voluntaryXchange

CEOs Who Were Mormon Missionaries

Bloomberg Businessweek published “God’s MBAs: Does the Mormon Faith Produce Better Leaders?” a while back.

While an interesting read,* I hate to break it to my Mormon friends and students, but this article doesn’t provide much solid evidence to back up its claim.

There are two reasons.

First, there is the problem that Nasem Taleb calls the invisibility of the drowned worshippers (no aspersion intended). There are 4 possibilities that you need to think about:

	Made CEO	Didn’t Make CEO
Did Mission	1	2
Didn’t Do Mission	3	4

The article only includes people in cell 1. But, if you really wanted to assess whether missions were helpful, you’d need to do a few things. You’d start by making an estimate of the count or proportion of how many people were in each cell. Then you’d want to do some basic data analysis: is ratio formed by taking the value you put in 1 and dividing by the value you put in 2 larger than doing the same to cells 3 and 4? Lastly, you’d actually want to firm that up with an actual hypothesis test.

 

You should note that doing those first two bits of data analysis is not that hard, and certainly not beyond what is often published in a data intensive magazine like Bloomberg Businessweek. The fact that they didn’t do this is telling.

Second, there is the problem endogeneity problem. What a reader really wants to know about a topic like this is whether going on a mission increases your chances of being a CEO. The endogeneity problem, in short, is what if there is a third factor that helps you be successful at both? Like charisma. If you don’t include charisma in your analysis, then you might be inclined to think that going on a mission increases your chances of making it to CEO, but if you did include charisma, you might find that there is very little relationship left over from missions to CEO positions.

I’m not saying that there isn’t a relationship, but I am saying that there is really basic econometrics left undone here.

* The online article missed one of the coolest parts of the print article: the marginalia listing Mormon CEO’s. They are listed in this separate article entitled “Mormons In Business”.

Technorati Tags: mormon,lds,mba,ceo,drowned,worshippers,endogeneity

If It’s New, It’s Not True

That’s the title, and theme, of an article from the religion section of our local paper (sorry, there is no better digital copy than this available).

That catchy phrase made me laugh. It’s quoting a local pastor from The Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, so it’s probably intended as a backhand to the local Mormon majority.

"We're an ancient representation of Christianity," he says. "We don't like innovations. For us, if it's new, it's not true.

Obviously, that’s a theological statement. But, vaguely insulting or not, what made me laugh is that I think the sentiment is a great expression of an important part of the belief structure of a lot of people, from a of different religious persuasions: a proclivity towards conservation of ideas as a form of social conservatism.

Technorati Tags: lutheran,new,true

Another Positive Post About Mormons and Baptism for the Dead

John G. Turner is a graduate of Notre Dame and holds a divinity degree from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

He’s also a non-Mormon expert on Mormons, and here’s what he has to say about the latest controversy:

… In this instance of proxy baptism, though, the level of outrage simply does not match the purported offense.

The Mormon desire to bring Jews, Protestants, Muslims, Catholics and others into their heaven is merely quirky and quixotic—not "scandalous," as Mr. Wiesel says. When Mormons are immersed in water in an attempt to offer salvation to our deceased ancestors, they do no harm to the living or the dead.

I’m still scandalized about baptizing people who died because they were born Jewish; since there’s fairly strong evidence that, for some, being a Jew is a matter of genetics above and beyond faith. But as to the rest, I promise not to be scandalized.

Technorati Tags: mormon,lds,baptism,dead,quirky,quixotic,wiesel,anne,frank

My Turn to Both Tick Off My Mormon Friends, and Give Them Something Positive to Mull Over

Nasty stuff at the top, good stuff at the bottom.

Mormons are in hot water again for the baptism by proxy of dead Jews; in particular Anne Frank.

The official position of the LDS church is that this is a no-no, and it has apologized. Again.

Sorry folks, this isn’t good enough. If it was, this wouldn’t keep happening.

The LDS church is very vertically integrated on decisions that are important to it.

Then there is baptism by proxy. This is mostly handled at the local level: baptism by proxy is an important rite for young men, and an important sacrament for families, that is performed at temples that are local to members with a recommend. When Anne Frank (or someone else) is baptized, it is a local decision.

This is why it was a done deal, again, before it hit the airwaves.

The official position is that this is wrong, and shouldn’t happen.

News Flash: it will happen, is happening, and it did happen. Again.

Let me make a suggestion as to how to get this to go away: excommunication of bishops and stake presidents that allow it to happen on their watch.

This is how the central authority of the church gets the attention of the rank and file. And you know what? It works. All Mormons know this.

And, to non-Mormons out there trying to understand this, lists for baptism by proxy are submitted to local bishops and approved by them. Discipline of local members is handled by local bishops, who occasionally have to kick things up to the stake president level. There is a very clear message between the lines here: bishops and stake presidents are not taking the public position of the LDS church seriously on this issue.

Now for the good part.

The world, and Jews in particular, get that individual Mormons can do a great deal of good in the world. And here’s the details of how one helped Jews when they needed it.

CTR: emulate Senator King.

Technorati Tags: anne,frank,elie,wiesel,baptism,proxy,mormon,lds,excommunication

Neo-Puritanism

An oldie but goodie from Samizdata.net, quoted nearly in full:

… Truth is more horrifying than fiction, sometimes.

The truth in question being the willingness of those close to power openly to advocate ever more interference with you and me, not ad hoc for venal, corrupt, human reasons, but in order systematically to enforce the currently approved good life on society.

From the BBC …

Jasper Gerard argues …

… Current regulations are failing to tackle the growing trend of under age and binge drinking. …

… He proposes getting 18-year-olds to carry smart cards which record how much they have drunk each night and making it an offence to serve more alcohol to anyone under-21 …

I note the BBC has this story under 'health', rather than 'politics'. It does not have a 'neo-Puritanism' category (perhaps we should have). Medicalised bullying sails past the questioning pickets of journalism and gets straight into the credulous baggage train. As does technological bullying. And here we have medicalised state bullying enabled by technology. Woo-hoo!

One can not quote this fragment of C.S. Lewis too often:

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber barons cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

… The robber baron pursues his own whims and pleasures, regardless of others; the neo-Puritan is only happy when the lives of others are under control. [italic emphasis added]

Neo-puritanism is a word I’m going to have to add to my world view.

And now we have the Obama administration’s new policy: a church that does not approve of birth control for its members must nonetheless provide it to its members because it volunteers to extend charitable care to people who are not church members and who might want birth control and who would like it provided through charity and who can’t be legally directed to some other charity that might also provide birth control.

That last clause may be hard to follow. Sorry, but you can’t make this stuff up.

Technorati Tags: neo-puritanism

Path Dependence As an Argument Against Religion

Penn Jillette makes a point that is new to me:

If every trace of any single religion died out and nothing were passed on, it would never be created exactly that way again.

I agree. But … I think the whole point of faith is the belief that it will turn out exactly the same again … so I’m not sure this argument will appeal to the religious. This is stronger:

If all of science were wiped out, it would still be true and someone would find a way to figure it all out again.

If I can restate in a stronger way: you should view science as true because path dependence doesn’t affect the final outcome, while you should view religion as false if you think path dependence will affect the final outcome.

Via Kottke.

Technorati Tags: religion,science,path,dependence

Dawkins On Atheism

Richard Dawkins on atheism:

We are all atheists about most of the gods humanity has ever believed in. Some of just go one step further.

Read the whole thing.

Now that’s turning the argument on its head: atheism as the norm rather than the exception.

Technorati Tags: atheism

Dawkins On Religion

Richard Dawkins:

“Religion teaches you to be satisfied with nonanswers,” he says. “It’s a sort of crime against childhood.”

It’s rather like my cousin telling me that he got so annoyed with the questions of his young boys that he started telling them that “Joe” invented everything. You know … why is the sky blue … because Joe made it that way. After a while his son caught on and stopped asking.

Read the whole thing.

Technorati Tags: religion,dawkins,nonanswer,crime,child

Is It a Religion or a Cult?

It turns out, there are criteria for assessing this.

… Observers of cult phenomena … agree on four criteria to define a cult. The first is behavior control, i.e., monitoring of where you go and what you do. The second is information control, such as discouraging members from reading criticism of the group. The third is thought control, placing sharp limits on doctrinal questioning. The fourth is emotional control—using humiliation or guilt.

Mitch Horowitz adds three more:

… Financial control and extreme leadership.

Financial control translates into levying ruinous dues or fees, or effectively hiring members and placing them on stipends … a friend of mine—today a respected officer with a nonprofit organization—who recalls how his departure from the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church was complicated by the problem of a massive hole in his résumé

Problems with extremist leadership can be more difficult to spot.

Yet every coercive religious group harbors one telltale trait: untoward secrecy. As opposed to a cult, a religious culture ought to be as simple to enter or exit, for members or observers, as any free nation. Members should experience no impediment to relationships, ideas or travel, and the group's finances should be reasonably transparent. Its doctrine need not be conventional—but it should be knowable to outsiders

So, here’s 7 questions. I have no guidance for how you’re supposed to weight these, or judge where the borderline between religion and cult is:

• Does someone monitor and/or judge what you do?
• Are you discouraged from reading criticism of your group?
• Are you limited in what you may question?
• Is humiliation or guilt used?
• Is the financial or labor commitment a problem?
• Would others consider the leadership extreme?
• Is doctrine knowable to outsiders?

Technorati Tags: religions,cult

Scientology and Paul Haggis

Got an hour? Read The New Yorker’s expose on the director Paul Haggis’ decision to leave Scientology (Fair Warning: it’s about 25K words).

Technorati Tags: haggis,scientology,cult