The Fluorescent Scorpion Test
In the first blog, How do you become a "eurosceptic Brexiteer"? I cited that I'd attended a meeting in Dawlish, on the coast of Devon, of extraordinary quality: Brexit: the Dawlish experience. One of the (many) things said on the day as being interesting:-
"With that, what people are also learning is that politics can be fun. For a day's outing, the 35-plus that attended found it an entertaining, challenging day, from which we all learnt and all benefitted."
About a year later, the next September, at Leaming Spa this time I also attended a second meeting which again I found conducive, as per When To Attend/Hold Meetings, EU Referendum: not just another meeting. One person I met and was very grateful to listen to, told me an interesting thing at lunch. "If they asked a politician whether or not they would vote yes or no (in/out; remain/leave) in a Referendum on our membership and that politician did not give a direct (no/out/leave) answer then this was a hugely economical test of that particular politician's credibility", as per MIND THE (Credibility) GAP! I would like to thank that person with this blog with the idea of suggesting a name for such a test:-
The Fluorescent Scorpion Test
When you shine an Ultraviolet (UV) light in the dark, the scorpion's body lights up with a fluorescent glow, making it particularly easy to spot and stand out against it's surroundings. The same concept applies to the above "Test Question"
A lot of hard work has been put into reading huge amounts of material and from time to time a new concept is coined or used which makes learning politics fun from time to time! So here's a list to add to our newly coined scorpion!
The Monkey And "Typewriter"
Fat Cats are the real target: Siemens
The Boiling Frog slowly cooks without realizing it!
Barking Cats: Have you ever heard one? Neither have I.
Purple Bananas: Totally relevant?
A Judas Goat: The Tory "eurosceptics" leading to slaughter
The Norway Model sounds like, but looks VERY different to The Norway Option!!
Dead Chicken Media: Laced with "industrial strength tranquillisers"
Elephant in the Room: The fallacy of omission's unavoidable presence.
Engrenage:"Gears" (french) small gears move big gears over time
Overcoming The Monster: Ignore the rules of the quest at your peril!
"The Wrong Turn": Excusing the inexcusable by the unspeakable?
As mentioned in When To Attend/Hold Meetings and in Learning & Playing The Rules Of The Game break-throughs in understanding often hinge on Definitions, decomposing the guiding Rules which are conducive to "Concept Shifts". We've just looked at how David Cameron is attempting to master the language of the debate before it's even started with his "Middle Way Fallacy" from the previous blog Using A Macroscope on Cameron's Reform and how this is an attempt to distort The Brexit Number & The EU Onion real picture of Brexit in relation to the EU itself, using another concept of the EU as an Onion of concentric layers towards the core.
When we achieve these concept shifts, often it can be experienced as an exercise of focus where are skills of understanding are matched by an appropriate challenge and we fall into the timeless FLOW + CHANNEL as per Power To The People:-
Even at low skill and low challenge level we can tap FLOW: The psychology of optimal experience; which often accompanies forming a "good fit" from using a newly created or encountered "model of understanding" of a new concept: Learning becomes it's own reward and is fun, as perhaps you can see above.
As per Pete North in A word about "showing unity" . Other politicians will suggest that "eurosceptics" should be clever and resort to a Middle Way to win and we can describe them as Judas Goats as this goes contrary to developing Power To The People. Others yet again will try to dodge the question of how they will vote for various reasons who are politicians who obviously have given up on the people as per You know, we're just not reaching that guy. and for them we can apply The Fluorescent Scorpion Test. In all cases, however there's a distinction: Where people are really trying to learn and develop the democracy and quality of our politics, there is likely a correlation with the attempt to inject some "flow" into the experience for others: Away from apathy and anxiety towards real control (not the lip-service the politicians peddle) and arousal to the challenges our political system is supposed to be designed to help resolve successfully.
That's as good a "Rule Of Thumb" over who to trust in the upcoming Referendum as any:-
