Antidem channeling Aristotle on poets and artists. Approximate quote: “it is poets who can make bad ideas seem beautiful, who can make awful ideas seem not only realistic but wonderful, and it’s really easy to deceive people with utopian ideas.” Art must be guided by a system of morality — as perhaps must be all things.

The “No True Communist (Scotsman)” argument and the spectacular failure modes of Communism — reminiscent of a podcast I heard with Nassim Taleb, in which he spoke about the importance of looking at not only probability of failure but also the severity of the failure mode(s). In the case of communism, high probability of failure with high severity of consequence! Not worth the risk. Don’t “do it harder;” don’t do it at all…

The left’s unfalsifiable claims are like the central truths around which a cult organizes and which motivates the cult’s existence; for the cultist these truths are both self-evident and unquestionable, thus axiomatic. They are not up for discussion. This seems like a useful framework for understanding many of the leftist’s responses to criticism.

I also really liked the phrase, “applied hypocrisy.”

Good ‘cast, thanks! (SB I think you might want to turn down the gain on your microphone, it sounds like it is clipping frequently.)

http://www.cnet.com/news/add-terror-to-the-toy-box-with-legends-of-cthulhu-action-figures/

Any help?