Posts Tagged ‘social commentary’

WikiLeaks cables: Bangladeshi ‘death squad’ trained by UK government

Rapid Action Battalion, accused of hundreds of extra-judicial killings, received training from UK officers, cables reveal The British government has been training a Bangladeshi paramilitary force condemned by human rights organisations as a “government death squad”, leaked US embassy cables...

December 22nd, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

A Police Chief with a Difference

Kiran Bedi has a surprising resume. Before becoming Director General of the Indian Police Service, she managed one of the country’s toughest prisons — and used a new focus on prevention and education to turn it into a center of learning and meditation. Before she retired in 2007, Kiran...

December 16th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Wikileaks’ aim to defeat “Authoritarian Conspiracy”

The following is an interesting analysis (by ‘zunguzungu’) of a text by Wikileaks leader Julian Assange, probably written around 2006. See the paper: State and Terrorist Conspiracies For additional analysis, see here. By Michel Bauwens for the P2P Foundation Analysis: (nearly quoted in full) “Most...

December 14th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Can Dope give us Hope?

The ban on hallucinogens is holding back vital research into their medical benefits, says Jake Wallis Simons. Last week, the news took on a decidedly trippy tinge. First, Professor David Nutt, sacked as an adviser to the Labour government for criticising its policy on drugs, sparked controversy...

December 14th, 2010 | Drug Policy | Read More

Was the poisoning of a French town in 1951 an LSD trial?

On August 16th 1951 a number of people in the quiet southern French town of Pont St.Esprit began to fall ill. Stomach pains were soon followed by violent and often terrifying hallucinations. Local hospitals were soon overwhelmed and more than thirty people were taken to asylums in nearby towns. It was...

August 25th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

‘I’m planning to retire to Mars’

Elon Musk, The SpaceX founder, is convinced that humanity’s survival rests on its ability to move to the red planet. He here speaks of how his company is making the leap to the stars an affordable dream The fresh-faced 39-year-old man, in a dark T-shirt and jeans, is talking about travelling to...

August 6th, 2010 | Science & Technology | Read More

An answer to the ‘Nature vs Nurture’ Debate?

Savage-Rumbaugh’s work with bonobo apes, which can understand spoken language and learn tasks by watching, forces the audience to rethink how much of what a species can do is determined by biology — and how much by cultural exposure.

August 6th, 2010 | Evolution | Read More

Monkey Economicus?

Laurie Santos looks for the roots of human irrationality by watching the way our primate relatives make decisions. A clever series of experiments in “monkeynomics” shows that some of the silly choices we make, monkeys make too. Laurie Santos studies primate psychology and monkeynomics —...

August 4th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Drugs That Shape Men’s Minds

Aldous Huxley’s acclaimed essay about man’s inclination towards intoxication and the potential for good and evil that drugs represent In the course of history many more people have died for their drink and their dope than have died for their religion or their country. The craving for ethyl...

August 4th, 2010 | Drug Policy | Read More

Wiping Minds

It is quite common, in these neurocentric days, to find statements from those who eagerly anticipate the final abolition of minds, with no thought to the consequences. One recent example was from archaeologist Peter Watson in the New Scientist, (quoted in Beauregard & O’Leary, 2007); “The...

August 3rd, 2010 | Science of the Mind | Read More