Friday Hodgepodge

Notable Commentary

"We still don't really know how many defensive gun uses (DGUs) there are each year." -- Paul Hsieh, in "That Time the CDC Asked About Defensive Gun Uses" at Forbes.

"[I]t is immoral to use catastrophes predicted by 'experts' (who have never been correct in the past) as an excuse to limit others' freedom." -- Bob Stubblefield, in "Letter: Climate Change Used to Limit Freedoms" (2017) at The Aiken Standard.

A typical gold bug, shortly after providing "investment" advice. (Photo by Itay Kabalo on Unsplash)

"Tragically, those who call for the government to regulate Facebook's posting standards are calling for censorship." -- Bob Stubblefield, in "Letter: Only Governments Can Truly Censor" at The Aiken Standard.

"We been pounding the table for going on a decade, sometimes even bellowing from the rooftops, that gold does not go up." -- Keith Weiner, in "Getting High on Bubbles" at SNB & CHF.

From the Blogs

Over at You Can and Did Build It, "ICouldAndDid" reviews Edwin Locke's recently-published The Illusion of Determinism: Why Free Will is Real and Causal, which he calls "the best book defending free will:"

A just-published book on free will, The Illusion of Determinism: Why Free Will is Real and Causal, by Edwin Locke, is a concise and devastating critique of the prevalent determinist view. The title is drawn as a counterpoint to Daniel Wegner's 2002 book The Illusion of Conscious Will. If you have observed the steady stream of literature and popular articles from neuroscientists rejecting free will, including repeated discussions of the famous Libet experiments, Locke's book will be of significant interest. Locke provides a thorough defense of free will, and an explanation of its meaning and scope. He also identifies the flaws in the most common arguments against free will, the interpretations of Libet's experiments among them.

Professor Locke is a psychologist who has also written about goal-setting and business success.

-- CAV