.... up to 20 rank-and-file [Liberal] party members have torn up their membership
tickets in the last 24 hours and switched allegiances to rival party,
the Liberal Democrats.
Thursday, August 13, 2015
LDP membership surges by about 50%, I see
Gay marriage: Liberal Party members deserting party over Abbott stance
About bicycle helmets
I'm not going to die in a ditch (allusion to not wearing a helmet not really intended) defending compulsory bicycle helmet laws, as I think that a more moderate legal line in use of bicycles generally in this country may be justifiable. (For example, if, as in Japan, the population was polite enough that cyclists could be trusted to ride at moderate speed and cautiously on urban footpaths, I wouldn't mind seeing that permitted, and for those who ride in such a manner not to be required to have helmets. Those who use dedicated bicycle lanes that are on the road - they can be treated differently.)
But still, people who say things like this:
In fact, let's look at the actual link at the claim, and here is what it says:
As for other reasons why the "never cycled as an adult in Australia" are not about to take it up now: the professional amateur cyclist (by which I mean "anyone who has ever wore bicycle pants - while on a bicycle") has probably done a greater deal of harm in the last 25 years than helmet laws which, I suspect, most adults have come to accept as sensible precaution. How? By frequently acting like entitled jerks on the road, and even on cycleways.
But still, people who say things like this:
But critics claim that helmet laws put people off cycling, causing far wider weight-related health problems due to Australians favouring driving, or not moving at all. One study found that 16.5% of people say they would ride more often if they were not required to wear a helmet at all times.should at least exercise some skepticism about what people say they would do were it not for factor X, especially when it comes to health matters. Just how many people would say, for example, that they know they should lose some weight, and will they take steps to do so, and then never quite get around to it?
In fact, let's look at the actual link at the claim, and here is what it says:
Oh really? Having to wear a helmet is just about the least of their reasons? That's not the impression that article initially gave.So what are the things that are preventing over 50% of the population from hopping on a bike, and what can our governments do to help the situation? Here’s what the they said was stopping them:
- Unsafe road conditions: 46.4%
- Speed/volume of traffic: 41.8%
- Don’t feel safe riding: 41.4%
- Lack of bicycle lanes/trails: 34.6%
- Destinations too far away: 29.9%
- No place to park/store bike: 23.5%
- Do not own a bike: 22.5%
- Weather conditions: 22.1%
- Not fit enough: 21.8%
- Too hilly: 19.6%
- Don’t feel confident riding: 18.6%
- Not enough time: 16.7%
- Don’t like wearing a helmet: 15.7%
- No place to change/shower: 14.6%
- Health problems: 14.4%
As for other reasons why the "never cycled as an adult in Australia" are not about to take it up now: the professional amateur cyclist (by which I mean "anyone who has ever wore bicycle pants - while on a bicycle") has probably done a greater deal of harm in the last 25 years than helmet laws which, I suspect, most adults have come to accept as sensible precaution. How? By frequently acting like entitled jerks on the road, and even on cycleways.
Can someone get this idiot off TV?
Michelle Rodriguez's urine breaks Bear Grylls
I just had to read the story, and it is as ridiculous as the headline indicates. Grylls makes a living out of faking survival scenarios which are stupid and pointless exercises in degradation for public entertainment.
I just had to read the story, and it is as ridiculous as the headline indicates. Grylls makes a living out of faking survival scenarios which are stupid and pointless exercises in degradation for public entertainment.
Modern marriage
I don't write much about same sex marriage because: it is, without doubt, the trickiest topic to address without feeling that you're hurting someone's feelings without actually wanting to; sexuality is actually a difficult matter theologically given that all types of relationships involving sex can be loving ones and God's supposed to be about love; and some of those on my side of the issue (against it, basically, while accepting that it appears virtually inevitable) are people:
1. only too willing to use derisive and insulting language with respect to homosexuals;
2. make it clear that they have a problem with homosexuality merely because they personally find the very idea of some forms of sex repulsive; and
3. have the worst possible judgement on the matter of actual great significance to the future of the planet*;
and as such it's embarrassing to be on their side.
Nevertheless, here we go:
a. I'm sorry, is this just an age related thing?, but whenever I see a same sex marriage ceremony on TV as part of their advocacy for a change in the law, I cannot help but feel it looks like a parody of what I, and (let's be truthful here) several billion other people both now and over history, have understood as a wedding. I have my doubts I'll ever get over that feeling, especially when you see things such as female couples in bridal gowns, cutting of wedding cakes with same sex couples on top, etc.
b. While we're being frank here, I've noticed what I think is an increasing strain of victimology coming in to some of the advocacy, particularly for those who claim that not being able to marry has made coping with their sexuality much harder psychologically. This at first blush sounds very plausible, but I was just checking around again on the matter, and as far as I can tell, homosexual people even in remarkably gay endorsing countries such as England still seem to suffer about twice the rate of mental health issues compared to the general population. Now, sure, I guess that no matter how many gay celebrities are on national television and how gay friendly your national laws are, being gay may well still cause tension and difficulties within families, and that can account for some incidence of depression and other mental health issues.
But....that being the case, and while fulling acknowledging that gay people were genuine victims of some appalling legal treatment via the criminalisation and medical definition of of their sexuality until quite recently, it seems near certain that gay marriage is not going to be a dramatic cure all for the increased rate of mental health issues which gay people suffer from.
Of course, the argument could be made that, even if the "gay gene" carries with it a predisposition to greater susceptibility to things like depression, that's all the more reason to remove any possible social reason as to why they might feel left out and unhappy. Maybe. But I still think some SSM advocates are overselling the benefits of this law reform as a cure all for what makes them - OK, some of them - unhappy. It reminds me a bit of the cases of the rich and ostensibly successful who find themselves puzzled because there is no longer any obvious reason why they still feel depressed much of the time. (Stephan Fry might fit into that category.)
c. I thought that Katy Faust last night on Lateline was actually not a bad advocate for the conservative position - but it's terribly unfortunate for the sake of the political and social argument that she is Christian. I have never heard of her before, and maybe if I read some of her stuff I might not find her as good as she appeared last night, but it seemed to me that her argument was not religiously based, but SSM advocates will dismiss her views because she is religious.
d. As Katy Faust would seem to agree, much of the issue that conservatives have with SSM is actually more to do with how SSM inter-relates with child bearing and child rearing. But heterosexual use of reproductive technology broke the ground for that, so there is no doubt that there has been a "slippery slope" effect in social views. Conservative Catholics would argue this started with modern contraception severing the natural connection between sex and child bearing, and as much as I disagree with them on the validity of trying to hold back the tide of improved methods of contraception, I have to admit it is a fair enough argument. The problem is, by over-reaching on the matter of how proscriptive they could be on the matter of what sexual acts are automatically against God's will, they lost all credibility for drawing lines anywhere else on matters of sex and reproduction amongst everyone except Latin loving Mass types, who also invariably happen to be nuttily against science on climate change.
e. On the matter of social attitudes towards reproductive technology and child rearing, people on the SSM side seem to always be inadequately acknowledging the degree to which they can change back to more conservative positions. Use of anonymous donor sperm is a great example of this: it was all the rage for a while there, and advocates for "anything goes" at the time never seemed to credit the importance with which the children from such a system could come in future to view knowledge of their biological parent.
It seems to me that with surrogacy, we could entirely face the same backlash in future, and all the gossip magazine current coo-ing over gay men happy with their adorable new baby pushed out by some well paid poor woman in India is not going to change that. (I find it deeply ironic that it tends to be women's magazines that see to be so gushing over celebrity gay male families using surrogacy. One commercial use of a woman's body is fine and dandy, apparently, yet a male celebrity using a prostitute doesn't get quite the same reaction.)
Even with lesbian couples, people seem blithely unwilling to question the matter of the relationship of the child with the biological father. Now, unlike commercial surrogacy, it may be that some such couples will be on good terms with the father who the child may always know (and, in fact, he may be something of a father figure to them if he is with them enough.) But it's clear that to a great many SSM advocates that this simply does not matter enough to even question - I'm thinking the case of Senator Penny Wong, for example - it's the fulfillment of the lesbian couple that counts. As with those who were thinking 30 years ago that anonymous sperm donation would never matter to the kids resulting, this is just a patently shallow attitude that is, in effect, the mere intellectual fashion of the moment.
f. Having said all of this, the popular tide of opinion, especially amongst the young, is strongly for gay marriage, and it appears socially inevitable and will not mean the downfall of civilization, so I don't quite understand why Tony Abbott, if going for a plebiscite on the matter, would not just bring it on for the next election.
I think it is pretty clear that however Abbott proceeds, it will come in, and any approach which is seen to be dragging out the inevitable only hurts him politically.
In order to keep face with his supporters, such that they are because, let's face it, he is a failure of a PM and you have to be nuts to disagree, the plebiscite idea is not a bad one. But why delay it for 3 years?
* global warming and climate change, as if you don't know...
1. only too willing to use derisive and insulting language with respect to homosexuals;
2. make it clear that they have a problem with homosexuality merely because they personally find the very idea of some forms of sex repulsive; and
3. have the worst possible judgement on the matter of actual great significance to the future of the planet*;
and as such it's embarrassing to be on their side.
Nevertheless, here we go:
a. I'm sorry, is this just an age related thing?, but whenever I see a same sex marriage ceremony on TV as part of their advocacy for a change in the law, I cannot help but feel it looks like a parody of what I, and (let's be truthful here) several billion other people both now and over history, have understood as a wedding. I have my doubts I'll ever get over that feeling, especially when you see things such as female couples in bridal gowns, cutting of wedding cakes with same sex couples on top, etc.
b. While we're being frank here, I've noticed what I think is an increasing strain of victimology coming in to some of the advocacy, particularly for those who claim that not being able to marry has made coping with their sexuality much harder psychologically. This at first blush sounds very plausible, but I was just checking around again on the matter, and as far as I can tell, homosexual people even in remarkably gay endorsing countries such as England still seem to suffer about twice the rate of mental health issues compared to the general population. Now, sure, I guess that no matter how many gay celebrities are on national television and how gay friendly your national laws are, being gay may well still cause tension and difficulties within families, and that can account for some incidence of depression and other mental health issues.
But....that being the case, and while fulling acknowledging that gay people were genuine victims of some appalling legal treatment via the criminalisation and medical definition of of their sexuality until quite recently, it seems near certain that gay marriage is not going to be a dramatic cure all for the increased rate of mental health issues which gay people suffer from.
Of course, the argument could be made that, even if the "gay gene" carries with it a predisposition to greater susceptibility to things like depression, that's all the more reason to remove any possible social reason as to why they might feel left out and unhappy. Maybe. But I still think some SSM advocates are overselling the benefits of this law reform as a cure all for what makes them - OK, some of them - unhappy. It reminds me a bit of the cases of the rich and ostensibly successful who find themselves puzzled because there is no longer any obvious reason why they still feel depressed much of the time. (Stephan Fry might fit into that category.)
c. I thought that Katy Faust last night on Lateline was actually not a bad advocate for the conservative position - but it's terribly unfortunate for the sake of the political and social argument that she is Christian. I have never heard of her before, and maybe if I read some of her stuff I might not find her as good as she appeared last night, but it seemed to me that her argument was not religiously based, but SSM advocates will dismiss her views because she is religious.
d. As Katy Faust would seem to agree, much of the issue that conservatives have with SSM is actually more to do with how SSM inter-relates with child bearing and child rearing. But heterosexual use of reproductive technology broke the ground for that, so there is no doubt that there has been a "slippery slope" effect in social views. Conservative Catholics would argue this started with modern contraception severing the natural connection between sex and child bearing, and as much as I disagree with them on the validity of trying to hold back the tide of improved methods of contraception, I have to admit it is a fair enough argument. The problem is, by over-reaching on the matter of how proscriptive they could be on the matter of what sexual acts are automatically against God's will, they lost all credibility for drawing lines anywhere else on matters of sex and reproduction amongst everyone except Latin loving Mass types, who also invariably happen to be nuttily against science on climate change.
e. On the matter of social attitudes towards reproductive technology and child rearing, people on the SSM side seem to always be inadequately acknowledging the degree to which they can change back to more conservative positions. Use of anonymous donor sperm is a great example of this: it was all the rage for a while there, and advocates for "anything goes" at the time never seemed to credit the importance with which the children from such a system could come in future to view knowledge of their biological parent.
It seems to me that with surrogacy, we could entirely face the same backlash in future, and all the gossip magazine current coo-ing over gay men happy with their adorable new baby pushed out by some well paid poor woman in India is not going to change that. (I find it deeply ironic that it tends to be women's magazines that see to be so gushing over celebrity gay male families using surrogacy. One commercial use of a woman's body is fine and dandy, apparently, yet a male celebrity using a prostitute doesn't get quite the same reaction.)
Even with lesbian couples, people seem blithely unwilling to question the matter of the relationship of the child with the biological father. Now, unlike commercial surrogacy, it may be that some such couples will be on good terms with the father who the child may always know (and, in fact, he may be something of a father figure to them if he is with them enough.) But it's clear that to a great many SSM advocates that this simply does not matter enough to even question - I'm thinking the case of Senator Penny Wong, for example - it's the fulfillment of the lesbian couple that counts. As with those who were thinking 30 years ago that anonymous sperm donation would never matter to the kids resulting, this is just a patently shallow attitude that is, in effect, the mere intellectual fashion of the moment.
f. Having said all of this, the popular tide of opinion, especially amongst the young, is strongly for gay marriage, and it appears socially inevitable and will not mean the downfall of civilization, so I don't quite understand why Tony Abbott, if going for a plebiscite on the matter, would not just bring it on for the next election.
I think it is pretty clear that however Abbott proceeds, it will come in, and any approach which is seen to be dragging out the inevitable only hurts him politically.
In order to keep face with his supporters, such that they are because, let's face it, he is a failure of a PM and you have to be nuts to disagree, the plebiscite idea is not a bad one. But why delay it for 3 years?
* global warming and climate change, as if you don't know...
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Combining solar farms and agriculture
Japan Next-Generation Farmers Cultivate Crops and Solar Energy - Renewable Energy World
I had been wondering about this for some time: lots of Australian farming land is flat, expansive fields in parts of the country where (I would have thought) the sunlight is of such intensity in summer that it's probably more than strictly necessary for most crops. In fact, some shading in the height of summer might be useful for decreasing soil drying.
So, is it possible to successfully combine large scale solar panels with useful agriculture beneath them?
From the link above - yes, it would seem that it is.
Worth looking into for Australia, isn't it?
Update: here's a paper from France looking at how some crops go under partial solar panel shade. Seems it can be made to work OK.
I had been wondering about this for some time: lots of Australian farming land is flat, expansive fields in parts of the country where (I would have thought) the sunlight is of such intensity in summer that it's probably more than strictly necessary for most crops. In fact, some shading in the height of summer might be useful for decreasing soil drying.
So, is it possible to successfully combine large scale solar panels with useful agriculture beneath them?
From the link above - yes, it would seem that it is.
Worth looking into for Australia, isn't it?
Update: here's a paper from France looking at how some crops go under partial solar panel shade. Seems it can be made to work OK.
On finding other planets
Matt Ridley on filters | …and Then There's Physics
The astronomer who blogs about climate change has an interesting post up after the difficult work of finding other, potentially habitable, planets. (And climate change still gets a mention, too.)
The astronomer who blogs about climate change has an interesting post up after the difficult work of finding other, potentially habitable, planets. (And climate change still gets a mention, too.)
A PM with scant authority in his own party room
Given all of the turmoil that Gillard had to face with disunity, along with an opportunistic policy windvane of an Opposition Leader, it's quite ironic to see from this report by Phil Coorey that Abbott seems to be having a lot of trouble convincing his own backbenchers to follow his preferred tactics.
Even more amusing was the last bit:
Even more amusing was the last bit:
The party room discussion comes amid growing unrest in the Coalition over Mr Abbott's leadership just six months after he survived a spill.
News of the push leaked while the party room meeting was underway. This caused angry scenes inside the party room as to who was leaking, according to further leaks.I tell you what: when Abbott goes, he's not going to be feted on the talk circuit by those on his side of politics as a basically good PM thwarted by circumstances, like Gillard. He is, undoubtedly, going down in history as one of our worst Prime Ministers by the reckoning of all sides of politics.
Mad film noted
Hard to Be a God review – mud, blood and holy hell | Film | The Guardian
This film seems to be in the category of "so bizarre, it might be worth seeing":
This film seems to be in the category of "so bizarre, it might be worth seeing":
This monochrome dream-epic of medieval cruelty and squalor is a
non-sci-fi sci-fi; a monumental, and monumentally mad film that the
Russian film-maker Alexei German began working on around 15 years ago.
It was completed by his son, Alexei German Jr, after the director’s
death in 2013. If ever a movie deserved the title folie de grandeur
it is this, placed before audiences on a take-it-or-leave-it basis:
maniacally vehement and strange, a slo-mo kaleidoscope of chaos and also
a relentless prose poem of fear, featuring three hours’ worth of
non-sequitur dialogue, where each line is an imagist stab with nothing
to do what has just been said....
It is set in what appears to be a horrendous central European village of
the middle ages, as imagined by Hieronymus Bosch, where grotesquely
ugly and wretched peasants are condemned to clamber over each other for
all eternity, smeared in mud and blood: a world beset with tyranny and
factional wars between groups called “Blacks” and “Greys”. In the midst
of this, what looks like an imperious baronial chieftain called Don
Rumata, played by Leonid Yarmolnik, walks with relative impunity: this
sovereignty is based on his claim to be descended from a god....
Each shot is a vision of pandemonium: a depthless chiaroscuro
composition in which dogs, chickens, owls and hedgehogs appear on
virtually equal terms with the bewildered humans, who themselves are
semi-bestial. The camera ranges lightly over this panorama of bedlam,
and characters both important and unimportant will occasionally peer
stunned into the camera lens, like passersby in some documentary.
Monday, August 10, 2015
More atomic musings
The BBC has some pretty good material on the anniversary of Hiroshima and Nagasaki: I thought this piece on "the man who saved Kyoto from the atomic bomb" (apparently, Secretary of War Henry Stimson, who had visited the city several times in the 1920's and may have honeymooned there) was interesting; as was this time line of the countdown to Hiroshima. There was a popular book about the Enola Gay's mission some years ago which I think is still on my bookshelf somewhere - I may yet get around to reading it.
One thing that I thought about today was how long it may have taken for photographic evidence of the extent of the devastation in Hiroshima to reach the fractured government in Tokyo. I mean, it's easy for us to look at the photos now and think it's amazing it took any more than a day or so to end the war after that scene of instant devastation, but visual communication then was not what it is now.
I guess someone has written about when the first photos of it were to be seen in Tokyo, but I haven't found the definitive answer. Certainly, Wikipedia indicates that at least eyewitness reports were being received pretty quickly:
I hadn't heard before about this possibly influential lie told by a captured US pilot:
Anyhow, back to the atomic bombings. The Wikipedia entry spends a bit of time on the debate had at the time about whether a demonstration bomb should be attempted, which is good to see. (Jon Stewart should have read about this.)
While the great uncertainty around whether the airborne bombs would even work, and the very small number available, makes for a convincing argument as to why it would have been extremely risky to make the first one an advertised demonstration, I wonder if a decent case can be made for the second bomb being a demonstration: one (say) within obvious sight of Tokyo. I suppose you would never be sure how many people would see it unless you warned them, and the mountain is not within easy sight of all parts of the city, but I speculate that seeing the spiritually important Mount Fuji under an atomic cloud (but at the relatively "safe" distance of 130 km) might have been psychologically very damaging. (Whether the subsequent number of people sickened by radiation around Tokyo would have been worse than the number sickened at Nagasaki remains guesswork, I suppose; but I presume there would have been comparatively few immediate casualties.)
Oh, and here's another thing I read about today - the extensive underground space known as the Matsushiro Underground Imperial Headquarters that was intended to be the last refuge of the Japanese government. Now in the suburbs of Nagano, it was no small undertaking:
Update: here's a lengthy article at Politico about the US's less than fully helpful research into the health effect of the victims of the bombings. Makes it all the more remarkable that US popular culture took off in the country within a short space of time. Here's some particularly sad information:
One thing that I thought about today was how long it may have taken for photographic evidence of the extent of the devastation in Hiroshima to reach the fractured government in Tokyo. I mean, it's easy for us to look at the photos now and think it's amazing it took any more than a day or so to end the war after that scene of instant devastation, but visual communication then was not what it is now.
I guess someone has written about when the first photos of it were to be seen in Tokyo, but I haven't found the definitive answer. Certainly, Wikipedia indicates that at least eyewitness reports were being received pretty quickly:
On August 7, a day after Hiroshima was destroyed, Dr. Yoshio Nishina and other atomic physicists arrived at the city, and carefully examined the damage. They then went back to Tokyo and told the cabinet that Hiroshima was indeed destroyed by an atomic bomb. Admiral Soemu Toyoda, the Chief of the Naval General Staff, estimated that no more than one or two additional bombs could be readied, so they decided to endure the remaining attacks, acknowledging "there would be more destruction but the war would go on."[164] American Magic codebreakers intercepted the cabinet's messages.[165]On that point about the limited number of bombs that the Japanese thought America might have, another Wikipedia entry notes this:
Admiral Soemu Toyoda, the Chief of the Naval General Staff, argued that even if the United States had made one, they could not have many more.[78] American strategists, having anticipated a reaction like Toyoda's, planned to drop a second bomb shortly after the first, to convince the Japanese that the U.S. had a large supply.[62][79]
I hadn't heard before about this possibly influential lie told by a captured US pilot:
The full cabinet met on 14:30 on August 9, and spent most of the day debating surrender. As the Big Six had done, the cabinet split, with neither Tōgō's position nor Anami's attracting a majority.[88] Anami told the other cabinet ministers that, under torture, a captured American P-51 fighter pilot had told his interrogators that the United States possessed 100 atom bombs and that Tokyo and Kyoto would be bombed "in the next few days". The pilot, Marcus McDilda, was lying. He knew nothing of the Manhattan Project and simply told his interrogators what he thought they wanted to hear to end the torture. The lie, which caused him to be classified as a high-priority prisoner, probably saved him from beheading.[89] In reality, the United States would have had the third bomb ready for use around August 19, and a fourth in September 1945.[90] The third bomb probably would have been used against Tokyo.[91]The Atlantic had this story which gives some details of the attempted coup and efforts to protect the Emperor's recorded surrender broadcast. Many military leaders were killing themselves, and unfortunately taking others with them:
In the days that followed the emperor’s radio address, at least eight generals killed themselves. On one afternoon, Vice Admiral Matome Ugaki, commander of the Fifth Air Fleet on the island of Kyushu, drank a farewell cup of sake with his staff and drove to an airfield where 11 D4Y Suisei dive-bombers were lined up, engines roaring. Before him stood 22 young men, each wearing a white headband emblazoned with a red rising sun.Well, for the airmen following him, I wonder if crashing pointlessly into an empty ocean might have felt a particularly embittering way to end their war.
Ugaki climbed onto a platform and, gazing down on them, asked, “Will all of you go with me?”
“Yes, sir!” they all shouted, raising their right hands in the air.
“Many thanks to all of you,” he said. He climbed down from the stand, got into his plane, and took off. The other planes followed him into the sky.
Aloft, he sent back a message: “I am going to proceed to Okinawa, where our men lost their lives like cherry blossoms, and ram into the arrogant American ships, displaying the real spirit of a Japanese warrior.”
Ugaki’s kamikazes flew off toward the expected location of the American fleet. They were never heard from again.
Anyhow, back to the atomic bombings. The Wikipedia entry spends a bit of time on the debate had at the time about whether a demonstration bomb should be attempted, which is good to see. (Jon Stewart should have read about this.)
While the great uncertainty around whether the airborne bombs would even work, and the very small number available, makes for a convincing argument as to why it would have been extremely risky to make the first one an advertised demonstration, I wonder if a decent case can be made for the second bomb being a demonstration: one (say) within obvious sight of Tokyo. I suppose you would never be sure how many people would see it unless you warned them, and the mountain is not within easy sight of all parts of the city, but I speculate that seeing the spiritually important Mount Fuji under an atomic cloud (but at the relatively "safe" distance of 130 km) might have been psychologically very damaging. (Whether the subsequent number of people sickened by radiation around Tokyo would have been worse than the number sickened at Nagasaki remains guesswork, I suppose; but I presume there would have been comparatively few immediate casualties.)
Oh, and here's another thing I read about today - the extensive underground space known as the Matsushiro Underground Imperial Headquarters that was intended to be the last refuge of the Japanese government. Now in the suburbs of Nagano, it was no small undertaking:
Construction began on November 11, 1944[2] and continued until Japan's surrender on August 15, 1945. Construction was 75% completed at the end of the war, with 5,856.6 square meters (63,040 sq ft) of floor-space (59,635 cubic meters (2,106,000 cu ft) of volume) excavated. Between 7,000 and 10,000 Korean slave laborers were used to build the complex, and it is estimated that 1,500 of them died.[3] Forty-six Koreans disappeared on August 15, 1945, when Japan surrendered.It was supposed to house an underground Imperial Palace:
The original purpose of the complex was to serve as an alternative headquarters for the Imperial General headquarters. However, in March 1945, secret orders were issued to add a palace to the complex.[5] Yoshijirō Umezu informed Emperor Hirohito about construction of the complex in May, but did not tell him that it contained a palace. The plan was to relocate the Emperor to the complex in an armored train. When informed about the existence of the palace in July, Hirohito twice refused to relocate.[5] It has been suggested that he refused because going to Matsushiro would have isolated the Emperor and allowed the army to rule in his name, effectively guaranteeing they would pursue the war to "suicidal extremes".[6]And finally, just as I linked the other day to photos taken of the resilient Hiroshima only two years after the bombing, here is a great series of photos from last year's The Atlantic of Japan in the 1950's, complete with its rapid industrialisation, Americanisation, and transistor TVs. What an incredible transformation the country made in such a small time...
Update: here's a lengthy article at Politico about the US's less than fully helpful research into the health effect of the victims of the bombings. Makes it all the more remarkable that US popular culture took off in the country within a short space of time. Here's some particularly sad information:
By the 1960s, long after Dr. Yamazaki had left Nagasaki, a study examining the effects of radiation exposure in utero in Nagasaki and Hiroshima grew to 3,600 children, including their control groups. As these children grew older, the ABCC’s outcomes confirmed radiation exposure as the cause of most of the children’s health conditions, including high incidences of microcephaly and neurological impairments. The studies revealed the particular vulnerabilities of timing as it related to in utero radiation exposure. Children who had been exposed at eight to 15 weeks after conception demonstrated significantly greater risk of developmental disabilities because fetal brain cells are more susceptible to radiation damage in this stage of pregnancy. In a Nagasaki substudy published in 1972, eight of nine children (89 percent) exposed before the 18th week of pregnancy were diagnosed with microcephaly—compared to two of nine children (22 percent) exposed to the same levels of radiation later in their gestational development.
Update 2: see here for a post about the important symbolism of Fuji, including information about the way Allied propaganda "targetted" the mountain in leaflets, and considered bombing it.
Friday, August 07, 2015
Fascinating science
RealClimate: Ice-core dating corroborates tree ring chronologies
Here's an interesting story of work done to resolve apparent conflict between tree ring temperature chronologies and those from ice cores.
The one thing I would like to know more about is this part of the story:
Here's an interesting story of work done to resolve apparent conflict between tree ring temperature chronologies and those from ice cores.
The one thing I would like to know more about is this part of the story:
In 2012, Miyaki et al. discovered a rapid increase of radiocarbon (14C) in Japanese cedar, precisely dated to AD 774-775. The cause of this increase was possibly due to a very high energy solar proton event (Usoskin et al., 2013), and its effect on radiocarbon has been observed in tree ring chronologies in both hemispheres (Güttler et al., 2015). Another rapid, slightly smaller (~60%), radiocarbon production event has been dated to AD 993-994 (Miyake et al., 2013).Do we know what causes "very high energy solar proton events"?
A Richard Tol thread of note
Personal attacks on Met Office scientists | …and Then There's Physics
Wow. Richard Tol gets involved in a thread and really takes a credibility battering at the link above.
Wow. Richard Tol gets involved in a thread and really takes a credibility battering at the link above.
Reality TV cooked
I'm not surprised that Restaurant Revolution has been a complete ratings failure.
The host is bland; the judging team is little better, although it is a little fun being scared of the Serious Asian Woman; and as the teams competing never spend much time together in the same spot, you just don't get the interest of face to face snide comments like you get in My Kitchen Rules.
As for "Hotplates": I've seen only 15 minutes, but it was during that time exactly identical in format to MKR. Oh alright, there was one difference: the teams wrote their scores on a piece of paper, as well as saying it out loud. It's a shameless rip off, as far as I can see, but with charmless hosts and more intensely annoying contestants than MKR can manage to find. It seems to me it should be liable for some form of breach of intellectual property....
The host is bland; the judging team is little better, although it is a little fun being scared of the Serious Asian Woman; and as the teams competing never spend much time together in the same spot, you just don't get the interest of face to face snide comments like you get in My Kitchen Rules.
As for "Hotplates": I've seen only 15 minutes, but it was during that time exactly identical in format to MKR. Oh alright, there was one difference: the teams wrote their scores on a piece of paper, as well as saying it out loud. It's a shameless rip off, as far as I can see, but with charmless hosts and more intensely annoying contestants than MKR can manage to find. It seems to me it should be liable for some form of breach of intellectual property....
Heat in the North
While (I think) much of Australia continues to have a colder winter than normal, I see that in the Northern Hemisphere, it's been hot in Japan, America (ironically, with Rick Perry's State perhaps about to set some records) and the Middle East.
As this story notes, Iraq has a huge number of displaced persons, many living in camps while the country hits highs of 51 degrees.
I really wonder how people in temporary shelters (not sure, but are many tents?) survive in that heat.
As this story notes, Iraq has a huge number of displaced persons, many living in camps while the country hits highs of 51 degrees.
I really wonder how people in temporary shelters (not sure, but are many tents?) survive in that heat.
Thursday, August 06, 2015
Hiroshima not forgotten
7.30 last night did a good story about high school girls in Hiroshima taking part in recording the previously untold stories of survivors. (The 88 and 90 year old sisters looked very sprightly, and sounded as sharp as a tack.)
I've been trying to find some other, less well known, photos with which to remember the 70 year anniversary, and perhaps these will do - a series of photos taken for Life only a couple of years after the bomb, which show both the horrifying wounds on survivors, but also signs of the resilience with which the city was (surprisingly rapidly) re-establishing itself.
I've been trying to find some other, less well known, photos with which to remember the 70 year anniversary, and perhaps these will do - a series of photos taken for Life only a couple of years after the bomb, which show both the horrifying wounds on survivors, but also signs of the resilience with which the city was (surprisingly rapidly) re-establishing itself.
Tracking down the conservative/liberal gene
Can genes make us liberal or conservative?
If Jason Soon doesn't tweet this story, I'll eat my metaphorical hat.
The one thing I don't quite understand about the apparent genetic component to political beliefs, however, is how it explains the not uncommon phenomena of former quite extreme Lefties who convert to being extreme Righties. (It sort of happens in the reverse direction too, I suppose, but not as often.) The ranks of Catallaxy threads are full of people who claim they made the conversion, for example. Is there just a genetic element to "it doesn't matter what I believe, I just must believe it 100% percent"?
Update: my "hat" is safe. I spent a while yesterday wondering whether I had correctly referred to it as "metaphorical" or not, and found it hard to work out a definitive answer from Google.
If Jason Soon doesn't tweet this story, I'll eat my metaphorical hat.
The one thing I don't quite understand about the apparent genetic component to political beliefs, however, is how it explains the not uncommon phenomena of former quite extreme Lefties who convert to being extreme Righties. (It sort of happens in the reverse direction too, I suppose, but not as often.) The ranks of Catallaxy threads are full of people who claim they made the conversion, for example. Is there just a genetic element to "it doesn't matter what I believe, I just must believe it 100% percent"?
Update: my "hat" is safe. I spent a while yesterday wondering whether I had correctly referred to it as "metaphorical" or not, and found it hard to work out a definitive answer from Google.
Beautiful Antarctica
Readers will know I like photos of Antarctica, and there is a beautiful set of them up at The Atlantic, for some reason.
More care needed
Crucial ocean-acidification models come up short : Nature News & Comment
Interesting article here, noting that a lot of the uncertainty in working out the ecological effects of ocean acidification comes from experimenters (especially those at the start of research into this) not being careful enough with the experimental set up.
I had noticed myself that, over the years, after the initial flurry of reports about the dire effects on different organisms, there followed a lot of considerably more ambiguous reports from tank experiments. And, yes, it had been noted before that how the water chemistry is altered is important.
But do the researchers writing this paper think this means there is not a serious problem for the oceans? Nope:
Interesting article here, noting that a lot of the uncertainty in working out the ecological effects of ocean acidification comes from experimenters (especially those at the start of research into this) not being careful enough with the experimental set up.
I had noticed myself that, over the years, after the initial flurry of reports about the dire effects on different organisms, there followed a lot of considerably more ambiguous reports from tank experiments. And, yes, it had been noted before that how the water chemistry is altered is important.
But do the researchers writing this paper think this means there is not a serious problem for the oceans? Nope:
Cornwall says that the “overwhelming evidence” from such studies of theThis article also notes that not enough experiments have looked at the combination of warming water and decreasing pH together.
negative effects of ocean acidification still stands. For example,
more-acidic waters slow the growth and worsen the health of many species
that build structures such as shells from calcium carbonate. But the
pair’s discovery that many of the experiments are problematic makes it
difficult to assess accurately the magnitude of effects of ocean
acidification, and to combine results from individual experiments to
build overall predictions for how the ecosystem as a whole will behave,
he says.
Wednesday, August 05, 2015
Climate change, algal blooms, poison crabs
Toxic algae blooming in warm water from California to Alaska
This coastal ribbon of microscopic algae, up to 40 miles wide and 650 feet deep in places,Come on. It's hard to imagine how warming ocean waters won't lead to more extensive and longer lasting poison algal blooms.
is flourishing amid unusually warm Pacific Ocean temperatures. It now stretches from at least California to Alaska and has shut down lucrative fisheries. Shellfish managers on Tuesday doubled the area off Washington's coast that is closed to Dungeness crab fishing, after
finding elevated levels of marine toxins in tested crab meat.
So-called "red tides" are cyclical and have happened many times before, but ocean researchers say this one is much larger and persisting much longer, with higher levels of neurotoxins bringing severe consequences for the Pacific seafood industry, coastal tourism and marine ecosystems.
Dan Ayres, coastal shellfish manager for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, said the area now closed to crab fishing includes more than half the state's 157-mile-long coast, and likely will bring a premature end to this year's crab season.
"We think it's just sitting and lingering out there," said Anthony Odell, a University of Washington research analyst who is part of a NOAA-led team surveying the harmful algae bloom, which was first detected in May. "It's farther offshore, but it's still there."
The survey data should provide a clearer picture of what is causing the bloom which is brownish in color, unlike the blue and green algae found in polluted freshwater lakes. Marine detectives already have a suspect: a large patch of water running as much as 3 degrees centigrade warmer than normal in the northeast Pacific Ocean, nicknamed "the blob."
"The question on everyone's mind is whether this is related to global climate change. The simple answer is that it could be, but at this point it's hard to separate the variations in these cycles," said Donald Boesch, professor of marine science at the University of Maryland who
is not involved in the survey. "Maybe the cycles are more extreme in the changing climate."
"Classic liberal" and its modern, crypto meaning
If you ask me, "classic liberal" has become something of a cover for "short-sighted rich libertarian asshat primarily interested in increasing his or her own wealth and influence."
Here's Charles Koch, for example:
Here's Charles Koch, for example:
Q: How important is it to you to see a Republican in the White House?
A: It depends on the Republican. I am not a Republican. I consider myself a classical liberal. I believe in certain principles and I am looking for candidates who are advancing those principles....
Q: How is it fair that people who have more money have more of a voice in politics? Isn’t that an imbalance?
A: Well, voice, what does that mean? I mean, the government is largely influenced by people who advocate corporate welfare and advocate these policies that create this two-tiered society … So I mean, a voice, yeah, we get more press. You all are interested in what we say. But are we really having an influence?...
Q: Are you worried about climate change?
A: Well, I mean I believe it’s been warming some. There’s a big debate on that, because it depends on whether you use satellite measurements, balloon, or you use ground ones that have been adjusted. But there has been warming. The CO2 goes up, the CO2 has probably contributed to that. But they say it’s going to be catastrophic. There is no evidence to that. They have these models that show it, but the models don’t work … To be scientific, it has to be testable and refutable. And so I mean, it has elements of science in it, and then of conjecture, ideology and politics. So do we want to create a catastrophe today in the economy because of some speculation based on models that don’t work? Those are my questions. But believe me, I spent my whole life studying science and the philosophy of science, and our whole company is committed to science.
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