People posed questions to Google, searching for wisdom, and instead found themselves here, looking at posts that were only tangentially related. Well, now I’m answering their questions. Too bad they left in disgust before they could read these responses, but you’re in luck.

is there ever a good reason for children to work

Why, yes, there is. My boys and I have just finished cleaning up Australia. (It took a while, but now it’s done for another year.) We spent a couple of hours picking up rubbish at a public park nearby with other volunteers. The boys got to do some public service, and they now have little patience with people who litter. I also learned that every volunteer thinks they’re going to find a body in the leaves, like at the beginning of a CSI episode.

But I think the question refers to child labor. Employers would love to get their hands on children because they’re cheap, compliant, and don’t unionise. Thank goodness progressives in the last century worked to pass laws to stop the exploitation of child workers. But you’d expect the current generation of conservative vipers to wish for a return to the Gilded Age, and argue for rollbacks. And so they do.

Meet Connor. He’s a constitutional conservative, a Mormon, and is currently in training to become a member of the next generation of apologists for unreconstructed small-government conservatism. He sharpens his rhetorical chops on his blog, where you’ll sometimes find me disrupting the social fabric. And the most jaw-dropping post so far has been this one where he argues that government has no business dictating the terms of child labour, and that it should be left up to financially desperate parents and their children. Can’t see any problems coming there!

This is why I say that movement conservatism is a pathology. Allowing employers to exploit children like in the old days would cause untold problems. And what problems would it solve? The problem of not enough conservatism? It’s madness. And since no one’s going to implement their program in totality, there’s no way to show them it’s madness. They’ll always claim that their program hasn’t been followed in an ideologically pure fashion.

Have a look at the post and prepare to shake your head in amazement. This is the logical conclusion of small-government libertarianism. They really are amoral cretins.

fatherly quotes

My father had a lot of quotes, mostly because he liked to say the same things over and over. As an educator, he called it ‘reinforcement’, but as a kid I called it ‘boring’. But at least I still remember a few things he said, so maybe he was onto something.

When, as a kid, I would get my shoelaces in a knot, Dad would untie them for me, and as he did, he’d say:

If a string is in a knot,
Patience will untie it.
Patience can do anything.
Have you ever tried it?

And now I say it to my boys, and the cycle continues. Cycle of what, I won’t say.

And my favourite:

When in danger,
When in doubt,
Run in circles.
Scream and shout.

I have followed this advice many times.

does milk cause mucus
do dairy products cause mucus
does dairy cause mucous
does dairy cause mucus
milk causing mucus

How many ways can we ask this question? Can we spell ‘mucus’ any differently? What if we include the various spellings of ‘yoghourte’?

But however you ask it, the answer is still: nope, milk does not cause mucus or mucous. Here’s a recent (2005) study entitled Milk Consumption Does Not Lead to Mucus Production or Occurrence of Asthma. From the abstract:

There is a belief among some members of the public that the consumption of milk and dairy products increases the production of mucus in the respiratory system. Therefore, some who believe in this effect renounce drinking milk. According to Australian studies, subjects perceived some parameters of mucus production to change after consumption of milk and soy-based beverages, but these effects were not specific to cows’ milk because the soy-based milk drink with similar sensory characteristics produced the same changes. In individuals inoculated with the common cold virus, milk intake was not associated with increased nasal secretions, symptoms of cough, nose symptoms or congestion. Nevertheless, individuals who believe in the mucus and milk theory report more respiratory symptoms after drinking milk.

So if you believe dairy causes mucus, and if you think you’ve just drunk some, you’ll report more mucus. Even if you haven’t had any.

40 and still in grad school

Hey, that’s a bit harsh. Go somewhere else if you’re going to be like that.