The Scorpion and the Frog

 

Together

Through thick and through thin,
All out or all in.
And whether it's win, place or show.
With you for me and me for you,
We'll muddle through whatever we do.
Together, wherever we go.

The group is stronger than the individual.

"A scorpion asks a frog to carry him over a river. The frog is afraid of being stung, but the scorpion argues that if it did so, both would sink, and the scorpion would drown. The frog then agrees, but midway across the river the scorpion does indeed sting the frog, dooming them both. When asked why, the scorpion points out that this is its nature."

This is a favorite cautionary story on why you should not trust others.  Those admiring the tale think that they are superior to both the stinging scorpion and the naïve frog.  However the people who admire this tale have a lot more in common with the scorpion than the frog.  The frog assumed that since he would not do anything to kill himself, the scorpion would do the same.  The frog is unlikely to approach the scorpion on land because that would be dangerous.  However the frog assumed that no one would be foolish enough to kill himself. It is told as a lesson to point out how foolish that frog was being.

This is a simple game where the scorpion has a goal to cross the river.  On each move the scorpion can sting or not sting and on that same move the frog can carry or not carry.  If the scorpion stings but the frog does not carry, the scorpion does not cross the river.  If the scorpion does not sting and the frog does not carry, the scorpion also does not cross the river.  If the scorpion stings and the frog carries, then the scorpion does not cross the river.  Only if the frog carries and the scorpion does not sting can the scorpion cross the river.

After the game play in the story, neither the frog nor the scorpion can ever play again. This is then by definition a game of only two.  But if the scorpion is playing for other scorpions and the frog is playing for other frogs, then stinging is NOT the best strategy.  The winning strategy in games with more than two players is the subject of an older blog post of mine.  https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2021/05/tough-but-fair-beats-always-being-nasty.html.  Or to borrow phrase,  the winning strategy is "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".  Don’t ever walk alone.

Regulations II

 

Liar, Liar

Liar, liar, pants on fire
Your nose is longer than a telephone wire
Ask me, baby, why I'm sad
You been out all night, know you been bad
Don't tell me different, know it's a lie
Come kill me, honey, see how I cry

Aren’t regulations just a protection from lying?

A basic principle of User Optimal solutions (such as those favored by Libertarians), is that all Users have perfect knowledge.  In the absence of perfect knowledge, the assumption is that in any transaction, all parties of that transaction can be trusted.  Regulations are imposed because one of the parties in a  transaction may be lying, while the other parties think that party is telling the truth.  Regulations are not because there are untrustworthy parties in a transaction but because there might be untrustworthy parties in a transaction.  Regulations are merely a way of substituting for perfect knowledge.

Any group of users, such as the United States, wishes to achieve a System Optimal solution.  In an ideal world, this System Optimal solution will be the sum of all of the User Optimal solutions.  But this is only possible if they are indeed User Optimal solutions for every party in the transactions.  If one of the parties in a transaction is not trustworthy, that user will achieve THEIR User Optimal solution, but every other party of the transaction will NOT achieve their User Optimal solution.

For example, Bernie Madoff achieved his User Optimal solution, which in his case included lying, while he was operating his investment scheme.  The victims of Bernie Madoff did NOT achieve their User Optimal solutions.  That is why Bernie Madoff and his Ponzi investment scheme was a criminal offense.  This is also why there are regulations.  Those who rail against regulations are saying that they, and all parties in transactions, are trustworthy so why the regulations.  The problem is that not every party in a transactions might be trustworthy, and in order to protect society, society has to enact regulations.  Are regulations costly? YES? Are costs imposed on trustworthy parties? YES.  Should the cost be borne by the parties of those transactions? THAT SEEMS FAIRER THAN IMPOSING THOSE COSTS ON ALL OF SOCIETY INCLUDING THOSE WHO ARE NOT NOW, AND WILL NEVER BE, A PARTY TO THOSE TRANSACTIONS.  If the regulations are less costly than the consequences of untrustworthy transactions, they are worth it to society.

Regulations are not imposed arbitrarily.  There are Notices of Proposed Rule Makings, NPRMs,  and comment periods for every potential federal regulation. www.federalregister.gov/uploads/2011/01/the_rulemaking_process.pdf.  
If there are objections to these regulations, that is the proper time and way to voice those objections.  If the comments were not properly considered, the laws for NPRMs and their comment periods can be revised, but that is not an excuse for no regulations.

The Supreme Court is supposed to be an arbiter of what is good for society, not for potentially untrustworthy users.  No regulations means that everyone can be trusted.  A nice position, but isn’t that being naïve?  Trust, but verify. Aren’t regulations verifying?

Nasty

 

Nasty Girl

Ohh (do you think I'm a nasty girl?)
Ohh (nasty)
Nasty girl (nasty girl)
Do you think I'm a nasty girl?
Ohh
I don't like this groove
Try and give me something I can croon to
Catch my drift?

Is Kaitlin Collins A Nasty Girl?

At the CNN Town Hall in New Hampshire with Donald Trump, where the audience must have been drawn from the parking lot crowd at Mar-a-Lago, the disgraced and disgraceful former President called Kaitlin Collins NASTY.  Should CNN have done that broadcast with that laugh track? NO. Was Kaitlin Collins asked by CNN to go into the Lions’ Den? YES.

Considering that Donald Trump has previously called Nancy Pelosi, Meghan Markel, Kamala Harris, April Ryan and Hillary Clinton nasty, Kaitlin is in good company.  If that is NASTY, then “More please”.

Perfection

 

Will The Circle Be Unbroken

Will the circle be unbroken
By and by Lord, by and by
There's a better home awaiting
In the sky Lord, in the sky

In case it isn’t obvious, the circle is God

The circle has long been a symbol of perfection, eternity, and of God.  It has no beginning and no end.  The Nicene Creed says that God is a trinity, 3, which creates confusion for the belief that there is but one God.  However the Trinity merely says that there are three aspects of that one God. The area of a circle is π*r(adius)² , the  circumference of circle is 2*π*r(adius),so it is common to use π as the symbol of a circle.

The major religions all seem to agree that life is about chaging our state from Unsaved to Saved.  (They of course disagree about how you get saved but they all still seem to say that there are these two states).  If there are two states,  Saved (1) and Unsaved (0), then the mean and median of these states is 0.5.  A normal distribution is the logistics distribution, also know as the sech-squared distribution.  It is has a range variable, s.  If there are two states, 0 and 1, and their median and mean is 0.5, then the range, s,  is 0.5, i.e. 0.5 + 0.5 = 1 and 0.5 - 0.5 =0.  The variance of the normal sech-squared distribution is s²*π²/3. In other words, Choice/Free Will, 0.5, squared multiplied by perfection, π, squared divided by 3.

A coincidence? Remember Einstein's quote that coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous.

Shame

 

It’s A Shame

It's a shame (shame) the way you mess around with your man
It's a shame (shame) the way you play with my emotions
It's a shame (shame) the way you mess around with your man
You're like a child at play, on a sunny day
'Cause you play with love, and then you throw it away

Have you no shame?

The exact words uttered by Joseph Welch to questions by Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Army hearings of 1954 were “Have you no sense of decency”. This was of course a rhetorical question directed to the audience of the hearings. Senator McCarthy of course had no sense of decency. A sense of decency, the ability to feel shame, means you value the opinion of the group more than you value your own opinion. Like the Orange Menace, Senator McCarthy cared not one whit about the opinions of the group. He only cared about his own opinions. Al Franken can resign from the Senate over an inappropriate photo. Abe Fortas can resign from the Supreme Court over a controversial $18,000 contribution that he refunded. Now that is shame!

And by the group, I mean the entire Nation, not just the group of supporters who share his opinion. The fact that Senator McCarthy was holding hearings charging lax security at a top-secret army facility was only an attempt to raise fear on the issue. A classic con artist stunt. “We’ve Got Trouble Right here in River City.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LI_Oe-jtgdI. Henry Hill did not care at all about the pool hall. A digression. Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang magazine mentioned in the lyrics became Whiz Comics which debuted the original Captain Marvel. Shazam! THAT’S your idea of trouble? He only wanted to sell band uniforms. It starts when you’re always afraid.

Math III

 

Born Free

Stay free
Where no walls divide you
You're free as a roaring tide
So there's no need to hide

Is division the opposite of being free?

Engineers such as myself may not care about the difference between approaching and being. We primarily care about close enough. But we understand that there is a difference. Division by infinity approaches zero, but it is NOT zero. A mathematician and a physicist would give different answers. The limit of a constant k divided by x, k/x,  as it approaches zero is undefined according to a mathematician, because if k is zero, then k/0 is undefined. If k is equal to zero, a physicist would  say 0/0 is 1 because the formula k/x approaches 1 as x approaches zero from the positive side. However if it were approached beginning from negative infinity, them its limit would be -1. So at 0 there is a discontinuity, but there is also a paradox because the limit is both -1 and 1.  Engineers like me don’t generally deal with negative numbers, and we have no dog in this fight, but work it out guys please. Discontinuities, abrupt changes in the slope of an equation, that we can handle. Paradoxes, contradictory values at the same value, typically indicate that a deeper truth is not yet understood. The fact that this involves division might be significant

As mathematicians and binary machine language computer programmers can tell you, multiplication is easy, division is hard. Multiplication of a by b, where a is the multiplicand and b is the multiplier, is the product ab. To get that product, you add the multiplicand to itself multiplier times. So multiplication and addition are easily linked. Also multiplication does not involve a change of case. If a and b are both integers then their product, ab, will also be an integer.

Division is not linked to subtraction in the same manner. If multiplication is just repeated addition, division is NOT repeated subtraction. Also division involves a change of case. The division of two integers will result in a rational number. It is even worse for roots. The root of an integer or a rational number can be an irrational number. Multiplication, or raising a number to a power, is a series of additions with no change of case. Division, or taking a root, is not a series of subtractions and it involves a change of case. The biblical injunction is “Be Fruitful and Multiply.”  “Divide and conquer” was said by Julius Caesar. I knew that there was a problem understanding that whole Render onto Caesar and God thing, but those who promote dividing us have at least made it clear on which side they are.

Math II

 

I Believe

Everytime I hear a newborn baby cry,
Or touch a leaf, or see the sky,
Then I know why, I believe!

Do Christian Nationalists believe in God?

Christian Nationalists have preached the belief that theirs is the only correct way and thus they believe in a government of “My way or the highway” rather than ‘All roads lead to Rome.”  Mathematically they believe in a Cumulative Distribution Function, CDF, that is 0 before a point  e.g.  “A Come to Jesus Moment,” µ, and is 1 after that point. But they also believe that there should be no variance, whose square root is σ, and their Probability Distribution Function, PDF, is the only PDF with the correct CDF. In fact it is not.

A normal logistics PDF for any value of x is  ¼*1/s*sech²((x-µ)/2s). Its CDF is ½+½*tanh((x-µ)/2s). It has a variance, σ², of s²π²/3. Its CDF is also 0 before a point, µ-3*σ, and is 1 after a point, µ+3*σ. Thus the difference between the Christian Nationalist, and a normal distribution is the value of the variance, σ². Christian Nationalists believe it can only be zero, while according to mathematics, normally it can be any nonzero number.

If you accept the premise that before µ , the “Come to Jesus” moment,  you were not saved, did not accept God/Jesus, and after µ you were saved, but you also believe that there is no variance, σ=0, then  you also have to believe that s = 0. The problem is that those people have confused variance with error. God has no error, but he does have a variance. In fact, according to a normal logistics function, when s= 0.5, which is also the mean and median of the CDF of Christian Nationalists, the variance is not zero but is perfection, God, π², divided into three parts, 3, times choice squared, s²= 0.25.  If you believe that your variance is zero, but God’s variance is not zero, you must also not believe in God. So please don’t call yourselves Christian Nationalists. Be honest and call yourselves Anti-Christian Nationalists.