Daily Archives: January 30, 2022

Commentary: The myths of the past no longer represent our world view – Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel

Posted: January 30, 2022 at 12:06 am

We live in an age of discord and distrust, much of it fueled by the splintering of our media landscape and the sheer volume of circulating information and misinformation. But there is also a deeper fracturing of what we used to think of as national historical truths.

Over the past several years, significant reappraisals of our collective past have exploded in number. Reconstruction, which was always an inconvenient blemish on our redemptive Civil War saga, is now rightly seen as the systemic continuation of oppression that is was, for example. And the perceived unity of purpose of the Greatest Generation is now counterbalanced by a more rounded view of the ambivalence felt by many at home and the brutality felt on the battlefield.

In an era of falling statues and other icons, some Americans despair that we have lost our collective American narrative to cynical and/or negative portrayals that disconnect us from a healthy patriotism and one another. Others respond that we need such accounts to acknowledge past injustices and better legitimize our present society and government.

One thing is clear: Our revised annals are richer and more complex. As Diane Turner, curator of an Afro-American history collection at Temple University said recently, by being able to tell everybodys story, its good for the society as a whole Lets have these stories, because the more truth we have, the better it is. But with this ever-growing number of stories, might something also be lost?

One prominent American historian worried about this years ago. In a 1982 essay in Foreign Affairs appropriately titled The Care and Repair of Public Myth, William McNeill (author of sweeping histories such as The Rise of the West and Plagues and Peoples) feared discrediting old myths without finding new ones to replace them. He understood such myths not in a negative sense as imaginary or unverifiable, but as a peoples rendering of historical events that illuminates their worldview. To McNeill, a people without a full quiver of relevant agreed-upon statements, accepted in advance through education or less formalized acculturation, soon finds itself in deep trouble, for in the absence of believable myths, coherent public action becomes very difficult to improvise or sustain. In what he saw even then as an increasingly atomized environment that might cause societies to retreat to more narrow in-groups, McNeill beseeched thoughtful men of letters to create new, more inclusive forms of myth. We must do the best we can, he said, to survive in a world full of conflict by creating and sustaining the most effective public identities of which we are capable.

What narratives can contribute those broader identities today? They cannot simply be those of yesteryear, no matter how nostalgically (or misguidedly) some citizens may yearn for them. Nor can they be manufactured overnight. Their appeal must be expansive and inspirational, and their credibility strong. They must reflect not a yes, but orientation that effectively seeks to erase narrower identities, but a yes, and approach that affirms both larger affinities and more localized loyalties.

One starting point might be the continuing significance of our Declaration of Independence, with its twin themes of liberty and equality tracing a common ongoing quest of various American communities religious, racial, ethnic, disabled, and those of different sexual orientations to gain greater freedom and status. Another is our reputation for both commercial and social entrepreneurship: While this is often touted as emblematic of our communal freedom from the state, we are also blessed with a history of innovative government-funded research and development, infrastructure, public health and environmental programs that have generated freedom for improved societal well-being. And of course, there is our voluntarism and activism, which continues to inspire people around the world nearly 200 years after de Tocqueville commented on them.

Perhaps our apex narrative needs to be one of economic and social progress that admits flaws and tragedies, but traces a hopeful and persistent, if jagged, story of growth and learning. Such an account, informed by more humility (and maturity) than those trumpeting our purported New World innocence and self-righteousness, can help inoculate us not only against hubris and global overreach, but exceptionalism and ignorance of other countries histories. It might even make us more compassionate toward our forebears, whose transgressions, we tend to forget, were not informed by later knowledge and insights.

Our rejuvenated, more expansive public myths fewer in number, but also more modest and congruent with our current understanding of the world will require many different contributors (not simply men of letters), who are all part of our national mosaic. These myths will not, by themselves, dissipate the rancor that has swelled in the past decade. But they may be one way to help keep our conversations more constructive.

Malcolm Russell-Einhorn teaches in the Elliott School of International Affairs at the George Washington University.___2022 The Baltimore Sun. Visit at baltimoresun.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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IYC protests against BJP led Central govt over RRB-NTPC examination – The Statesman

Posted: at 12:06 am

Indian Youth Congress (IYC) today protested against the Central Government over RRB-NTPC examinations. The National President of IYC Srinivas BV alleged that the weapons of the BJP government are atrocities and crime.

Today, where there is a BJP government, there are atrocities against the youth. The double-engine government of Bihar is betraying the aspirations and hopes of the students. Police brutality on students protesting against malpractices in examination results exposes the authoritarian character of the government, said Srinivas.

He said, The Constitution of the country has given every citizen the right to protest, but the police personnel is beating up the students by entering hostels and lodges. On the eve of Republic Day, the police of Dictator Ajay Bisht has given a message to the youth of Uttar Pradesh that the right to protest has now been taken away in this republic, which is very condemnable.

Coming down heavily upon the BJP government, the IYC president said that the rights of the youth cannot be snatched away on the basis of sticks and bullets. Congress is with youth power, justice will be done. The dictatorship BJP government will not be able to win in the republic in front of this power of youth.

Srinivas demanded that the fake FIRs registered against students and teachers should be withdrawn immediately and Policemen who ruthlessly wield sticks should be suspended immediately.

There will be revolution across the country against the oppression of youth and the arrogance of BJP will be shattered. The youth will take their right to employment and the Indian Youth Congress is standing with them in their struggle, said IYC National Media In-charge Rahul Rao.

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IYC protests against BJP led Central govt over RRB-NTPC examination - The Statesman

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Can Science Fiction Wake Us Up to Our Climate Reality? – The New Yorker

Posted: at 12:05 am

Its possible it could work, he said. Worst case, you have to descend with headlamps.

They conferred with each other, and Robinson turned to Biagioli, resuming the conversation about Galileo. A little while later, I saw the hikers waving to us from a distance. They had started their traverse.

What I wanted was reassurance. As we picked our way through the Sierras, I asked Robinson lots of questions; one loomed behind them: Will it be all right? Of course, Robinson has no idea how the future will really go. He does believe that there is a futurean unknown place yet to be explored. He thinks that attitudes shift, that progress exists, that necessity drives invention; but also that progress is slow and easily reversed, that money talks, and that disorder is the norm. In 2002, he published The Years of Rice and Salt, a novel imagining what might have happened if the Black Death had killed all the Europeans instead of a third of them. (Jameson has taught it to his students in a class on historiography.) In a fanciful conceit, the same characters take us from the fourteenth century to the present by means of reincarnation. During every epoch, they engage in theceaseless work of improving civilization. Toward the end of the book, a feminist scholar attends an archeological conference in Iran. As she listens to the presentations, shes struck by an impression of peoples endless struggle and effort. A sense of endless experimentation, of humans thrashing about trying to find a way to live together, deepens in her. In a subsequent incarnation, she works for the international Agency for Harmony with Natureher worlds version of the Ministry for the Future.

Climate work will be the main business of this century. Its basic outlines are already clear. Build wind farms, solar farms, and other sources of clean energy. Start an Operation Warp Speed for clean power: improve energy storage, and make small, cheap power systems for rural places. Tax carbon, reform agriculture, and eat less meat. Rethink construction, transportation, and manufacturing. Study the glaciers, the permafrost, the atmosphere, the oceans. Pilot some geoengineering schemes, in case we need them. Rewild large parts of the Earth. And so on, and so on, and so on. How will all this happen? In The Ministry for the Future, societies start to make good choices, in part because citizens revolt against the monied interests that preserve the status quo. But people also thrash about. They grow frustrated, angry, and violent. Some survivors of the Indian heat wave become ecoterrorists and use swarms of drones to crash passenger planes; no one can figure out how to stop the drones, and everyone gets scared. People fly less. They teleconference, or take long-distance trains, or even sail. They work remotely on transatlantic crossings. Its not how we want change to happen. But, in the end, the jet age turns out to have been just thatan age.

We made our camp near a shallow, glassy lake in a hollow, where a single shelf of granite tilted into the water, like a hard beach. While we built our rock stove, Robinson and Biagioli talked about sailing. Biagioli had crossed the Atlantic twice, once with his wife and once with friends; Robinson was an amateur freshwater sailor of long standing.

Robinson said that when he was invited to COP26, the climate-change conference, he thought, Well, I gotta do it like Greta Thunberg. (The summer before, Thunberg had sailed across the Atlantic instead of flying.) Hed been surprised to learn that there was no way of signing up in New York to sail, as a passenger, to the U.K. My books have convinced me that its so obviousI thought, its surely gonna come. Its low carbon, and youre still doing world travel!

Except, what Greta didshe sailed in a super-fancy, sixty-foot carbon-fibre monster, Biagioli said. It can do thirty-five knots. She needed to go fast, otherwise it wouldve taken a month.

But why arent there lots of those boats? Robinson asked.

I think theyre incredibly uncomfortable, Biagioli said. They bounce. I mean, people wear helmets inside the boat.

But what if they were bigger? Robinson persisted. What if they were like clipper ships?

Well, then, that would be fantastic, Biagioli said. He shared some cubes of Parmesan from a small container. And they would be stable, and you could have sailing ships that blow by diesel ships.

Club Medtheyve been putting sails on their cruise ships, Robinson noted. And the whole technology of sails, per se, is rapidly shifting, because of computer modelling.

The problem is the weight, Biagioli said. People cross the Atlantic in five days, but thats predicated on a boat not weighing anything. So its like here. He gestured to his ultralight pack.

Hmm, Robinson said. He smiled, enjoying the conversation. Well, but if you go back tolook, my Atlantic crossing is gonna take me two weeks, and Im gonna be Internet-connected the whole time. And say you have a big boat, a passenger boat.

Then that would be no problem, Biagioli said. I even think you could do something really comfortable in not even two weeks. It could be ten days. The people who have a lock on the technology are the French.

Robinson laughed. What are our billionaires doing? he said. We talked a bit more about the idea, and about the prospects for dirigibles, which might replace short-hop jet flights, then went to sleep.

In the morning, we set out for Thunderbolt Pass. The climb began immediately. We ascended a series of steep slopes to the vast, mirrorlike Barrett Lakes, navigating around their rocky shores. The pass looked serious: it was about twelve thousand feet high, and made entirely of rock and sand. We started climbing, sometimes pulling ourselves up with our hands, sometimes slipping between narrow gaps. I looked back to find the lake where wed camped the night before; it was like peering from an airplane and trying to spot my house.

Eventually, we reached a rock shelf about a hundred feet wide, where hulking boulders had been deposited by some vanished glacier. We passed a lone climber with a tent hanging from the sheer rock wall. The sun seemed to radiate more strongly. It was a long, challenging climb to the very top, where we rested in a small sandy spot, closed in by rock on two sides, like a little room.

Now, this descent, Robinson said, while we drank water. Its the most technical, meticulous part of our trip. Theres nothing you wont be able to do. But youll have to go slowly, and be careful.

I looked out over the other side of the pass, which led back to Dusy Basin. The landscape yawned downward over a couple of thousand feet. A field of boulders came first; beyond it was a rib of rock, which we could use to descend part of the way. The rib ended in a broad slope of fine-grained talus. We could navigate this by glissadinga kind of sliding, as though we were on snowshoes. That, in turn, would bring us to an ocean of smaller rocks. The first step was to traverse sideways across the mountain, over the boulders. I was nervous.

Just go slow, Robinson said.

We started to cross the boulder field. The rocks were huge, with big gaps between them. Sometimes we clambered forward over empty space, touching four boulders at once. Then the rocks got smaller. I turned to face the mountain, my back to the sun. I moved laterally to my left, wondering how far it was to solid ground; I stepped carefully onto a funny-shaped rock that moved beneath me.

Uh-oh, I said, louder than I meant to. I dont like that.

All four of the rocks I was touching were moving.

Dont look up! Biagioli called.

I looked up. An apparent infinity of similar rocks was stacked above me on the hillside. By a trick of perspective, they seemed ready to fall.

I moved along. We reached the rock rib and crossed it to the long slope of talus. We glissaded down in zigzags through the lunar powder. At the bottom lay the ocean of rocks, small and sharp. They cast harsh shadows, creating pockets of darkness, and crossingthem required intense attention. I had to remember to breathe, and to blink. Hours passed. I stopped to finish my water and looked ahead to see our destination, a lake glittering in the far distance. Almost all Robinsons novels involve an experience of this kinda long, difficult, rocky journey through a mountain landscape, on Earth or elsewhere, accomplished through sustained concentration that lifts one out of time. The main thing is to start, then to keep going, finding your way one step at a time. It never occurs to you to stop. Even if the path isnt set, the job before you is clear: you have to get down the mountain before dark.

Robinson had been right. The descent had been difficult and doablean ideal combination. Back in Dusy Basin, we watched the sun set from atop a high rocky outcropping. The lakes far below us glowed silver in the light.

What a planet! Robinson said.

The next day, we hiked out. It was a long, easy walk, over Bishop Pass and through the picture-postcard forest. Robinson was sad to leave, and worried about the wildfires.

What do you think? I asked, finally, as we made our way down an ordinary rocky slope. Will we be all right?

Well have to make some big changes, he said. I just hope that we wont have to make them so quickly that we break everything.

I wondered what he meant by everything. Jobs? Currencies? Supply chains? Coastal cities? Beaches? Food? Ecologies? Societies? I looked around at the Sierras. Water stretched wide to my left, and pines framed a blue sky overhead. Songbirds were in the trees. It occurred to me that he meant everything. The whole world. All of it could break. Then, lost in thought, I slipped.

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Can Science Fiction Wake Us Up to Our Climate Reality? - The New Yorker

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Jordan Peterson Biography – Facts, Childhood, Family Life …

Posted: at 12:04 am

Childhood & Early Life

He was born on June 12, 1962 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada to Walter Peterson and Beverley as the eldest of three children and was raised in Fairview, Alberta. His father was a schoolteacher and his mother a librarian at the Fairview campus of Grande Prairie Regional College.

The librarian of his school Sandy Notley (mother of Canadian politician and Alberta New Democratic Party leader Rachel Notley, the 17th and present Premier of Alberta) introduced Peterson to literary works of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Aldous Huxley, Ayn Rand and George Orwell.

In 1979 he graduated from Fairview High School and started attending Grande Prairie Regional College to study English literature and political science. All through his teens Peterson worked for the New Democratic Party (NDP) but later got disenchanted and quit the party at age 18.

He left Grande Prairie Regional College in-between and took transfer to the University of Alberta, from where he obtained his B.A. in Political science in 1982. He then visited Europe and became interested in psychological origins of the Cold War, especially on European totalitarianism of the 20th century.

The ability and scope of mankind for doing evil and destruction gradually started bothering him leading him to go through works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Friedrich Nietzsche and Carl Jung. He went back to the University of Alberta and studied psychology eventually earning a B.A. degree on the subject in 1984.

He relocated to Montreal in 1985 and furthered his studies at the McGill University from where he obtained Ph.D. in clinical psychology in 1991 under supervision of Robert O. Pihl. His thesis was titled Potential psychological markers for the predisposition to alcoholism. Thereafter he worked with Pihl and Maurice Dongier till June 1993 as a post-doctoral researcher at McGill's Douglas Hospital.

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Career

He conducted research as also taught in the psychology department at the Harvard University in the capacity of an assistant and an associate professor from July 1993 till June 1998. He examined aggression spurted from substance abuse and overlooked several unconventional thesis proposals. There he received nomination for the Levenson Teaching Prize in 1998.

He went back to Canada in July 1998 where he started working as a full professor at the University of Toronto, a post he holds till present.

The fields of his study and research includes creativity, political, religious, ideological, industrial and organizational, social, clinical, neuro, abnormal, and personality psychology and psychopharmacology. Over the years he wrote and co-wrote over hundred academic papers.

In 1999 he came up with a book titled Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief published by Routledge. He penned down the book in an attempt to "explain the meaning of history". The book where he briefly reflected on his childhood and upbringing in a Christian family took him more than 13 years to complete.

In Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief Peterson elucidates an extensive theory on the way meanings and beliefs are constructed by people and on how they make narratives applying concepts from different fields like psychology , religion, mythology, philosophy and literature that are in conformity with the modern scientific understanding of the way the brain works.

The classroom lectures of Peterson on psychology and mythology based on his book Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief were made into a 13-part TV series that was aired on TVOntario in 2004. His other pursuits with the network includes appearing frequently as guest panellist and essayist on the popular current affairs program The Agenda starting from 2008 as also featuring on the series Big Ideas that showcases public intellectual culture.

He has also thrived in garnering decent recognition online. His YouTube channel JordanPetersonVideos that he created on March 29, 2013, and features his university and public lectures and interviews with people among other things have already amassed over 1 million subscribers and more than 52 million views. His clips YouTube channel for shorter videos Jordan B Peterson Clips that he created on June 14, 2017, has also accumulated over 66 K subscribers and more than 3.3 million views.

He along with his colleagues came up with two online assessment programs, Self Authoring Suite and UnderstandMyself, that aid one to analyse and understand his/her personality and better ones life.

Since September 2016, he posted a number of videos on his YouTube channel criticising political correctness and the Canadian government's Bill C-16. Such move of Peterson was censured by many including transgender activists, critics, faculty and labour unions leading to protests including some violent ones thereby creating controversy and attracting worldwide media attention. He also received two warning letters from academic administrators at the University of Toronto.

For the first time in his entire career, Peterson was refused a grant from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council in April 2017, which he considers retribution against his statement on Bill C-16.

He began his own podcast The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast in December 2016 and started a series of live theatre lectures The psychological significance of the Biblical stories in May 2017. He has also featured in several online shows and podcasts like The Rubin Report, Waking Up and The Joe Rogan Experience.

He has more than two decades of experience in clinical practice attending 20 people weekly. However he resolved to keep such endeavour on hold in 2017 so as to give more time to new projects.

He came up with his second book, 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos published by Penguin Random House in January 2018. This self-help book penned down in a more accessible style than his first book encompasses abstract ethical principles on life.

Peterson went on a world tour to promote 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos and also had an interview with Cathy Newman on Channel 4 News as part of it. The interview went viral on YouTube garnering him considerable attention with over 9 million views. The book became best-seller topping bestselling lists in the US, Canada and the UK including emerging as #1 best-seller book on Amazon in Canada and the US.

Personal Life

In 1989 he tied knot with Tammy Roberts with whom he has two children, a daughter and a son. In August 2017, he became a grandfather.

A philosophical pragmatist, Peterson elucidates himself as a classic British liberal politically. He called himself a Christian in a 2017 interview but did not identify himself as one in 2018. Responding to his belief on God, he mentioned I think the proper response to that is No, but I'm afraid He might exist".

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Dr. Jordan B. Peterson’s Book List (128 books)

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Dr. Jordan B. Peterson's Book List (128 books)

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Jordan Peterson: I Got The Damn Vaccine And The Government …

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During an interview this week with Dave Rubin of "The Rubin Report," Canadian psychology professor and Jungian evangelist Jordan Peterson said he regrets taking the Covid-19 vaccine.

"You know, Canadians who arent vaccinated now cannot leave the country," he reported. "What the hell? Why is that?"

"Look, I got vaccinated, and people took me to task for that. And I thought, 'All right, Ill get the damn vaccine.' Heres the deal, guys: Ill get the vaccine, you f***ing leave me alone. And did that work? No. So, stupid me," he said.

"Thats how I feel about it. So, like, well, I have to get tested for COVID when I come back into Canada. I have to get tested before I leave Canada."

"That might be an issue with the Americans... but the restrictions to get back into Canada are even more stringent... Why did I get the vaccine then, if youre not going to leave me alone?"

"And I don't think the argument that vaccinated people are less contagious is very compelling. So why are the unvaccinated all of a sudden a danger? And i certainly don't get the push to get children vaccinated."

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Jordan Peterson on Joe Rogan show: Being trans is like satanic ritual abuse – New York Post

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Canadian clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson has claimed on Joe Rogans podcast that being transgender is a result of a contagion and similar to satanic ritual abuse.

The controversial host appeared to endorse Petersons theory when he suggested that acceptance of the trans community is a sign of civilizations collapsing during the Jan. 25 episode of Spotifys The Joe Rogan Experience.

Critics once again are calling out the podcast host for having peddled harmful anti-trans rhetoric.

Rogan, 54, implored the controversial pundit and author to share his thoughts on what made an individual trans.

Peterson, 59, described it as a sociological contagion, comparing it to the satanic ritual abuse accusations that emerged in day cares in the 1980s.

The former University of Toronto psychology professor also used his time on Rogans popular platform to oppose Canadian federal Bill C-16, which amended the countrys human rights protections to cover trans and nonbinary citizens. Instead, the former academic made the unsubstantiated claim that opening the boundaries of sex categories would fatally confuse thousands of young girls.

Rogan then referred back to his conversation with British columnist Douglas Murray of the Spectator in September, in which the writer said that trans issues will be seen to be a late-empire, a bad sign of things falling apart.

He had an amazing point about civilizations collapsing, and that when they start collapsing, they become obsessed with gender. And he was saying that you could trace it back to the ancient Romans, the Greeks, said Rogan.

He continued, I think probably its not so much an obsession with gender, its a disintegration of categories as a precursor like so its a marker for if categories just dissolve, especially fundamental ones, the culture is dissolving because the culture is a structure of category.

Rogan concluded by drawing connections to Christian scripture. So, in fact, culture is a structure of category that we all share, so we see things the same way not exactly the same way, because then we would have nothing to talk about, but roughly speaking, we have a bedrock of agreement. Thats the Bible, by the way.

Watchdog group Media Matters has since spoken out about Rogans recent broadcast.

Spotifys Joe Rogan once again peddled harmful anti-trans rhetoric, Media Matters proclaimed Wednesday on its blog, suggesting that social acceptance of trans people is a sign of civilizations collapsing.

This bizarre theory has been an ongoing fixation for Rogan, Media Matters continued, and listed four additional episodes in which the host raised the subject.

Such views have landed Rogan in hot water with his host, Spotify, which took arrows in support of the entertainers freedom of speech as its own staff railed over his transphobic comments.

While Rogan has espoused controversial ideologies regarding the LGBTQIA+ community for years, his controversy du jour has been his COVID-19 denial. Rogan was recently referred to as a menace to public health by one doctor, who co-signed an open letter alongside hundreds of other health care experts decrying the dangerous podcaster last week. Rogan, they pointed out, enjoys an audience of some 11 million listeners.

Mass-misinformation events of this scale have extraordinarily dangerous ramifications, they wrote in their letter.

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He can do what he likes: Inside Spotifys love affair with Joe Rogans misinformation – The Independent

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You can say whatever you want were on Spotify.

Those were Joe Rogans words of reassurance to a podcast guest when she paused to joke that she would be arrested for what she said next. Like, YouTubes not gonna pull it, he went on, prompting her laughter. Were in a weird realm.

The remarks, made during Rogans interview with Canadian anti-transgender writer Meghan Murphy last August, reflects a difficult truth for the worlds largest music streaming platform as it seeks to extend its dominance, and becomes a media company in its own right.

Under heavy political pressure tech giants like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter have increased efforts to tackle misinformation on their platforms during the pandemic, tightening their rules and hiring third-party fact-checkers (albeit with limited success).

Audio streaming platforms like Spotify have so far escaped a similar level of scrutiny. But the Swedish-based, public company is now being forced to grapple with questions of its responsibility over misinformation and pseudoscience as it makes exclusive multimillion-dollar deals with popular podcasters.

Its flagship grab is undoubtedly The Joe Rogan Experience, Spotifys number one podcast, whose colourful and free-wheeling host was paid a reported $100m in early 2020 for exclusive rights to his show.

This week, Rogan once again proved the tricky balancing act for Spotify. In a four-hour interview, broadcast on Tuesday, he gave the self-help author and anti-feminist mystic, Dr Jordan Peterson, a platform to claim without evidence that climate science has no basis in reality, and that solar power kills more people than nuclear.

Its the latest example of Rogan and his guests appearing to have free rein to spread false claims and conspiracy theories, which in the past have spanned topics from the coronavirus vaccine and Dr Anthony Fauci to transgender people.

In some instances, Rogans words appeared to break with what Spotify has said publicly about Covid-19 misinformation.

The streaming service has previously told news outlets that it bans false or dangerous deceptive content about COVID-19, which may cause offline harm and/or pose a direct threat to public health.

It also claims to have removed over 20,000 podcast episodes related to COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic.

Yet no misinformation policy is listed in Spotifys user guidelines or in summaries of prohibited content on the company website. Spotify did not respond to a list of questions from The Independent seeking clarity on its policies surrounding misinformation.

Spotify has a hate speech policy on its website banning content that expressly and principally promotes, advocates, or incites hatred or violence against people based on characteristics such as race, sex, and sexual orientation.

Rogan has showed time and time and again that he will misinform his audience on Spotify and wont face any repercussions for doing so, says Alex Paterson, a senior researcher with the left-wing campaign group Media Matters for America, who listened to over 300 hours of the podcast in 2021.

Spotifys complete failure to mitigate Rogans harmful rhetoric about the pandemic demonstrates clearly that when it comes to their top podcast host [the stated] policy is just a hollow PR strategy.

Theres no such thing as climate

Rogan, who is also a stand-up comedian and a combat sports commentator, was Spotifys most-listened podcaster in both 2020 and 2021.

Before his deal with the company he had an estimated 11 million downloads per episode, although that figure likely included some automatic downloads that were never listened to. According to Chartmetrics and Viberate, two analytics companies, his audience is mostly young men aged 18-35 in English-speaking countries.

That is a familiar audience to Dr Peterson, who is not a climate scientist but a clinical psychologist who became famous for his anti-political correctness views, attacks on the trans community, arguments that white privilege isnt real, and defence of the patriarchy.

Climate is about everything, okay, says Dr Peterson on the episode. But your models arent based on everything. Your models are based on a set number of variables. So that means youve reduced the variables which are everything to that set.

Well, how did you decide which set of variables to include in the equation if its about everything? [...] Because your models do not and cannot model everything.

At one point, Rogan acknowledges that his guest went on these rants but continues the conversation on climate change. Dr Peterson then alleges, with zero factual basis, that more people die every year from solar energy than die from nuclear.

Asked what he means, Dr Peterson laughs and says: No, you fall off the roof when youre installing it ... gravity! He describes this as a good example of unintended consequences.

Dr Petersons claims were widely panned as "climate denial", "wackadoo" and "completely wrong". John Cook, who studies climate change denial narratives at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub in Melbourne, Australia, toldThe Independent that they were very old, debunked arguments that Ive seen a million times over the last decade and a half.

Dr Cook added: He talks as if hes saying something insightful, but its a complete misunderstanding of how science works.

Dr Peterson did not respond to a request to comment from The Independent.

Joe Rogan guest claims pandemic is just a money grab, they are trying to kill us

Climate denial is nothing new, and has been around for as long as scientists have been sounding the alarm on the fact that humans are causing the steep rise in global temperatures, primarily from the burning of fossil fuels. Its less common, however, for climate myths to be pumped into the auditory canals of millions with only a glancing, credulous attempt at being challenged.

Podcasts are very intimate, says Dr Cook. Its like youre listening in on a conversation.

Rogans just asking questions style in which he seeks out fringe figures with unusual perspectives and mostly listens non-judgmentally actually plays into a highly common climate denial tactic, Dr Cook notes, that of spuriously casting doubt on scientific conclusions.

Joe Rogan vs Neil Young

Rogans statements about Covid-19 and its vaccines have attracted anger, as has his choice of guests to discuss the pandemic.

One recent interview was with Dr Robert Malone, an infectious disease specialist banned from Twitter for spreading misinformation. Dr Malone has questioned the Covid jabs effectiveness and falsely suggested that millions of people had been hypnotised into believing that the vaccines work to prevent serious disease.

Rogan has claimed that young people and children should not get the vaccine and inaccurately stated they are gene therapy. He has promoted the anti-parasite drug Ivermectin, whose effect on coronavirus remains unclear, and suggested that prolific conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was right to worry about microchips being hidden in Covid vaccines.

On the other hand, Rogan has also given a platform to an authoritative medical figure, Dr Sanjay Gupta, a neurosurgeon and chief medical correspondent for CNN.

Still, Mr Paterson of Media Matters for America says: [Rogan] plays a crucial role in the right-wing echo chamber by amplifying vaccine sceptics and coronavirus conspiracy theorists, says Mr Paterson, of Media Matters for America.

Dr Malones appearance prompted a group of doctors and scientists to sign an online petition calling on Spotify to adopt policies to prevent the spread of misinformation on its platform.

By allowing the propagation of false and societally harmful assertions, Spotify is enabling its hosted media to damage public trust in scientific research and sow doubt in the credibility of data-driven guidance offered by medical professionals, the letter read. It had been signed by more than 1,300 people as of Friday.

The veteran rocker Neil Young took issue with Rogans coronavirus misinformation and asked Spotify to remove his music this week.

They can have Rogan or Young. Not both, he wrote on his website.

Neil Young on stage in Quebec in 2018

(Alice Cliche / AFP via Getty Images)

Spotify has removed Youngs music from the platform, saying: We regret Neils decision to remove his music from Spotify, but hope to welcome him back soon.

The Joe Rogan episode with Dr Malone remains available.

Announcing his Spotify deal in 2020, Rogan stressed to his audience that it will be exactly the same show and that Spotify wont have any creative control.

Since then, he has repeatedly boasted about his freedom. Spotify has given me no pushback whatsoever. Its been amazing, he said in September. And in May, he said: Theyre f***ing great. They dont say s***.

He added: I tested it, too like when I brought Alex Jones on? I was like lets see! You guys talk a lot of s***, lets see! That f***ing guy is right way more than hes wrong.

Taking the biggest bite

All this comes as Spotify colonises the podcasting industry at breakneck pace.

Having launched in 2008, it is already the worlds largest music streaming service, according to Midia Research, controlling one-third of the market compared to 15 per cent for its next largest competitor, Apple music.

The company reports that it has 381 million users, including 172 million subscribers, across 184 markets and hosts 70 million tracks, including more than 3.2 million podcast titles. Some estimates now suggest it has a bigger podcast audience than Apple, the free app that comes pre-installed on every iPhone.

Joe Rogan continues to ignore covid science even as he reads it out loud

Among the 20,000 podcast episodes that Spotify claims to have removed due to vaccine misinformation include that of Australian anti-vaxxer and celebrity chef Pete Evans.

The policy applies to music too: Spotify reportedly nixed a controversial anti-lockdown song by Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown last March.

In 2018, it deleted several episodes of Infowars, a radio show hosted by Alex Jones, for hate speech. The interview with Mr Jones on The Joe Rogan Experience, is still available.

Spotify has not left Rogan completely alone. It has removed as many as 42 episodes dating from before his exclusive deal with the streaming service, including interviews with far right figures such as activist Milo Yiannopolous and Proud Boys founder Gavin McInnes.

Spotifys chief executive, Daniel Ek, has said that he does not believe Spotify has any editorial responsibility over its podcasts.

"We have a lot of really well-paid rappers too that make tens of millions of dollars, if not more, each year from Spotify, Mr Ek told Axios last year. And we dont dictate what theyre putting in their songs, either."

Audio misinformation is harder to challenge

Until recently misinformation on Spotify has flown under the radar compared to social networks such as Facebook, Dr Cook says.

One reason is because audio content is more difficult to search through and scrutinise compared to the short snippets of text, often tied to a URL, found on other platforms.

In the past, Dr Cooks team has used artificial intelligence (AI) to analyse data from blogs and think-tank publications, but he says that would be much harder to do with podcasts.

That makes it more difficult to track and challenge the reach of climate misinformation on Spotify even as the company boasts about its own green credentials and says it is listening to the science.

This is a really massive problem, says Dr Valerie Wirtschafter, a senior data analyst at the Brookings Institution, who has studied how disinformation spread through podcasts on the Big Lie that victory had been stolen from Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

Dr Wirtschafter and her colleague Dr Chris Meserole, director of research for Brookings AI and Emerging Technology Initiative, are undertaking new research which will analyse 79 podcasts and 37,000 episodes for verifiable falsehoods on the Covid pandemic, while also exploring broader disinformation including climate denial.

Figuring out the reach of audio disinformation is critical due to how listeners respond to the medium.

The [podcast hosts] are in your ear, youre often listening to them alone, you choose when to start these episodes, Dr Wirtschafter says, noting that research has shown that people are more likely to incorporate information they hear from podcasts into their beliefs.

Theres an intimacy factor, she added. These hosts often develop identities, personalities that people gravitate toward. Thats really important in this conversation. On the flip side of that intimacy, theres this implicit level of trust that gets built. But that podcaster could be anybody.

Why Spotify needs Joe Rogan

The big question is: will Spotify ever part ways with its number one podcasting star? According to John Sullivan, a professor at Muhlenberg College in Pennsylvania who studies podcasting and tech industries, that is not likely.

Spotify honestly couldnt have cared less about Joe Rogan; what they wanted was Joe Rogans audience, says Professor Sullivan.

He argues that Spotify should not be seen as a media company, because its game plan is simply to suck as much of the podcast industry into its platform as possible, with each exclusive content deal a means to that end.

Traditionally, podcasts have been distributed via web links that made it hard to measure their audience and almost impossible to censor them.

By contrast, Spotify is a very sophisticated surveillance machine that tracks every second of its users listening, helping it develop recommendation algorithms that keep subscribers on board and sell targeted adverts aimed at non-subscribers.

As such, Prof Sullivan says the company needs to grow as big as possible as quickly as it can so that it can become dominant before regulators and politicians grow restive.

If it can get to that point, then, like Facebook, it will be rich enough to resist or adapt to whatever new regulations come its way.

At the moment its fair to say that Spotify needs [Rogan] more than the other way around, says Prof Sullivan. Its in a moment now where its trying to maximise its growth as quickly as possible. Someone like Joe Rogan is in an ideal position, because he holds the keys to that growth so that probably gives him a level of confidence about saying and doing whatever he would like.

He adds that Spotifys reported $100m investment in Mr Rogan will make it harder to give him up, to say nothing of the public firestorm it could ignite by deplatforming him.

The current approach may already be bearing fruit. According to Chartmetrics, Joe Rogans followers on Instagram are posting about Spotify more often over time, having started out less interested in it than the average user.

However, musicians might be able to force its hand if they follow the path of Young and pull their content from the service. A big enough boycott, Prof Sullivan says, would bite into Spotifys core revenue.

In the meantime, Dr Cook believes that Spotifys supposed rules against dangerous Covid-19 misinformation should be extended to other kinds.

While many tech giants put false Covid claims in a different category, saying they can directly cause harm to life and limb, Dr Cook says this is short-sighted.

Covid misinformation is much more immediate, says Dr Cook. People will hear something, and then theyll step outside and not wear a mask, or they wont get vaccinated, or they wont socially distance.

Climate misinformation is more complicated, because its such a holistic issue. Its long-term, its global. Its harder to get our head around, but the threat is actually much greater than Covid misinformation because its this existential problem on a global scale, decades and centuries into the future.

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Indonesia Is Switching Capital Cities Because the Old One Is Sinking Into the Ocean – Futurism

Posted: at 12:04 am

Jakarta, Indonesias biggest city, has been free of Dutch rule for about 70 years but the lasting effects of colonialism are far from over.

Case in point, the city is sinking into the surrounding Java Sea because many of the citys 10 million people have noaccess to piped water and must rely on wells to suck up drinkable groundwater.

The flooding, pollution, sinking earth and congestion have gotten so catastrophic,in fact, that the country is switching capital cities altogether. Yes, seriously: the government is packing up and moving the countrys capital to the island of Borneo, according to the Associated Press.

But the move is unlikely to help poor residents who are still suffering from the chaos of environmental disaster, financial ruin, and the side effects of colonization ever since the Netherlands built a purposefully segregated city in the 1600s.

The construction of the new capital city is not merely a physical move of government offices, President Joko Widodo told AP. The main goal is to build a smart new city, a new city that is competitive at the global level, to build a new locomotive for the transformation toward an Indonesia based on innovation and technology based on a green economy.

It sounds great in theory, but according to the AP, current plans are for about 8,000 civil servants to have moved to the new capital by 2024. The whole relocation process is scheduled to be completed by 2045, but thats only five years ahead of 2050, when an entire third of Jakarta could be submerged, and its not really clear how everyday residents who arent civil servants are expected to make the move or what will happen to people who cant relocate.

In addition, the new location in Borneo isnt ideal considering the wide variety of flora and fauna nearby. APreports that Borneos East Kalimantan province is home to orangutans, leopards and a wide array of other wildlife.

The new capital citys strategic environmental study shows that there are at least three basic problems, Dwi Sawung, an official with the Indonesian Forum for Environment, or WALHI, told the wire service. There are threats to water systems and risks of climate change, threats to flora and fauna, and threats of pollution and environmental damage.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place aka staying in a doomed city or moving to an imperfect new one Indonesia once again reminds us that just because a country has independence doesnt mean its free of a grim history.

More on climate change: The Doomsday Glacier is Irreversibly Melting, Researchers Say

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Apple CEO Menaced by Armed Stalker Who Thinks She’s His Wife – Futurism

Posted: at 12:04 am

Apples CEO has taken out a restraining order against a stalker who he says keeps emailing him photos of loaded guns and creeping around outsidehis house.

AsThe Mercury News reports, a Virginia woman has spent the past year menacing Apple CEO Tim Cook, escalating from sending him photos of a loaded gun and bizarre roommate applications to driving cross-country in a Porsche to stalk his Palo Alto home all of which led a judge to grant him a wide-ranging restraining order against the woman, which bars her from owning firearms, entering Apple premises, speaking to Apple employees, or going to Cooks house.

It gets weirder: according to the report, the woman believes she is the CEOs wife and mother to his children, and uses the last name Cook on Twitter. Cook, it bears mentioning, is gay and has been out about that since 2014.

The womans obsessive behavior towards the Apple CEO appears to have begun in the fall of 2020, the report noted, when Cook noticed her tagging him on Twitter. On Halloween of that year, she tweeted continuously about the relationships she claims they had, and thereafter began escalating and becoming threatening and highly disturbing, Cooks application for a restraining orderreads.

In one of her more than 200 emails, the woman reportedly said that she was almost done waiting to have a sexual relationship with Cook, Mercury News added.

Alongside Cook, the 45-year-old womans Twitter which Futurism has reviewed but will not link to protect the woman, who may well be struggling with mental health issues also mentions Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in a threatening manner.

In her applications to be Cooks roommate, according to Mercury News report, the woman listed corporations shes registered in Virginia, California, and New York that all have highly offensive names and boast Cook as an executive. After sending the roommate applications, she then reportedly drove cross-country in a Porsche Macan SUV in October 2021 and tried to enter his building, only to wait around for him outside after being rebuffed by security. Thereafter, she fled but was found by police and arrested, and allegedly told officers that she could get violent when she was in custody.

After her Palo Alto arrest, the woman continued to escalate further, the report noted, demanding hundreds of millions of dollars from Cook, tweeting violent things about him, and demanding him to move. According to the CEOs since-granted restraining order application, the womans continued presence in the South Bay makes her more dangerous.

Though this isnt Cooks first stalker or even the first to show up at his house, this series of behavior is uniquely bizarre and freaky, even by the standards of Apple obsessives.

When tech CEOs become celebrities, they seem to get all the same treatment granted to movie stars right down to the stalkers.

READ MORE:Apple CEO Tim Cook targeted by possibly armed stalker who came to his home and is still in the area, company alleges [The Mercury News]

More on stalkers:Elon Musk Says People Stalking His Location Has Become a Security Issue

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