You have chosen......poorly...

When the evil Nazi in "Indiana Jones and the Lost Crusades" swallows water from the false chalice and begins to rapidly age and crumble, how did you feel? If you are a conservative, you might have felt that his greed and lusts had gotten the better of him, that indeed HE had chosen poorly. If you are a liberal, you might have felt that society had let him down, that his choice was not of his own doing, that we, as a society, as a world, had let him down. You would see little blame in him, but a lot in all of us.

So goes the concept behind special privileges for minorities. Liberals seem to have the concept that, if you live in America and are white/Asian/ and poor, you really are of your own making, but if you are black and poor, you are a product of society who requires special assistance.

Assuming we have the ability to observe our world (access to books, television, radio; the facility to learn; and normal function of our senses)"

• To the extent that we can exercise "free will" we can choose well or poorly.
• To the extent that we cannot choose, our future is predetermined.

Odds and probabilities are a way of expressing the outcomes, but do not tell us about free will vs determinism. This is the human equivalent of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. A life of determinism seems quite bleak and seems to run counter to observation, but does open up possibilites. For example, if there is determinism, there can be time travel, as the future cannot change the past. However, if there is free will, time must run only in one direction or there must be multiple simultaneous universes.

What factors impact opportunity?

• Personal characteristics (friendliness, grooming, knowledge, ability, appearance, skills, availability, honesty, and so forth)
• Societal values (conformity vs diversity, prior connections vs new faces, output/outcome vs balance/mixture, and so forth)

DocBrain believes that the fear of diversity is no longer a major factor in opportunity, but that the personal characteristics are still tipping points, and these are modifiable by free will.

Choose well.