Uncommon Denominator
Uncommon Denominator
The Newsletter of the Commonweal Institute
www.commonwealinstitute.org
"It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know the sense of wonder and humility."-- Rachel Carson
CONTENTS
Talking Points: The cross in the jungle
Wit and Wisdom: On indecency
Around the Corner: On the precautionary principle
Quoted! John C. Yoo on American values
Featured Article: "Revenge of the Right Brain"
Happenings: Monthly round-up
Endorsements: Steve Westly
Get Involved: Spread the word; become a contributor
TALKING POINTS
It's a curious feature of American political culture that today, in 2005, we are witnessing both a determined assault on the country's long-standing entitlement and assistance programs and, simultaneously, a newly energetic Christian politics on the Right. Curious, because to many on the Left, it's hard to see which "moral values" are served by making it easier for people to get left behind or to fall between the cracks. While it might seem that these political trends represent separate strains of conservatism -- the libertarian and the religious -- there is actually a profound connection between the two. Understanding that connection may suggest strategies for how the Left can reclaim the initiative. The elemental divide between the governing philosophies of conservatives and progressives involves the role of self-interest in society. Those on the left typically advocate a sharper abridgement of what we might call the "natural liberty" of human beings to pursue their own self-interest by accumulating ever more resources and power. That abridgement, most visible in the form of progressive taxation and regulation, means to create a more level social playing field and to diminish the abuses inherent in a free market system. Metaphorically, it is meant to raise us out of the anarchic jungle, where the natural liberty of the strongest lion to eat the entire antelope is unchallenged by law or morality. Progressives want the antelope to be shared, and in order to do so, appeal to the "right" of the majority to band together and take some of it away from the strong lion. This orientation toward greater equality is, in a nutshell, the essential moral vision of modern progressivism. Conservatives, meanwhile, have much less of a problem with self-interest. Indeed, they argue that the unfettered pursuit of individual self-interest will, in the aggregate, advance the general public good. In this view, the free market, low taxes, and minimal regulation will enable a growing economy to lift all boats. That, at least, is the idealistic version. There's also a strain of conservatism that isn't particularly concerned with the public good, and that sees self-interest as simply an inevitable or even desirable fact of human nature that should not be hindered. In both cases, the conservative philosophy is closer in spirit to the jungle. Let's acknowledge that the conservative suspicion of government can be a good thing -- insofar as it aligns itself against such power-grabbing ideological tyrannies as Soviet communism -- but we should also be clear that conservatives are not suspicious of power per se. In fact, they seem to have a great fondness for power (particularly in their engines and their armies). The Cold War aside, on a day to day basis the conservative suspicion of governmental power seems oriented most toward programs designed to create a more equitable society. There's an apparent paradox in all this. What we find is that the same conservatives who, by and large, oppose the teaching of evolution on religious grounds are also those most committed to a social Darwinist vision of human life. That is, the doctrine of "survival of the fittest" seems to deeply inform conservative philosophy at the same time that the evolutionary idea itself is dismissed as un-Christian. How is it possible to live comfortably with the sink-or-swim, red-in-tooth-and-claw, free-market jungle (despite the rhetoric of "compassion"), while rejecting natural selection as a scientific principle? What makes that possible is the cross in the jungle, a figure for the Christianizing of nature. In other words, the conservative nonchalance regarding economic competition and self-interest depends on a faith in a superintendent God who upholds a moral order rather than allowing moral anarchy to reign. The cross in the jungle is an image of nature redeemed by culture, or of nature serving culture. Rather than relying on coordinated social action (i.e., government) to solve problems, conservatives have faith that individuals operating according to the law of the jungle will somehow forward the will of God. Regarded in this light, humankind in a state of nature is not threatening to conservatives, because the very processes and phenomena of nature are informed and guided by a transcendent, divine morality. So perhaps the seeming paradox between social darwinism as policy and anti-evolutionism as creed is not really a paradox after all. We might say that the dominant conservative philosophy today is like an application of the principle of "intelligent design" to human society. Intelligent design (a recent form of creationism that aspires to scientific respectability) acknowledges that species change over time, but maintains that this change is guided and given purpose by a higher being. In that sense, it goes back to pre-Darwinist evolutionary theory, or "developmentalism." Translated into social policy, this implies that the inequalities and abuses in an economic system are incidental to the larger good that the system produces, that the grinding under of some individuals does not negatively redound to the moral order itself. What we're seeing in modern conservatism, in short, is like social darwinism softened and sanctioned by religious faith. The problem, however, is that history tells a different story. By seeking to undo the New Deal, to fundamentally change the nature of American governance, conservatives would return us to something like the Gilded Age of the 1880s and 1890s -- the age of the robber barons, of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, of grotesque disparities in wealth and power, and of social darwinist theory at its very worst. The history of unfettered capitalism in the United States, when social safety nets did not exist, teaches that the conservative vision simply does not hold water, that the common good is not always found in the jungle. The whole system of entitlement assistance programs that developed during the twentieth century was based on a conviction that people need to take responsibility for one another, and that an enlightened government represented the people coming together to do that. Of course there are problems in the system. But compared to the abuses and excesses that came before, the system is profoundly humane. By planting the cross in the jungle, conservatives have seized the initiative on both religion and economics, but progressives have no less a claim to the moral high ground. Evolution and natural selection are facts -- but that doesn't mean we need to apply them to human society while hoping that Providence will sort everything out for the best. Rather, it falls to people to pull themselves, and each other, out of the jungle of self-interest.
WIT AND WISDOM
"Congress may pass a law that would result in TV networks that broadcast indecency being even stiffly penalized. In fact, it is going to cost us 500 more bucks because I said stiffly penalized." -- Craig Ferguson
AROUND THE CORNER
Where medical knowledge goes, perhaps environmental policy should follow. Over the past half century, as we know, modern medicine has increasingly emphasized a proactive, preventive approach to bodily affliction. Better to cut cholesterol, the thinking goes, than to call the heart surgeon. The same thinking underlies a recent concept in ecology called the "precautionary principle," which aims at identifying environmental risks and implementing policies that will head off environmental damage before it occurs. In the 1980s, the precautionary principle began appearing in policy statements and mechanisms in Europe and Canada, and it has been written into international treaties such as the North Atlantic Treaty, the Maastricht Treaty on the European Union, and the 1992 Rio Declaration from the UN Conference on Environment and Development (Agenda 21), to which the United States is a signatory. In 1998, at the Wingspread Conference on the precautionary principle, an international gathering of scientists, government officials, lawyers, labor representatives, and environmental activists formulated some of the principle's key components:
* When an activity or policy potentially threatens human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken, even if certain cause-and-effect relationships are not fully established scientifically.
* The burden of proof regarding environmental damage falls not on the public but on the specific proponents and actors behind a given activity or policy.
* Application of the precautionary principle must be open, informed, and democratic, and must include potentially affected parties. It must also involve an examination of the full range of alternatives, including no action.
Simply put, the precautionary principle embodies a philosophy of "better safe than sorry" in matters of commerce, industry, environmental law, and public health. So how can the precautionary principle be put into practice? One approach is an open, public review process for evaluating new products and technologies before they are manufactured and marketed -- similar to the current system of vetting new pharmaceutical medicines. In addition to protecting public health, this review process promotes transparency in decision-making and greater accountability in the private sector. Another precautionary approach is to require insurance bonds from private entities whose proposals have the potential for causing environmental damage. This would provide a means of offsetting or covering the monetary costs of clean-up or repair. (Compare this to the Superfund approach, where taxpayers, not polluters, are footing the bill for a variety of environmental disaster sites, while the perpetrators walk away with money in their pockets). In each case, the fundamental idea is to create powerful incentives for private actors to anticipate and avert the environmental harm that their products or activities might cause down the road, rather than making a mess and then trying to duck responsibility. These incentives are carrots as well as sticks; they are based not just on regulation but on the market. Certainly some new products might be more expensive to bring to market, at least in the short term. But there are long-term savings overall to the business community when no harm is done to the environment or to the public health -- savings in terms of litigation, public reputation, and mandated environmental restoration. Indeed, new, cleaner technologies have become increasingly important and popular exports for countries that have begun incorporating the precautionary principle into their economies. In the United States, even companies without great environmental track records are discovering the economic advantages of sustainability -- including Texaco, Dow, and Hewlett-Packard. The rapidly emerging field of biomimicry -- taking lessons from nature as a basis for innovation -- promises to be a rich source of technological concepts that will be more friendly to living systems. There's still a long way to go, and the precautionary principle per se is not always the motivating factor for cleaner, greener business practices, but the signs are encouraging. (For news on this front, check out a company called Clean Edge, whose mission is "to help companies and investors understand and profit from the clean-tech revolution and to catalyze the development of clean-tech companies and markets.") For more information on the precautionary principle, take a look at: the Science and Environmental Health Network (SEHN), AG Biotech Infonet, and the Environmental Research Foundation. A particularly useful document is SEHN's Precautionary Principle Handbook, a practical implementation guide for communities and environmental groups. Some critics of the precautionary principle fear that it will cut into corporate profits. Others, operating at a somewhat higher level, argue that it will stifle the spirit of innovation that has yielded products beneficial to the well-being of humankind. That does not have to be the case, however, if the precautionary principle is implemented in a sensible and forethoughtful way. And after all, those critics who are concerned about entangling red tape are engaged, even if they don't realize it, in the very dynamic that the precautionary principle advocates: one of vigorous, multi-sided debate about the potential future consequences of a particular course of action. That's the whole idea, and the stakes are too high, for ourselves and for future generations, not to take it seriously. The public campaign against cholesterol hasn't ruined the dairy industry (although hopefully it will decrease the demand for heart surgeons), and a preventive approach to environmental problems won't destroy the economy -- indeed, it will strengthen it over the long run. Besides, no one has yet figured out how to do a bypass operation on the environment.
-- Karen Watters Cole
QUOTED!
Congress cannot "tie the President's hands in regard to torture as an interrogation technique. It's the core of the Commander-in-Chief function. They can't prevent the President from ordering torture." -- John C. Yoo, formerly deputy assistant attorney general, and now a law professor at Berkeley, as quoted in The New Yorker
FEATURED ARTICLE
The following is an excerpt from "Revenge of the Right Brain," by Daniel H. Pink, which appeared in the February 2005 issue of Wired magazine:
"Scientists have long known that a neurological Mason-Dixon line cleaves our brains into two regions -- the left and right hemispheres. But in the last 10 years, thanks in part to advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers have begun to identify more precisely how the two sides divide responsibilities. The left hemisphere handles sequence, literalness, and analysis. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, takes care of context, emotional expression, and synthesis. Of course, the human brain, with its 100 billion cells forging 1 quadrillion connections, is breathtakingly complex. The two hemispheres work in concert, and we enlist both sides for nearly everything we do. But the structure of our brains can help explain the contours of our times. "Until recently, the abilities that led to success in school, work, and business were characteristic of the left hemisphere. They were the sorts of linear, logical, analytical talents measured by SATs and deployed by CPAs. Today, those capabilities are still necessary. But they're no longer sufficient. In a world upended by outsourcing, deluged with data, and choked with choices, the abilities that matter most are now closer in spirit to the specialties of the right hemisphere -- artistry, empathy, seeing the big picture, and pursuing the transcendent."Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we've often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind." Click here to read the whole article.
HAPPENINGS
New Advisory Board Member -- The Commonweal Institute is proud to welcome Bruce Codding to its Advisory Board. Mr. Codding is President and CEO of Librx, a management consulting firm that focuses on improving clients' decision-making in three strategic areas: future direction, marketing, and hiring key personnel. To reach effective long-term solutions and develop change strategies, he approaches problems from multiple perspectives, considering both present and future stakeholders and the potential ramifications of change. Mr. Codding has extensive experience in several disciplines-business, consulting, insurance, risk management, government, and nonprofits. As a consultant for nearly 20 years, he has worked with corporate clients in the financial services, food processing, healthcare, manufacturing, transportation, and utilities sectors; and with state and local governments. Prior to consulting, Mr. Codding was, for five years, the Director of Risk Management for Varian, a multinational electronics manufacturer based in Palo Alto, California. He also served four years as the Risk Manager for the city of Fresno, California. Progressive Infrastructure -- A condensed version of the Commonweal Institute paper, "Creating Progressive Infrastructure Now: An Action Plan for Reclaiming America's Heart and Soul," was published in February, 2005, issue of The New Democrat, the newsletter of the Peninsula Democratic Coalition. Also, a new Progressive Infrastructure Information Page has been added to CI's website. If you wish to suggest other articles that might be listed there, please send the links to David Johnson at djohnson@commonwealinstitute.org. Voting Reform -- Dennis Paull, a member of the Commonweal Institute's Advisory Board and Chair of its Election Systems Reform Committee, has accepted an invitation to be a founding member of the new Voting Systems Performance Rating (VSPR) group. He has also agreed to chair VSPR's "Definitions Working Group," which will develop a variety of ways to measure system performance and create standards so that elections officials and others can objectively compare the products of various voting equipment vendors. The VSPR for the first time brings together advocates, social scientists, elections officials, computer and security experts, and voting systems vendors in a joint effort to improve our elections systems. Please visit www.vspr.org for more information.
ENDORSEMENTS
"As a candidate for political office, I saw the pressing need for a large-scale think tank that can gain public and media support for progressive and centrist positions, and that will serve as a valuable resource for candidates and office-holders who take such positions. The Commonweal Institute will help office-holders put their progressive and centrist principles into action." -- Steve Westly, California State Comptroller
GET INVOLVED
If you agree with Steve Westly (see above), there are a number of ways you can help the Commonweal Institute achieve its goals.Right now, as you read, you can simply forward the Uncommon Denominator to friends and family who might be interested in learning about the Commonweal Institute. Getting the word out is crucial.
You can also join our network of donors building the Commonweal Institute. Your tax-deductible contribution is vital to making the Commonweal Institute an effective organization. $100 would help so much! Even a contribution of $10 or $20 will make a difference because there are so many moderates and progressives. Click here to contribute online. Or call 650-854-9796. Your support is essential.
© 2005 The Commonweal Institute
To subscribe to this free e-newsletter, send a blank message to:
ci-newsletter-subscribe@svpal.org.
-- or --
To subscribe from an email address other than your regular one, go to mailman.svpal.org/mailman/listinfo/ci-newsletter, and then enter your name and email address and click on "Subscribe."
Privacy Policy: The Commonweal Institute does not share subscriber information with any other organization or with individuals.
The Newsletter of the Commonweal Institute
www.commonwealinstitute.org
"It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know the sense of wonder and humility."-- Rachel Carson
CONTENTS
Talking Points: The cross in the jungle
Wit and Wisdom: On indecency
Around the Corner: On the precautionary principle
Quoted! John C. Yoo on American values
Featured Article: "Revenge of the Right Brain"
Happenings: Monthly round-up
Endorsements: Steve Westly
Get Involved: Spread the word; become a contributor
TALKING POINTS
It's a curious feature of American political culture that today, in 2005, we are witnessing both a determined assault on the country's long-standing entitlement and assistance programs and, simultaneously, a newly energetic Christian politics on the Right. Curious, because to many on the Left, it's hard to see which "moral values" are served by making it easier for people to get left behind or to fall between the cracks. While it might seem that these political trends represent separate strains of conservatism -- the libertarian and the religious -- there is actually a profound connection between the two. Understanding that connection may suggest strategies for how the Left can reclaim the initiative. The elemental divide between the governing philosophies of conservatives and progressives involves the role of self-interest in society. Those on the left typically advocate a sharper abridgement of what we might call the "natural liberty" of human beings to pursue their own self-interest by accumulating ever more resources and power. That abridgement, most visible in the form of progressive taxation and regulation, means to create a more level social playing field and to diminish the abuses inherent in a free market system. Metaphorically, it is meant to raise us out of the anarchic jungle, where the natural liberty of the strongest lion to eat the entire antelope is unchallenged by law or morality. Progressives want the antelope to be shared, and in order to do so, appeal to the "right" of the majority to band together and take some of it away from the strong lion. This orientation toward greater equality is, in a nutshell, the essential moral vision of modern progressivism. Conservatives, meanwhile, have much less of a problem with self-interest. Indeed, they argue that the unfettered pursuit of individual self-interest will, in the aggregate, advance the general public good. In this view, the free market, low taxes, and minimal regulation will enable a growing economy to lift all boats. That, at least, is the idealistic version. There's also a strain of conservatism that isn't particularly concerned with the public good, and that sees self-interest as simply an inevitable or even desirable fact of human nature that should not be hindered. In both cases, the conservative philosophy is closer in spirit to the jungle. Let's acknowledge that the conservative suspicion of government can be a good thing -- insofar as it aligns itself against such power-grabbing ideological tyrannies as Soviet communism -- but we should also be clear that conservatives are not suspicious of power per se. In fact, they seem to have a great fondness for power (particularly in their engines and their armies). The Cold War aside, on a day to day basis the conservative suspicion of governmental power seems oriented most toward programs designed to create a more equitable society. There's an apparent paradox in all this. What we find is that the same conservatives who, by and large, oppose the teaching of evolution on religious grounds are also those most committed to a social Darwinist vision of human life. That is, the doctrine of "survival of the fittest" seems to deeply inform conservative philosophy at the same time that the evolutionary idea itself is dismissed as un-Christian. How is it possible to live comfortably with the sink-or-swim, red-in-tooth-and-claw, free-market jungle (despite the rhetoric of "compassion"), while rejecting natural selection as a scientific principle? What makes that possible is the cross in the jungle, a figure for the Christianizing of nature. In other words, the conservative nonchalance regarding economic competition and self-interest depends on a faith in a superintendent God who upholds a moral order rather than allowing moral anarchy to reign. The cross in the jungle is an image of nature redeemed by culture, or of nature serving culture. Rather than relying on coordinated social action (i.e., government) to solve problems, conservatives have faith that individuals operating according to the law of the jungle will somehow forward the will of God. Regarded in this light, humankind in a state of nature is not threatening to conservatives, because the very processes and phenomena of nature are informed and guided by a transcendent, divine morality. So perhaps the seeming paradox between social darwinism as policy and anti-evolutionism as creed is not really a paradox after all. We might say that the dominant conservative philosophy today is like an application of the principle of "intelligent design" to human society. Intelligent design (a recent form of creationism that aspires to scientific respectability) acknowledges that species change over time, but maintains that this change is guided and given purpose by a higher being. In that sense, it goes back to pre-Darwinist evolutionary theory, or "developmentalism." Translated into social policy, this implies that the inequalities and abuses in an economic system are incidental to the larger good that the system produces, that the grinding under of some individuals does not negatively redound to the moral order itself. What we're seeing in modern conservatism, in short, is like social darwinism softened and sanctioned by religious faith. The problem, however, is that history tells a different story. By seeking to undo the New Deal, to fundamentally change the nature of American governance, conservatives would return us to something like the Gilded Age of the 1880s and 1890s -- the age of the robber barons, of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, of grotesque disparities in wealth and power, and of social darwinist theory at its very worst. The history of unfettered capitalism in the United States, when social safety nets did not exist, teaches that the conservative vision simply does not hold water, that the common good is not always found in the jungle. The whole system of entitlement assistance programs that developed during the twentieth century was based on a conviction that people need to take responsibility for one another, and that an enlightened government represented the people coming together to do that. Of course there are problems in the system. But compared to the abuses and excesses that came before, the system is profoundly humane. By planting the cross in the jungle, conservatives have seized the initiative on both religion and economics, but progressives have no less a claim to the moral high ground. Evolution and natural selection are facts -- but that doesn't mean we need to apply them to human society while hoping that Providence will sort everything out for the best. Rather, it falls to people to pull themselves, and each other, out of the jungle of self-interest.
WIT AND WISDOM
"Congress may pass a law that would result in TV networks that broadcast indecency being even stiffly penalized. In fact, it is going to cost us 500 more bucks because I said stiffly penalized." -- Craig Ferguson
AROUND THE CORNER
Where medical knowledge goes, perhaps environmental policy should follow. Over the past half century, as we know, modern medicine has increasingly emphasized a proactive, preventive approach to bodily affliction. Better to cut cholesterol, the thinking goes, than to call the heart surgeon. The same thinking underlies a recent concept in ecology called the "precautionary principle," which aims at identifying environmental risks and implementing policies that will head off environmental damage before it occurs. In the 1980s, the precautionary principle began appearing in policy statements and mechanisms in Europe and Canada, and it has been written into international treaties such as the North Atlantic Treaty, the Maastricht Treaty on the European Union, and the 1992 Rio Declaration from the UN Conference on Environment and Development (Agenda 21), to which the United States is a signatory. In 1998, at the Wingspread Conference on the precautionary principle, an international gathering of scientists, government officials, lawyers, labor representatives, and environmental activists formulated some of the principle's key components:
* When an activity or policy potentially threatens human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken, even if certain cause-and-effect relationships are not fully established scientifically.
* The burden of proof regarding environmental damage falls not on the public but on the specific proponents and actors behind a given activity or policy.
* Application of the precautionary principle must be open, informed, and democratic, and must include potentially affected parties. It must also involve an examination of the full range of alternatives, including no action.
Simply put, the precautionary principle embodies a philosophy of "better safe than sorry" in matters of commerce, industry, environmental law, and public health. So how can the precautionary principle be put into practice? One approach is an open, public review process for evaluating new products and technologies before they are manufactured and marketed -- similar to the current system of vetting new pharmaceutical medicines. In addition to protecting public health, this review process promotes transparency in decision-making and greater accountability in the private sector. Another precautionary approach is to require insurance bonds from private entities whose proposals have the potential for causing environmental damage. This would provide a means of offsetting or covering the monetary costs of clean-up or repair. (Compare this to the Superfund approach, where taxpayers, not polluters, are footing the bill for a variety of environmental disaster sites, while the perpetrators walk away with money in their pockets). In each case, the fundamental idea is to create powerful incentives for private actors to anticipate and avert the environmental harm that their products or activities might cause down the road, rather than making a mess and then trying to duck responsibility. These incentives are carrots as well as sticks; they are based not just on regulation but on the market. Certainly some new products might be more expensive to bring to market, at least in the short term. But there are long-term savings overall to the business community when no harm is done to the environment or to the public health -- savings in terms of litigation, public reputation, and mandated environmental restoration. Indeed, new, cleaner technologies have become increasingly important and popular exports for countries that have begun incorporating the precautionary principle into their economies. In the United States, even companies without great environmental track records are discovering the economic advantages of sustainability -- including Texaco, Dow, and Hewlett-Packard. The rapidly emerging field of biomimicry -- taking lessons from nature as a basis for innovation -- promises to be a rich source of technological concepts that will be more friendly to living systems. There's still a long way to go, and the precautionary principle per se is not always the motivating factor for cleaner, greener business practices, but the signs are encouraging. (For news on this front, check out a company called Clean Edge, whose mission is "to help companies and investors understand and profit from the clean-tech revolution and to catalyze the development of clean-tech companies and markets.") For more information on the precautionary principle, take a look at: the Science and Environmental Health Network (SEHN), AG Biotech Infonet, and the Environmental Research Foundation. A particularly useful document is SEHN's Precautionary Principle Handbook, a practical implementation guide for communities and environmental groups. Some critics of the precautionary principle fear that it will cut into corporate profits. Others, operating at a somewhat higher level, argue that it will stifle the spirit of innovation that has yielded products beneficial to the well-being of humankind. That does not have to be the case, however, if the precautionary principle is implemented in a sensible and forethoughtful way. And after all, those critics who are concerned about entangling red tape are engaged, even if they don't realize it, in the very dynamic that the precautionary principle advocates: one of vigorous, multi-sided debate about the potential future consequences of a particular course of action. That's the whole idea, and the stakes are too high, for ourselves and for future generations, not to take it seriously. The public campaign against cholesterol hasn't ruined the dairy industry (although hopefully it will decrease the demand for heart surgeons), and a preventive approach to environmental problems won't destroy the economy -- indeed, it will strengthen it over the long run. Besides, no one has yet figured out how to do a bypass operation on the environment.
-- Karen Watters Cole
QUOTED!
Congress cannot "tie the President's hands in regard to torture as an interrogation technique. It's the core of the Commander-in-Chief function. They can't prevent the President from ordering torture." -- John C. Yoo, formerly deputy assistant attorney general, and now a law professor at Berkeley, as quoted in The New Yorker
FEATURED ARTICLE
The following is an excerpt from "Revenge of the Right Brain," by Daniel H. Pink, which appeared in the February 2005 issue of Wired magazine:
"Scientists have long known that a neurological Mason-Dixon line cleaves our brains into two regions -- the left and right hemispheres. But in the last 10 years, thanks in part to advances in functional magnetic resonance imaging, researchers have begun to identify more precisely how the two sides divide responsibilities. The left hemisphere handles sequence, literalness, and analysis. The right hemisphere, meanwhile, takes care of context, emotional expression, and synthesis. Of course, the human brain, with its 100 billion cells forging 1 quadrillion connections, is breathtakingly complex. The two hemispheres work in concert, and we enlist both sides for nearly everything we do. But the structure of our brains can help explain the contours of our times. "Until recently, the abilities that led to success in school, work, and business were characteristic of the left hemisphere. They were the sorts of linear, logical, analytical talents measured by SATs and deployed by CPAs. Today, those capabilities are still necessary. But they're no longer sufficient. In a world upended by outsourcing, deluged with data, and choked with choices, the abilities that matter most are now closer in spirit to the specialties of the right hemisphere -- artistry, empathy, seeing the big picture, and pursuing the transcendent."Beneath the nervous clatter of our half-completed decade stirs a slow but seismic shift. The Information Age we all prepared for is ending. Rising in its place is what I call the Conceptual Age, an era in which mastery of abilities that we've often overlooked and undervalued marks the fault line between who gets ahead and who falls behind." Click here to read the whole article.
HAPPENINGS
New Advisory Board Member -- The Commonweal Institute is proud to welcome Bruce Codding to its Advisory Board. Mr. Codding is President and CEO of Librx, a management consulting firm that focuses on improving clients' decision-making in three strategic areas: future direction, marketing, and hiring key personnel. To reach effective long-term solutions and develop change strategies, he approaches problems from multiple perspectives, considering both present and future stakeholders and the potential ramifications of change. Mr. Codding has extensive experience in several disciplines-business, consulting, insurance, risk management, government, and nonprofits. As a consultant for nearly 20 years, he has worked with corporate clients in the financial services, food processing, healthcare, manufacturing, transportation, and utilities sectors; and with state and local governments. Prior to consulting, Mr. Codding was, for five years, the Director of Risk Management for Varian, a multinational electronics manufacturer based in Palo Alto, California. He also served four years as the Risk Manager for the city of Fresno, California. Progressive Infrastructure -- A condensed version of the Commonweal Institute paper, "Creating Progressive Infrastructure Now: An Action Plan for Reclaiming America's Heart and Soul," was published in February, 2005, issue of The New Democrat, the newsletter of the Peninsula Democratic Coalition. Also, a new Progressive Infrastructure Information Page has been added to CI's website. If you wish to suggest other articles that might be listed there, please send the links to David Johnson at djohnson@commonwealinstitute.org. Voting Reform -- Dennis Paull, a member of the Commonweal Institute's Advisory Board and Chair of its Election Systems Reform Committee, has accepted an invitation to be a founding member of the new Voting Systems Performance Rating (VSPR) group. He has also agreed to chair VSPR's "Definitions Working Group," which will develop a variety of ways to measure system performance and create standards so that elections officials and others can objectively compare the products of various voting equipment vendors. The VSPR for the first time brings together advocates, social scientists, elections officials, computer and security experts, and voting systems vendors in a joint effort to improve our elections systems. Please visit www.vspr.org for more information.
ENDORSEMENTS
"As a candidate for political office, I saw the pressing need for a large-scale think tank that can gain public and media support for progressive and centrist positions, and that will serve as a valuable resource for candidates and office-holders who take such positions. The Commonweal Institute will help office-holders put their progressive and centrist principles into action." -- Steve Westly, California State Comptroller
GET INVOLVED
If you agree with Steve Westly (see above), there are a number of ways you can help the Commonweal Institute achieve its goals.Right now, as you read, you can simply forward the Uncommon Denominator to friends and family who might be interested in learning about the Commonweal Institute. Getting the word out is crucial.
You can also join our network of donors building the Commonweal Institute. Your tax-deductible contribution is vital to making the Commonweal Institute an effective organization. $100 would help so much! Even a contribution of $10 or $20 will make a difference because there are so many moderates and progressives. Click here to contribute online. Or call 650-854-9796. Your support is essential.
© 2005 The Commonweal Institute
To subscribe to this free e-newsletter, send a blank message to:
ci-newsletter-subscribe@svpal.org.
-- or --
To subscribe from an email address other than your regular one, go to mailman.svpal.org/mailman/listinfo/ci-newsletter, and then enter your name and email address and click on "Subscribe."
Privacy Policy: The Commonweal Institute does not share subscriber information with any other organization or with individuals.
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