Posted by
Ender on Friday, July 18, 2008 9:11:43 AM
Short version for Liberals: The Jester speculates that, based on the current stances being shown on both sides, liberals are for increasing order, while conservatives are for increasing chaos. Thank you. You may now return to your previously scheduled tasks.
Long version for Conservatives:
I've been thinking about this for a while, but it was Ken Blackwell's recent column on the Fairness Doctrine that actually gave me the impetus to put this down. I'm simply trying to offer my own viewpoint, to explain, not really to inform - I suspect most of those likely to read this already would tend to agree with me, in essence if not in the exact structure of my thoughts.
James Clerk Maxwell was a renowned Scottish physicist. One of the things he is noted for was a thought experiment known as Maxwell's Demon (MD), basically a question about an attempt to break the second law of thermodynamics - effectively, reversing entropy and bringing order out of chaos.
The basis of the MD was a creature capable of opening and shutting a door between two compartments, both filled with air, at such speeds that individual molecules could be allowed passage, or blocked. If the MD opened the door properly, allowing faster (hotter) molecules travel only one way, and slower (colder) ones only the other way, eventually the temperatures in the two boxes (originally the same) would differ - giving rise to what appears to be energy from nothing.
If the above process sounds familiar to any of you who didn't take physics or chemistry in high school or college, it's probably because it's roughly the same procedure the media, and their allies in 'official' political positions, are using - simply replace the words hotter and colder with conservative and liberal, and temperature with information. I presume you've already made the connection to the Fairness Doctrine.
This definately results in an ordered informational environment. There's none of that pesky 'alternate viewpoint' procedure to deal with inside the liberal box. The problems come in when the liberal political-media system attempts to extract the informational equivalent to useful work.
In the 'Maxwell box'* example, the energy shift which drives useful work can only be obtained by allowing the hot side to act as a power source for something else. The cold side would, presumably, act to take away waste heat, permitting the process to continue. This process, however, increases entropy in the box and the outside environment - it heads toward a more chaotic, less orderly total state.
The metaphor kind of breaks down here, I'll admit. It's not perfect. But I think I can get the gist of my point across. What if the hot side (and only the hot side) were never allowed to come into contact with anything? What if, as seems to happen in the 'general' media (as opposed to reasonably accessible fora such as this one), only the cold (liberal, remember?) side came into contact with anything in the outside world?
The outside world would still gradually heat up the cold box. The media's MD would continue to parse out anything too warm(conservative) for the cold box. But the environment, losing its heat to the cold side of the box, would gradually become cooler and cooler - in our analogy, more and more liberal.
I stated earlier for our distinguished (just ask them!) liberal elites that they were in favor of order, we (conservatives) in favor of chaos. By this definition, and concerning information, it's true. They're in favor of a world where everything is neat, orderly, and utterly incapable of overturning their viewpoints. (Example: See AGW consensus arguments.) We're in favor of a world where all sides are allowed into action, there to be measured and weighed in the balance. Some will fall by the wayside, others will thrive. (I know I'm not telling the conservatives reading this anything new, but I'm kind of hoping some of the local libs ignored my earlier advice to them.) After all, order - especially among a substance as naturally entropic as the human community - tends to be a bit brittle.
I said earlier I'm not really expecting to inform anyone with this, as most who'll bother to read past the first lines will already likely agree with me. Still, it might be a useful way to think about the issue - and provide a bit of thought- and/or debate-fodder for the next time a liberal accuses my conservative readers of being 'opposed to science'.
*I'm sure there's an official name for these boxes, but I cannot recall it offhand. 'Maxwell box' is simply my own way of thinking about them.