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A major civil rights group says the Justice Department has more a lot more power than it's using to change the behavior of local police departments.
The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund wants Attorney General Merrick Garland to suspend grants to local law enforcement until he's sure that no federal taxpayer money is funding police departments that engage in discrimination, according to a letter obtained by NPR.
The letter comes days after a jury convicted former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin of murder in the death of George Floyd. Garland has announced a sweeping federal civil rights investigation of the police force there that will examine use of force, discrimination and possible mistreatment of people with behavior disorders.
But NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund (LDF) president Sherrilyn Ifill said the Justice Department needs to deploy a potentially more powerful tool at its disposal to combat racial discrimination: Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
"The innovation of it was really designed to address recalcitrant Southern jurisdictions that refused to comply with Brown v. Board of Education," Ifill said, referring to the landmark 1954 Supreme Court school desegregation decision. "But it doesn't apply just to education. It essentially says that federal funds cannot be used to support local programs that engage in discrimination."
The new letter to the Justice Department points out that police have killed at least 17 Black people since Garland was confirmed as Attorney General this year and that several of the deadly incidents occurred while the trial in Minneapolis was under way. Years of Justice Department investigations and independent research have uncovered racial discrimination in patterns of traffic stops, arrests and even deaths from law enforcement agencies across the country.
"Every new shooting, every video brings with it an urgency to address discriminatory police conduct nationwide," said Puneet Cheema, who manages the Justice and Public Safety Project at the LDF. "And now it's not an individual officer, it's not an individual department. It's a national problem, and it needs a national solution."
President Biden has pledged to make racial equity a central focus of his work, across all federal agencies. Last week, Garland said his department "will be unwavering in its pursuit of equal justice under law."
Newly confirmed Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta, the first civil rights lawyer and woman of color to hold that post, will oversee both the civil rights division and the Office of Justice Programs, which administers grants.
Police departments rely on federal grant dollars to support training, body-worn cameras and other initiatives. In 2020 alone, two of the biggest such Justice Department grant programs accounted for $504 million.
LDF said the Justice Department needs to develop clear standards and protocols for civil rights enforcement among its grantees and that taking the word of police groups in a single, check-the-box attestation on a grant application form is not enough.
The group said DOJ's own regulations provide that federal money "may not, directly or through contractual or other arrangements, utilize criteria or methods of administration which have the effect of subjecting individuals to discrimination because of their race, color, or national origin, or have the effect of defeating or substantially impairing accomplishment of the objectives of the program as respects individuals of a particular race, color, or national origin."
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.


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GUEST COLUMN | By Paul Langhorst
Bullying in schools is hardly a new problem, but in today's "connected" world, it doesn't look like it once did. Face-to-face harassment incidents, once confined to the schoolyard, have moved to the cyber schoolyard. Children and teens are using technology to target one another. They take social media outlets, such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and turn them into powerful instruments to terrorize peer victims, anonymously.
Current statistics estimate that 160,000 children miss school every day due to fear of attack or intimidation by other students. Other highly publicized statistics note that:
– 56% of students have personally witnessed some type of bullying at school.
– 15% of all school absenteeism is directly related to fears of being bullied at school.
– 71% of students report incidents of bullying as a problem at their school.
– 282,000 students are physically attacked in secondary schools each month.
– 90% of 4th through 8th graders report being victims of bullying
While no national law against cyber bullying exists, many states are putting anti-cyber bullying laws into effect. Yet while many schools and districts may have anti-bulling policies in place as result of those laws, many lack actual strategies, tactics and processes to address this growing problem.
The biggest challenge to combating cyber bullying, is leaning which students are dealing with cyberbullying because it is seldom reported. Deputy Trevor Fowler, President of the Missouri School Resource Officers Association said, "The problem is…only about half of the bullying incidents are ever reported…once we know about them, we successfully resolve 90 percent of the issues."
There will never be a complete "cure" for bullying and cyber bullying behavior. However, with continuous focus, energy, and commitment, there can be successful management of all forms of bullying, with significant minimization of the number of victims.
With October being National Bully Prevention Month, we wanted to share some effective strategies that are technologically relevant to establish an anti-cyber bully culture at your school or district.
Students' First-Amendment right and the fact that much of cyber bullying occurs not at school or during school hours, but after school and off campus, impact school response to cyber bullying. However, experts suggest some simple steps that school administration can take to respond appropriately to cyber bullying. The steps are:
__Develop clear rules and policies to prohibit the use of school technologies to bully others.
__Educate students and staff members about what types of behavior constitute cyber bullying and how the school district's policies apply to them.
__Provide adequate supervision and monitoring of student use of technology.
__Establish systems for reporting cyber bullying or misuse of technology.
__Establish effective responses to reports of cyber bullying.
In addition we recommend that you speak with your district or school attorney, and your state attorney general to get a clear understanding of where your authority starts and stops over the matter of cyber bullying.
During this important month ask yourselves, "What steps is your school or district taking to respond to cyber bullying?" Consider these:
- Building positive digital citizenship. Offer fun, interactive resources such as "Be Seen" by Web Wise Kids.
- Increasing staff and student understanding of online privacy, ethical behavior, digital footprints, and not-so-anonymous, virtual lives. Then, teach them to be astute observers.
- Supporting behavioral changes through curriculum integration.
- Emphasizing the balance between freedom of expression and individual rights to safety, privacy and protection from harm, by using role-playing situations, teaching strategies, and instilling trust.
- Discuss the difference between reporting on cyber bullying vs. snitching or tattling. Reporting is done to stop unwanted behavior; snitching or tattling on someone is done to get the other person in trouble for something that really does not impact the "tattler."
- Implementing clear policies consistently using appropriate rewards/consequences for effective, immediate impact.
- Adopting the latest technology available to thwart bully/cyber bullying behaviors and make useful technological options available to every student to prevent, respond to, and report bullying incidents.
There are many wonderful anti-bullying programs such as Olweus, PBIS and Steps-to-Respect that are designed to create a positive school climate in which negative behaviors are reduced and replaced with positive behaviors. These programs also stress the importance of creating a climate of trust, one in which students feel comfortable coming forward for help.
Anonymous bullying reporting solutions like the CyberBully Hotline should serve to compliment these programs. We created the program as a means to combat reporting fear. Schools should strive to create a climate in which students feel comfortable reporting face to face, but certain situations will be better served by an anonymous reporting system.
Our program's relevancy in today's text-based communications atmosphere allows students to send text and voice messages from where they spend most of their time these days – from their mobile phones. Students are more comfortable texting than they are talking and our program leverages that comfort to increase the likelihood of timelier reporting. Students can text anonymous reports, which are delivered immediately and simultaneously to a school official's email and mobile device and to their CyberBully Hotline user account where messages can be viewed and archived. This unique feature allows for an anonymous two-way dialog between sender and receiver completing a complete communication cycle.
Remember, communication is key, and any and all programs should be promoted or marketed to both the bullied and the bystander. Your marketing efforts should consist of discussions during classroom meetings and assemblies; placement of hallway signage; postings on your school and district web pages and newsletters; even backpack notes. It's important to constantly appeal to the bystanders to step up and help those that are being tormented. They have the power to enlist adults' help in stopping it.
Assure them that by coming forward anonymously that their identity will be kept confidential. Do not bring bully, bullied and bystander together to "work things out." That is a further victimization and manifests the worst fears of the bullied and bystander.
Keep the focus on creating a climate of trust, market the program effectively, and respond immediately and with clear, positive action and your anonymous bully reporting system will be well received.
Paul Langhorst serves as Chief Marketing Officer and Co-Founder of GroupCast, LLC, the parent company of SchoolReach and the CyberBully Hotline.

subset: commoncrawl


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The Alpha 115 is designed from the ground up to be the most transparent loudspeaker in its class. Its neodymium 15" LF driver produces smooth low-end while its custom designed 1.75" titanium HF driver provides incredible high-end across a wide dynamic range.
The Alpha 115 has a complete mixer section with all the inputs and outputs you need, plus some additional features to enhance your sound. Two Mic/Line combo inputs with independent volume controls are available as well as an XLR output to link speakers. The Contour switch instantly provides a gentle EQ curve that's perfect for music playback.
The lightweight cabinet is perfectly suited to perform as a traditional upright loudspeaker or as a floor wedge monitor. The Alpha 115 is stand- or pole-mountable via its standard 35 mm socket, and standard M10 rigging points are built in for flying the speaker overhead.
Alesis Digital Signal Processing is onboard to control key aspects of the speaker's operation, resulting in precisely tuned and completely consistent performance for any live sound application.


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International Gang Gyok Day - Run For A Better Future
On June 18, 2017 Tulku Lobsang Rinpoche will host the Annual International Gang Gyok Day in Barcelona, Spain. The purpose of the Day is to promote health and happiness throughout the world.
Rinpoche started International Gang Gyok Day in 2015 when he led over 700 people running through the streets of Dharamsala, India. Thousands of people worldwide showed their support by organizing local Gang Gyok events, making this a truly international event.
Through this annual event, Rinpoche hopes to bring awareness to our current health and happiness crisis. By including proper movement into our daily lives, we can create healthier bodies and happier, more peaceful minds. Gang Gyok is one simple technique that can help change our lives and create a better future world.
Gang Gyok is a powerful Tibetan method for running or walking with endless energy and vitality. Using this technique can enhance your daily running or walking practice and can help prevent some common injuries that occur when we run with distracted minds. It is one of the many Tibetan Movement practices taught by Tulku Lobsang Rinpoche that can improve our physical and mental wellbeing.
Even if you cannot join Tulku Lobsang in Barcelona, you can still be part of this very special event! Several International Gang Gyok Day events are being organized in various countries.
This special Tibetan technique can be used with walking or running.
- Hold your hands in vajra fist (middle and ring finger bent, thumb pressing against the fingernails, pinky and index finger extended like bull horns).
- Bend your arms slightly. Keep them loose and a little away from the body.
Bend your spine forward slightly – keep it loose and not completely straight. - Special Breathing Technique:
- Take one breath in through the mouth while making a whispering sound.
- Gently push the breath down the body to four fingers below the navel and HOLD IT. (Imagine you are pushing the breath down about 70%, while simultaneously pulling up or engaging your pelvic floor 30%). - Start running (or walking):
- While holding this breath, run or walk 21 steps using your full power. Engage all your muscles.
- Then, breathe out, slow down and relax the muscles and body. - Continue running (or walking):
- Run or walk in your own rhythm.
- Always keep 10% of your breath below your navel (or, don't exhale 100%). Keep breathing through the nose, slow and steady.
- Always reserve some part of your energy.
- Look forward towards the horizon. Do not focus your eyes on any objects.
- Focus your inner mind on the point four fingers below your navel.
- The mind should not be thinking anything.
After the practice:
Do a short and simple meditation to focus the mind. For example, a single-pointed mind meditation that focuses on a single object, like a rock or a leaf.


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The Second to the Corinthians
13 This is the third time I am coming to you. "On the testimony of two or three witnesses every matter must be established."+ 2 Although I am absent now, it is as if I were present for the second time, and I give my warning in advance to those who sinned previously and to all the rest, that if ever I come again* I will not spare them,+ 3 since you are seeking proof that Christ, who is not weak toward you but strong among you, is really speaking through me. 4 For, indeed, he was executed on the stake because of weakness, but he is alive because of God's power.+ True, we also are weak with him, but we will live together with him+ because of God's power toward you.+
5 Keep testing whether you are in the faith; keep proving what you yourselves are.+ Or do you not recognize that Jesus Christ is in union with you? Unless you are disapproved. 6 I truly hope you will recognize that we are not disapproved.
7 Now we pray to God that you may do nothing wrong, not that we may appear approved, but that you may do what is fine, even if we may appear disapproved. 8 For we can do nothing against the truth, but only for the truth. 9 We certainly rejoice whenever we are weak but you are powerful. And this is what we are praying for, your being readjusted.+ 10 That is why I write these things while absent, so that when I am present, I may not have to be severe in using the authority that the Lord gave me,+ to build up and not to tear down.
11 Finally, brothers, continue to rejoice, to be readjusted, to be comforted,+ to think in agreement,+ to live peaceably;+ and the God of love and of peace+ will be with you. 12 Greet one another with a holy kiss. 13 All the holy ones send you their greetings.
14 The undeserved kindness of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the sharing in the holy spirit be with all of you.


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SpaceX and NASA are just days away from a crucial test of a crew capsule escape system that will save astronauts lives in the unlikely event of a launch failure with the Falcon 9 rocket.
Buster the Dummy is already strapped into his seat aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon test vehicle for what is called the Pad Abort Test, that is currently slated for Wednesday, May 6.
The test is critical for the timely development of the human rated Dragon that NASA is counting on to restore the US capability to launch astronauts from US soil abroad US rockets to the International Space Station (ISS) as early as 2017.
Boeing was also selected by NASA to build the CST-100 spaceship to provide a second, independent crew space taxi capability to the ISS during 2017.
The May 6 pad abort test will be performed from the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch pad from a platform at Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The test will not include an actual Falcon 9 booster.
The SpaceX Dragon and trunk together stand about 20 feet tall and are positioned atop the launch mount at SLC-40 for what is clearly labeled as a development test to learn how the Dragon, engines and abort system perform.
Buster will soar along inside the Dragon that will be rapidly propelled to nearly a mile high height solely under the power of eight SpaceX SuperDraco engines.
The trunk will then separate, parachutes will be deployed and the capsule will splashdown about a mile offshore from Florida in the Atlantic Ocean, said Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of Mission Assurance at SpaceX during a May 1, 2015 press briefing on the pad abort test at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida.
The entire test will take about a minute and a half and recovery teams will retrieve Dragon from the ocean and bring it back on shore for detailed analysis.
The test will be broadcast live on NASA TV. The test window opens at 7 a.m. EDT May 6 and extends until 2:30 p.m. EDT. The webcast will start about 20 minutes prior to the opening of the window. NASA will also provide periodic updates about the test at their online Commercial Crew Blog.
The test is designed to simulate an emergency escape abort scenario from the test stand at the launch pad in the unlikely case of booster failing at liftoff or other scenario that would threaten astronauts inside the spacecraft.
The pad abort demonstration will test the ability of a set of eight SuperDraco engines built into the side walls of the crew Dragon to pull the vehicle away from the launch pad in a split second in a simulated emergency to save the astronauts lives in the event of a real emergency.
The SuperDraco engines are located in four jet packs around the base. Each engine produces about 15,000 pounds of thrust pounds of axial thrust, for a combined total thrust of about 120,000 pounds, to carry astronauts to safety, according to Koenigsmann.
"This is what SpaceX was basically founded for, human spaceflight," said Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of Mission Assurance with SpaceX.
"The pad abort is going to show that we've developed a revolutionary system for the safety of the astronauts, and this test is going to show how it works. It's our first big test on the Crew Dragon."
SpaceX and NASA hope to refurbish and reuse the same Dragon capsule for another abort test at high altitude later this year. The timing of the in flight abort test hinges on the outcome of the pad abort test.
"No matter what happens on test day, SpaceX is going to learn a lot," said Jon Cowart, NASA's partner manager for SpaceX. "One test is worth a thousand good analyses."
Beside Buster the dummy, who is human-sized, the Dragon is outfitted with 270 sensors to measure a wide range of vehicle, engine, acceleration and abort test parameters.
"There's a lot of instrumentation on this flight – a lot," Koenigsmann said. "Temperature sensors on the outside, acoustic sensors, microphones. This is basically a flying instrumentation deck. At the end of the day, that's the point of tests, to get lots of data."
Buster will be accelerated to a force of about 4 to 4½ times the force of Earth's gravity, noted Koenigsmann.
The pad abort test is being done under SpaceX's Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) agreement with NASA that will eventually lead to certification of the Dragon for crewed missions to low Earth orbit and the ISS.
"The point is to gather data – you don't have to have a flawless test to be successful," Cowart said.
The second Dragon flight test follows later in the year, perhaps in the summer. It will launch from a SpaceX pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California and involves simulating an in flight emergency abort scenario during ascent at high altitude at maximum aerodynamic pressure (Max-Q) at about T plus 1 minute, to save astronauts lives.
The pusher abort thrusters would propel the capsule and crew safely away from a failing Falcon 9 booster for a parachute assisted splashdown into the Ocean.
Koenigsmann notes that the SpaceX abort system provides for emergency escape all the way to orbit, unlike any prior escape system such as the conventional launch abort systems (LAS) mounted on top of the capsule.
"Whatever happens to Falcon 9, you will be able to pull out the astronauts and land them safely on this crew Dragon," said Koenigsmann. "In my opinion, this will make it the safest vehicle that you can possibly fly."
The SpaceX Dragon V2 and Boeing CST-100 vehicles were selected by NASA last fall for further funding under the auspices of the agency's Commercial Crew Program (CCP), as the worlds privately developed spaceships to ferry astronauts back and forth to the International Space Station (ISS).
Both SpaceX and Boeing plan to launch the first manned test flights to the ISS with their respective transports in 2017.
During the Sept. 16, 2014 news briefing at the Kennedy Space Center, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden announced that contracts worth a total of $6.8 Billion were awarded to SpaceX to build the manned Dragon V2 and to Boeing to build the manned CST-100.
The next Falcon 9 launch is slated for mid-June carrying the CRS-7 Dragon cargo ship on a resupply mission for NASA to the ISS. On April 14, a flawless Falcon 9 launch boosted the SpaceX CRS-6 Dragon to the ISS.
There was no attempt to soft land the Falcon 9 first stage during the most recent launch on April 27. Due to the heavy weight of the TurkmenÄlem52E/MonacoSat satellite there was not enough residual fuel for a landing attempt on SpaceX's ocean going barge.
The next landing attempt is set for the CRS-7 mission.
Stay tuned here for Ken's continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.
For over ten years, the ESA's Gaia Observatory has monitored the proper motion, luminosity, temperature,…
Lunar exploration equipment at any future lunar base is in danger from debris blasted toward…
The largest storm in the Solar System is shrinking and planetary scientists think they have…
According to the ESA's Near-Earth Objects Coordination Center (NEOCC), 35,264 known asteroids regularly cross the…
Astronauts face multiple risks during space flight, such as microgravity and radiation exposure. Microgravity can…
When a massive star dies in a supernova explosion, it's not great news for any…


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FEMA opens recovery center in Gerritsen Beach
Gerritsen Beach is getting some much-needed post-Sandy attention from the federal government.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has opened a Mobile Disaster Recovery Center in the community to help residents whose homes were heavily damaged pick up the pieces of their lives.
The center, which will help homeowners with damaged property to register for assistance, will also help refer residents to resources for disaster needs, according to U.S. Rep. Bob Turner (R-Brooklyn-Queens), who recently paid a visit to the site.
The Mobile Disaster Recovery Center is located at the Garrison Little League fields, on Gerritsen Avenue between Seba and Cyrus avenues. The center is open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., seven days a week.
"My staff and I have been throughout the district in Brooklyn since the storm, and I have spoken to federal, state, and local officials about the continued needs of Gerritsen Beach and Brooklyn as a whole. This Mobile Disaster Recovery Center is a positive step in the right direction to assist local residents in getting the aid they need and deserve from the federal government," Turner said.
FEMA community relations personnel have been going door-to-door in the community, delivering information encouraging residents with damaged property to register for assistance.
Individuals do not have to go to a disaster recovery center to register with FEMA. They can apply for FEMA assistance by calling the toll-free registration number at 1-800-621-FEMA. The line is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Residents can also register online at www.DisasterAssistance.gov.
In another development, state Sen. Marty Golden (R-Bay Ridge-southern Brooklyn) is wondering why Gerritsen Beach wasn't classified as a mandatory evacuation zone by the city prior to Hurricane Sandy.
Gerritsen Beach was considered a Zone B, meaning that evacuation was not mandatory. As a result, Golden said, many residents chose to stay in their homes and ride out the superstorm, puting their lives in danger.
Golden is requesting that Office of Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph Bruno take a second look at the designation and reclassify Gerritsen Beach as a Zone A for evacuation declarations.
"Gerritsen Beach suffered severe flooding as a result of an unusual high tide during Hurricane Sandy with almost all homes being affected. In fact, some homes were flooded at the first floor and numerous rescues had to be undertaken by first responders, and sadly a death did occur," Golden said.
"Frankly if not for the heroic efforts of the city's emergency responders and the Gerritsen Beach Volunteer Fire and Ambulance Corps, more lives may very well have been lost," Golden said.


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Adam Smith on Bargaining
How Vernon Smith has helped us understand Adam Smith better…
Maria Pia Paganelli of Yeshiva University has this nice paper on the topic.
She says most economics bases itself on self-interest. However, this is not always the case as we see humans valuing cooperation and fairness as well. Adam Smith's The Theory of Moral Sentiments was based on these ideas. AS said humans value other things as well- sympathy, and innate desire to be both praised and praiseworthy.
Vernonm Smith extended Adam Smith's ideas and showed via experiments that indeed people valued cooperation and fairplay and were sympathetic to others. This led to people monitoring and giving punishment for non-cooperative behaviors or by following internalized rules of conduct that promote fair and cooperative behaviors.
In experimental results in industrialized countries, cooperation and fairness are routinely observed. Cooperation and fairness may vary with the degree of anonymity, because subjects do respond to incentives. Nevertheless, even with complete anonymity, a relevant amount of cooperation and fairness is observed. For example, using undergraduate subjects from the University of Arizona, even with double blind procedures, 29% of second movers choose $25 for self and $15 for other, over $40 for self and $0 for other, after the first movers have forgone $10 for self and $10 for other (Cox and Deck 2005). Additionally, cooperation and fairness are also observable in many foraging societies across the globe, although in different forms from the ones observed in industrialized countries.
Fairness seems to be universally present among humans, even if it varies with different incentives and across cultures (Henrich et al. 2004). Interestingly, similar experiments done with non-human primates also show some level of cooperation and "fairness." Non-human primates help each other in getting food and reciprocate the help received. They get upset if one gets an "unfair" share: if one primate undeservedly gets a larger portion or tastier food, the other primate screams in protest (de Waal 1996 and 2003 de Waal and Berger 2000, de Waal and Luttrell 1988, Brosnan and de Waal 2003, Jansen, Hare, Call and Tomasello 2006).
The paper looks at this linkage of Adam Smith thoughts to Vernos Smith's experiments:
This paper develops as follows. The first section describes some of the hypotheses used to explain cooperative behaviors in the existing literature. It is followed by the explanation of how Adam Smith may help us understand the mechanism through which we may be able to move from personal to impersonal exchange, namely the internalization of rules of cooperation achieved through sympathy, reducing the transaction costs present in complex anonymous societies. The Smithian explanation is subdivided in three sections: the generation and internalization of cooperation at the individual level, at the social level, the institutionalization of the rules of cooperation which may be seen as a feedback mechanism caused by and causing increasing cooperation. The final section of the paper briefly examines some limitations for developing cooperation.
I had the privilege of hearing an early version of Maria Pia Paganelli's paper in 2009 at the Summer School on the History of Economic Thought at Richmond University, Virginia and commenting on her paper. Maria is a rising – probably by now, a risen – star of Adam Smith scholarship. (Apologies if the above link to it does not work; it failed to do so on my Apple Macbook Pro).
I shall cover briefly the gist of my thoughts on Professor Veron Smith's work, as I understand it.
Modern economists have lumbered Adam Smith with ideas he did nto have, at least in the form as it is commonly presented. Smith was not a singular theorist who boiled everything down to pure self-interest, often eliding into 'selfish self interest'. This is so far from Adam Smith's presentation that I am often provoked into critiquing it on Lost Legacy and elsewhere when it is invoked, usually in reference to the famous (and misunderstood) paragraph on the 'butcher, brewer, and baker' example in Wealth Of Nations. First check out the preceding lines:
'But man has almost constant occasion for the help of his brethren, and it is in vain for him to expect it from their benevolence only. He will be more likely to prevail if he can interest their self-love in his favour, and shew them that it is for their own advantage to do for him what he requires of them. Whoever offers to another a bargain of any kind, proposes to do this. Give me that which I want, and you shall have this which you want, is the meaning of every such offer; and it is in this manner that we obtain from one another the far greater part of those good offices which we stand in need of' (WN I.ii.2: 26).
Clearly, Adam Smith is emphasizing the important point (crucial to understanding his approach) that relying on someone else's benevolence is not enough (nobody, be they benevolent in the extreme, has sufficient of anything, to donate it to everybody else who might need it). That is the limitation of benevolence, our admiration of it as a virtue, notwithstanding. He goes to on make his point even clearer:
"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages" (WN I.ii.2: 26-7).
As clearly, Adam Smith did not counter the evident limitations of the virtue of absolute benevolence with a reliance on self-interest alone. That might justifiably be termed selfish. But he didn't draw that conclusion at all. Instead, he said that one's self-interest is best served by addressing the self-interests/ 'self-love' of the other party (butcher/brewer/baker or whomsoever. In sum, Adam Smith, asserted that self-interests are realized in our bargaining transactions with others by serving their (not our!) self-interests.
So, when Maria Paganelli says that 'most economics bases itself on self-interest" she is reporting how modern economists (not Adam Smith) have reduced economics to this single assumption and build its neo-classical Homo economicus upon it (it suits the maths much better to arrive at its claimed determinate conclusions).
No wonder on this inaccurate interpretation that modern economics is under siege from practical attempts to model actual behaviours in the fascinating games that Professor Vernon Smith and others have devised in what has become known as the school of behavioural economics. The modern assertions of Adam Smith's view are exposed convincingly by the numerous experiments conducted across the world, but Adam Smith never made such narrow assertions about self-interest in the first place.
The ingenious experiments designed by Professor Vernon and others for their observations of the behaviours of graduate students have produced many remarkably consistent results exposing the near fallacy of the pure self-directed, self-interest thesis as proclaimed by most modern economists (rational behaviourists). And in the main, I applaud their work with the provisio that they recognize their fundamental error of attributing the limited concept of self-interest to Adam Smith.
My own experience, where from 1970-72, I observed live negotiations at a Shell Refinery for my MSc degree in 'Productivity Bargaining', and since 1972 through Strathclyde Business School to 1983, and then through Edinburgh Business School to 2005, where I was involved in observing thousands of real world bargainers at real work for real stakes, felt by them to be important to the welfare of their businesses or countries and, ultimately, to themselves and their families, all of which invariably showed Adam Smith's insight in Book 1 of WN was confirmed time and time again.
People learn, one way or another, that demanding the other party give them all of what they want without in some measure offering some of what they want in return, seldom works and that mostly it doesn't. Self-centred egoists refusing to move, more often than not find it leads to 'no deal'; but formulating their offers in some version of: 'Give me that which I want, and you shall have this which you want', as Adam Smith advised, more often than not leads to a mutually acceptable agreements.
Selfish, or narrow-minded would-be bargainers, who insist on their self-interests alone, seldom succeed, especially when they act as if they conform to the behaviour of the so-called 'rational egoist' beloved by so-called 'scientific' micro-economics taught across modern campuses.
In bargaining, where conversation is present, we can see what happens in the Vernon Smith game where the 'so-called 'rational egoist' offers the other party 1 unit while demanding 99 for him/her self. By not accepting the offer, the idea that 1 unit is better than none (an heroic assumption that he/she would accept only 1 rather than nothing) the frustrated bargainer, says in effect, 'then you shall have none too' – a perfectly reasonable reaction, consisting of no surprises, in my experience of real-world bargainers. These games confirm Adam Smith's insight; they do not revise it in any way. That the players in the games have single choices, without conversations, strongly confirms Adam Smith.
My message to the behaviourists is that they are not 'extending' Adam Smith, nor revising him. He is completely innocent on this subject. It is the so-called 'rational' school that is in the frame for revision, not Adam Smith. I suggest to everybody that they study Paragraph 2 in Book I of WN and understand the exact words of Adam Smith.
Labels: Adam Smith on Bargaining


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Thanks for a wonderful weekend.
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You may have heard of this alternative form of oral health care called oil pulling. Within the past couple of years, it's become an increasingly popular way to boost oral health and the appearance of teeth. But does it actually do all the things it claims it can? Our dental office in Memphis is here to find out.
What is Oil Pulling?
First discovered over 3,000 years ago, oil pulling is an ancient technique originated by Ayurvedic medicine. Ayurvedic medicine was founded in India and is a holistic approach to medical care. It wasn't until the past couple of years when the trend started to infiltrate into modern times and has since become widely used.
The act of oil pulling is simple, but does require a commitment. You start by taking a tablespoon full of liquid vegetable oil — most people choose coconut oil — and swishing it around in your mouth for 20 minutes. During this time you should push and pull the liquid in between your teeth and expose it to every part of your mouth. Once the 20 minutes is complete, simply spit it out and rinse with water. Many oil pullers recommend doing this every day for maximum results.
Oil Pulling Claims
There are a multitude of supposed benefits associated with oil pulling. We chose to focus on the ones related to oral health. Some of which include:
- Whiter Teeth
- Fresher Breath
- Lower Amount of Plaque
- Reduced Risk of Cavities
Does It Actually Work?
There hasn't been a wealth of research conducted on oil pulling, but what we do know is that it is not a substantial substitute for brushing and flossing daily and seeing your dentist in Memphis twice a year. With that said, there is some truth behind some of the benefits of oil pulling. Swishing with coconut oil, for example, for 20 minutes each day can help remove surface stains on teeth, therefore giving them a brighter, whiter look. It can also be used as an alternative to mouthwash to help freshen breath. Even more, daily oil pulling may reduce the amount of plaque in the mouth. However, the amount it removes isn't enough to counteract gum disease or reduce the risk of cavities.
There's still a lot of research that needs to be done to truly understand just how beneficial oil pulling may be to oral health. Until then, we encourage you to keep brushing, flossing, and visiting our Memphis dental office regularly to ensure optimal oral health.
Accepting new patients from Memphis, Germantown, Cordova and beyond.