regimen will also offer you a vital lifeline to the non-running world, where you can intermingle with the less-masochistic segments of society.

For everyone else, Winter training is an opportunity to work on developing a good looking body; to prime yourself up for that Springtime beach vacation, as it were.

You've Got the Look
Now, I am not one to advocate fitness for the sake of beauty. First of all, I think body-building is silly. But most of all, I think it is extremely important to separate positive feelings from negative ones.

What do I mean? Well, it is not uncommon for people to feel that they "must" go to the gym in order to maintain their figure, or in order to "get hot" for the sake of another person or group of people. I associate these kinds of feelings with feelings of fundamental inadequacy. If you think exercise is your ticket to being beautiful, then by assumption you are not beautiful if you don't exercise.

That's a terrible reason to exercise. Fitness should be about making yourself feel better, not worse.

So, while it's a good idea to hit the gym to get yourself looking and feeling better, it's a bad idea to use physical appearance as your primary source of motivation. It shouldn't even be a significant one.

Instead
Instead, fitness can be your connection to the active pursuits you maintain in warmer periods. You may not be able to get outside and go for the two-hour run you might look forward to during the Summer, because it's too darn cold out there! But what you can do is plan for next season's long runs by improving your flexibility, core strength, posture, and body symmetry. It's not about how you look, it's about making the most of your favorite activities!

If that doesn't get you going (and how couldn't it?), you can always use your daily Wintertime trip to the gym as a way to just get out of the house, out of the office, out of the flourescent lights and re-circulated air, and into a place where people are moving around and accomplishing something.

Let's face it, Canadian winters are long and arduous. Many of us have the knack for fabulous outdoor winter sports like skiing and skating, but some of us are too skinny, too cold, and too diabetic to spend a lot of time outdoors in the cold. (And I really wish I could do it.) People like me might never be able to cross-country ski like a champ, but what we can do is channel our efforts into exercising at the gym.

A Look Ahead
In the forthcoming months, I'll be providing some ideas for working out at the gym, to help you get the most of your Winter training. I'll also be engaging in a personal journey to conquer my loathing of Canadian winters. Will this be the year I finally don't mind getting outside and taking advantage of what Canada has to offer during those other nine months of the year? I certainly hope so.

Perhaps you can share your ideas with me, too, and we can all learn.

The Entrepreneurial Spirit

Suddenly, I find myself with many items on-the-go.

Within the past month, I have undertaken two new music projects. That is, music performance projects. Unlike Ryan Ruins Requests or Insipid Pop Weekend, these projects will be incorporated into a single channel of musical expression, along with my existing progressive rock band, Prime Numbers. The idea here is that there is one Ryan, but multiple media.

Well, like all such projects, there is some danger of letting too much of the cat (or too many cats?) out of the bag. Because there is some work to do before anything is ready to be announced "officially," I am unable to provide more details about these projects than what I already have. Faithful Ryan fans, however, can look forward to finally hearing some real musical diversity from me for the first time. While in the past I have been in direct and virtually complete control of my musical undertakings, these new projects involve a higher degree of collaboration (or indeed hardly any creative control whatsoever).

Sure it sounds like I'm selling out, but I like to think you readers know me better than that...

But What Does It All Mean?
That's the high-level overview, but what are we really talking about here? I'm glad you asked! I'll break it down for you:

• I will be preparing no less than 22 new songs for performance-ready shape, all during the course of about one month.
• I will be engaged in a bit of a website re-design, with some host domain implications. That is to say, the blog will soon be more-than-a-blog.
• As the above item implies, I will be making additional resources and content available to you, the content-hungry public.
• I will be engaging in more public-facing initiatives. Live music performance certainly counts as one example, but you may soon expect more.
• Access to existing content should (hopefully) be improved to a significant degree.
• I will be pretty darn busy.

Despite all that, your Stationary Waves delivery service should remain intact and virtually uninterrupted while all of this occurs. The adverse impact to readers should be minimal; the positive impact will hopefully be maximal!

So, as my to-do list expands, expect your to-read list to expand exponentially. Exciting things are afoot around here, and I absolutely cannot wait to keep you posted. 

Why Climate Change is So Important for the Left

When you think about it, climate change should be an issue that doesn't "choose sides." Some of us will inevitably favor government policies that aim to account for climate change, and others will not. The issue itself has precious little tie-in to other big ticket political issues like abortion, social welfare programs, jobs-creation policy, international trade, etc.

Because it doesn't have much to do with these other issues, it's difficult to really understand why virtually everyone on the left is a firm believer in the anthropogenic global warming (AGW) theory. The same cannot be said of people on the right-hand side of politics. Some of them, such as John McCain, are ardent believers in AGW, while others are not. It is not easy to know in advance which rightists believe in AGW unless you ask them. Leftists, on the other hand, are virtually unanimous on the issue.

And not just unanimous, but passionate. Indeed, I am often taken aback by the extent to which the issue is moralized. It is not simply a good practice to recycle, it is morally reprehensible not to. But why? We all understand that living cleaner is better than being messy and dirty, but can it really be said that reducing, reusing, and recycling is a moral requirement? At any rate, most leftists believe that it is...

Why is the AGW issue so important to the left? 
I would like to venture my own personal theory...

On virtually every other political issue, leftists have not taken the position of the scientific majority.

On economic issues, for example, leftists frequently find themselves at odds with the majority of mainstream economists. For better or for worse, leftists find the economic analyses of e.g. Karl Marx, Max Weber, Naomi Klein, and Noam Chomsky far more compelling than those of, say, Milton Friedman and Robert Lucas. It is often said among leftists that economics is a mere tool for corporations to provide a justification for their exploitative goals. Leftism is so steeped in this sort of belief that - at least on the majority of economic issues - core, theoretical leftism finds itself at odds with the "scientific" majority.

To choose another issue for illustrative purposes, a large majority of leftists are pro-choice on the issue of abortion and euthanasia. Their rationale for this position, however, is not steeped in the scientific definition of life, where it begins and ends, etc. Their rationale is simply a matter of civil rights, the right to own our own bodies and to choose accordingly.

Similarly, leftists favor legalization of drugs neither because drugs have scientific benefits nor due to the violence inherent in black markets. Instead, leftists simply believe that a person is entitled to do to their own bodies what they themselves see fit, so long as they aren't endangering others.

Again and again, leftists find themselves taking moral positions on political issues. The cold, dispassionate, and scientific points of view are often derided by leftists. Leftists prefer not to view human beings as "mere numbers."

And yet, the climate change issue is entirely different. Here, at last, leftists share the point of view held by the majority of climate scientists.

The issue is, perhaps, the one and only issue that is purely a matter of science for leftists. (As I have noted above, the leftists have turned it into a moral issue, for whatever reason; but at any rate the fact remains that the bulk of the climate change rationale is rooted in the published papers of scientists.) Here, at last, leftists have an opportunity to deride all dissenters as non-scientific ignorami, religious zealots who have traded in their minds for right-wing idiocy.

Were the left to relinquish this issue - if leftists were to become disbelievers of AGW - they would no longer have a scientific claim to any issue whatsoever. Fully 100% of their political positions would be entirely moral in nature; none of their positions would be scientifically based.

Because of this, leftists cannot afford to take any position other than that the AGW theory is indisputable scientific fact.

They are painting themselves into a corner, however. As human knowledge progresses on matters of climate and physics, additional climactic subtleties reveal themselves. The exact relationship among solar radiation, air temperature, atmospheric composition, heat, and ocean currents is increasingly revealed to be an unfathomably complex system.

The results of human action on a system that is increasingly complex are, therefore, increasingly uncertain. While I will probably never live to see the day when leftists and rightists mostly agree on the issue, each passing year renders the climate predictions and allegations of the past increasingly more preposterous.

Eventually the "scientific consensus" will disappear and will be replaced with additional complexities, as has been demonstrated in virtually every other branch of science. Science abhors dogma. Today's majority is not guaranteed to be tomorrow's majority.

It would be unfortunate for the left if they once again chose dogma over science.

Illegal to be Fat

The Issue

My news feed is all a-flutter this morning with news of Denmark's levying "the world's first fat tax."

As with any such event, a person's perspective on the issue depends largely on whether or not that person happens to be a government insider. The AFP reports that the tax is designed "as a health issue to limit the population's intake of fatty foods."

I assume the reporter was attempting to be "objective" in his/her providing "the industry's perspective." The article quotes a spokeswoman from a foodstuffs manufacturer who expressed doubt as to the efficacy of the initiative and called it "just a tax." 

The Lie

The big lie in this news item is the idea that there are two sides to the issue: "the government" and "industry." News agencies are always keen to phrase issues this way. For any regulatory issue (they would have us believe), there are those who wish to have free reign to reap large profits, and there are those in the government who wish to protect us from those exploitative behaviors.

It is easy and tempting to conceive of such a world, one in which one side always has good intentions and the other side always has bad intentions. I suppose this is the modern framework for "Left vs. Right." The average leftist would be compelled to believe that regulators always have good intentions and corporations, always bad ones; the average rightist I guess is supposed to believe the opposite.

Hence we are always pit against each other with regard to who we think is inherently evil to the bone.

The Idiocy

Let us entertain the Denmark government's actions for a moment. Let us assume that their motives were good ones. 

• Does anyone actually believe that "making fat illegal" will cause people to stop being fat?
• Does anyone actually believe that saturated fats are the only type of macronutrients that cause ill health?
• Does anyone actually believe that "industry" "wants us to be fat," and therefore fills our plates with hideously unhealthy foods against our will, just to take advantage of us?
• Does anyone actually support this tax?
• In a world where people are starving to death, does anyone actually think it's a good idea to make food more expensive?!?

But perhaps one of the worst aspects of this tax is that it is not in any way grounded on real health science. Not only are saturated fats consumed in normal amounts not correlated with adverse events (i.e. they produce no conclusively demonstrated ill effects), they are actually a somewhat important part of the human diet. Granted, you shouldn't over-do it because high fat intake is certainly bad. But normal fat intake is healthy. That's why they call it "normal."

Of course, a "fat tax" doesn't know whether the fat you're eating is normal or excessive. The fat tax simply taxes first - and doesn't even ask questions later. All saturated fats are subject to the tax, regardless of whether your intake of them is healthy.

I am having a real problem with this. Idiocy indeed.

The Crossfire

I submit the following as an indisputable fact: Everyone's dietary needs are a little different. Some people require a very high carbohydrate diet, others require a more moderate carbohydrate intake. 

Consider this article by Dr. Uffe Ravnskov, in which he indicates that a diet slightly lower in carbohydrates and slightly higher in saturated fats actually produces clinical health benefits among type 2 diabetics. So, while the "majority" of people may at some point begin to feel that a ban or tax on saturated fats is "good for society," they are leaving out whole swaths of the population. 

Let's call a spade a spade here: it's bigotry. Any time a government or a population decides to tax one group for the benefit of another, we are dealing with institutionalized prejudice. If a person spends $300 per month on food, and a person's diet is such that they require more fatty foods, that person will either be forced to take home less food for $300, or will have to spend more than $300 for the same amount of food. 

By singling out the diabetic population in such a way, the state is engaging in an unconscionable bigotry that must be stopped yesterday.

Conclusion

There is no good reason to impose a fat tax. It is at best misguided, on average ineffective, and at worst downright wicked. I don't even see this as an issue of "personal liberty." It is an issue of basic survival and equal treatment under the law. The foods a person requires should not be subject to the democratic process. Which foods I choose to ingest are not "up to a vote." You have no right to force me to eat your diet. I'm diabetic: I have other needs.

Once In Idaho, Why Leave?

A couple of days ago, I described a potentially positive way to digest problems, using the old handy phrase "private Idaho." Well, I feel as though I have been living comfortably in my own private Idaho for the past week and I am now confronted with a new "dilemma." Once one finds oneself in Idaho, why leave?

I first conceived of the whole Idaho metaphor while staring at the back of a semi-truck in the middle of virtually gridlocked traffic conditions. The back of the truck's trailer was painted to look like a farm truck full of potatoes rolling along on a beautiful sunny day. That truck must have been rolling along at just the right moment, because I was instantly transported out of my dreary, bleak day and into the cool Autumn breeze and heady aroma of a sunny afternoon somewhere in, say, Preston, Idaho. I spent my university years in the general vicinity, and while it's not something I'd describe as "perfect," there is something about those Autumn breezes that really soothes and calms the soul.

Suffice it to say, taking myself there mentally was a great relief that day. It allowed me to "step outside of myself" a bit and take a more even-tempered look at the stressors in my life. I liked it so much, I decided to try as much as possible to keep my head in that kind of a state: cool, even-tempered, peaceful, happy, calm.

In a way, it kind of seemed like a mental vacation at the time, Yet, here I am - days later - and I don't really want to "go back." I like it in Idaho.

Then again, who wouldn't like being cool, even-tempered, peaceful, happy, and calm? Granted, it's not possible all the time, but what a great way to handle every situation you confront: with a perfectly rational, cool head and positive perspective.

Because this line of discussion is new to my blog, I'm going to act quickly and flag it immediately as a mental health strategy. Specifically, it shall henceforth be known as...

Mental Health Strategy #1: Go to Idaho, and Just Stay There

The Paradox Paradox

One of the greatest paradoxes I have come across is the question of the existence of paradoxes. Think of it this way:

• A paradox is a statement that is both true and false.
• No statement can be both true and false.

So which is it?

Dictionaries neatly sidestep this issue by defining paradoxes to be statements that are seemingly or apparently self-contradictory. This would imply that we will discover, upon closer examination, that a paradox will not be determined to be self-contradictory. 

Naturally, if that were true, then the statement would no longer appear or seem to be self-contradictory. It would not be a paradox. 

If paradoxes cannot exist by their own definition, then can it be said that they exist at all?

The Paradox of the Heap and the Theseus' Ship paradox are two versions of the same fundamental paradox. The idea in both cases is that there is essentially an arbitrary difference between a collective concept (such as a heap, a ship, or a forest) and the individual components that define it (such as a grain of sand, the plank of a ship, or a single tree). 

There is no universal number of sand grains that make up a heap, nor a critical number of "original planks" that define a single ship. Instead, we choose to perceive something as a heap, or a ship, or a forest more or less on an individual level.

We also call them "mashed potatoes," even if the total number of potatoes used to make the dish is one.

Paradoxes always come down to either a problem of definition or a problem of perception. Either the language used in our definitions is not precise or accurate enough to encapsulate what we're trying to describe, or we are attempting to describe something universally, when its definition is entirely arbitrary. 

Mashed potatoes are a problem of definition because we have defined them to be plural no matter what the reality of the situation is. Forests are a problem of perception because there exists no specific number of trees such that that number of trees makes up a forest, but one fewer tree does not.

The interesting thing about paradoxes is that they are both a problem of definition and of perception. The definition can never be true, and their existence is in fact only a matter of perception.

When Evidence Doesn't Matter Anymore

I have provided plenty of explanations about the health care industry in the past, and I will do so in the future. After a certain point, however, one has to acknowledge that evidence simply doesn't matter to people.

If it did, people would take the national (international, really) drug shortage more seriously. Sure, you can blame it on evil profiteering, but the economic fact of the matter is that if regulations and legislation make pharmaceuticals an unprofitable industry, then companies will shut their doors and entrepreneurs will seek other means to make money.

Indeed, if evidence mattered, then people would simply be forced to acknowledge that the ObamaCare legislation has failed miserably in its promise to reduce the cost of health insurance.

If proof and facts were important to anyone, then my descriptions of the many failures of Canadian single-payer health care to provide me with any health care at all would move people to acknowledge the truth.

BUT CULTS DON'T CARE ABOUT EVIDENCE.

I am tired of people telling me that my experiences didn't happen. I am tired of people telling me that my evidence is beside the point. I am tired of people telling me that this failed god of government medicine really does work, and that I am merely imagining the failures. I am tired of my American readers assuming that doctors offices and hospitals in Canada look exactly the same as they do in the USA without any evidence to support this assumption. I am tired of my Canadian readers assuming that health care looks the same all over the world as it does in Canada. I am tired of people making theoretical comparisons and ignoring the words of people like myself, who have consumed health care for more than one reason, in more than one country, under more than one system.

If I am wrong, then show me the evidence, don't just give me some half-baked Cracker Jacks theory about how the poor would implode if private health care were introduced in Canada or that cancer will swallow the entire American nation unless a single-payer system is introduced.

Don't waste my time with a fantasy. I don't believe in your cult.

Members of cults believe whatever they think they are supposed to believe, regardless of evidence. There is no evidence against private, unregulated health care. There is only the belief that "some people" would die.

"Some people" are already dying. Looks like your god hasn't managed to solve that problem.

But it doesn't matter, does it? You can't speak out against god.

Upcoming Events

There are a couple of events of interest to faithful Stationary Waves readers planned for early October:

• The next Ottawa-area meet-up of the Ludwig von Mises Institute of Canada will be held on Sunday, October 2nd, featuring yours truly and Mark Stobnicki of the Institute. We have some good topics lined up for this event, so come on down to the Heart & Crown and join the fun!

• The next information night for Team Diabetes, the official competitive/fund-raising arm of the Canadian Diabetes Association will be held on Tuesday, October 4th. I have no affiliation with the CDA other than my public declaration to get involved.

Come on out and join me, we will have an excellent time together.