Observations focused on the problems of an underdeveloped country, Venezuela, with some serendipity about the world (orchids, techs, science, investments, politics) at large. A famous Venezuelan, Juan Pablo Perez Alfonzo, referred to oil as the devil's excrement. For countries, easy wealth appears indeed to be the sure path to failure. Venezuela might be a clear example of that.
Unknown FeedAs part of the destruction of Venezuela’s scientific infrastructure and community, the current authorities of Venezuela’s former premier scientific research institute IVIC, have decided to change the icons of knowledge and creativity by those of ideology and destruction:
The Devil's Excrement 
July 26, 2013 at 10:11 am
Write more, thats all I have to say. Literally,
it seems as though you relied on the video to make your point.
You obviously know what youre talking about, why waste your
intelligence on just posting videos to your site when you could be giving us something informative to read?
January 22, 2013 at 8:56 pm
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December 19, 2010 at 8:22 pm
The Lysenkos are the ones putting up the pictures
December 19, 2010 at 8:19 pm
Lysenko, another one who believed he could rewrite the book of science to suit ideology and people starved to death with his socialist genetics. His ideas were so quietly shelved. Lots of Lysenkos in the world today in other “sciences”. Hope their Ideas can be shelved as well.
December 19, 2010 at 1:11 pm
What? No picture of Lysenko? ¿Qué sucedió? ¿Por qué hay ninguÌn cuadro de Lysenko?
December 18, 2010 at 9:35 am
“When ideology replaces reason and the amygdala trumps the frontal cortex, the laws of nature refuse to play ball and then all hell breaks loose.” This unfortunately has been happening in the first world too and we have seen it recently in many press revelations. Hope those wannabe scientists learn this lesson too. Science is supposed to discover the laws of nature not make then up to suit his political agenda, nor ignore them when he finds them “inconvenient”. And there is such a thing as social science too.
December 18, 2010 at 3:42 am
odef007,
There are still pictures of Chavez on the highway, but they are less imposing than previously. The use of scantily clad girls in advertising seems to be trending downwards here. Venezuela, like most of the rest of the world, is currently becoming more socially conservative.
December 17, 2010 at 7:44 pm
Take a look at the Venesuelan third reich:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101217/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/lt_venezuela_chavez
I am sad for the people of benesuela. S.
December 17, 2010 at 7:24 pm
I am not insulting people at IVIC.
I am not insulting people who study politics and society, particularly not those that try to make an objective study pathological persons,eras and societies like those you mentioned. They study crackpots, but are surely not crackpots themselves.
To use another metaphor; if Political Science is to be represented by the likes of those two, a criminology institute might as well revere and have the portraits of Pablo Escobar Gaviria and Ted Bundy, among others. There is quite a gulf of difference between a pathological actor/subject and it’s scientific observer.
December 17, 2010 at 5:03 pm
Again, I ask as above:
——————————————————-
Miguel wrote “change the icons of knowledge and creativity by those of ideology and destruction.”
So what was hanging there before?
——————————————————-
If nothing was hanging there before, this was not the best way to word it.
December 17, 2010 at 1:33 pm
Thank you host for the Venue
An Interested Observer: “any of his suck-ups could have even conceived that idea.”
Many here may correct me but I believe Das Leader has a leftwing US guy advising him now. He said his name in Cedena not to long ago, I think the day Goliger had her captive audience, but I do not remember it. That along with the S26 results may have swayed the Ego for longevity.
loroferoz: Whoa … graphic
Roy: Did they get rid of the ones on the road from the Airport to Town… so
Repressive …. I liked the Whisky billboards better. NE has been the only one from the beginning that could see through his lies
December 17, 2010 at 1:30 pm
Loroferoz:
I think you are right but I was trying to be polite to my friends that still work at IVIC and are excellent scientists. I was a researcher at IVIC for many years and I do not think that the good guys at IVIC deserve to be lumped with the chavocrazy. I would like to add that there are a lot of political science centers around the world that study Fidel, Che Guevara, Mugabe and Chavez. So they do make science believe it or not.
December 17, 2010 at 10:20 am
Political Science? SCIENCE??? Is that a joke? You mean political crackpotry / mumbo-jumbo / hackery / fundamentalism.
If these guys on the wall have anything scientific about their approach to politics, then hacking a person to pieces with a machete qualifies the killer as an accomplished surgeon.
December 17, 2010 at 9:03 am
Roy, I understood the “lesson,” so to speak. Believe me, I am under no illusion that you’re going to extrapolate anything about pictures to positive national policy. That’s all I referred to as well. But still, I’m surprised to think he’s subsuming his ego to any other priority.
Of course, it’s post-election, which could be a factor with those billboards. I still want more evidence. I mean, if it’s really an intentional decision, then someone must have gone to Chavez and said, “We need less of you.” I’m having a hard time imagining any of his suck-ups could have even conceived that idea.
December 17, 2010 at 7:18 am
Very sad and disappointing, IViC is now the Venezuelan Institute for Political Science
December 17, 2010 at 6:33 am
Some great posts here! But a question:
Miguel wrote “change the icons of knowledge and creativity by those of ideology and destruction.”
So what was hanging there before?
December 17, 2010 at 12:59 am
lovely
December 16, 2010 at 6:35 pm
What I see: Megalomania, narcissism, idolatry of a murderer and torturer (or two), lack of imagination,brains and/or a sense of place, and a lot of sucking up.
The lack of imagination,brains and/or sense of place: They could have found a number of scientists (or pseudoscientists like Marx) that were Socialists, to put upon the wall of a scientific institute. But then, the era before was no better, honoring a barbarian-by-choice like Ezequiel Zamora by putting his name on a university.
Carlos Elio: We might not have reduced human behavior, motivations and reactions (and sociology and economics) to deterministic science, even a statistical science, let alone a science with some undisputed, basic, theories.
But empirically speaking, Socialism fails the subject of human nature and behavior spectacularly. And messes up society in unexpected, sad ways.
It is quite sad that great scientists (not economists) that were Socialists did not understand that the lively debate and freedom of choice they swam in inside their disciplines should be pursued in human life in general. That letting humans decide, think and risk for themselves is the way to go. Even in the immense task of building theories of human behavior that might conceivably be used to guide society.
Your comment, referring to East and West Berlin and North and South Korea also illuminates another aspect of human behavior. We humans might be able enough to solve point problems if free to decide how to do it, or might decide to imitate successful examples. We are not intelligent enough to dictate the decisions of other humans and even have the slightest idea of what we are doing, never mind attaining the measured efficiency of humans thinking, interacting and acting themselves.
December 16, 2010 at 6:33 pm
Two losers.
But at least Guevara lost some battles. Chavez is too much of a coward to even try.
December 16, 2010 at 5:54 pm
Roy, I think we understood it as you meant. The military are revamping their propaganda in several ways: cute girls (but not vulgar), the posters that looked like bad imitations of NEP (New Economic Policies during Lenin’s times) posters are now better (probably also more costly), they are using the word socialism for anything that may have a positive connotation.
They know the personality cult is getting on people’s nerves, so they are approaching it in another way (still, if one watches the propaganda videos in VTV you see Hugo is the real “motor”)
December 16, 2010 at 5:45 pm
AIO,
Actually, in Margarita, the huge PDVSA billboards that have Chavez’s image on them are disappearing. Simply driving about, I see few images of Chavez than previously.
When I say “lesson learned”, I didn’t mean it in either a positive or negative sense. I simply meant that he finally figured out that he may not want to have his name and image sullied by plastering it over obvious failures. I didn’t mean that he has “seen the error of his ways” in the sense that he is going to start doing what is best for the country. That will not happen. His delusions run far too deep for that to happen.
December 16, 2010 at 4:54 pm
I wonder if it would do any good to spread images of Hugo looking scornful, with the caption “Big brother is watching”. It might help educate people to the fact that socialism destroys freedom and enhances corruption.
December 16, 2010 at 2:57 pm
Roy, good point about how no one in chavismo can be as iconic as Che, but before you call this a “lesson learned” by Chavez, I think we need to see more examples. Better (at least in terms of evidence of your theory, I’m not sure it would be better in any other sense of the word) yet, pictures of Che without any pictures of Chavez. I’m not at all convinced his ego will allow it.
colon, I think that only one of those two is deserving of both of those moustaches, as he has been both more the dictator and more the fool.
December 16, 2010 at 2:50 pm
Thank you host for this venue
CarlosElio: “When ideology replaces reason and the amygdala trumps the frontal cortex” .. I would venture a guess that the Fearless leader (and that is definitely a oxymoron reference to the moron) has his amygdala the
size of golf balls right about now. There is no place for Politics or Religion in Scientific research.
Ego replaced reason and logic hence the plastering of his face everywhere. The intent I believe was to have the psychological effect on the population to provoke the sentiment bestowed on a Messiah. Never taking in to the equation the other side of the scale. Current events show the fear of declining public opinion this Icon has. He is reacting. As he perceives the cage getting smaller he WILL become more aggressive. Removing his picture at this time, although it may lesson the immediate and constant emotion of repression, the damage has been done. The Mesa de Unidad has picked up on this and are using it.
May the Powers that be protect VE
December 16, 2010 at 2:27 pm
Good observation, Roy. Hugo realised he had to replace his image for the image of Che, beautiful girls and young men looking at the same direction and loads of slogans with socialist + positive thingie.
I don’t want to excuse socialism, but I do think we should say it to all:
Chavismo is not about socialism, it is about Chávez and the millitary. Of course, some people would have problems with that, less the military definitely stick to Chavez as in Burma.
December 16, 2010 at 1:58 pm
Good idea jeffry.
I will paint an Adolf-style and a Cantinflas-style moustache. Guess who will get which?
December 16, 2010 at 12:17 pm
If I worked there. I would put up a teeny-tiny picture of Einstein right between the two Great Heroes.
No one could object, surely.
December 16, 2010 at 11:47 am
I find it interesting that Chavez has finally learned the lesson that Fidel understood from the beginning. Fidel never allowed his image to be used as a symbol of his revolution. Instead, he used Che’s image. Of course, to be crafted into an icon, it is much better for the subject to be deceased. That way, the subject cannot contradict the legend you create for him.
Now, I am sure that Castro told Chavez this, but Chavez, being the overt narcissist he is, couldn’t accept it. He needed to “feel the love”, and nuthin’ says lovin’ like seeing your picture everywhere you turn. Only now, when his image presides over so many failed and abandoned projects, does he finally understand the wisdom of his mentors advice, hence the recent law about the unrestricted use of his image.
So, completely lacking in imagination, Chavismo is slowly replacing Chavez’s image with… Che! Yes, the same homicidal sociopath that Castro converted into an icon in the sixties after having him murdered in Bolivia.
Well, what the hell! Why invent a new icon, when you already have one, albeit one that is tired and worn out? Che may not be as “cool” as he used to be, but he is way cooler than Simon Bolivar. And let’s face it… who amongst Chavismo really has the stuff that legends are made of?
December 16, 2010 at 11:07 am
When ideology replaces reason and the amygdala trumps the frontal cortex, the laws of nature refuse to play ball and then all hell breaks loose. Electrical systems obey Faraday laws, not hat oxymoron called “scientific socialism”. Have you seen a night picture of the Korean peninsula? Take a look http://bit.ly/5nX3Ee South Korea looks like an island because the North is obscured by the waters of the sea of happiness of fricking communism
The failure in agricultural production, science, technology, roads, housing, education, and so forth in Marxist economies is massive and is constant. Once I stood at the Postdamer Platz of Berlin. On the one side the buildings of former East Berlin: autere, spartan, colorless, bleak. Opposite to it the buildings of West Berlin: vibrant, colorful, attractive.
In the East you were seeing what urban planning driven by the political interests of the party yields to its population: a single mind making decisions to please the boss. In the West, the collage of thousands of bright architects, each one of them vying for the best design, the most profitable, the most attractive.
Bring the North/South Korea or the East/West Belirn contrasts to the realm of science and you will see how the party, pretending to screw the natural laws, ends up screwing the people. No matter how many medals the Supreme Leader wears on his chest, no one fucks with mother nature.
The sad chapter playing out now in the halls of IVIC, has been played out before in other corridors that were intended to be devoted to the pursuit of knowledge but were were redirected towards the pursuit of party allegiance and purity of revolutionary zeal.
Suck my dick, socialist science.
December 16, 2010 at 10:59 am
With your permision, I will reuse the picture and comment it in German.
December 16, 2010 at 10:19 am
I recall someone saying that the work of Einstein’s work was not to be used because it was “jewish physics”… I guess the same will go with “Imperial Science”
December 16, 2010 at 10:14 am
WOW!!!
Curly and Moe….
WOW!!!