The generalisation that all generalisations are wrong, is self-contradictory and therefore false. An example of the relevance of this truism can be found in the comments on this blog entry.

I'm now the top google hit for Elliot Temple, with or without quotes. :-D

looking at more old TCS posts. here's an important idea, though not one I'd forgotten about:

Fallibillity, does not imply any particular mistake. No real-life failure can ever be blamed on fallibility. which may sound kinda "duh". but ppl ignore this quite often.

for example, sum1 might mention hitting his kid once, and say he was taken over by passion (a diff error) and that mistakes happen (bingo). the fact that mistakes happen, in no way excuses this particular one, whihc was avoidable.

the problem with the passion excuse is all the passion means is that he was in the right environment to act on a facet of his personality that he usually doesn't.

Den Beste's worst blog is kinda shockingly evil. *sigh*

all the rest of the non-tcs-affilliated right-wing warblogs do it too, and most more often than Den Beste.

UPDATE: sum1 suggested it's Den Worste blog. *g*

and i just noticed i didn't say what "it" was outloud. AGEISM. demeaning children. slandering babies. comparing youth and evil via metaphor.

okie, 'nother old idea i like.

p: if ya constrain sum1's choices, ur responsible for making the constraint not hurt person
p: having a kid, constrains kid's choices b/c "not be born" is out, ie ya make person live
c: parents r responsible for making being born not hurt kid

i'm reading my old TCS posts. one esp cool feature, is rediscovering good ideas *of my own* that i'd forgotten. here's one:

Sometimes there are arguments about what things should be offered to kids. Some people acknowledge they should let their kids try things the kids might like, but then deny that kids might like ice cream, or chocolate, or whatever. And then people debate this. But doesn't the very fact that the item is worth debating, mean the kid *might* like it? By the very act of arguing about it, the anti-ice cream people lose the argument.

talk about a worldview/vocabulary gap.

i wrote something about good intentions being fulfillable (i'd write realisable, but I was trying to be easy to read)

and i meant intentions that are good.

and some guy read it as people who subjectively mean well, instead.

Any given policy/law/institution, we know will, in the future, be different/better/obselete.

So, if governments are characterised by any specific thing, (like monopoly on initiating force [not that i concede that definition makes any sense]) that's the end of minarchy as a plausible concept.