Private Security Attitudes About the Role of Weapons in Preventing Workplace Violence

As some of you know, I'm working on a Masters in Human Development - concentrating on Leadership, Team Building, and Problem Solving...

Some recent discussions at the Security Source Online discussion group at LinkedIn have got me thinking there may be some detectable demographic differences between security professionals who hold strong opinions regarding the role of armed security personnel and armed citizens in reducing homicides at work, in houses of worship, or at school.

If you are a private security professional please visit Survey Monkey to take the survey titled "Private Security Attitudes About the Role of Weapons in Preventing Workplace Violence."

I am using Survey Monkey instead of LinkedIn Polls as there are people I'll be inviting to participate who may not have a LinkedIn account (yeah, really).  I do not have a premium account at Survey Monkey so I can ask only 10 questions. This make every question critically important, so please provide your best answer before proceeding.

The results of the survey will be tabulated and reported at Security Source Online and here at Eclectic Breakfast.

Thank you!

Black Swan

The book, not the movie...

The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, comes highly recommended by several of my peers.  I'm getting tired of heavy reading so I'm going to cut The Feeling of Risk from my 2011 reading list and replace it with Black Swan.  I picked up a copy last night with some birthday money. I will keep you posted...

It's Not About The Science

It's about not wanting to admit that pollution represents a failure of free markets...

As you may recall, Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, was on my reading list for 2011.  Well, read it I did and happy I am for having done so.  This is one deeply researched and well written book.  As important as the history of denialism is, in less skilled hands the sheer volume of the material covered might have made for stultifying reading.  Let me politely suggest that Merchants of Doubt belongs on the bookshelf of anyone who cares about the role of science in the public square.  Historians Naomi Oreskes and Erik Conway have done science, our country, and humanity a great service.

UPDATE: Here's a fresh and unhappy post about the state of polarization on the issue of global warming written by Chris Mooney.

REUPDATE: I sent the authors of Merchants of Doubt some fan mail and asked the question:

"I wonder if evangelicals prone to biblical literalism also find common cause with denialist free market cold warriors because the ability to call "junk" any science they disagree with enables them to cling to their world view?"

Naomi Oreske graced me with a prompt reply:

"Indeed!  I am working on this very question now."

Cool news, indeed.

PS Merchants is now available in paperback for ~$11.00.  Consider giving a copy to the denialists in your life.  I'm going to...

Another Update: A nice profile of Professor Oreskes in the Christian Science Monitor.

This Has Been A Good Spring For Science Fiction And Fantasy Films

For the most part...

 

Just when you think there's no new way to spin a cloak and dagger action pic along comes Hanna.  Think Grimms' Fairy Tales meets The Three Days of the Condor.  The interplay between image, motion, sound, and music is unlike anything I've experienced recently, thanks no doubt to The Chemical Brothers.  Roger Ebert explains it better, as usual...  Fable.

The Adjustment Bureau reminds us that Matt Damon really is pretty talented.  Emily Blunt does a very fine turn.  Almost any movie adapted from a Phillip K. Dick story is worth a try; this one delivers.  Fate.

Source Code features Jake Gyllenhaal, a much more human Vera Farmiga than we saw in the unsatisfactory Up In The Air, and a totally dreamy Michelle Monaghan.  It started out far fetched, got a little weirder, then became engaging and emotionally true.  Second chances.

Okay, so Sucker Punch was as emotionally bereft as it was visually striking, but it's visual strikingness was pretty damn striking.  Image over substance.

Just kidding!  Battle: Los Angeles was not so good, but it made Roger Ebert's hilarious review possible.  Action-packed action, with an extra helping of action.

Spring Suffers A Setback

Our patio the morning of 16 April 2011...

Spring was here, summer was just around the corner, I swear it.  It's like some Twilight Zone version of The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats, except I'm not Peter and I don't want it to snow.