(If Mike goes long enough without giving me positive examples of good leftfielder posts, eventually my posts devolve into things like this…)

I don’t know the mechanism for doing this sort of spying - maybe you need cooperation from the cell service provider for this to be possible. But it also seems possible that some clever electrical engineering students at my university are secretly listening in at faculty meetings…

I’ve been helping my parents determine when to start receiving benefits, and the more I look at the system, the more broken it seems. No wonder it’s heading towards bankruptcy…

A half hour goes by with no incident, but then two teenage girls come into the restaurant. Maybe the dog didn’t like their perfume or clothing - I’m not sure what happened. But suddenly the dog jumps up, starts barking, growling and bearing its teeth at the two (very frightened) teenagers. The owner of the dog is telling it to hush, but the dog isn’t listening, straining at its leash in what appears to be an attempt to attack the girls. The hostess is forced to put the girls at a back corner table well away from the dog before it quiets down.

So, here is my question. Does anybody know what rules/laws govern service animals? Obviously you can’t refuse service to somebody because they are handicapped. But can you refuse to allow their animal in the restaurant, which amounts to the same thing? And what if that animal acts up, or harasses other customers. Are you allowed to kick the animal out (which forces the handicapped person to leave too, so is tantamount to kicking out the disabled fellow)?

I’ve been pondering what the right way to handle this is. On one hand, I don’t like the idea of discrimination against the disabled. On the other, this incident could be really bad for business - I’ll bet those girls won’t head back to that restaurant again after the scare that they had. And what if the dog were to defecate or otherwise threaten the sanitation of the restaurant. I’m trying to think of a way that the rights of the disabled and the rights of other clientele and the proprietor can coexist. So far I’ve come up blank, but I’d be interested in hearing what y’all have to say.

I want to use this as a chance to reflect upon love, and on being single. The thing is, for many people, love just isn’t in the cards. There is a small, but non-negligible percentage of the population that will never find love. Most of our culture is predicated on the notion of finding meaning in life through romantic relationships. But for those of us who don’t get to live out that cultural meme, where can we look for models of a fulfilling life without romance?

The most obvious choice is in religion. In particular, priests, monks and nuns of various faiths forgo the possibility of coupling up in the name of serving G-d. They find meaning through their relationship with their deity rather than their relationship with a romantic partner. Indeed, one need not be cloistered to find meaning through faith, nor even be single.

Others find meaning in seeking knowledge or producing art. There are a few examples in movies and literature of this. Although, they are often depicted as a ‘tortured soul’ or ‘obsessed’ or some such. It isn’t typically portrayed in a flattering light, but it is, none the less, given attention as a lifestyle by media outlets.

Rarer, but more positively portrayed are the folks who spend their lives giving back to their communities. Typically this is linked to religion, but not always - especially with regard to teaching. There are several movies that come to mind showing teachers so dedicated to their students that the students serve as their families.

Aside from that, I don’t see much in the way of positive role models for how to live a fulfilling life alone. It seems a pity. There are some of us who will never find love, and in addition to all the other drawbacks, we are made to feel inferior because romantic love is held up in our culture as such an important ideal. It would be great if more attention were paid to alternative paths to fulfillment. (Not to mention helping widows and widowers that have to adjust to life after the loss of a loved one, and find meaning through other avenues).

This is not the first time the DSM has been revised this new version with be the fifth instantiation (DSM-V). It undergoes revisions every 10-15 years to update in accordance to research in the field. The idea is to make it conform as closely to scientific knowledge about the mind and brain as possible. But it is unavoidably political. Homosexuality, for example, used to be classified as a psychological disorder requiring treatment and possibly being committed. Recent versions of the DSM have not included sexual orientation. You can see why the newest revision is drawing the scrutiny of many activists.

Issues can be subtler than that, though. Insurance will typically only cover treatment for disorders that are in the DSM. Which leads to all sorts of problems for patients suffering from conditions that don’t fit the symptoms for any standard disorders. Here’s an interesting article on Orthorexia (not currently in the DSM - pathological obsession with healthy eating) which isn’t covered by insurance. Insurance does need guidelines on what are legitimate conditions, and the DSM is the natural source for that, but this makes it’s revision political.

The DSM has broader funding implications as well. Researchers will find it much easier to get NIH grants if they study conditions already in the DSM. Which lessens the likelihood of things outside the DSM being identified to the point where they can be included in future revisions. Moreover, accessibility to many government assistance programs hinges upon DSM categories. Right now, Autism and Aspergers are separate categories - but the DSM revisions may lump them together. This means that government autism programs will be open to a new population.

There are also stigmatizing and helpful effects of labels. If I say that Mike is a slow writer that’s all well and good. But if I say he suffers from Bradyscribia (a condition I just made up but etymologically accurate…) people will treat him differently. There are strong stigmas attached to psychological disorders. At the same time, the label might encourage Mike to seek help, or come to grips with how slowly he writes. What is, and isn’t in the DSM has important consequences.

It would be ideal to just “go with the science”. The problem is, the science is rarely cut and dry, and abnormality is to a large part socially constructed. E.g. Pathological obsession over healthy eating is almost certainly unique to today’s nutrition obsessed media culture. Plus, as described above regarding research dollars, sometimes the labels influence what data we have access to.

So, on the whole, since the DSM-V draft has been released, expect to see a lot of discussion/debate over what’s included, and what’s not. The question of the extent to which practical and social concerns should influence a medical text is a challenging one, and something that we’ll be hearing a lot about in the coming weeks.

When I teach policy makers, the number one thing I try to do is get them to look pas the first step, and see what the downstream consequences will be. I find myself wondering why that sort of reasoning doesn’t happen more naturally…

With that in mind, a few thoughts:

1) It is wrong to knowingly give a parent the option “your child can have a good life without you, or a bad life with you”. The parents claim that this is exactly what the missionaries told the family members of these kids. Stay in Haiti and your kids might starve. Go to the Dominican Republic, and they can live a good life, and you can still go see them whenever you want. The parents believed what they were told, and the missionaries might have believed it when they said it. But it’s a false choice. If the missionaries wanted to help, they should have used their resources to assist the families, children and parents included, and not tried to convince the families that separation was the wisest course of action.

Besides, we are steeped in a culture of “you should do anything to help your children”. That’s a good thought, most of the time. But we also need to remember that we can’t help everyone, and most children are better off living in abject poverty surrounded by people who love them, rather than live in merely extreme poverty surrounded by strangers.

2) International borders matter. The Dominican Republic is a much different place than Haiti. They are substantially richer, more politically stable, they speak a different language (Spanish instead of French), and have a dramatically different culture and history. That border is hard to cross (which is why telling the parents they could visit anytime was a flat out lie), the Dominican Republic doesn’t want to be flooded with Haitian immigrants (especially orphans), and Haiti doesn’t want to have all of their children shipped off to a foreign country. Moreover, once there the kids would have been in a place they didn’t know, surrounded by a culture they didn’t understand, forced to learn a completely new language, and completely cut off from all friends and family.

Most Americans don’t really understand the importance of international boundaries. The United States is an extremely large and extremely rich place, with a very powerful culture. We can speak English anywhere in the world. You can order a cheeseburger while listening to the Beach Boys on any continent. Going to Canada is trivial, and most Americans feel right at home. Mexico? A little more exotic, but at most of the tourist destinations everyone bends over backwards to make the Americans feel at home. Sure, going through customs is a hassle, but we can move in and out of the United States, and go to basically any country in the world, without incident.

Most people in the world don’t have that luxury. Most international borders are closed to most people; Americans are often excepted because we spend lots of money, and then want to go home. Haitians don’t have those luxuries. When Haitians leave Haiti, they step into an unfamiliar world that views them suspiciously. And so often they aren’t allowed to leave Haiti in the first place; even if they have the money and the permission of the Haitian government (which, by the way, isn’t always a given).

So my guess is that the Americans in question here were naive, ignorant, and arrogant, in much the same way that many Americans (and many people from other countries, to be fair) are. They didn’t think that they were kidnapping children. They honestly thought they were helping; after all, these kids don’t have anything at all, and just a few miles away is an orphanage that will be glad to take them in and feed them! So just grab the kids and go!

So the real question is this: assuming that’s really what happened here, what punishment do they deserve? I have no clue.

The problem seems to be that Pelosi sees “health care reform” as “fighting big insurance”. Guess what Pelosi - insurance companies are no angels, but they’re also not the only source of health care inefficiency. Also, being able to say “I passed a major healthcare overhaul” is much more satisfying than saying “I passed a small bill that will make a small but important difference”.

In fact, I think piecemeal bills can be MORE effective. Because large cumbersome bills are hard to analyze for flaws and perverse incentives, and are harder to fix if problems arise.

So Pelosi, for once in your life stop stubbornly clinging to your first impression about what ought to be done, and think outside the box. You might actually make a difference on the issues that you find important.