Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

Earlier I read about a group of young men with Muslim names — Mohammad Habibzada, Shafiq Hashemi and Sayed Bassam — who went from their hometown of Hayward, California to San Francisco, California for the express purpose of shooting gays with a BB gun, which they already confessed to doing: Three Hayward men are scheduled…

Like clockwork, every time I might think of taking a little time to do, you know, things unrelated to blogging, a new emergency arises. Until a few moments ago, I had absolutely no idea that “they” were about to burn the Reichstag, and that because M. Simon was discussing drugs, that makes this blog “unreal.”…

High Country News has an interesting article on how Mexico is becoming a failed state. All because of the Drug War. The man talking on the screen was recruited by the drug industry in Ciudad Juarez, sent to the state police academy, where he got around $150 a month as a student and around $1,000…

One of my pet peeves is that in many jurisdictions, police officers have become little more than revenue agents. Tax collectors, if you will. Here’s a typical rant: You go 75 (which nearly everyone does, and which you have to do to keep up with traffic), and you’re vulnerable, because sooner or later, some damnable…

If you read my post Investing In Polywell you would know that venture capital seems interested in funding fusion start-ups. We now have more confirmation in this Finance Business article. A prominent venture capitalist, Wal van Lierop, of Chrysalix Energy Venture Capital, has begun to invest in companies (such as General Fusion) who are providing…

Famulus at Prometheus Fusion has raised enough funds through Kick Starter to get the funds released for his amateur Polywell Fusion Reactor experiments. We look forward to the results in three months or so. Small fusion is doing well. Big fusion not so much. The roughly $10 billion ITER Project in France is being delayed…

Yes, the above has become a cliche. But because the cliche reflects a narrative that many people are not buying, it’s become a bitterly sarcastic cliche. I think that when a narrative becomes a sarcastic cliche, it’s worth taking a closer look at the narrative. For many years I lived in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. I…

Pelosi is once again claiming the end is near on healthcare. That’s nothing new, a fact Drudge had some fun with today, but this bit rankles: These states, New York, Pennsylvania and Massachusetts among them, already provide coverage under the low-income program for the poor that other states do not but would be required to…

Dr. Helen has reviewed Amy Alkon’s book I See Rude People: One woman’s battle to beat some manners into impolite society, and she also interviewed the author for PJTV. In one of her posts about the book (which I bought), Dr. Helen asked what I thought was an excellent (but not easy) question: If someone…

From Ed Driscoll, here’s the Quote Of The Day from Nancy Pelosi on why the health care bill should be passed: “We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.” I always knew Nancy Pelosi was wacky, but I didn’t know…

Famulus at Prometheus Fusion had a close encounter with an angel investor from Europe. He gives an account of his interactions. Famulus was kind enough to ask me for some assistance with his proposal. I also got one of my physicist friends (Dr. Mike) to help out. Famulus needs to raise funds to continue his…

Nick Gillespie’s post about the Pennsylvania crackdown on unlicensed allegedly “unregistered” beers makes me glad I left the state: More than a dozen armed State Police officers conducted simultaneous raids last week on three popular Philadelphia bars known for their wide beer selections. The cops confiscated hundreds of bottles of expensive ales and lagers, now…

Dan Rather’s remark that Barack Obama couldn’t sell watermelons has drawn a lot of attention and ridicule, and Ann Althouse is inclined to give Rather a pass, but with a caveat: So I’ll give Dan Rather a pass. But if we give Dan Rather a pass for the accidental appearance of racism, will anyone who…

NOTE: This post was written by M. Simon (who is having computer problems), and posted by Eric. The natural order of things is for the rich to steal from the poor. Any other order is unnatural. So how do you maintain an unnatural system where the poor have a chance? The only way is that…

Sharing photos of the bizarre Barcelona blizzard, Barcepundit’s José Guardia speculates that Al Gore must be in town. Snow in mid-March is of course extremely unusual because Barcelona has a mild Mediterranean climate. Telegraph reports forecasts of snowfalls of up to 20 inches, school closures, and 200,000 clients without electricity. So where is Al Gore?…

Carl Cannon thinks Barack Obama will win reelection in 2012 for a variety of reasons, one of which involves the dynamics of Congress. He compares the situation to that of Reagan and Clinton: …Incumbency is supposed to be a disadvantage in the current political environment, but that perception is worth a closer look. It’s certainly…

Who are “they”? It’s an ongoing question here, and I have devoted a number of posts to the issue. In a piece titled “Boss Rangel and the Spirit of 1876,” Walter Russell Mead really nails them: ….take the upper middle class neo-Puritan goody-goodies out of the mix and there isn’t all that much left of…

Confronted with the spectacle of the gluttonous David Axelrod chomping on a drumstick, President Obama is reported to have “surveyed the spread on Mr. Axelrod’s desk with a slight smirk” and then quipped “What is this, King Arthur’s court?” Neo-Neocon notes that the president committed a historical gaffe: King Arthur’s court? I believe Obama must…

Government run medicine in Britain strikes again. A man of 22 died in agony of dehydration after three days in a leading teaching hospital. Kane Gorny was so desperate for a drink that he rang police to beg for their help. They arrived on the ward only to be told by doctors that everything was…

While I’ve used Ebay to buy and sell for many years, about a year ago I decided that I would never be a seller again. That’s because after many years of a feedback system that allowed both buyers and sellers to leave negative feedback, Ebay suddenly instituted a “no-negative feedack” rule — but only against…