#Infographic How to Win an #Argument Every Time (According to #Science )

Courtesy of: CashNetUSA

found via a tweet by @logicinbound

1min 16sec clip - A Harvard psychologist's advice on how to #argue when you know you're right

found via techinsider

thomas #aquinas & the 1st #mover argument

Church Commissioners' funds & inter-generational #equity - a summary of the #facts & #arguments in 16 short points

On Friday the above clip was posted along with a transcript, a tumblr post , a paper  and a discussion forum on the subject.

What follows is my summary of the paper in 16 shortish points.  At the foot of this post are links to my posts summarising all the other recently issued reports by the CofE, plus other related posts on CofE matters/conferences/stats.



Summary step through of the facts and arguments


The funding situation
1) In 2013 the Commissioners spent £208m (15% of the CofE's total spend). (annex para 6). 

2) Of this £122m was on pensions, £86m on non-pension costs (47% on supporting dioceses, 36% on bishops’ ministry and a further 11% supporting cathedral ministry) (annex para 6). 

3) £97m of the £208m was met from income, the balance from funds. (annex para 6). 

4) The Dioceses can't fund the proposals in the various papers.(para 2 page 2)

5) If the Commissioners pay for such they'd 'over-distribute' from their funds which pay for the spend in 2) above.(para 2 page 2)


Positives of a one off time limited Over-distribution
6) It helps generate church membership growth and local financial sustainability (annex para 21)

7) Thereby reducing the need for support from national funds in the long term. (para 39 pages 6&7).  

8) Over-distributing knowingly with precautions in place is a legitimate strategy.(para 41 page 7). 

9) A successful outcome, as a by-product, would be an increase in the Church’s financial strength. (para 4 page 1)

10) Such a one-off distribution would in principle be possible - subject to the Commissioners taking legal and actuary advice - without the need for further legislation (though legislation would be needed if new types of distribution - for example for clergy or lay training- were to be envisaged). (annex para 16 &18)


Negatives of Over-Distribution  

11) ‘Over- distribution’ means an irreversible reduction in the size of the funds (not tied up in pension) available in perpetuity to meet the costs of the living church. (annex para 4 & 20)

12) For every +'nal £100m spent the funds available for distribution (see 2) above) reduces by £2-3m p.a.(annex para 19).

13) ‘Bad’ over-distribution led to a severe financial crisis in the early 1990s. (para 5 page 1)

14) Over-distributing without understanding the consequences is a sure road to disaster. (para 5 page 1)

15) If we over-distribute the risk is that instead of having a substantial endowment and few members - the Church might have neither. (annex para 21)


Conclusion
16) Andreas Whittam Smith therefore welcomes comment from Synod on the proposals and precautions he shall outline in the debate. (it isn't clear to me if these precautions are in addition to those discussed in the paper) (para 41 page 7)



Some Background information


1) For more than 20 now the Commissioners have adopted a rigid policy of distributing only such sums that will enable the value of the endowment to be maintained in real terms through time. In so doing they have observed the principle of inter-generational equity. (para 10 page 2).  

2) They have achieved investment returns in excess of their target return of RPI plus 5% consistently over the last 20 years. This, plus a prudent distribution regime informed by independent actuarial advice, means the investment portfolio at the end of 2013 was some £6 billion. (If they'd only managed to keep pace with inflation it would be 1/2 of this). (para 36 page 6)

3) As the Commissioners are not encumbered with any borrowing and have been growing the value of the portfolio at a rate faster than simply maintaining it's real value ....SO financial support to the Church is greater than would otherwise have been the case had it merely kept pace with inflation. (para 38 page 6)

4) The highly diversified investment portfolio has shown itself resilient during recent economic turmoil. It has been able to maintain its level of distribution to the Church, in particular its support for poorer dioceses, and more recently for mission and development opportunities. (para 37 page 6)

5) Around £2 billion of the £6 billion is required to extinguish the pension obligation over the next 60 years. (annex para 2).  The actuaries advice is there will not be any increase in money available for non-pension purposes once the pension liabilities have been met.  (annex para 3)

6) The report sets out the key lessons learnt from previous mistakes:

- from 1974 onwards, over-distribution became a habit and the additional spending was targeted on recurring costs (stipends, pensions etc.), which could not be cut back when things turned sour;

- there was an over concentration of assets (Commercial property ='d 38% of assets and itself was made up of a small number of large schemes);

- The decision to borrow exacerbated the risks. Moreover interest rates doubled to 10% so in 1991 loan repayment spend was almost as much as stipends or pensions.  (para 35 page 6)

7) If over distribution were chosen there would be important questions to address over:

- The scale of the money released (if a special distribution is to be made it has to be sufficient to make a difference);

- For what purposes it was to be used and;

- How to distribute funding in such a way as to avoid a ‘boom and bust’ culture or to create dependency. The profile and purpose of the spending would need to be shaped to avoid long-term operational funding commitments and to build long-term sustainability. (annex para 22)

8) And any such distribution would need to be tightly governed, in particular to ensure the
additional monies are being properly directed towards the change programme and
are not being mopped up by ‘business as usual’ activity.  (annex para 23)

Related CofE Posts

CofE Discerning & nurturing paper - with Green Report attached - from January 2015

Church Commissioners' funds and inter-generational equity - from January 2015

CofE Resourcing the Future - from January 2015

CofE Resourcing Ministerial Education - from January 2015

CofE Simplification paper - from January 2015

CofE Developing Discipleship paper - from January 2015

“In Each Generation” : A programme for reform and renewal - from January 2015

The Green Report - on CofE talent management - from December 2014

CofE typos in services - a compilation of a @OurCofE twitter hashtag - from December 2014

CofE 2013 mission stats - from November 2014

Household of faith conference - one of several posts summarising - from July 2014

CofE Strategies - one of several posts summarising - from June/July 2014

Role of church in society conference - from June 2014

CofE church growth research conference - from January 2014

the internet #arguer - good job we're not like that

- yep - that about nails it - by slacktory

 

critical thinking no. 2: broken #logic

script by mike mcrae and james hutson, recording and music by audrey studios, animated and directed by James Hutson, produced by Bridge 8, found via brainpickings 

in summary

- logic has a structure - in logic an idea is called a premise

- which can be put with other premises in such a way as they lead us to a conclusion

- so for example
   one premise might say magnets attract iron
   another premise might be this object is made from iron
   therefore without seeing it you can logically conclude that the magnet will attract this object

- but what if we swop around the information?
  premise - magnets attract iron
  premise - this object is attracted to magnets
  from this info you cannot logically conclude that this item is made of iron  (eg magnets might attract other metals as well)

- this broken logic is called a logical fallacy - the particular example above is a formal fallacy as its form looks similar to logic but is false - in latin - and in legal circles - its called a non sequiter (which means does not follow)

critical thinking no. 1: a valuable argument

script by mike mcrae and james hutson, recording and music by audrey studios, animated and directed by James Hutson, produced by Bridge 8, found via brainpickings 

in summary

to make sense of things the brain has some clever tools and tricks
- it can turn experiences into symbols
- recall sensations
- and identify patterns

and it also takes shortcuts
- seeking out ideas that confirm what you already suspect
- finding the ideas of those you trust more appealing
- treating your own experience as evidence
- blurring the line between what you feel to be the case and what you know to be the case

most of the time these tricks serve us so well we are hardly aware of then
- but sometimes they mislead us
- the bias that are so useful can also blind us
- and in a complex world with differing opinions its hard to decide when to think using shortcuts and when to think using our heads

but thinking doesn't need to be hard
- logic is a useful way to identify ideas that are likely to be helpful - its a way of combining ideas to come to a conclusion
- e.g. on convincing somebody to let you go to an event  - instead of arguing all people are allowed to go so why can't I?  - a logical argument would be 
1) all people are allowed to go
2) I am people
3) therefore I should be allowed to go
- logic is a useful way to combine established ideas to of using established ideas to support the existence of a new idea
- looking for logic in an argument can help you decide whether you should agree with somebody or wait for more information