‘Facts, facts, facts,’ cries the scientist if he wants to emphasize the necessity of a firm foundation for science. What is a fact? A fact is a thought that is true. But the scientist will surely not recognize something which depends on men’s varying states of mind to be the firm foundation of science.
Gottlob Frege, “The thought: A logical inquiry,” in Peter Ludlow’s Readings in the Philosophy of Language (1997), p. 27.
On Jan. 30, 1948, Indian leader Mohandas K. Gandhi, known for his non-violent, non-cooperation struggle for freedom and national independence, was assassinated by a Hindu extremist.
On Jan. 30, 1956, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s home was bombed in retaliation for his work on the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
On Jan. 30, 1972, British soldiers killed fourteen unarmed civil rights marchers in Northern Ireland in what came to be known as “Bloody Sunday.” Soldiers shot 26 unarmed protesters and bystanders – 13 males, seven of whom were teenagers, died immediately, while another man died of his injuries nearly five months later. In the immediate aftermath, an investigation by the British Government largely cleared the soldiers and British authorities of blame. A second investigation begun in 1998, released a report in 2010 declaring that all of those shot were unarmed, and that the killings were both “unjustified and unjustifiable.”
Not quite fitting today’s “non-violence elicits violence” theme, on January 30, 1835, Richard Lawrence attempted to shoot former military leader and then-President Andrew Jackson, but failed. He was subdued by a crowd, including several congressmen. That marked the first attempt on the life of a sitting U.S. president.
Beginning with Greek philosophers and ending with abandoned cars in the forest:
In the animal kingdom, the rule is, eat or be eaten; in the human kingdom, define or be defined.
Thomas Szasz, in The Second Sin (1973), p. 20.
On January 29, 1761, Albert Gallatin was born. Gallatin served as the fourth United States Secretary of the Treasury — a post in which he served longer than any other in American history — advanced the anthropological and linguistic study of native Americans, and became the subject of a biography by Henry Adams. Called the “father of American ethnology,” he has been honored with a 1967 U.S. stamp as well as many place names, including the Gallatin National Forest in Montana.
Jacinda the Wicked Witch of New Zealand, is on the outs. Ousted. Disappeared. But not by magic.
Paul Jacob explains:
A wise man’s country is the world.
According to Diogenes Laërtius, The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book I: “The Seven Sages.”
On January 28, 1912, Belgian economist Gustave de Molinari died. Molinari was one of the last major economists of the French Liberal School, heir to Frederic Bastiat, and a prominent advocate of free trade. His last book, The Society of To-morrow (the only one of his many books to be translated into English in his day) envisioned a future of extremely limited government, and argued against the growing tide of socialism and war that was becoming all too apparent as the future of Europe.
Sadly, the old liberal order of Europe ended with the beginning of the Great War, exactly two and one half years after Molinari’s demise.
On Jan. 28, 1981, President Ronald Reagan lifted the federal government’s remaining domestic petroleum price and allocation controls in the United States, helping to end the 1970s energy crisis and begin the 1980s’ oil glut.
The deregulatory move had been begun by Democrats in Congress, particularly Sen. Ted Kennedy, but had been placed on a gradual schedule, and the whole effort clouded with talk of “windfall profits” and a tax on those allegedly unfair returns on investment.
“Deserted cars may be driving a type of racism,” The Washington Post headlined its take.*
The paper introduces readers to Nathan Harrington, executive director of the Ward 8 Woods Conservancy, who has discovered four decaying automobiles in those woods.
No one knows how the cars got there.
All that is known is that their presence is, well, racist.
Blacks make up 87 percent of Ward 8’s population, one of the most heavily black areas of the city. “Advocates,” explains The Post, “call this neglect of Black neighborhoods ‘environmental racism.’”
An assistant professor of sociology and environmental studies at Boston College is offered to explain that, as The Post paraphrases, “environmental racism is linked to ‘racial capitalism’ — the idea that the economic value of a person is based on their race.”
And to think I was worrying that those rusting vehicles might be leaching dangerous elements into our environment!
“It’s deliberate inaction on the part of the agencies that control that land,” complains Harrington. Believable enough, on the surface, but we are presented with no specifics as to who has refused to help.
Nor are we provided any evidence that this failure of the DC government, if it even is one, can legitimately be ascribed to racial bias.
The District of Columbia’s mayor happens to be black, as are eight of 13 city council members.
When four rusted-out cars in the woods become front-page fodder to focus on systemic racism, it seems things are looking up.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* This punny headline adorned the dead-tree edition. Online, the article’s headline is: “‘Environmental racism’ and the mysterious cars rusting in D.C. woods.”
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The universe is an intelligence test.
Timothy Leary, as quoted in Cosmic Trigger I: The Final Secret of the Illuminati (1977) by Robert Anton Wilson, p. 170.