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Showing posts from April, 2012

On living in the real world

Recently a friend alerted me to a KU News Release, " Distractions, quick thinking lead to conservative thoughts, research finds ." It begins, Could knocking back a few beers influence a person's views on property rights or the role of government in production and trade? By asking bargoers to take a political survey and blow into a Breathalyzer, a scholarly investigator at the University of Kansas has found that as blood alcohol levels rise, people become increasingly intoxicated with conservative policies, too. Sounds interesting, methinks. So I pours meself a cold one and reads on. The press release refers to a study, Low-Effort Thought Promotes PoliticalConservatism , by two researchers from the University of Arkansas and one each from universities of Kansas and Wisconsin. They introduce their study thus,   Conservative political ideology in Western democracies may be identified by several components, including an emphasis on personal responsibility, ac