
The psychology of power: Absolutely - mblakele
http://www.economist.com/sciencetechnology/displaystory.cfm?story_id=15328544
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greenlblue
"The alternative, though cleaner, is leadership by wimps." - What an
underhanded way to validate the current power structure. The alternative is
not leadership by wimps but a better political and power structure with more
inherent fairness for all.

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Towle_
Finally!

I've always hated that saying. "Absolute power corrupts absolutely." Nonsense.

Just look at the types of individuals who gain access to absolute power.
Either they're ruthlessly ambitious, men for whom the ends always justify the
means, or they're born into royalty/nobility and have a distorted sense of
their own worth-- and the worth of others.

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maurycy
This is just correlation vs causation. ;-)

It is false that "Absolute power corrupts absolutely.", but it is true that
"Those who are in absolute power are corrupted absolutely".

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Towle_
Yes sir, yessir, yezzir. Exactly what I'm trying to say. :D

(Caution ahead: unnecessary detour...in the form of a light rant)

Correlation is so, so often mistaken for causation. And unlike most logical
fallacies, 'correlation vs. causation' seems to know no borders whatsoever.
That fact is really very striking to me.

 _Ad hominem_ attacks, for example, are extremely prevalent in political
discussion, especially on political talk shows, but you'd rarely see one in
such forums as medical journals, formal debates, et al.

But 'correlation vs. causation' fallacies seem, to me at least, to be
pervasive throughout nearly every-- if not all-- forums of discussion. Sure,
it's worse in some areas than it is in others, but it's _everywhere_.
Personally, I'm most annoyed when I see it in magazine and newspaper articles
(especially frequent in those on medical studies and surveys and whatnot), not
because journalists/writers should be more aware of this fallacy than the rest
of the population but because these places are _supposed to be_ our most
reliable, most verifiable sources of information available. And they're not
just supposed to be, _they claim to be_ as well.

99.237% of the time, I'm a very laid-back guy. 0.763% of the time, I'm reading
an article titled "Eating mashed potatoes and gravy causes CANCER?" or some
similar nonsense. (Intentionally ridiculous example chosen. Everybody knows
mashed potatoes and gravy have no capacity for evil, none whatsoever.)

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Towle_
1\. Make that "109.237% of the time." I always go 110%. What's that, you say?
Mathematically impossible? I used to think so too. Then one day I slept for
26.4 hours.

2\. In completely unrelated web surfing occurring in totally different tabs on
the opposite side of my Firefox window, I was searching thesaurus.com for a
contextually superior synonym of 'saying'/'phrase'. Plenty to choose from, of
course. I was thinking of going with 'aphorism' for a moment, so I switched
from thesaurus to dictionary to make certain it correctly fit my context.

Look for yourself: <http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aphorism>

Infuriating how pervasive its usage is. Infuriating.

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nazgulnarsil
i recommend, as always, Bertrand Dejouvenal's On Power.

~~~
Towle_
Give me some truly convincing reasoning, _bitte_? Doesn't have to be long;
succinctness, after all, is one of the forms in which power appears.

> as always

Or, of course, a link to another time you did.

~~~
nazgulnarsil
On Power is about the scope of political power throughout history. I couldn't
recommend it to someone already intimately familiar with the last few hundred
years, but as an overview of history that doesn't simply devolve into "story
time" (viewing history as a coherent narrative in the style that we are
comfortable with; involving heroes, villains, and dramatic tension) it is hard
to beat. Since such gross simplification is all most people are familiar with
(think the history channel) I recommend it to everyone as a starting point for
non-pandering historical analysis.

In addition it is only $11 for a very nice book that will impress others :p

