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Kevin Pezzi, MD

I developed technology to instantly
stop school shooters and other criminals,
such as rapists, robbers, home invaders,
and shoplifters. I also created ways to block
airborne germ transmission. Read more >

Iconoclastic views on economics, politics, technology, science, and life.

Disagree with something I wrote? So do I! Read more

“To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.”

— Elbert Hubbard, American editor, publisher, and writer (1856–1915)

Trivia: He and his wife, Alice Moore Hubbard, the noted feminist and writer, died aboard the RMS Lusitania, which was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine on May 7, 1915, when they were heading to Europe to cover the war and interview Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany.

If you disagree with something I wrote, feel free to challenge it. Some of my viewpoints are the antithesis (exact opposite) of what they once were. That isn't flip-flopping; that is changing opinions with scant evidence to support them into convictions with a firmer foundation of facts.

My political philosophy is an amalgamation of libertarian, conservative, and liberal principles. My opinions have changed so significantly that my conservative friends might be horrified by how I strongly believe that liberals are correct on certain issues. I've previously written about some of them, but to make this more fun, I will present others as challenges in which I offer $100,000 to the first person who can refute the logic I used in forming that opinion. Please note that due to my limited time and difficulty using my hands after I broke my neck, I cannot quickly update my previously published opinions. However, now that I am balancing the promptings of head and heart, I strongly disagree with many opinions I expressed in my writings.

I like finding people who make me think, not necessarily those who agree with me. Genius Robert Heinlein said, “I never learned from a man who agreed with me.” If you can educate me, I'm all ears.

“Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions.”
— Albert Einstein

“Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.”
— Albert Einstein

“What I would like to see more often in this nation is an open and intelligent conversation, not people just casting aspersions at each other … it's unbelievable to me the way people act like third graders. And if somebody doesn't agree with them, they're this and they're that … it comes from both sides. And it's just so infantile.”
— Dr. Ben Carson, neurosurgeon

“The ultimate ignorance is the rejection of something you know nothing about and refuse to investigate.”
— Dr. Wayne Dyer

“If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.”
— General George Patton

“Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.”
— Oliver Wendell Holmes

“A lot of people risk their lives in a brief act of heroism, which is kind of cool, but Jill has what I call slow heroism. She is risking her professional life on something that her own calculations show may not work for a thousand years—may not ever. So I like to support people that are risking their lives.”
— ex-Microsoft billionaire brainiac Nathan Myhrvold speaking about Jill Tarter, who inspired the character played by Jodie Foster in the movie Contact. It takes a brilliant person to see that others who go against the grain of conventional wisdom may be sages although lesser minds often ridicule their ideas.

“I am not young enough to know everything.”
— Oscar Wilde

“You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life.”
— Winston Churchill

“Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish.”
— Euripides, Greek tragic dramatist (484 BC - 406 BC)

“It is socially unacceptable to be right too early.”
— Robert Heinlein

“I'd rather stand alone on the truth than with millions on a lie.”

“The most distinctive mark of a cultured mind is the ability to take another's point of view; to put one's self in another's place, and see life and its problems from a point of view different from one's own. To be willing to test a new idea; to be able to live on the edge of difference in all matters intellectually; to examine without heat the burning question of the day; to have imaginative sympathy, openness and flexibility of mind, steadiness and poise of feeling, cool calmness of judgment, is to have culture.”
— Arthur H. R. Fairchild

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”
— Theodore Roosevelt

“It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.”
— Abraham Lincoln

This reminds me of something stressed by one of my psychology professors, who said that society imposes rigid boundaries for what behavior is acceptable, and applies tremendous pressure trying to force people to conform to the behavioral expectations. Some of the most brilliant and productive outside-the-box thinkers led unconventional lives. One of the side effects of forcing people to think inside the box is that by lopping off outside-the-box behavior, potentially great outside-the-box ideas are lost, too.

“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it.”
— Edward R. Murrow, American journalist (1908-1965)

“You will not do incredible things without an incredible dream.”
— John Eliot

1. The Lincoln mystery I solved but the media suppressed
2. More examples of media bias

The motto of The New York Times is “All the News That's Fit to Print.” Similarly, other liberal media outlets want you to believe they keep you well-informed. Although I knew that is laughably untrue, I didn't realize how their ideological prism filtered out interesting rays of light on various topics until one of the big-name weekly news magazines published an article about a photograph of Abraham Lincoln—or was it? That was the million-dollar question, because no one knew for sure if the relatively young man was indeed Lincoln, or just someone who bore a remarkable resemblance to him. Whether or not it was him would greatly influence the value of the photo, which was scheduled for sale by the premier auction house that caters to the über-rich.

As various experts looked at the facial features and concluded it could very well but not certainly be Lincoln, I thought of an easy way to conclusively solve this mystery: compare the clearly visible hand vein patterns to older known photographs of Lincoln. Hand vein patterns are very unique and stable.

I proposed this in a letter sent to the magazine, which never printed it. While magazines cannot print everything sent to them, it was suspiciously odd they saw fit to publish an article on this mystery but not a way to solve it. They did, however, find enough space to print the guesses of experts in needs of more expertise and even guesses from Joe Sixpack. Given that this magazine bills itself as a fount of facts, this omission is impossible to justify. Its publisher wonders why readers are leaving in droves, but that's no mystery.

Other examples of media bias

When Fox News focused on honor killings, I contacted them, offering to discuss an honor killing case with a twist I was involved in, as a doctor, but I never heard back from them.

I also received no response from CBS's 48 Hours after I tipped them off about a crime that would make for a fascinating episode. The wife of my organic chemistry professor was a Ph.D. chemist with a twisted mind. She wanted her children to be the best in their school band, but her kids just weren't that talented, so Little Miss Chemist—excuse me, Doctor Chemist—crafted a diabolical plan to help her kids rise to the top: eliminate the competition! She did that by planting toxic chemicals in the homes of her kid's competitors, along with their automobile air ducts, hoping to knock them off. She was caught exiting the garage of one of her targets, holding a bag with poison inside.

Some of my sheds:

A few years ago, Popular Mechanics (PM) magazine invited readers to submit photographs of unusually nice sheds. I submitted some of mine, none of which appeared in a subsequent article in which the fanciest shed shown was so ordinary that most people would give it little or no attention.

Since my sheds have received worldwide coverage, including by Alex Johnson (author of Shedworking and publisher of the Shedworking site), I was confident that at least one of my sheds would tickle the fancy of the PM editors. But no, Popular Mechanics readers were treated to sheds that screamed “plain-vanilla.”

Another magazine, another fancy shed contest, and not even an honorable mention for one of mine while their grand prize winner would not look out of place in a Home Depot parking lot. Yawn.

What might explain this media bias? I have a suspicion, but not yet enough evidence to conclusively prove it, so I won't speculate now. However, I do have a nifty way to test my hypothesis. Stay tuned for that later this year.

The political relevance of this?

You may not care about Lincoln's photo or my sheds, but if you live in the United States, you almost certainly care about our national prosperity. In my opinion, one of the reasons why we are failing is because our system is degenerating from an idea meritocracy (in which the best ideas get the most attention and funding) to an old boys' club in which Ivy League grads and other well-connected people help their buddies with third-rate ideas and products instead of the best ones. There's only so much capital to go around, and if it is frittered away on mediocre investments, none is left for ideas that could allow us to compete with China and other nations with an insurmountable advantage in cheap labor. We can't beat them by working for peanuts, but we can beat them with products that are amazingly good.

How? See my strategy to leave China in the dust.

Notes:

Buy lunch, pay with your hand: Vein scanning technique
Excerpt: “Every individual's vein pattern is completely unique …”
February 12, 2021 (> two decades after I contacted the magazine about Lincoln's photo): AI can use the veins on your hand like fingerprints to identify you

The views expressed on this page may or may not reflect my current opinions, nor do they necessarily represent my past ones. After reading a slice of what I wrote in my various websites and books, you may conclude that I am a liberal Democrat or a conservative Republican. Wrong; there is a better alternative. Just as the primary benefit from debate classes results when students present and defend opinions contrary to their own, I use a similar strategy as a creative writing tool to expand my brainpower—and yours. Mystified? Stay tuned for an explanation. PS: The wheels in your head are already turning a bit faster, aren't they?

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”
— F. Scott Fitzgerald

Reference: Imagining dialogue can boost critical thinking: Excerpt: “Examining an issue as a debate or dialogue between two sides helps people apply deeper, more sophisticated reasoning …”

Comments (1)

Missing your wit and intellect . . .

This is quite an interesting post. You never cease to amaze me as to how insightful you are. When I find time I plan on reading all of your articles. Stay safe and keep busy. Until we hear from you again.