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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

That's, again, your interpretation. You are so defensive that there's really not reasoning with you. Have you, for example,considered also reading the line that isn't highlighted? Anger management, bro.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

It is very clear here that we have folks interpreting it in different ways. You can pretend they don't exist, but that doesn't mean they actually don't.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

No one is saying the title misled. You're in a strangely defensive posture. Nothing ruled out the possibility that after the affidavit was submitted, something didn't happen to the woman or baby. Being less deterministic about ways things may be interpreted is a skill that could benefit you.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

It's pretty common for judges to want more time to think abut the arguments and effects of their decisions for rulings.

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Filip Vanevski, PhD @filipvanevski.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

This is the problem with influencers pushing the narrative that specialists (govt, science, etc) don't actually know more than anybody else, and just use their titles and elite status to grift. In that warped reality, facts are the provenance of opinion, and deciding for yourself is a virtue. Chaos.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

It did kind of read like fromhis post that this was filed and then the baby or mom may have died after it was filed. Clarification isn't a bad idea and I did read it. I do think you're right about what he meant though.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

The authors said “suffer” is “language of illness” and while it may provoke empathy “it does also suggest BAME victimhood rather than steadfastness and agency”.

An example of a message that made people less likely to think of racism as a systemic problem was one that said: “This country’s black and minority ethnic communities still suffer poorer outcomes across education, employment, health and in the criminal justice system. In order to achieve genuine racial equality, we must work towards an inclusive Britain in which we all feel valued, enjoy equal opportunities and share a common sense of belonging.”

The authors said “suffer” is “language of illness” and while it may provoke empathy “it does also suggest BAME victimhood rather than steadfastness and agency”.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

Job discrimination faced by ethnic minorities convinces public about racism (2022) Study finds the best way to convince the public that racism is a real problem and requires major change: tell them about a study exposing discrimination faced by job applicants. www.theguardian.com/money/2022/d...

Researchers believe they may have found the best way to convince the public that racism is a real problem and requires major change: tell them about an Oxford University study exposing discrimination faced by job applicants.

A groundbreaking project exploring how better to boost public support for action against systemic racism tested which messages best move people towards a more anti-racist position.

Reframing Race, a charity, tested dozens of arguments on almost 20,000 people and found highlighting research from 2019 showing ethnic minority applicants received less positive responses to job applications than white people, was the “blockbuster” in terms of making people more likely to agree that all races and ethnic groups are equally as capable as one other.

By contrast using well-trodden language about people “suffering” from “inequality” was less likely to convince people of the systemic problem and even sometimes backfired.

The need for better arguments was made clear by a survey for the study covering England and Scotland, which revealed widespread racist attitudes with 40% of people believing that “some races or ethnic groups are naturally harder working than others” and one in five think some races are more intelligent than others.

The research also showed it remained easier to get audiences to accept racism as a real and pressing problem than to get them to support particular solutions.

“If we want to end racism and entrench anti-racism it is critical to build public demand for deep and irreversible progress,” said Sanjiv Lingayah, report author and director of Reframing Race. “[This] shows there is still a way to go. The data shows significant attachment to deep-seated and debunked myths about ‘race’. More positively, the findings show that the public can understand systemic racism and that they can be rallied around far-reaching anti-racist solutions.”

The researchers found the message with the most potential was when people in England were told Oxford University researchers had applied for more than 3,000 jobs in the names of fictitious applicants, randomly varying the ethnicity, but keeping the skills, qualifications and work experience the same. White British applicants had to make four applications to get a positive response while ethnic minority applicants had to make seven.

“It is an almost watertight piece of evidence about the existence of racism in hiring,” the authors said. “The experiment ‘catches racism red-handed’. Naming Oxford University gives the results further credibility. And, additionally, the way that the fake CV ‘sting’ is outlined gives the message the feel of a compelling story – with plot, characters and a powerful ending.”

Other effective messages involved telling people about far worse maternal mortality rates for black women than faced by white women and even using a metaphor to describe racism as a birdcage which traps people all boosted public acceptance of racism as a problem.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

White people more likely to confront authors of racist online posts to set discussion rules (2024) White people surveyed indicated they'd be more likely to confront those posting racist content to defend norms for political discussion, not change their prejudices. news.illinois.edu/white-people...

“Overall, we found that reframing the confrontation goal from changing someone’s mind to setting social norms increased participants’ willingness to challenge these types of posts,” Coles said. “Participants also indicated greater willingness to confront someone they were closer to rather than someone who was relationally distant, such as a stranger or acquaintance.”

Norm-setting changes the nature of the social media environment, eroding the social power that allows users to disseminate racist ideology, the researchers said.

It also was an appealing strategy for two groups of people in the study – those who were the most cynical about the value of discussing political issues such as race and those with the greatest reluctance to challenge offensive content posted by relationally distant users such as strangers and acquaintances, the researchers found.

Some research has shown that challenging hate speech and racist stereotypes posted online reduces the odds that offenders will repeat it. However, the hostility and entrenched viewpoints that permeate online communities, as well as widespread cynicism about politics in general and the likelihood of changing others’ beliefs about race through online discourse may discourage users from objecting to racist content, according to the study.

"However, if the objective is reframed from trying to change a transgressor’s deep-seated attitudes to a potentially more achievable goal – that of defining the social norms for political discussions – participants’ willingness to confront others about racist content increases,” Coles said.

With fiery comments about societal problems such as immigration, antisemitism and police officers’ treatment of minorities commonplace on social media, there is a critical need for interventions that empower people to challenge online hate speech because it is intricately tied with perpetuating structural racism and acts of racial violence, Coles said.

“Framing the confrontation goal as norm-setting may spur white social media users to step up rather than stand by,” he said. “This may change the social power dynamics online, instead of trying to convince racist users to behave better out of the goodness of their own hearts.”

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

Experiment #3 When far-right individuals choose to share misinformation, virtue signal. Virtue signaling is strongest when the misinformation presented relates to sacred community values (immigration, religion, nationalism).

To understand the brain activity of political extremists viewing misinformation, the researchers conducted a third experiment on 36 participants from Spain who supported the far-right political party, Vox. Here, the researchers repeated the same procedure as in the first and second experiments, but this time they conducted an fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to observe the changes in participants’ brains as they were asked to decide if they would reshare the social media post.

The experiment revealed that certain parts of the brain, like the bilateral inferior frontal cortex and the precuneus, were more active in these individuals when they contemplated sharing the post. These areas of the brain are involved in making you feel like you belong to a social group, understanding other people’s emotional states, and responding to social cues in ways that are considered socially appropriate.

Plainly speaking, when these far-right individuals choose to share misinformation, they are likely doing so because they view it as a way to signal to other like-minded extremists that they belong to the same social and political group. This need to virtue signal is the strongest when the misinformation presented to them is related to values that are considered sacred to their community, which, in the case of the far-right, may involve issues such as immigration, religion, or nationalism.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

Experiment #2 Republicans who voted for Trump were undeterred by Twitter fact-checks and were willing to share the misinformation anyway. Social media fact-checks or flagging of “fake news” may not sufficiently prevent the spread of misinformation, especially if it has an extremist agenda.

For the second experiment, the researchers replicated the social media experiment in the United States, where they found similar results among Trump-supporting Republicans. In fact, Republicans who voted for Trump (and self-identified as Trump supporters) were found to be undeterred by Twitter fact-checks and were willing to share the misinformation anyway. This tells us that social media fact-checks or flagging of “fake news” may not sufficiently prevent the spread of misinformation, especially when it has an extremist agenda attached to it.

To understand the brain activity of political extremists viewing misinformation, the researchers conducted a third experiment on 36 participants from Spain who supported the far-right political party, Vox. Here, the researchers repeated the same procedure as in the first and second experiments, but this time they conducted an fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) to observe the changes in participants’ brains as they were asked to decide if they would reshare the social media posts.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

Experiment #1: Despite fact-checks and accuracy nudges, far-right individuals were far more likely compared to center-right individuals to reshare blatant misinformation - especially if it resonated with their sacred values & if their personal identity closely related to their political ideology.

A recent study published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General explored, through a series of three experiments, how conservatives in Spain and the United States respond to misinformation that aligns with their political values.

In the first experiment, conservatives from Spain who were either far-right or center-right were shown various social media posts criticizing the liberal government. These posts were designed to either appeal to their conservative sacred values or their non-sacred values. Sacred values are moral imperatives that people are unwilling to compromise while non-sacred values can be weighed against other values and may be subject to negotiation or trade-offs.

The experiment showed that despite fact-checks and accuracy nudges (like you would see on popular social media platforms like Twitter or Instagram), far-right individuals were far more likely compared to center-right individuals to reshare blatant misinformation. This was especially true if the post resonated with their sacred values and if their personal identity was closely related to their political ideology.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 18/02/2025

Why Some People Turn Into Political Extremists Understanding emotional and societal factors behind misinformation spread is key. The issue means debunking false information but also involves addressing extremists’ need for social belonging and affirmation. www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/soci...

psychologytoday.com

Why Some People Turn Into Political Extremists

In the post-truth age, we will believe anything as long as it echoes us.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

I've seen a lot of people, even Dems, swear they wouldn't be coming after states when it is obvious they are going to do so. People really seem to not get just how bad this is going to all be.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

The pilot did such a good job though for landing it safely as they could. Imagine having to land it upside down.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

One of the things you are seeing right now is federal employees afraid to go on the record, plus inspectors generals are fired. Qualified and credible voices who know the inner workings of govt are afraid to rebut DOGE's bullshit. This is a real and incredibly consequential chilling effect!

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

I wonder how Trump's has been resolved. Seems like whomever is supposed to enforce them isn't and I don't know who that responsibility actually falls upon.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

That's also absolutely not true about his security clearance.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

How empathic we are is not just our experiences experience but also our genes - How empathetic we are is partly due to genetics (10%) - Women are on average more empathetic than men, but not due to genetics - These variants also associate with higher risk for autism www.cam.ac.uk/research/new...

The new study has three important results. First, it found that how empathetic we are is partly due to genetics. Indeed, a tenth of this variation is due to genetic factors. This confirms previous research examining empathy in identical versus non-identical twins.

Second, the new study confirmed that women are on average more empathetic than men. However, this difference is not due to our DNA as there were no differences in the genes that contribute to empathy in men and women.

This implies that the sex difference in empathy is the result of other non-genetic biological factors, such as prenatal hormone influences, or non-biological factors such as socialisation, both of which also differ between the sexes.

Finally, the new study found that genetic variants associated with lower empathy are also associated with higher risk for autism.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Ugh. It's paywalled using that link too, unfortunately.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Paywalling stuff right now is so unethical. I wish the press would stop paywalling at least anything related to what's happening now.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

Also funny because Natsios works at Texas A&M's Bush School. They rarely speak up on issues like this but is says something that he is.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 17/02/2025

I had a job interview one with Andrew Natsio. Still sad I didn't get it. He told me I was everything they were looking for in a candidate. Then I never heard back.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Well drat. Let's try a non-fed site. This link references it and provides a summary: firstamendment.mtsu.edu/article/jack... Here's a link to download the full report: electionlawblog.org/wp-content/u...

firstamendment.mtsu.edu

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Airbnb is an extremely unethical company for many reasons. www.theinvisibletourist.com/why-you-shou... They also support Trump. www.newsweek.com/american-businesses-supporting-donating-donald-trump-list-2027957

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Allison Gill @muellershewrote.com · 16/02/2025

From an FDA probationary employee: the firings are coming from outside the agency without cause and with zero input from supervisors (as promised.) More firings expected between now and Tuesday. Do not open the termination email before you download your documents and performance evals.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Energy Matters (2014) "It seems safe to assume that if Vladimir Putin’s aggressive actions in the Crimea result in billion dollar space contracts for the US government being awarded to Elon Musk, then Tesla and Solar City will also be major beneficiaries" www.bermudasun.bm/news/2014/ma...

bermudasun.bm

Bermuda Sun

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

During Trump's presidential campaign, Musk said that Trump "doesn't seem to have the sort of character that reflects well on the United States." (2016) www.newsweek.com/elon-musk-be...

newsweek.com

Elon Musk Joins Donald Trump's Advisory Team

Trump asked Tesla CEO Musk to be part of his Strategic and Policy Forum.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Musk (2014) accused the Air Force of moving the “goal posts” back when it comes to certifying its rockets and wasting taxpayer dollars by choosing more expensive launch services over his. Discusses Russian sanctions, federal spending, and SpaceX. www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/201...

nationaldefensemagazine.org

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Elon Musk on avoiding being at Putin's mercy and SpaceX involvement (2014) m.youtube.com/watch?v=xHRL...

m.youtube.com

Elon Musk on avoiding being at Putin's mercy 2014

YouTube video by Elon Musk best videos

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Why Russia Won’t Catch Up in the Space Race (2014) The U.S. and Russia were once the Castor and Pollux of space travel, but now - for Russia - not so much. Russia is grimly trying to claw its way back—and the grimness is a problem. time.com/2937697/russ...

And so it will probably go with Russia in space. The original space race was no less political than anything Russia is doing today, but both the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. were operating from positions of strength, projecting their competing power over a sprawling region of client states and taking the duel to the cosmic high ground.

Russia today—with Putin calling the shots on when a booster should be launched and the government issuing petulant threats to quit flying American astronauts to the International Space Station—is acting neither strong nor confident.

It is, instead, joining the long list of states that have dreamed of space but sought to power themselves more with rage than rocket fuel. And consider how far they’ve gotten. North Korea? Pathetic. Iran? Please. China? They’re doing great things now, but that only started when they climbed down from their revolutionary zeal and started focusing on the engineering and physics instead of the ideology and slogans.

And Russia? Not so much. The collapse of communism, the loss of Kazakhstan—which put the Baikonaur Cosmodrome, Russia’s Cape Canaveral, in an entirely different country—and hard economic times made space an unaffordable luxury. But now Russia is grimly trying to claw its way back—and the grimness is a problem.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Putin and Trump could be on the same side in this troubling new world order (2016) Dugin: We must create strategic alliances to overthrow the present order, everything that is the face of the Beast, the anti-Christ. www.theguardian.com/world/commen...

Putin and Trump could be on the same side in this troubling new world order

The hacking crisis may be distracting. Us from a disturbing convergence between 2 mighty powers.

Mon. 19 December 2016 01.00 EST

[Graphi]
Graffiti depicting Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump: 'Alexander Dugan was one of the first public figures in Russia to spot that Trump was a potential ally photograph.' Mindaugas Kubis/AP.

My point is that the battle of ideas matters even when those in power pour scorn upon it, or claim themselves to be no more than practitioners of “common sense”.

Discourse analysis teaches us that ideas are the magmatic force of public life, rumbling beneath the feet of the mighty, shaping their actions and the popular response. As Isaiah Berlin put it, ideas “are indeed the central complex of relations of a man towards himself and to the external world”.

In Dugin’s case, the “central complex” is a mess of imperialism, bigotry, reactionary religiosity and a loathing of social diversity. To confuse matters further, he has borrowed from postmodernism the idea that “truth is a matter of belief … there is no such thing as facts”.

In the year of “post-truth politics”, this contention resonates all too deeply. Worse, Dugin’s ideas help to explain why the present tensions between the US and Russia may be distracting us from a potential convergence between the two mighty powers – and not the good kind, either.

This is Dugin’s world. In it, Trump and Putin, for all their differences, would be on the same side.

The core lesson of 2016 is that there is nothing inevitable in the march of progress. But it is equally true that the ultra right has no providential monopoly on success. Vile as they are, Dugin’s ideas constitute a half-mad manual to what is happening today, and may happen tomorrow. It should be read with care by all those who are planning the counterattack.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

The son of the John Deere company that played the game ended up going into healthcare.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

The End of Term Web Archive The End of Term Web Archive contains federal government websites (.gov, .mil, etc) in the Legislative, Executive, or Judicial branches of the government. Local government websites, or any site not part of the federal government domain are out of scope. eotarchive.org

whitehouse.gov

The White House

President Donald J. Trump and Vice President JD Vance are committed to lowering costs for all Americans, securing our borders, unleashing American energy dominance, restoring peace through strength, a...

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

FUN FACT: when you try to go to the OMB website to see their data from this USA Gov link (www.usa.gov/agencies/off...), it now redirects you to this instead (www.whitehouse.gov).

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Personal anecdote: My father owned a computer store at the time, back when mom-and-pop stores built the computers instead of being sold assembled at big box stores. He said he only ever sold one copy of it - to one of the owners of the local John Deere tractor supply for his son.

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

FUN FACT: did you know there used to be a video game that was essentially The Sims, but for explaining Clinton's health plan to the common person? It was called SimHealth: The National Health Care Simulation. It was ended because it wasn't terribly fun. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimHealth

[Screenshot of video game]

SimHealth: The National Health Care Simulation

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Psychology of Terrorism (2004) In an ongoing effort to better understand the causes, motivations & determinants of terrorist behavior through a comprehensive review of scientific and professional literature, it analyzes key findings on the “psychology of terrorism.” www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/ni...

Psychology of Terrorism
Randy Borum
Director, Psychology of Terrorism Initiative

• Surprisingly little research or analysis has been conducted on terrorist recruitment. Recruitment efforts do appear concentrated in areas where people feel most deprived and dissatisfied. Relationships are critical. Effective recruiters create and exploit a sense of urgency and imminence.

• Effective leaders of terrorist organizations must be able to: maintain a collective belief system; establish and maintain organizational routines; control the flow of communication; manipulate incentives (and purposive goals) for followers; deflect conflict to external targets; and keep action going.

• Research on the psychology of terrorism largely lacks substance and rigor. Cultural factors are important, but have not been studied. Future research should be operationally-informed; maintain a behavior based focus; and derive interpretations from analyses of incident-related behaviors.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive Summary 3

Introduction 4

Aims & methodology 6

Psychological approaches to understanding violence 9
*Instinct Theories
*Drive Theories (Frustration – Aggression)
*Social Learning Theory
*Cognitive Theory
*Biological Factors
*Raw Empirical Approaches

First generation psychological
research on terrorism 18
*Psychoanalytic Theory
*Narcissism
*Early Typologies

Contemporary psychological research
on terrorism 22
*How and why do people enter, stay in, and leave terrorist organizations?
*To what extent is psychopathology relevant for understanding or preventing terrorism?
*To what extent is individual personality relevant for understanding or preventing terrorism?
*To what extent are an individual’s life experiences relevant for understanding or preventing terrorism?
*What is the role of ideology in terrorist behavior?
*What distinguishes extremists who act violently from those who do not?
*What are the vulnerabilities of terrorist groups?
*How do terrorist organizations form, function, and fail?

Conclusions on the state of research 64

References 64

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Deedee96 @dariusaudubon.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

Actually, ranking member Rep Takano of House Veterans committee are asking people fired from VA for their stories. Here is the website forms.office.com/pages/respon...

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Strategy Science @strategyscience.bsky.social · 16/02/2025

This link bypasses the exclusive piece of "See inside DOGE’s playbook for eliminating DEI". @washingtonpost.com should be ashamed of paywalling this right now.

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