Sex, Murder, and the Meaning of Life: A Psychologist Investigates How Evolution, Cognition, and Complexity are Revolutionizing our View of Human Nature Review

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Sex, Murder, and the Meaning of Life: A Psychologist Investigates How Evolution, Cognition, and Complexity are Revolutionizing our View of Human Nature ReviewFor those who have ever read E. O. Wilson's classic book Sociobiology: The New Synthesis, Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Edition (or maybe On Human Nature: Revised Edition), then I suppose you could consider Professor Kenrick's book somewhat of an updated version. It's a real primer on evolutionary psychology. Having been familiar with evolutionary psychology, I thought that there might not be anything very interesting in Prof. Kenrick's book, but I was dead wrong. In fact, I think quite the opposite now. To be honest though, I didn't really get into the book until about half-way; however, once I got to about Ch. 7, I was hooked. Several things that I really enjoyed were: 1) Kenrick's discussion of the need to update Abraham Maslow's famous Hierarchy of Needs, 2) the `reproductive religiosity model' which looks at the difference between Conservatives and Liberals as a difference in mating strategies, and 3) the brief, but important, discussion on the connection between dynamical systems theory and evolutionary psychology.
I realize that there are some people out there who continue to insist that evolutionary psychology is bogus and consequently not their cup of tea, but I would challenge them to read Prof. Kenrick's book and find a better - more rational - theory of human nature than evolutionary psychology. I would also venture to say that Kenrick is definitely one of the better spokespersons for it. By the end of the book I was really at home with his laid-back, breezy, and humorous style of writing. I also appreciated the brevity with which he covered the topics; he covered many issues. For instance, Modularity of the Mind (Why Everyone (Else) Is a Hypocrite: Evolution and the Modular Mind), the Prisoner's Dilemma (SuperCooperators: Altruism, Evolution, and Why We Need Each Other to Succeed), Decision Making (Gut Feelings: The Intelligence of the Unconscious), and our Basic Human Needs (The Fair Society: The Science of Human Nature and the Pursuit of Social Justice).
Lastly, as far as an answer to the Meaning of Life question, Prof. Kenrick has really hit the nail on the head when he writes, "I am not suggesting that we all ought to go forth and multiply, ignoring the problem of overpopulation, or that you rush out to make five hundred new Facebook "friends." What I am suggesting instead is that you let yourself enjoy the natural pleasures of taking care of the intimate associates you already have. You can regard time spent with family and friends as a distraction from the central task of life, or you can slow down and let your brain's social mechanisms savior the experiences." I think that's pretty sound advice. I highly recommend this book.
Here is a quick run-down of the chapters: Ch. 1 - Standing in the Gutter: How did an innocent young student accidentally fall in with a band of intellectual revolutionaries?; Ch. 2 - Why Playboy is Bad for Your Mental Mechanisms: When is beauty bad for you?; Ch. 3 - Homicidal Fantasies: Why have most of us had at least one fantasy about committing murder; Ch. 4 - Outgroup Hatred in the Blink of an Eye: Why can't we all just get along; Ch. 5 - The Mind as a Coloring Book: Why doesn't cultural variation support the blank-slate view of the mind? Ch. 6 - Subselves: The three faces of thee; Ch. 7 - Reconstructing Maslow's Pyramid: Where are the missing bricks in the classic pyramid of needs?; Ch. 8 - How the Mind Warps: Why do men and women forget different people and regret different things?; Ch. 9 - Peacocks, Porsches, and Pablo Picasso:Why do men go out of their way to avoid a Consumer Reports Best Buy?; Ch. 10 - Sex and Religion: When is godliness just another mating strategy?; Ch. 11 - Deep Rationality and Evolutionary Economics: Why are behavioral economists only half right when they say that our economic choices are irrational?; and Ch. 12 - Bad Crowds, Chaotic Attractors, and Humans as Ant: Why your parents were right about the company you keep.Sex, Murder, and the Meaning of Life: A Psychologist Investigates How Evolution, Cognition, and Complexity are Revolutionizing our View of Human Nature Overview

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Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception Review

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Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception ReviewOne of the benefits of retiring from my career as a statistician is that I no longer feel it's my personal responsibility to alert friends and colleagues to the myriad ways they are being misled or deceived by the kind of abominably poor summarization of data that's pretty much the norm these days. It's just as well - who wants to be *that guy*, the crank at the table who people start to inch away from surreptitiously, avoiding eye contact all the while?
Not that I endorse misleading or deceptive data presentation - far from it. Now more than ever, as we all struggle to make sense of the avalanche of information that constantly assails us, the capacity for critical, intelligent interpretation is vital. So it's important to be able to see through the most prevalent fallacies in data interpretation, not to mention data presentation strategies deliberately intended to mislead. This latest book by Charles Seife has the laudable goal of educating the reader about some of the most common types of statistical malpractice out there, continuing a tradition established by such authors as Darrell Huff ("How to Lie With Statistics"), John Paulos ("Innumeracy"), Edward Tufte, or the authors of last year's highly successful "The Numbers Game" (Michael Blastland and Andrew Dilnot).
Unfortunately, though "Proofiness" is a well-intentioned book, it suffers from a fundamental crisis of identity. There is a major gap between what "Proofiness" promises and what Seife actually delivers. The first hundred pages cover roughly what one might expect: graphical deception by use of misleading labels or scales, comparison of apples and oranges (e.g. dollar amounts unadjusted for inflation, absence of an appropriate control group, regression to the mean), cherry-picking of data, the tendency to interpret mere random variation as systematic, nonsensical conclusions obtained by extrapolating beyond the range of observed data, overstatement of the precision of measurements, the way in which humans are hard-wired to misinterpret risk and deal poorly with calculations involving risk. Seife's exposition of these topics is lively and clear (with the major caveat discussed below). About halfway through the chapter on risk, however, he makes a major detour. His discussion of the malfeasance of those involved in the Enron debacle, the Bernie Madoff pyramid scheme, the failures at AIG, Citigroup and other institutions, and the subsequent bailout efforts has almost nothing to do with statistical trickery, focusing instead on the public policy and regulatory issues raised by the financial meltdown.
The next chapter, "Poll Cats" does return to the issues involved in conducting accurate sample surveys and presenting the data appropriately, with a reasonably clear discussion of systematic error versus random error. However, the following two chapters, "Electile Dysfunction" and "An Unfair Vote", taking up some 80 pages, really have little to do with data-related issues. Instead they provide a review of events surrounding the Florida vote count in the 2000 presidential election, the six-month circus that took place before Al Franken was eventually declared winner in the 2008 Minnesota Senate race, and a review of historical and present-day gerrymandering efforts whenever congressional redistricting comes up for discussion. Not that Seifen's review of the relevant events, and the issues they raise, is not interesting - but it is largely editorial comment on political events and, as such, it seems to belong in a different book, as does the appendix in which he discusses electronic voting. In making this criticism, I take the view that fraud, malfeasance and corruption stemming from poor public policy, faulty regulatory mechanisms, or inadequate enforcement of existing protections, really are subjects for a different kind of book than that initially described by Seifen. Though the author does return to his initial remit in the final two chapters (discussing abuse of probability and statistical arguments within the judicial system, and for propaganda purposes), overall the book does not make a coherent whole.
Then there's the caveat mentioned above, regarding Seife's exposition methods, which turns out to be a serious one, enough to prevent me from giving this book my endorsement, despite its good intentions. It's the author's predilection for coining cutesy neologisms that not only add nothing to the discussion, but actually end up seriously muddying the exposition. It's evident right there in the book's faux-cute title, "Proofiness". I wish I could say that the author offers a rigorous definition of exactly what he means by this invented term, but he doesn't. It remains unhelpfully vague throughout the book. Sadly, it's not the only example of authorial neologism run amok. "Disestimation", "Potemkin numbers", "randumbness", "regression to the moon", and the horrendous coinage "causuistry"; each of these is a neologism that adds nothing to the discussion. Many of them lack a clear definition, or when a definition is offered, the term just seems to muddy the waters. For instance, Seife uses "disestimation" to mean "overstatement of the precision of a number or measurement", indicating an error based in randomness. But the 'dis'-prefix clearly suggests a systematic error, as does the parallelism with "misestimation", a term which statisticians routinely use to indicate a systematic error. And while one applauds the author's efforts to educate his readership about the error of mistaking correlation for causation, the term "causuistry" is simply an abomination. I'm not sure where this recent trend for authors to invent their own faux-cutesy terminology, where none is needed, originates (possibly Malcolm Gladwell bears some of the responsibility), but it needs to stop.
Though I am sympathetic to the author's stated aims, his execution was such that I cannot endorse this book. Anyone interested in this important topic would be far better served by reading The Numbers Game: The Commonsense Guide to Understanding Numbers in the News, in Politics, and inLife by Michael Blastland and Andrew Dilnot.Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception Overview

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Safire's Political Dictionary Review

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Safire's Political Dictionary ReviewYou will love this whopper of a book - all 896pp! William Safire belongs to the delightfully patrician generation of political insiders alongside the likes of radio columnist Alistair Cooke Alistair Cooke's America and Ted Sorenson, speechwriter and adviser to JFK. Safire, who has contributed his own fair share of speeches on the Republican side, (it was he who added alliterative relief to Spiro Agnew's barren verbal landscape through phrases such as "nattering nabobs of negativism") has a keen ear for political language and he rises above partisanship simply because he is fascinated by the provenance and meaning of political language. As he points out, a political dictionary is fascinating because the language has been chosen to either inspire or inflame - it is rich, sometimes explosive emotive fuel.
- This very complete dictionary, fully updated, provides a rich journey and explains where so many of our commonly used and extremely colorful phrases really come from.
- It is comprehensive: reaching back to historic phrases, that go back beyond the original era of pork-barrel politics, and coming right up to the present to include the words of McCain, Clinton and Obama.
- It highlights the hidden agendas behind the language we hear: the phrases designed to make headlines, the sayings that are used to bring a folksiness to our sometimes aloof politicians.
- The dictionary does this with real panache. Safire is part wit, part journalist and part investigator - and he makes great company for the reader. It is a treat to dip into.
And yes, it is election year, so a tour of duty through Safire's fascinating lexical battleground will leave you ready for the speeches to come: your BS detectors set on full alert, your sense of irony and history sharpened. What an excellent book.
Perfect for students of political studies. Ideal for journalists. Essential for voters of all stripes. Democracy may be messy sometimes, but as this book shows - the language of politics is always darned colorful.Safire's Political Dictionary Overview

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