Boing Boing: Bush could have gotten Zarqawi long ago
OK, this may not be new for some readers, but it is something I had either overlooked or have forgotten.
Boing Boing, which is good on pop culture but always liberal in any political post, notes the brief Salon article that points out that in 2002, before the Iraq invasion, Bush had a chance to take out an Al-Zarqawi camp in Northern Iraq, but chose not to.
The reasons given depend on the source. MSNBC said in 2004 it was because Bush did not want to take out a justification for invading Iraq. The ABC had a Four Corners relevant to this that I obviously missed. It reported a CIA agent as saying that the reason was that Bush did not want to appear to be a "gunslinger" while he was trying to build up French support for an invasion. Of course, most Salon and Boing Boing readers will take the first explanation over the second any day, even though if he had attacked the camp, it is pretty clear he would have been criticised.
Meanwhile, the Weekly Standard article referred to a couple of post ago has details from Colin Powell's speech (not contradicted according to Hayes) in which it was pointed out that although the camp itself was in a part of Iraq not fully controlled by Saddam, Zarqawi and associates were in the Sunni triangle in the lead up to the invasion. As Hitchens and others have pointed out, Iraq was not then the sort of place in which figures with a terrorist profile could get around without the State knowing.
What have we learned in the last 12 months? That Saddam liked to pretend even to his generals that he had WMD up his sleeve. That al Qaeda people, including Zarqawi, were not only in Northern Iraq setting up terrorist camps, but were also in the Sunni triangle.
Even in the (unlikely) event that Saddam had no knowledge or interest in al Qaeda in Iraq whatsoever, why is anyone surprised that the USA legitimately thought that if he had WMD (as he pretended to) he would be prepared to pass them onto al Qaeda?
UPDATE: I wrote the above before reading Hitchen's latest piece in Slate. (It's not the one that was reprinted in the Australian.) It is excellent stuff. An extract:
It is from this source [Jordan]that we know that Zarqawi was in Baghdad at least as early as June 2002, almost a year before the invasion. Indeed, as the Senate intelligence committee report has confirmed, it was in that month that the G.I.D. contacted the Saddam Hussein regime to "inform" the Iraqis that this very dangerous fellow was on their territory. Given the absolute police-state condition of Iraq at that time, it is in any case impossible to believe that such a person was in town, so to speak, incognito. And remember that in 2002, even states like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan were at least ostensibly expelling known al-Qaida members from their turf or else arresting them. Only Saddam's Iraq (—which did not reply to the Jordanian messages) —was tolerating and encouraging the presence of men who were on the run from Afghanistan.
It is customary to dismiss evidence of this kind with a brisk and pseudo-knowing sneer about the "secular" nature of Saddam's regime and thus its presumed incompatibility with theocratic fanatics. Quite how this CIA-sponsored "analysis" has survived this long is beyond me. At least from the time of its conclusion of hostilities with Iran, Baghdad became a center of jihadist propaganda and sponsorship. Saddam himself started to be painted and photographed wearing the robes of an imam. He began a gigantic mosque-building program. He financed the suicide-murderers who worked against the more secular PLO. He sent money to the Muslim separatists in the Philippines. His closest regional ally was the theocracy in Sudan, which had been the host of Osama Bin Laden.
As opposed to this, we have Phillip Adams in his column today saying this:
Zarqawi's death will not reduce terrorism in Iraq. It will, however, briefly endorse one of Bush's dubious justifications of his war - that alleged link between 9/11, Saddam and bin Laden. Al-Qa'ida arrived in Iraq after the fall of Saddam. The coalition gave them a red carpet. But despite disenchantment with Bush and his war, most US voters still believe their President's bizarre allegations that 9/11 was a double-act involving Saddam and bin Laden. And here's a trophy head to prove it.
This is rich. The Left is simply unable to point to any statement by Bush or his cohorts that that they believed Saddam was behind 7-11. Yet they still blame Bush for (apparently) a significant percentage of Americans believing a connection existed. (By the way, I would like to know the way that polling was done in some detail before getting too uptight about how smart the US public is.)
I have seen nothing at all in the Bush administration's reaction to last week's events to show they tried to use it to bolster an argument (a Saddam/9-11 connection) that they never made anyway. For Adams to claim that showing him dead "was a trophy head to prove it" is just ludicrous.
On the other hand, Adams and his cohorts continue repeating their memes ad naseum, encouraging the blind allegiance to allegations that are becoming increasingly discredited or (such as in the case of the suggestion that Bush misled the public on Saddam and 9-11,) outright lies.
The history of all this in 30 years time is not to going to read the way Adams expects.
UPDATE 2: Here's what the New Yorker says about it:
According to Iraq’s former interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, who claims that he discovered the information in the archives of the Iraqi secret service, Zarqawi travelled to Iraq in 1999, around the same time as Zawahiri. Saddam Hussein was courting Al Qaeda at the time. Inspired, perhaps, by Iran’s relationship with Hezbollah, he may have believed that he could use terrorists to conduct his foreign policy without undermining his rule. Contrary to Secretary of State Colin Powell’s assertion before the U.N. Security Council, in February, 2003, that Zarqawi provided the link to Al Qaeda in Iraq, bin Laden and Zawahiri spurned Saddam’s overtures.
Sources for that last bit of information would be...? I should go double check the Congressional inquiry again, I suppose.
Monday, June 12, 2006
About the future Palestine
TCS Daily - Creating Palestine
The article above takes a tough line on what is necessary to create what could be called a "viable" Palestinian State. (Very little, argue the authors. They point out that there are many tiny countries with less than ideal geography.)
But their earlier article that they link to, about the neverending call by Arabs for Israel to comply with UN Resolution 242 (ie, going back to the pre-1967 Six Day War borders) is even more interesting. The gist of it is that they argue (fairly convincingly, it seems to me) that the resolution as finally passed was specifically meant to leave the precise final boundaries open. In other words, not to require that all occupied land be returned.)
Can't say I have heard this argument before, but then I am no expert on Middle East history. (Like many people, the post 9/11 world has made me take much more of an interest in it.)
The article above takes a tough line on what is necessary to create what could be called a "viable" Palestinian State. (Very little, argue the authors. They point out that there are many tiny countries with less than ideal geography.)
But their earlier article that they link to, about the neverending call by Arabs for Israel to comply with UN Resolution 242 (ie, going back to the pre-1967 Six Day War borders) is even more interesting. The gist of it is that they argue (fairly convincingly, it seems to me) that the resolution as finally passed was specifically meant to leave the precise final boundaries open. In other words, not to require that all occupied land be returned.)
Can't say I have heard this argument before, but then I am no expert on Middle East history. (Like many people, the post 9/11 world has made me take much more of an interest in it.)
Inconstant constants
ScienceDaily: Variable Physical Laws
This seems very important, although what exactly it means for cosmology is not at all clear:
On April 21 this year new findings were published in Physical Review Letters implying that a dimensionless constant – the ratio between the electron mass and the proton mass – has changed with time.
And shortly measurements will be presented in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society showing that another dimensionless constant, called the fine structure constant, is also varying with time.
This seems very important, although what exactly it means for cosmology is not at all clear:
On April 21 this year new findings were published in Physical Review Letters implying that a dimensionless constant – the ratio between the electron mass and the proton mass – has changed with time.
And shortly measurements will be presented in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society showing that another dimensionless constant, called the fine structure constant, is also varying with time.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Now if only I spoke Japanese
Love and marriage in Japan | White weddings | Economist.com
An amusing article about "fake" Western weddings at one particular fake church in Japan:
Weddings are what it does, at ¥5m ($46,000) a time for 100 guests, five times a day.
The couples who come have already married before at a city registrar. Their wedding at St Grace Cathedral and similar places offers only the outward trappings of a Christian wedding. Most establishments get couples and their guests through the service in 40 minutes; one cut-rate place does it in 20. Catering is where the money is made, while most other wedding services—flowers, choir, even harpist—are subcontracted.
The most sought-after is the Western “priest”. These are supplied by an ecclesiastical talent agency complete with fake ordination papers, should anyone bother to ask. For impoverished actors, models and English-language teachers, the work is manna: the pay is ¥10,000-15,000 a service, and you can do eight a day. One young Westerner, who earns ¥10m a year for a three-day week, says the work is not easy: unlike acting, where at least you get a break, you have to be a priest all day, and speak flawless Japanese to boot.
An amusing article about "fake" Western weddings at one particular fake church in Japan:
Weddings are what it does, at ¥5m ($46,000) a time for 100 guests, five times a day.
The couples who come have already married before at a city registrar. Their wedding at St Grace Cathedral and similar places offers only the outward trappings of a Christian wedding. Most establishments get couples and their guests through the service in 40 minutes; one cut-rate place does it in 20. Catering is where the money is made, while most other wedding services—flowers, choir, even harpist—are subcontracted.
The most sought-after is the Western “priest”. These are supplied by an ecclesiastical talent agency complete with fake ordination papers, should anyone bother to ask. For impoverished actors, models and English-language teachers, the work is manna: the pay is ¥10,000-15,000 a service, and you can do eight a day. One young Westerner, who earns ¥10m a year for a three-day week, says the work is not easy: unlike acting, where at least you get a break, you have to be a priest all day, and speak flawless Japanese to boot.
Zarqawi in pre-war Iraq
Their Man in Baghdad
Stephen Hayes article above, about Zarqawi's presence in Iraq before the war is important.
The Atlantic agrees that he was there, but caims that Zarqawi was not really connected with al-Qaeda at all during that time. However, it seems that the article does not really explain what he was doing in the Sunni triangle prior to the war.
All very interesting.
Stephen Hayes article above, about Zarqawi's presence in Iraq before the war is important.
The Atlantic agrees that he was there, but caims that Zarqawi was not really connected with al-Qaeda at all during that time. However, it seems that the article does not really explain what he was doing in the Sunni triangle prior to the war.
All very interesting.
Saturday, June 10, 2006
Anti terrorism story missed
Captain's Quarters
I missed this from earlier in the week:
A terrorist cell plotted to shoot down an Israeli airliner over Switzerland but was foiled by intelligence services, Swiss prosecutors said yesterday.
Seven people of north African origin are under arrest in connection with the alleged plot, said a statement from the federal prosecutor's office.
I guess it must be all those Swiss soldiers in Iraq that provoked this terrorist plan that (no doubt) would have endangered Swiss lives.
I missed this from earlier in the week:
A terrorist cell plotted to shoot down an Israeli airliner over Switzerland but was foiled by intelligence services, Swiss prosecutors said yesterday.
Seven people of north African origin are under arrest in connection with the alleged plot, said a statement from the federal prosecutor's office.
I guess it must be all those Swiss soldiers in Iraq that provoked this terrorist plan that (no doubt) would have endangered Swiss lives.
Death on the beach
Artillery fire kills 12, wounds dozens on Gaza beach | Jerusalem Post
Bad time for such an incident to happen. That it was an accident would seem to be strongly supported by this (from the report in the The Jerusalem Post):
According to Galant, the IDF is currently investigating two possible options: misfiring of an artillery round or a dud that exploded on the Gaza beach.
"Even when a tragic and unfortunate incident takes place, it does not mean that we are not committed to defending the citizens of southern Israel who face continuous barrages of Kassam rockets," he said.
The IDF confirmed the Gaza coast deaths, saying that it regretted the harm done to innocent civilians and offering the Palestinians any assistance needed, including evacuation to Israeli hospitals.
Neither The Age , the ABC nor The Australian's reports mention this offer of help in Israeli hospitals. (In fact, The Australian's story is one of the least balanced and inflammatory versions I have read.) The Guardian, to its credit, does mention the offer of assistance. Funny what gets left out of reporting on the Middle East.
Bad time for such an incident to happen. That it was an accident would seem to be strongly supported by this (from the report in the The Jerusalem Post):
According to Galant, the IDF is currently investigating two possible options: misfiring of an artillery round or a dud that exploded on the Gaza beach.
"Even when a tragic and unfortunate incident takes place, it does not mean that we are not committed to defending the citizens of southern Israel who face continuous barrages of Kassam rockets," he said.
The IDF confirmed the Gaza coast deaths, saying that it regretted the harm done to innocent civilians and offering the Palestinians any assistance needed, including evacuation to Israeli hospitals.
Neither The Age , the ABC nor The Australian's reports mention this offer of help in Israeli hospitals. (In fact, The Australian's story is one of the least balanced and inflammatory versions I have read.) The Guardian, to its credit, does mention the offer of assistance. Funny what gets left out of reporting on the Middle East.
John Marsden again
The reputation rapists at large - Opinion - smh.com.au
Mike Carlton comes to John Marden's defence in the Sydney Morning Herald today. He says (of the successful criminal injuries compensation case):
[Judge]Taylor did not find that Marsden had abused anybody, let alone the eight-year-old boy. He came to no such conclusion.
This was a civil case - not a criminal trial with rules of evidence, cross-examination and a jury - in which a man, referred to as "F", had sought money from the Victims Compensation Tribunal for sexual abuse he claimed to have suffered as a child in the '60s.
The tribunal had turned him down. In 2001, F appealed before Taylor in the District Court. There was general medical and specialist psychiatric evidence to support his case. The judge accepted that evidence, found that F had been sexually assaulted, and awarded compensation of $40,000.
But at no stage during the hearing, nor in Taylor's written judgement of July 6, 2001, was any offender or alleged offender named. The word "Marsden" never appeared. Despite the emphatic assertions of Hicks and Fife-Yeomans, it did not happen. Not verbally. Not in print - I have read the judgement. There was no laying of guilt.
For some extracts from the initial report, see my previous post here.
There's something fishy about this, I think. While Carlton is presumably correct about what the judgement says, he seems to be suggesting that in the whole process of making this claim Marsden's name was not brought up. But that surely can't be correct, can it? When a victim makes a claim for compensation in New South Wales, he or she does not have to name the alleged offender? For that matter, if they fail, why is the name not mentioned in the appeal?
Also, I am pretty sure that the original report about this (the link is now dead) said that the successful victim claims he was warned off proceeding with a criminal case by Marsden. (Behaviour which would not be inconsistent with what happened in the defamation action. But then again it might be a recent invention based on the reporting of the defamation case.)
I would love to see a more detailed explanation of what happened in this victim's case. Will the ABC, which pursues other controversial legal cases, take this on in a documentary? (I think it deserves more than a 30 minute Australian Story, though.)
I am also surprised that journalist David Marr has not taken this on. He must have known Marsden, surely, and be "outraged" (I can hear his plummy voice saying it already) by slurs against a fellow gay lawyer. Or does Marr know something about Marsden he would prefer not to say? (Just a guess...)
Mike Carlton comes to John Marden's defence in the Sydney Morning Herald today. He says (of the successful criminal injuries compensation case):
[Judge]Taylor did not find that Marsden had abused anybody, let alone the eight-year-old boy. He came to no such conclusion.
This was a civil case - not a criminal trial with rules of evidence, cross-examination and a jury - in which a man, referred to as "F", had sought money from the Victims Compensation Tribunal for sexual abuse he claimed to have suffered as a child in the '60s.
The tribunal had turned him down. In 2001, F appealed before Taylor in the District Court. There was general medical and specialist psychiatric evidence to support his case. The judge accepted that evidence, found that F had been sexually assaulted, and awarded compensation of $40,000.
But at no stage during the hearing, nor in Taylor's written judgement of July 6, 2001, was any offender or alleged offender named. The word "Marsden" never appeared. Despite the emphatic assertions of Hicks and Fife-Yeomans, it did not happen. Not verbally. Not in print - I have read the judgement. There was no laying of guilt.
For some extracts from the initial report, see my previous post here.
There's something fishy about this, I think. While Carlton is presumably correct about what the judgement says, he seems to be suggesting that in the whole process of making this claim Marsden's name was not brought up. But that surely can't be correct, can it? When a victim makes a claim for compensation in New South Wales, he or she does not have to name the alleged offender? For that matter, if they fail, why is the name not mentioned in the appeal?
Also, I am pretty sure that the original report about this (the link is now dead) said that the successful victim claims he was warned off proceeding with a criminal case by Marsden. (Behaviour which would not be inconsistent with what happened in the defamation action. But then again it might be a recent invention based on the reporting of the defamation case.)
I would love to see a more detailed explanation of what happened in this victim's case. Will the ABC, which pursues other controversial legal cases, take this on in a documentary? (I think it deserves more than a 30 minute Australian Story, though.)
I am also surprised that journalist David Marr has not taken this on. He must have known Marsden, surely, and be "outraged" (I can hear his plummy voice saying it already) by slurs against a fellow gay lawyer. Or does Marr know something about Marsden he would prefer not to say? (Just a guess...)
Sea level again
Christopher Pearson: Rising tide of bad science | Opinion | The Australian
From what I can recall of past columns, Pearson's scepticism of global warming may be too extreme, but his column today on sea level rise is pretty good. (Basic message: it's defintely not the case that any islands are currently suffering from global warming induced sea level rises, and indeed any serious effect is quite a way off yet.)
He is right to criticise Labor on this. As I noted in a past post, Albanese is well and truly a gullible dill who does not appear capable of independent fact checking. As Pearson says:
Our island neighbours may well have claims on our foreign aid, but as a matter of charity rather than any sort of entitlement. In the absence of compelling evidence, and in defiance of Darwin's model, Labor shouldn't be encouraging them to believe that they are the victims of profligate coal, gas and oil-fired economies. Nor should it be creating unrealistic expectations that, as the largest regional consumer of fossil fuels, Australia has endless obligations to a new class of mendicants from Kiribati, Tuvalu, the Carteret or the Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia.
My other posts on sea level rises are here, here here and here.
From what I can recall of past columns, Pearson's scepticism of global warming may be too extreme, but his column today on sea level rise is pretty good. (Basic message: it's defintely not the case that any islands are currently suffering from global warming induced sea level rises, and indeed any serious effect is quite a way off yet.)
He is right to criticise Labor on this. As I noted in a past post, Albanese is well and truly a gullible dill who does not appear capable of independent fact checking. As Pearson says:
Our island neighbours may well have claims on our foreign aid, but as a matter of charity rather than any sort of entitlement. In the absence of compelling evidence, and in defiance of Darwin's model, Labor shouldn't be encouraging them to believe that they are the victims of profligate coal, gas and oil-fired economies. Nor should it be creating unrealistic expectations that, as the largest regional consumer of fossil fuels, Australia has endless obligations to a new class of mendicants from Kiribati, Tuvalu, the Carteret or the Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia.
My other posts on sea level rises are here, here here and here.
Friday, June 09, 2006
An unusual death
The Japan Times Online - Brake, software probed in Tokyo elevator death
What surprises me, in a way, is that elevator deaths seem so uncommon. I mean, I just would have thought they would malfunction with dangerous consequences much more often.
What surprises me, in a way, is that elevator deaths seem so uncommon. I mean, I just would have thought they would malfunction with dangerous consequences much more often.
Polar bears' problem
The Japan Times Online - '98 Arctic thaw laid to warm ocean, not hot air
Not sure whether this is really relevant to global warming arguments or not, but still it's interesting.
Not sure whether this is really relevant to global warming arguments or not, but still it's interesting.
An Austin Powers moment
The Aljazeera.net reporting of the death of Al Zarqawi contains an item about the reaction of his family. It seems that even though they had to distance themselves from him after the (very unpopular) hotel bombings in Amman, they are now happy to talk of him being a martyr.
There is also mention of how a nephew feels "so sad" about it. When reading this, I had a sudden reminder of the funny/clever part of the first Austin Powers movie, where the death of one of the evil henchmen is followed by scenes of how his very "all american" family are upset by the news.
There is also mention of how a nephew feels "so sad" about it. When reading this, I had a sudden reminder of the funny/clever part of the first Austin Powers movie, where the death of one of the evil henchmen is followed by scenes of how his very "all american" family are upset by the news.
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Euthanasia and consequences
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Call for no-consent euthanasia
The key part of this argument is all to do with moral philosophy:
Prof Doyal says withdrawing life-saving treatment from severely incompetent patients - which may involve turning off a ventilator, ending antibiotics or withdrawing a feeding tube - is "believed to be morally appropriate because it constitutes doing nothing. It is disease that does the dirty work, not the clinician. Yet this argument cannot wash away the foreseeable suffering of severely incompetent patients sometimes forced to die avoidably slow and distressing deaths."
He draws a parallel with a father who sees his baby drowning in the bath and fails to do anything to save it. The father foresaw the certainty of the death and did nothing and would therefore be morally considered to have killed the child.
"Clinicians who starve severely incompetent patients to death are not deemed by law to have killed them actively, even if they begin the process by the removal of feeding tubes. The legal fiction that such starvation is not active killing is no more than clumsy judicial camouflage of the euthanasia that is actually occurring."
First of all, I thought that there was quite a lot of confidence that most cases of withdrawal of treatment did not cause unnecessary suffering. (Or at least, if suffering was detected, there is no issue with administering pain relief, even if an unintended consequence is shortening life.) So I am not sure that unnecessary suffering is really the issue.
But this Professor's arguments are all based on an acceptance that consequentialism is the right way to make ethical decisions. Peter Singer is also a "consequentialist", which should send up warnings.
Rather than have me bang on about why it consquentialism is a problem, have a look at the good Wikipedia article about its critics. (All hail Wikipedia.)
The key part of this argument is all to do with moral philosophy:
Prof Doyal says withdrawing life-saving treatment from severely incompetent patients - which may involve turning off a ventilator, ending antibiotics or withdrawing a feeding tube - is "believed to be morally appropriate because it constitutes doing nothing. It is disease that does the dirty work, not the clinician. Yet this argument cannot wash away the foreseeable suffering of severely incompetent patients sometimes forced to die avoidably slow and distressing deaths."
He draws a parallel with a father who sees his baby drowning in the bath and fails to do anything to save it. The father foresaw the certainty of the death and did nothing and would therefore be morally considered to have killed the child.
"Clinicians who starve severely incompetent patients to death are not deemed by law to have killed them actively, even if they begin the process by the removal of feeding tubes. The legal fiction that such starvation is not active killing is no more than clumsy judicial camouflage of the euthanasia that is actually occurring."
First of all, I thought that there was quite a lot of confidence that most cases of withdrawal of treatment did not cause unnecessary suffering. (Or at least, if suffering was detected, there is no issue with administering pain relief, even if an unintended consequence is shortening life.) So I am not sure that unnecessary suffering is really the issue.
But this Professor's arguments are all based on an acceptance that consequentialism is the right way to make ethical decisions. Peter Singer is also a "consequentialist", which should send up warnings.
Rather than have me bang on about why it consquentialism is a problem, have a look at the good Wikipedia article about its critics. (All hail Wikipedia.)
A Danny Katz piece
Subliminal scholarship, schoolboy-style - Danny Katz - Opinion - theage.com.au
I have mentioned before how I think Danny Katz is a great humourist. If only he could write something decent for Australian TV comedy. (Who knows, maybe he does?)
Anyway, his column above made me laugh.
I have mentioned before how I think Danny Katz is a great humourist. If only he could write something decent for Australian TV comedy. (Who knows, maybe he does?)
Anyway, his column above made me laugh.
More detail, Ken
Nuclear electricity is just more expensive - Opinion - theage.com.au
Kenneth Davidson in The Age, talking about nuclear power, makes this surprising comment:
Lovelock's Gaia theory, which treats the Earth as a kind of living organism, is as revolutionary as the Renaissance was 500 years ago when man displaced God at the centre of the world. It means that the survival of the Earth as a self-regulating ecosystem must take precedence over individual rights.
All hail Mother Gaia!
I think Ken should specify which "individual rights" he has in mind here.
Kenneth Davidson in The Age, talking about nuclear power, makes this surprising comment:
Lovelock's Gaia theory, which treats the Earth as a kind of living organism, is as revolutionary as the Renaissance was 500 years ago when man displaced God at the centre of the world. It means that the survival of the Earth as a self-regulating ecosystem must take precedence over individual rights.
All hail Mother Gaia!
I think Ken should specify which "individual rights" he has in mind here.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Bugs in Japan
Japundit � Duck Season . . . Rabbit Season . . . BUG SEASON!
See the link above for a short discourse on the rather odd Japanese kids obsession with Rhino Beetles. I contributed comment number 8, by the way.
See the link above for a short discourse on the rather odd Japanese kids obsession with Rhino Beetles. I contributed comment number 8, by the way.
The open letter
Janet Albrechtsen in today's Australian rips into John Howard for backing down on the sale of the Snowy River scheme. Personally, I don't see it as an issue worth getting too worked up about either way.
Still, her column does have this paragraph which I can agree with:
But perhaps most irritating is the fact that Howard's backflip only encourages our collective letter writers to keep on writing. The apparent victory by the 57 assorted luvvies, political has-beens and political never-beens will make them think their sentimental jottings have policy substance. These letters are blots on the political landscape that invariably feature artistes trying to prove they can do more than memorise scripts by signing up to something drafted by retirees suffering relevance deprivation syndrome.
One hopes that their saccharine superficiality has been carried prominently by newspapers such as The Australian as a cute reminder that collectivists are now reduced to the pathetic business of writing collective letters. But after Howard's surrender last week, they received a fillip.
Yes, this "open letter" tactic has irritated for a long time. Firstly, how many people actually read them (or, more importantly, people who have not yet made up their mind about an issue.) Do they think that people care what actors and former diplomats and such like think about economic and other issues? I guess some people might if the actor has some particularly high public profile for, I don't know, niceness and the common touch. But once they are highly successful, people surely just see them as rich and idle enough to dabble in politics. And even if one of them could influence the public, joining in the collective letter dilutes their own input.
No, it always seems to be mostly about posturing from a political side that everyone already knows is nearly ubiquitous in the arts world. (And in the world of retired diplomats, too.)
Still, her column does have this paragraph which I can agree with:
But perhaps most irritating is the fact that Howard's backflip only encourages our collective letter writers to keep on writing. The apparent victory by the 57 assorted luvvies, political has-beens and political never-beens will make them think their sentimental jottings have policy substance. These letters are blots on the political landscape that invariably feature artistes trying to prove they can do more than memorise scripts by signing up to something drafted by retirees suffering relevance deprivation syndrome.
One hopes that their saccharine superficiality has been carried prominently by newspapers such as The Australian as a cute reminder that collectivists are now reduced to the pathetic business of writing collective letters. But after Howard's surrender last week, they received a fillip.
Yes, this "open letter" tactic has irritated for a long time. Firstly, how many people actually read them (or, more importantly, people who have not yet made up their mind about an issue.) Do they think that people care what actors and former diplomats and such like think about economic and other issues? I guess some people might if the actor has some particularly high public profile for, I don't know, niceness and the common touch. But once they are highly successful, people surely just see them as rich and idle enough to dabble in politics. And even if one of them could influence the public, joining in the collective letter dilutes their own input.
No, it always seems to be mostly about posturing from a political side that everyone already knows is nearly ubiquitous in the arts world. (And in the world of retired diplomats, too.)
Sad story
The Age has been following the very sad story about a Victorian hospital causing severe brain damage in a baby through a simple mistake. The reports are here and here.
The one month baby was taken to hospital with persistent vomiting. Then:
...two days later he was diagnosed with pyloric stenosis — a condition that blocks the flow of food into the small intestine — and was booked in for surgery.
About 1am on September 19, consultant surgeon Paddy Dewan assessed the baby, conducted a tutorial on the condition for Dr Foo and recommended intravenous fluids to treat dehydration. At this point the boy's treatment went tragically wrong. Instead of a solution containing 5 per cent glucose, he was given a concentration of 50 per cent glucose, which led to his severe brain damage.
Ms Young told the board that Dr Foo, who had responsibility for prescribing and recording the fluids, maintains the solution was specified by Professor Dewan but another doctor present at the time rejects the claim.
Nurses caring for the baby raised concerns about the solution, which was described as unusual, but were reassured by Dr Foo that it was correct. Ms Young told the board that Dr Foo might not have understood their concerns.
In todays paper, it is reported that Professor Dewar:
...said he ordered a solution of 5 per cent dextrose, or glucose, which was to be made up using the hospital's supply of a 50 per cent concentrate.
An alleged transcription error by resident doctor Lea Lee Foo meant the baby was given a 50 per cent solution, causing massive brain damage. Dr Shobha Iyer and Dr David Tickell allegedly failed to check the fluids or adequately examine the baby later in the day.
Professor Dewan said it was unbelievable that the error was not picked up by any of the staff, and a culture where junior staff were not encouraged to question orders was partly to blame.
A few things to note here: the nursing staff questioned the solution, which I am guessing must be very unusual for a baby. (Your comments reader Geoff?) The parents tried to warn the doctors that the baby was getting worse, but the other doctors missed the problem with the solution too.
All very sad. For me, the lesson seems to be to question hospital staff a lot, to the point of being a real pest, if things seem to be going badly.
The one month baby was taken to hospital with persistent vomiting. Then:
...two days later he was diagnosed with pyloric stenosis — a condition that blocks the flow of food into the small intestine — and was booked in for surgery.
About 1am on September 19, consultant surgeon Paddy Dewan assessed the baby, conducted a tutorial on the condition for Dr Foo and recommended intravenous fluids to treat dehydration. At this point the boy's treatment went tragically wrong. Instead of a solution containing 5 per cent glucose, he was given a concentration of 50 per cent glucose, which led to his severe brain damage.
Ms Young told the board that Dr Foo, who had responsibility for prescribing and recording the fluids, maintains the solution was specified by Professor Dewan but another doctor present at the time rejects the claim.
Nurses caring for the baby raised concerns about the solution, which was described as unusual, but were reassured by Dr Foo that it was correct. Ms Young told the board that Dr Foo might not have understood their concerns.
In todays paper, it is reported that Professor Dewar:
...said he ordered a solution of 5 per cent dextrose, or glucose, which was to be made up using the hospital's supply of a 50 per cent concentrate.
An alleged transcription error by resident doctor Lea Lee Foo meant the baby was given a 50 per cent solution, causing massive brain damage. Dr Shobha Iyer and Dr David Tickell allegedly failed to check the fluids or adequately examine the baby later in the day.
Professor Dewan said it was unbelievable that the error was not picked up by any of the staff, and a culture where junior staff were not encouraged to question orders was partly to blame.
A few things to note here: the nursing staff questioned the solution, which I am guessing must be very unusual for a baby. (Your comments reader Geoff?) The parents tried to warn the doctors that the baby was getting worse, but the other doctors missed the problem with the solution too.
All very sad. For me, the lesson seems to be to question hospital staff a lot, to the point of being a real pest, if things seem to be going badly.
Tuesday, June 06, 2006
A whole new world of stupidity
New Scientist News - Abuse of prescription drugs fuelled by online recipes
It seems that abuse of prescription drugs is a big issue in the States (and no doubt it happens here too.) The internet allows users to quickly pass on information on how to abuse the drugs:
For instance, some sites suggest ways of tampering with skin patches designed to slowly release the opioid painkiller fentanyl. Users sometimes extract the drug from a patch to eat, inject or smoke. Yet a single patch can contain enough fentanyl to kill several people, according to toxicologist Bruce Goldberger from the University of Florida in Gainesville. "It's like Russian roulette - you just don't know how much drug you're going to get," he says....
Surveys by the US Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) suggest the number of emergency hospital visits involving oxycodone misuse increased about 10-fold between 1996 and 2004. Estimates suggest that in 2004 there were more than 36,000 admissions involving misuse of the drug, now nicknamed "hillbilly heroin".
Drug companies have to go out of their way to make the medicine harder to abuse:
The good news is that some barriers to tampering seem to be genuinely effective. Disgruntled recreational users report online that one methylphenidate drug called Concerta, a stimulant used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), is very difficult to crush and snort. One user's verdict reads: "No effects to very minimal with an irritated nose full of chunks."
While we are talking about abuse of things intended for other puproses, here's my semi-obscure piece of drug lore (found in some time ago in a Fortean Times article). If you eat enough nutmeg, you'll trip out.
Actually, this site claims its effects were relatively well known, with its users including Charlie Parker and Malcolm X (!)
This interested me particularly, as I recalled an old Carl Barks Uncle Scrooge comic that I read as a child about Uncle Scrooge's addiction to nutmeg tea. (It didn't make him trip out, though.) I remembered asking my father if he knew about nutmeg tea; he just laughed.
You can see some extracts of this comic here and here.
I presume that the hallucinogenic effects were unknown to Carl Barks. Why he would chose nutmeg tea is something of a mystery, though. (I am sure I read someone on the internet who suggested that maybe it meant that all of Uncle Scrooge's riches were just a hallucination caused by his drug habit.)
Of course, it goes without saying that I am against all forms of drug induced mood alteration, except for alcohol in moderation. My readership is so small that I think I can safely assume I am not spreading harmful ideas too widely.
It seems that abuse of prescription drugs is a big issue in the States (and no doubt it happens here too.) The internet allows users to quickly pass on information on how to abuse the drugs:
For instance, some sites suggest ways of tampering with skin patches designed to slowly release the opioid painkiller fentanyl. Users sometimes extract the drug from a patch to eat, inject or smoke. Yet a single patch can contain enough fentanyl to kill several people, according to toxicologist Bruce Goldberger from the University of Florida in Gainesville. "It's like Russian roulette - you just don't know how much drug you're going to get," he says....
Surveys by the US Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) suggest the number of emergency hospital visits involving oxycodone misuse increased about 10-fold between 1996 and 2004. Estimates suggest that in 2004 there were more than 36,000 admissions involving misuse of the drug, now nicknamed "hillbilly heroin".
Drug companies have to go out of their way to make the medicine harder to abuse:
The good news is that some barriers to tampering seem to be genuinely effective. Disgruntled recreational users report online that one methylphenidate drug called Concerta, a stimulant used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), is very difficult to crush and snort. One user's verdict reads: "No effects to very minimal with an irritated nose full of chunks."
While we are talking about abuse of things intended for other puproses, here's my semi-obscure piece of drug lore (found in some time ago in a Fortean Times article). If you eat enough nutmeg, you'll trip out.
Actually, this site claims its effects were relatively well known, with its users including Charlie Parker and Malcolm X (!)
This interested me particularly, as I recalled an old Carl Barks Uncle Scrooge comic that I read as a child about Uncle Scrooge's addiction to nutmeg tea. (It didn't make him trip out, though.) I remembered asking my father if he knew about nutmeg tea; he just laughed.
You can see some extracts of this comic here and here.
I presume that the hallucinogenic effects were unknown to Carl Barks. Why he would chose nutmeg tea is something of a mystery, though. (I am sure I read someone on the internet who suggested that maybe it meant that all of Uncle Scrooge's riches were just a hallucination caused by his drug habit.)
Of course, it goes without saying that I am against all forms of drug induced mood alteration, except for alcohol in moderation. My readership is so small that I think I can safely assume I am not spreading harmful ideas too widely.
A reminder of the Saddam regime
Graves reveal clues to Saddam brutality - World - theage.com.au
From the above article:
"There are 200 sites registered with the Ministry of Human Rights. Witnesses led us to these sites," said chief investigating judge Raed al-Juhi of the Iraqi High Tribunal.
"These witnesses stated that some vehicles had taken people on the highway to somewhere and brought back no one. Our formal documents refer to over 100,000 victims (from 1991)," Judge Juhi said. "The unofficial information we have, that is not documented until now, refers to more than 180,000 victims."
From the above article:
"There are 200 sites registered with the Ministry of Human Rights. Witnesses led us to these sites," said chief investigating judge Raed al-Juhi of the Iraqi High Tribunal.
"These witnesses stated that some vehicles had taken people on the highway to somewhere and brought back no one. Our formal documents refer to over 100,000 victims (from 1991)," Judge Juhi said. "The unofficial information we have, that is not documented until now, refers to more than 180,000 victims."
On the nature of Islam
Good old Archbishop George Pell. The Sydney Morning Herald today calls him "the country's most influential catholic", which is surely a bit of an overstatement. He is far too much of a straight talking conservative for that. I also suspect that a small majority of Catholics here (and in most western countries) are of the soft left variety now.
Anyway, he is quoted in the SMH today as saying:
Australia had not been much changed by the rising Islamic threat after September 11, 2001, the Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, said. But this could change depending "on how many terrorist attacks" Islamic extremists could "bring off successfully". "The million-dollar question" was whether intolerance was a modern distortion of Islam or arose out of internal logic. "It's difficult to find periods of tolerance in Islam. I'm not saying they're not there, but a good deal of what is asserted is mythical."
He obviously is not in the Karen Armstrong camp. She gave an interview in Salon recently and had this to say about the Koran and violence:
[Interviewer]: Sam Harris, in his book "The End of Faith," has seven very densely packed pages of nothing but quotations from the Quran with just this message. "God's curse be upon the infidels"; "slay them wherever you find them"; "fighting is obligatory for you, much as you dislike it." And Sam Harris' point is that the Muslim suicide bombings are not the aberration of Islam. They are the message of Islam.
[Armstrong]: Well, that's simply not true. He's taken parts of those texts and omitted their conclusions, which say fighting is hateful for you. You have to do it if you're attacked, as Mohammed was being attacked at the time when that verse was revealed. But forgiveness is better for you. Peace is better. But when we're living in a violent society, our religion becomes violent, too. Religion gets sucked in and becomes part of the problem. But to isolate these texts as though they expressed the whole of the tradition is very mischievous and dangerous at this time when we are in danger of polarizing people on both sides. And this kind of inflammatory talk, say about Islam, is convincing Muslims all over the world who are not extremists that the West is incurably Islamophobic and will never respect their traditions. I think it's irresponsible at this time.
[Interviewer]: But many people would say you can't just pick out the peaceful and loving passages of the sacred scriptures. There are plenty of other passages that are frightening.
[Armstrong]: I would say there are more passages in the Bible than the Quran that are dedicated to violence. I think what all religious people ought to do is to look at their own sacred traditions. Not just point a finger at somebody else's, but our own. Christians should look long and hard at the Book of Revelation. And they should look at those passages in the Pentateuch that speak of the destruction of the enemy.
I think Armstrong is being rather disingenuous here though; it seems she is pretending for a moment that the New Testament, which after all is the modern basis of Christianity, doesn't represent a dramatic change in the view of violence from that contained in parts of the Old Testament. (The Book of Revelation is in its own weird category of its own, and there was considerable disagreement centuries ago over whether it should be included in the Bible at all. Anyway, it's not as if Catholicism in my lifetime has ever paid it much attention. I suppose American fundamentalism pays it more attention, and this form of Christianity is what seems to annoy Armstrong the most.)
As for the correct reading of the Koran, here I am somewhat at a loss to have an independent opinion. The practical problem is, from my cursory look at the book, it seems unreadable as narrative. (I have the same reaction to the Book of Mormon. It seems to come with the territory when the book is claimed to be a direct and unalterable dictation from God. He needs an editor badly.) The Wikipedia entry on the Koran goes some way to explaining why it is so unreadable.
So what does a conservative like me do? Side with the conservative Archbishop, of course! Put it this way: I suspect he may be closer to the truth and that Armstrong, in her project to rehabilitate all religions into one (read the rest of her interview), probably sides with the softer interpretions of Islamic history because it suits her ideas better.
Anyway, he is quoted in the SMH today as saying:
Australia had not been much changed by the rising Islamic threat after September 11, 2001, the Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, said. But this could change depending "on how many terrorist attacks" Islamic extremists could "bring off successfully". "The million-dollar question" was whether intolerance was a modern distortion of Islam or arose out of internal logic. "It's difficult to find periods of tolerance in Islam. I'm not saying they're not there, but a good deal of what is asserted is mythical."
He obviously is not in the Karen Armstrong camp. She gave an interview in Salon recently and had this to say about the Koran and violence:
[Interviewer]: Sam Harris, in his book "The End of Faith," has seven very densely packed pages of nothing but quotations from the Quran with just this message. "God's curse be upon the infidels"; "slay them wherever you find them"; "fighting is obligatory for you, much as you dislike it." And Sam Harris' point is that the Muslim suicide bombings are not the aberration of Islam. They are the message of Islam.
[Armstrong]: Well, that's simply not true. He's taken parts of those texts and omitted their conclusions, which say fighting is hateful for you. You have to do it if you're attacked, as Mohammed was being attacked at the time when that verse was revealed. But forgiveness is better for you. Peace is better. But when we're living in a violent society, our religion becomes violent, too. Religion gets sucked in and becomes part of the problem. But to isolate these texts as though they expressed the whole of the tradition is very mischievous and dangerous at this time when we are in danger of polarizing people on both sides. And this kind of inflammatory talk, say about Islam, is convincing Muslims all over the world who are not extremists that the West is incurably Islamophobic and will never respect their traditions. I think it's irresponsible at this time.
[Interviewer]: But many people would say you can't just pick out the peaceful and loving passages of the sacred scriptures. There are plenty of other passages that are frightening.
[Armstrong]: I would say there are more passages in the Bible than the Quran that are dedicated to violence. I think what all religious people ought to do is to look at their own sacred traditions. Not just point a finger at somebody else's, but our own. Christians should look long and hard at the Book of Revelation. And they should look at those passages in the Pentateuch that speak of the destruction of the enemy.
I think Armstrong is being rather disingenuous here though; it seems she is pretending for a moment that the New Testament, which after all is the modern basis of Christianity, doesn't represent a dramatic change in the view of violence from that contained in parts of the Old Testament. (The Book of Revelation is in its own weird category of its own, and there was considerable disagreement centuries ago over whether it should be included in the Bible at all. Anyway, it's not as if Catholicism in my lifetime has ever paid it much attention. I suppose American fundamentalism pays it more attention, and this form of Christianity is what seems to annoy Armstrong the most.)
As for the correct reading of the Koran, here I am somewhat at a loss to have an independent opinion. The practical problem is, from my cursory look at the book, it seems unreadable as narrative. (I have the same reaction to the Book of Mormon. It seems to come with the territory when the book is claimed to be a direct and unalterable dictation from God. He needs an editor badly.) The Wikipedia entry on the Koran goes some way to explaining why it is so unreadable.
So what does a conservative like me do? Side with the conservative Archbishop, of course! Put it this way: I suspect he may be closer to the truth and that Armstrong, in her project to rehabilitate all religions into one (read the rest of her interview), probably sides with the softer interpretions of Islamic history because it suits her ideas better.
Monday, June 05, 2006
More on safer nuclear
Nuclear power | The shape of things to come | Economist.com
The article is a short but interesting summary of safer nuclear reactor designs in the works. (The Pebble Bed design I have blogged about before also gets a brief mention.)
The article is a short but interesting summary of safer nuclear reactor designs in the works. (The Pebble Bed design I have blogged about before also gets a brief mention.)
How low can you go?
Scotland on Sunday - Family entertainment?
I have not commented on this year's Big Brother. However, the brainiacs at Larvatus Prodeo obviously devote some time to following it. (This is one program about which being a cultural snob is well deserved!)
From what I gather, this year's Australian version is perhaps not quite as grubby as last year's. (I could be wrong.) But if you want to see how low this type of show can go, have a look at the above report on the current UK version:
With debate raging about how low television standards can go, most vitriol at present is focused on Channel 4's Big Brother, a competitive popularity contest which bizarrely forces extreme personalities to fight for a £70,000 prize by being themselves.
After on-screen sex last year, series seven has plumbed new depths with its selection of candidates including a Scottish homosexual with suicidal tendencies, a teenage boy who wants to be a girl and a Tourette Syndrome sufferer. Even hardened media watchers are astonished.
Brian McNair, professor of communication at the University of Strathclyde, said: "You really have to question what that show is doing this year. The contestants are getting younger and younger and at least one of them showed signs of having mental health issues."
I wait for similar developments here next year. (I assume it will be back. I remain perplexed at the MSM coverage this show gets.)
I have not commented on this year's Big Brother. However, the brainiacs at Larvatus Prodeo obviously devote some time to following it. (This is one program about which being a cultural snob is well deserved!)
From what I gather, this year's Australian version is perhaps not quite as grubby as last year's. (I could be wrong.) But if you want to see how low this type of show can go, have a look at the above report on the current UK version:
With debate raging about how low television standards can go, most vitriol at present is focused on Channel 4's Big Brother, a competitive popularity contest which bizarrely forces extreme personalities to fight for a £70,000 prize by being themselves.
After on-screen sex last year, series seven has plumbed new depths with its selection of candidates including a Scottish homosexual with suicidal tendencies, a teenage boy who wants to be a girl and a Tourette Syndrome sufferer. Even hardened media watchers are astonished.
Brian McNair, professor of communication at the University of Strathclyde, said: "You really have to question what that show is doing this year. The contestants are getting younger and younger and at least one of them showed signs of having mental health issues."
I wait for similar developments here next year. (I assume it will be back. I remain perplexed at the MSM coverage this show gets.)
Anti spam help
Jetable.org - Home
This sounds like a very good idea:
To avoid spam, jetable.org provides you with a temporary email address. As soon as it is created, all the emails sent to this address are forwarded to your actual email address.
Your antispam address will be deactivated after the lifespan you selected comes to its end.
Found via Red Ferret Journal, which I must add to my links one day.
This sounds like a very good idea:
To avoid spam, jetable.org provides you with a temporary email address. As soon as it is created, all the emails sent to this address are forwarded to your actual email address.
Your antispam address will be deactivated after the lifespan you selected comes to its end.
Found via Red Ferret Journal, which I must add to my links one day.
Pat O'Shane's turn
Again, the law shoots and misses - Opinion - smh.com.au
Paul Sheehan's article is worth reading. Controversial New South Wales magistrate Pat O'Shane is its main subject.
Another case of a legal figure getting a mysteriously charmed run in that State.
Paul Sheehan's article is worth reading. Controversial New South Wales magistrate Pat O'Shane is its main subject.
Another case of a legal figure getting a mysteriously charmed run in that State.
Sunday, June 04, 2006
Caz rips into romanticised heroin
A very interesting post over at Avatar Briefs about the arts' infatuation with heroin addiction.
The extracts from Dalrymple are also fascinating.
By the way, what has happened to Major Anya? Has her blog permanently disappeared?
The extracts from Dalrymple are also fascinating.
By the way, what has happened to Major Anya? Has her blog permanently disappeared?
Fennel with parmesan
Maybe most of the sophisticated epicurean world knows about roast fennel and parmesan, but I only cooked this dish for the first time this weekend. Fennel is a vegetable that (I think it is fair to say) had little attention paid to it in Australia until the 1990's. I have used it in other recipes, but never got around to cooking it alone as a side vegetable.
Anyway, the recipe I followed was dead easy: vertically slice up a big bulb into about 8 thin pieces, fry them for a few minutes in 2 tablespoons each of butter and olive oil (with salt and pepper), shove in oven to bake for 25 minutes, sprinkle about 1/2 cup of grated parmesan on top and put back in oven for 5 minutes to melt the cheese. Very pleasing. Even Mrs Opinion Dominon likes it despite her claim to not be a fan of aniseed flavour generally.
Anyway, the recipe I followed was dead easy: vertically slice up a big bulb into about 8 thin pieces, fry them for a few minutes in 2 tablespoons each of butter and olive oil (with salt and pepper), shove in oven to bake for 25 minutes, sprinkle about 1/2 cup of grated parmesan on top and put back in oven for 5 minutes to melt the cheese. Very pleasing. Even Mrs Opinion Dominon likes it despite her claim to not be a fan of aniseed flavour generally.
On religion in Europe
I found this article in last Friday's Australian (about how religion and politics in Europe have changed in the last couple of centuries) to be interesting, but overly brief. (Actually, it reads as a heavily edited down version of a longer article or talk.) Here's a sample:
Rather than Europe becoming more secular in the past 200 years, I suspect the religious instinct has simply metabolised into other forms. This was most obvious in the case of the political religions. These began with the radical Jacobins during the French Revolution, who made the first attempt to create a "new man" so as to realise heaven on earth through violence. The result was hell for many people, with a quarter of a million people murdered simply for adhering to their traditional Christian beliefs.
The metabolisation of the religious instinct was also evident in the two big creeds of the 19th century. Classical nation states used schools, patriotic myths, anthems, flags and monuments to achieve the goal of turning peasants with localised loyalties into Frenchmen, Germans or Italians....
Marxist socialism was another totalising creed. The 1848 Communist Manifesto was called a "catechism" until Engels renamed it. Mankind's expulsion from the garden of Eden was the Christian original for Marxist notions of man's alienation from his perfect self. There was no chosen people, but instead a saviour class called the proletariat. Instead of an apocalypse, there would be a cleansing revolution, the prelude to the restoration of a lost communist paradise. Then man would be reborn in harmony with his original true self.
On Saturday I heard the author, Michael Burleigh, being interviewed on the ABC, and he elaborated on these ideas a little more. His book on the topic could be good; if only I had time to read anything lately.
Rather than Europe becoming more secular in the past 200 years, I suspect the religious instinct has simply metabolised into other forms. This was most obvious in the case of the political religions. These began with the radical Jacobins during the French Revolution, who made the first attempt to create a "new man" so as to realise heaven on earth through violence. The result was hell for many people, with a quarter of a million people murdered simply for adhering to their traditional Christian beliefs.
The metabolisation of the religious instinct was also evident in the two big creeds of the 19th century. Classical nation states used schools, patriotic myths, anthems, flags and monuments to achieve the goal of turning peasants with localised loyalties into Frenchmen, Germans or Italians....
Marxist socialism was another totalising creed. The 1848 Communist Manifesto was called a "catechism" until Engels renamed it. Mankind's expulsion from the garden of Eden was the Christian original for Marxist notions of man's alienation from his perfect self. There was no chosen people, but instead a saviour class called the proletariat. Instead of an apocalypse, there would be a cleansing revolution, the prelude to the restoration of a lost communist paradise. Then man would be reborn in harmony with his original true self.
On Saturday I heard the author, Michael Burleigh, being interviewed on the ABC, and he elaborated on these ideas a little more. His book on the topic could be good; if only I had time to read anything lately.
Back to Marsden..
Well, as I guessed, there was a damaging John Marsden allegation to come, and it came via News Limited on the day of his funeral. Questionable timing, but a pretty important story.
For those who missed it, and there must be many given that it seems much of the media is not wanting to cover it, the report is that an adult man received criminal injuries compensation in 2001 based on his claims that as an 8 year old, Marden sexually molested him. This means the judge found that the incidents were proved on the civil standard of "balance of probabilities".
More from the report itself:
In his judgment of July 6, 2001, NSW District Court judge Ken Taylor accepted "on the balance of probabilities" that Marsden had sexually abused Mr Fraser after swimming lessons, after football training and after a junior rugby league grand final.
"The appellant (Mr Fraser) is supported by the psychological evidence. Resistance to his version of events has been slight. On the basis of the material before the court, it has concluded that it is more likely than not that the events occurred as stated by the appellant (Mr Fraser)," Judge Taylor said.....
In 1992, Mr Fraser, who was being treated for "severe depression and psychosexual dysfunction", told his psychiatrist that he had been sexually abused by Marsden. This was more than two years before NSW Labor frontbencher Deirdre Grusovin named Marsden in parliament as a "pederast" and more than three years before two Seven Network current affairs programs alleged Marsden had had underage sex.....
Mr Fraser described in graphic detail how he was sexually assaulted on three separate occasions as an eight- and nine-year-old boy by Marsden, who coached rugby league and taught swimming at St John's College (now St Patrick's), Campbelltown, where he later established his first law practice.
Marden's brother has not taken the allegation well. The Melbourne Age notes just this:
Controversy dogged Mr Marsden right up to the service with a newspaper claim that previously suppressed court records showed he was a pedophile. His brother Jim described the reports as "a scurrilous lie that should be flushed down the toilet".
The media treatment of this story is interesting of itself. Most Australian media appears to be giving it a wide berth. Perhaps because of the funeral day timing? Perhaps because they don't realise how scandalous it is? I think there is a tendency amongst some to think that if a matter can't be proved on a criminal standard of proof, then you are allowed to treat it as "unproven". No doubt, that is how Marsden would have wanted people to view it.
It leaves open fascinating questions such as how many within the profession knew about this. Did his own brother know about it? Did it give the Law Society any concerns (if they knew about it at all.) Note that the judge is quoted as saying that "resistence to his [the complainant's ] version of events has been slight."
I await some more detailed analysis of this story.
For those who missed it, and there must be many given that it seems much of the media is not wanting to cover it, the report is that an adult man received criminal injuries compensation in 2001 based on his claims that as an 8 year old, Marden sexually molested him. This means the judge found that the incidents were proved on the civil standard of "balance of probabilities".
More from the report itself:
In his judgment of July 6, 2001, NSW District Court judge Ken Taylor accepted "on the balance of probabilities" that Marsden had sexually abused Mr Fraser after swimming lessons, after football training and after a junior rugby league grand final.
"The appellant (Mr Fraser) is supported by the psychological evidence. Resistance to his version of events has been slight. On the basis of the material before the court, it has concluded that it is more likely than not that the events occurred as stated by the appellant (Mr Fraser)," Judge Taylor said.....
In 1992, Mr Fraser, who was being treated for "severe depression and psychosexual dysfunction", told his psychiatrist that he had been sexually abused by Marsden. This was more than two years before NSW Labor frontbencher Deirdre Grusovin named Marsden in parliament as a "pederast" and more than three years before two Seven Network current affairs programs alleged Marsden had had underage sex.....
Mr Fraser described in graphic detail how he was sexually assaulted on three separate occasions as an eight- and nine-year-old boy by Marsden, who coached rugby league and taught swimming at St John's College (now St Patrick's), Campbelltown, where he later established his first law practice.
Marden's brother has not taken the allegation well. The Melbourne Age notes just this:
Controversy dogged Mr Marsden right up to the service with a newspaper claim that previously suppressed court records showed he was a pedophile. His brother Jim described the reports as "a scurrilous lie that should be flushed down the toilet".
The media treatment of this story is interesting of itself. Most Australian media appears to be giving it a wide berth. Perhaps because of the funeral day timing? Perhaps because they don't realise how scandalous it is? I think there is a tendency amongst some to think that if a matter can't be proved on a criminal standard of proof, then you are allowed to treat it as "unproven". No doubt, that is how Marsden would have wanted people to view it.
It leaves open fascinating questions such as how many within the profession knew about this. Did his own brother know about it? Did it give the Law Society any concerns (if they knew about it at all.) Note that the judge is quoted as saying that "resistence to his [the complainant's ] version of events has been slight."
I await some more detailed analysis of this story.
Friday, June 02, 2006
Australia started with a very big bang?
ScienceDaily: Big Bang In Antarctica: Killer Crater Found Under Ice
Today's interesting science news is about evidence found for a very big and very old giant crater beneath the ice of Antarctica:
The 300-mile-wide crater lies hidden more than a mile beneath the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. And the gravity measurements that reveal its existence suggest that it could date back about 250 million years -- the time of the Permian-Triassic extinction, when almost all animal life on Earth died out.
Its size and location -- in the Wilkes Land region of East Antarctica, south of Australia -- also suggest that it could have begun the breakup of the Gondwana supercontinent by creating the tectonic rift that pushed Australia northward.
Wouldn't be much concern about global warming - or anything else for that matter, if a hit that size happened again.
Now I'll wander off into science fiction speculation for a bit. One of the reasons for colonizing the solar system, if you actually like humanity and think it deserves surviving, is to provide a lifeboat for civilization if a huge global disaster of that kind happened again. (Maybe there is little chance of killing all people on earth, but the course of civilization would surely be put back a couple of thousand years.)
Now, the easiest (and nearest) place to colonize is the moon. But, there is one significant problem: what will happen to the human body after living for prolonged periods in 1/6 G, and what will the bodies of babies conceived and born in such a low gravity environment be like? Long and spindly like that silly Jedi knight in the last couple of Star Wars films? Or same body shape, but with a heart that simply could never cope with a full 1 G? (It would presumably be the same as a normal "1 G" person being taken to a 6 G planet to live.) Can you counteract the effect of low gravity by sitting in a centrifuge for an hour a day?
One of the first things a permanent moon colony should investigate is animal models of this. Rats, rabbits or other animals that breed quickly should be put through a few generations of low gravity to see what happens to their bodies. I think Jerry Pournelle has written that rats have been put in a permanent higher G environment (in a centrifuge) and developed super muscles to compensate. However, I don't know that it is possible to simulate a 1/6 G for a rat for any long period of time.
If it all looks hopeless (from the point of view of humans born there never being able to go back to earth) then it may be some time before any woman ever lets a child conceived there be born.
The other space colonisation idea is the construction of giant spinning O'Neill colonies, which could have an artifical gravity somewhat higher than the moon. (Living in about 1/2 G sounds a pleasant idea to me.) Such huge engineering seems to be no longer taken seriously, but who knows, in a hundred years it may be on the cards.
As for Mars: well, it has water, but then it seems quite possible that parts of the Moon do too. Its atmosphere is so thin it's barely worth having there at all. And its gravity is only about double that of the Moon, but is that enough to make it safe to have a baby there (who can return to earth?)
(I just found a site for a proposed "Mars Gravity Biosatellite", which would send 15 mice into space in a spinning satellite designed to simulate Mars gravity. I am not sure if this will involve them having babies, though.)
Anyway, Mars is so far away that I am sceptical of its use as a lifeboat for humanity. Building a big enough colony underground on the Moon, near lunar ice, seems a much better way to go to me.
Today's interesting science news is about evidence found for a very big and very old giant crater beneath the ice of Antarctica:
The 300-mile-wide crater lies hidden more than a mile beneath the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. And the gravity measurements that reveal its existence suggest that it could date back about 250 million years -- the time of the Permian-Triassic extinction, when almost all animal life on Earth died out.
Its size and location -- in the Wilkes Land region of East Antarctica, south of Australia -- also suggest that it could have begun the breakup of the Gondwana supercontinent by creating the tectonic rift that pushed Australia northward.
Wouldn't be much concern about global warming - or anything else for that matter, if a hit that size happened again.
Now I'll wander off into science fiction speculation for a bit. One of the reasons for colonizing the solar system, if you actually like humanity and think it deserves surviving, is to provide a lifeboat for civilization if a huge global disaster of that kind happened again. (Maybe there is little chance of killing all people on earth, but the course of civilization would surely be put back a couple of thousand years.)
Now, the easiest (and nearest) place to colonize is the moon. But, there is one significant problem: what will happen to the human body after living for prolonged periods in 1/6 G, and what will the bodies of babies conceived and born in such a low gravity environment be like? Long and spindly like that silly Jedi knight in the last couple of Star Wars films? Or same body shape, but with a heart that simply could never cope with a full 1 G? (It would presumably be the same as a normal "1 G" person being taken to a 6 G planet to live.) Can you counteract the effect of low gravity by sitting in a centrifuge for an hour a day?
One of the first things a permanent moon colony should investigate is animal models of this. Rats, rabbits or other animals that breed quickly should be put through a few generations of low gravity to see what happens to their bodies. I think Jerry Pournelle has written that rats have been put in a permanent higher G environment (in a centrifuge) and developed super muscles to compensate. However, I don't know that it is possible to simulate a 1/6 G for a rat for any long period of time.
If it all looks hopeless (from the point of view of humans born there never being able to go back to earth) then it may be some time before any woman ever lets a child conceived there be born.
The other space colonisation idea is the construction of giant spinning O'Neill colonies, which could have an artifical gravity somewhat higher than the moon. (Living in about 1/2 G sounds a pleasant idea to me.) Such huge engineering seems to be no longer taken seriously, but who knows, in a hundred years it may be on the cards.
As for Mars: well, it has water, but then it seems quite possible that parts of the Moon do too. Its atmosphere is so thin it's barely worth having there at all. And its gravity is only about double that of the Moon, but is that enough to make it safe to have a baby there (who can return to earth?)
(I just found a site for a proposed "Mars Gravity Biosatellite", which would send 15 mice into space in a spinning satellite designed to simulate Mars gravity. I am not sure if this will involve them having babies, though.)
Anyway, Mars is so far away that I am sceptical of its use as a lifeboat for humanity. Building a big enough colony underground on the Moon, near lunar ice, seems a much better way to go to me.
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Digging in on the Moon
New Scientist SPACE - Breaking News - Can bulldozers save Moonwalkers from solar flares?
The short article above talks about how to protect astronauts on the moon from radiation by burying them. Well, their habitats anyway.
Seems to me that looking for suitable caves for shelter would be a good idea too. Must be some somewhere up there.
By the way, TLPs (transient lunar phenomena) don't get much of an airing these days. Would these sites be good places to send explorers (of the human or robotic kind) looking for holes or caves to live in? (Maybe the holes are full of gas, though. Still, would be interesting to try to find any active geological process going on there.)
The short article above talks about how to protect astronauts on the moon from radiation by burying them. Well, their habitats anyway.
Seems to me that looking for suitable caves for shelter would be a good idea too. Must be some somewhere up there.
By the way, TLPs (transient lunar phenomena) don't get much of an airing these days. Would these sites be good places to send explorers (of the human or robotic kind) looking for holes or caves to live in? (Maybe the holes are full of gas, though. Still, would be interesting to try to find any active geological process going on there.)
Revisionism on Arctic history
BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Arctic's tropical past uncovered
It seems that there is still a lot of new stuff being discovered about the history of the Arctic, and it's all very relevant to how good current models of climate change are.
This part seemed surprising in particular:
"Five hundred thousand years above where the Azolla was found, we found the first drop stones," explained Professor Brinkhuis, who is also a co-author on the third paper which details Arctic ice-formation.
"These are little stones that come from icebergs, icesheets or sea ice. So it must have been cold enough to have ice."
"Before we did this it was thought that the ice field in the Northern hemisphere only began about three million years ago, but now we have pushed that back to 45 million years ago."
That's some major revision of a very major issue (when did the Arctic freeze over?)
It seems that there is still a lot of new stuff being discovered about the history of the Arctic, and it's all very relevant to how good current models of climate change are.
This part seemed surprising in particular:
"Five hundred thousand years above where the Azolla was found, we found the first drop stones," explained Professor Brinkhuis, who is also a co-author on the third paper which details Arctic ice-formation.
"These are little stones that come from icebergs, icesheets or sea ice. So it must have been cold enough to have ice."
"Before we did this it was thought that the ice field in the Northern hemisphere only began about three million years ago, but now we have pushed that back to 45 million years ago."
That's some major revision of a very major issue (when did the Arctic freeze over?)
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
On the Reign of Terror
The New Yorker: The Critics: A Critic At Large
This is a really good book review/essay, of the kind the New Yorker can do so well, on the French Reign of Terror. To give you a taste (talking of Robespierre):
There is a case to be made that the real singularity of the Terror was the first appearance on the stage of history of this particular psychological type: not the tight-lipped inquisitor, alight with religious rage, but the small, fastidious intellectual, the man with an idea, the prototype of Lenin listening to his Beethoven as the Cheka begins its purges. In normal times, such men become college professors, or book reviewers or bloggers. It takes special historical circumstances for them to become killers: the removal of a ruling class without its replacement by a credible new one. In the confusion, their ethereal certainties look like the only solid thing to build on.
This is a really good book review/essay, of the kind the New Yorker can do so well, on the French Reign of Terror. To give you a taste (talking of Robespierre):
There is a case to be made that the real singularity of the Terror was the first appearance on the stage of history of this particular psychological type: not the tight-lipped inquisitor, alight with religious rage, but the small, fastidious intellectual, the man with an idea, the prototype of Lenin listening to his Beethoven as the Cheka begins its purges. In normal times, such men become college professors, or book reviewers or bloggers. It takes special historical circumstances for them to become killers: the removal of a ruling class without its replacement by a credible new one. In the confusion, their ethereal certainties look like the only solid thing to build on.
Fun and Games in India
Do you have a sex problem?- The Times of India
I don't know what gave me the urge to look up the news in India right now, but I am glad I did. From the above article:
MUMBAI: On Sunday, Delhi's Javed Ali, suffering from a sexual disorder, finally discovered his manhood. He opened fire on his sexologist Rajesh Abbot. After four rounds, when the pistol jammed, he pulled out another one.
Of the 13 shots fired, seven hit Abbot, who died on the spot. Ali was upset that despite Abbot's promises, his performance in the bedroom had remained unchanged.
This extreme episode serves as a cold reminder to those in the difficult business of curing male problems.
I wonder if it is hard to get life insurance there if your profession is "quack sexologist." The article goes on to detail the typical quackery in this field:
The quack's ingenuity starts with what seems to be highly impressive diagnostic equipment. A patient is made to lie down and a red light is shone on his body from a hidden source.
Except that when it comes to the patient's private parts, the light is switched off with a remote control trick and the doctor gasps with practised shock.
The patient is then told that since the light did not work in that zone, he suffers from a grave disorder and that he needs a special course of treatment.
The patient is also asked baffling questions like, "Did you use a lot of hand as a child?" Since in 19 out of 20 cases the answer in yes, the patient instantly bonds with the quack and reposes his faith in the diagnosis.
Delhi resident Pradeep once entered a professed sexologist's clinic in Daryaganj. The 'doctor' sat behind a neat desk in a one-room clinic and on hearing about the problem, immediately ordered Pradeep to stop masturbating.
"You're wasting a nectar from heaven," he said.
I don't know what gave me the urge to look up the news in India right now, but I am glad I did. From the above article:
MUMBAI: On Sunday, Delhi's Javed Ali, suffering from a sexual disorder, finally discovered his manhood. He opened fire on his sexologist Rajesh Abbot. After four rounds, when the pistol jammed, he pulled out another one.
Of the 13 shots fired, seven hit Abbot, who died on the spot. Ali was upset that despite Abbot's promises, his performance in the bedroom had remained unchanged.
This extreme episode serves as a cold reminder to those in the difficult business of curing male problems.
I wonder if it is hard to get life insurance there if your profession is "quack sexologist." The article goes on to detail the typical quackery in this field:
The quack's ingenuity starts with what seems to be highly impressive diagnostic equipment. A patient is made to lie down and a red light is shone on his body from a hidden source.
Except that when it comes to the patient's private parts, the light is switched off with a remote control trick and the doctor gasps with practised shock.
The patient is then told that since the light did not work in that zone, he suffers from a grave disorder and that he needs a special course of treatment.
The patient is also asked baffling questions like, "Did you use a lot of hand as a child?" Since in 19 out of 20 cases the answer in yes, the patient instantly bonds with the quack and reposes his faith in the diagnosis.
Delhi resident Pradeep once entered a professed sexologist's clinic in Daryaganj. The 'doctor' sat behind a neat desk in a one-room clinic and on hearing about the problem, immediately ordered Pradeep to stop masturbating.
"You're wasting a nectar from heaven," he said.
One year blogiversary
Happy...blogiversary..to me
Happy blogiversary to..me
Happy blogiversary Mr...OD
Happy...blogiversary to...me
(I paid $1.26 million for that dress, so it's got to get some use sometime.)
[Silly fantasy post- well, not fantasy exactly, I wish I did own a $1,260,000 dress, but purely for investment purposes of course (does something crassly masculine to emphasise the point) - ends here.]
Tuesday, May 30, 2006
Some scepticism on wind power
BBC NEWS | Business | Germany's wind farms challenged
OK, I'll admit something here. I really dislike windpower as a concept. I have never been near a giant wind farm, but from all photos of them, I think they are an aesthetic blot on the landscape. They are pretty noisy in a strong wind too, I believe. They must kill some birds, from time to time. What's worse, they spread their offensive features over large areas, not like a single power station that can be hidden behind a hill yet service an enormous area.
Apart from aesthetics, I think what annoys me is the idea of giving up so much control as to how much electricity is in the grid to mother nature. I don't trust her. Give me a power source that puts me in complete control instead. Put nature in its place, which is to serve us higher creatures at the pointy end of creation/evolution. (I could go on in that patriarchal, judaeo-christian vein, but it would only be worthwhile if I knew I did have readers that it would annoy.)
I guess the same could be said for the unreliability of solar power too. However, at least it has the good grace to not clutter up the landscape.
Anyway, any articles that criticise windpower will always be welcome here.
OK, I'll admit something here. I really dislike windpower as a concept. I have never been near a giant wind farm, but from all photos of them, I think they are an aesthetic blot on the landscape. They are pretty noisy in a strong wind too, I believe. They must kill some birds, from time to time. What's worse, they spread their offensive features over large areas, not like a single power station that can be hidden behind a hill yet service an enormous area.
Apart from aesthetics, I think what annoys me is the idea of giving up so much control as to how much electricity is in the grid to mother nature. I don't trust her. Give me a power source that puts me in complete control instead. Put nature in its place, which is to serve us higher creatures at the pointy end of creation/evolution. (I could go on in that patriarchal, judaeo-christian vein, but it would only be worthwhile if I knew I did have readers that it would annoy.)
I guess the same could be said for the unreliability of solar power too. However, at least it has the good grace to not clutter up the landscape.
Anyway, any articles that criticise windpower will always be welcome here.
A prescription to do nothing
Vile acts cut across colour and class | Phillip Adams | The Australian
I knew Phillip Adams could not help but weigh in on the aboriginal abuse debate going on at the moment.
His column above is a typical example of an extremely common approach used by the Left. It's the old "mote and the beam" argument taken to a deadening extreme. Don't go criticising aboriginal abuse, says Phillip, as our own westernised suburbs are full of abuse against women too.
This is a formula for ignoring realities on the ground, and for doing nothing, or at least nothing effective. It is why the Left often fails on the issue of moral leadership. It lets itself become paralysed by a debilitating philosophy that is essentially relativist in its outlook, and expands a fear of hypocrisy away from the personal (which is the extent to which the Christian teaching is unexceptional and worthy) to the corporate. By this technique, no one is entitled to criticise other cultures too much (because their own is never perfect,) the United States in particular, but the West generally, is to be extremely circumspect in its dealings with all other nations (because the West is not perfect either,) and isolationism is the de facto "correct" response. [Unless of course a collectivist approach can be achieved, which it rarely can when the "collective" has to include those persons or nations deserving criticism in its decision making forums.]
Yet the same approach gives full permission to the Left to concentrate on the perceived inequities in their own societies or governments, regardless of how relatively minor such social issues may now be compared to those in the rest of the world.
It's a galling approach, as it means the Left usually claims to be the side taking the high moral ground, while simultaneously not realising that it is also the side more prepared to ignore or downplay clear instances of moral depravity deserving and requiring action. (They don't even like mere criticism of groups very much, if the group can argue it is acting on Left-ish collectivist "good intentions", such as ATSIC, or some of the communist regimes.)
There is more I can write, but it will have to wait.
I knew Phillip Adams could not help but weigh in on the aboriginal abuse debate going on at the moment.
His column above is a typical example of an extremely common approach used by the Left. It's the old "mote and the beam" argument taken to a deadening extreme. Don't go criticising aboriginal abuse, says Phillip, as our own westernised suburbs are full of abuse against women too.
This is a formula for ignoring realities on the ground, and for doing nothing, or at least nothing effective. It is why the Left often fails on the issue of moral leadership. It lets itself become paralysed by a debilitating philosophy that is essentially relativist in its outlook, and expands a fear of hypocrisy away from the personal (which is the extent to which the Christian teaching is unexceptional and worthy) to the corporate. By this technique, no one is entitled to criticise other cultures too much (because their own is never perfect,) the United States in particular, but the West generally, is to be extremely circumspect in its dealings with all other nations (because the West is not perfect either,) and isolationism is the de facto "correct" response. [Unless of course a collectivist approach can be achieved, which it rarely can when the "collective" has to include those persons or nations deserving criticism in its decision making forums.]
Yet the same approach gives full permission to the Left to concentrate on the perceived inequities in their own societies or governments, regardless of how relatively minor such social issues may now be compared to those in the rest of the world.
It's a galling approach, as it means the Left usually claims to be the side taking the high moral ground, while simultaneously not realising that it is also the side more prepared to ignore or downplay clear instances of moral depravity deserving and requiring action. (They don't even like mere criticism of groups very much, if the group can argue it is acting on Left-ish collectivist "good intentions", such as ATSIC, or some of the communist regimes.)
There is more I can write, but it will have to wait.
The cat amongst the pigeons
Let's talk about nuclear power and other energy sources - Opinion
So Tim Flannery is very clearly in favour of having the nuclear debate, and does not want to dismiss it out of hand. I can hear him being quoted in Parliament by the government already.
As I said before, stubborn resistance to nuclear is not going to be the clear winner that much of Federal Labor thinks.
So Tim Flannery is very clearly in favour of having the nuclear debate, and does not want to dismiss it out of hand. I can hear him being quoted in Parliament by the government already.
As I said before, stubborn resistance to nuclear is not going to be the clear winner that much of Federal Labor thinks.
Monday, May 29, 2006
Baby must be perfect
Babies with club feet aborted - Sunday Times - Times Online
From the above article:
MORE than 20 babies have been aborted in advanced pregnancy because scans showed that they had club feet, a deformity readily corrected by surgery or physiotherapy.
According to figures from the Office for National Statistics covering the years from 1996 to 2004, a further four babies were aborted because they had webbed fingers or extra digits, which are also corrected by simple surgery. All the terminations took place late in pregnancy, after 20 weeks. ...
Some parents, doctors and charities are increasingly worried by what they see as a tendency to widen the definition of “serious handicap”. The handicap provision, which does not exist in most other countries, permits abortions to be carried out until birth. It was intended to save women from the trauma of giving birth to babies likely to die in infancy...
One doctor in the north of England who did not want to be named, said a recent case in his hospital had involved the discovery of a hand missing from a foetus scanned at 20 weeks. “The father did not want the pregnancy to proceed because of his perception that the child would not be able to do all the usual things like sport,” said the doctor.
Of course, the followers of Peter Singer should have no problem with this. But for people of common sense, it's a pretty appalling state of affairs.
From the above article:
MORE than 20 babies have been aborted in advanced pregnancy because scans showed that they had club feet, a deformity readily corrected by surgery or physiotherapy.
According to figures from the Office for National Statistics covering the years from 1996 to 2004, a further four babies were aborted because they had webbed fingers or extra digits, which are also corrected by simple surgery. All the terminations took place late in pregnancy, after 20 weeks. ...
Some parents, doctors and charities are increasingly worried by what they see as a tendency to widen the definition of “serious handicap”. The handicap provision, which does not exist in most other countries, permits abortions to be carried out until birth. It was intended to save women from the trauma of giving birth to babies likely to die in infancy...
One doctor in the north of England who did not want to be named, said a recent case in his hospital had involved the discovery of a hand missing from a foetus scanned at 20 weeks. “The father did not want the pregnancy to proceed because of his perception that the child would not be able to do all the usual things like sport,” said the doctor.
Of course, the followers of Peter Singer should have no problem with this. But for people of common sense, it's a pretty appalling state of affairs.
How did I miss this?
TIMEasia Magazine: Best of Asia - Meguro Parasitological Museum, Tokyo, Japan
Always good to know there is still something to see in place you've been to before!:
Though it occupies only two floors of a small office building, the museum boasts that it displays more specimens of roundworms, hookworms, flukes, nematodes and leeches than any other place on earth—not to mention gruesomely graphic images and descriptions of the havoc they can wreak on humans and other hosts.
Always good to know there is still something to see in place you've been to before!:
Though it occupies only two floors of a small office building, the museum boasts that it displays more specimens of roundworms, hookworms, flukes, nematodes and leeches than any other place on earth—not to mention gruesomely graphic images and descriptions of the havoc they can wreak on humans and other hosts.
Distracting drivers in Japan
Back to Japan for a minute. One thing about that country that I find surprising is the very common use of quite large in-dash LCD screens for GPS navigation, but also watching TV or DVDs.
You would think that this would be dangerous and distracting for the driver, but I have been in so many different cars in which the TV or a DVD has been on, I presume there is no Japanese traffic law against it.
It seems that it is blamed for some accidents, and that is hardly surprising. In New South Wales, the situation is like this:
..driving with a TV/VDU (visual display unit) visible to the driver carries the same penalty as mobile use: $225 and three demerit points. Factory-installed DVD players/TV screens in cars that are dash-mounted typically switch off when the vehicle is in motion.
If drivers in Australia were allowed to watch TV, I wonder which shows would cause the most accidents.
You would think that this would be dangerous and distracting for the driver, but I have been in so many different cars in which the TV or a DVD has been on, I presume there is no Japanese traffic law against it.
It seems that it is blamed for some accidents, and that is hardly surprising. In New South Wales, the situation is like this:
..driving with a TV/VDU (visual display unit) visible to the driver carries the same penalty as mobile use: $225 and three demerit points. Factory-installed DVD players/TV screens in cars that are dash-mounted typically switch off when the vehicle is in motion.
If drivers in Australia were allowed to watch TV, I wonder which shows would cause the most accidents.
Disaster compassion fatigue
BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Rain compounds Java quake misery
Don't you get the feeling that the media (and world) reaction to this latest Indonesian disaster indicates a significant degree of compassion fatigue? (Australian attention is also heavily distracted by having to send people in to try to deal with the East Timor troubles too.)
If the Java volcano goes sky high and kills another few thousand, at least dramatic pictures of an eruption gets attention, I suppose.
Don't you get the feeling that the media (and world) reaction to this latest Indonesian disaster indicates a significant degree of compassion fatigue? (Australian attention is also heavily distracted by having to send people in to try to deal with the East Timor troubles too.)
If the Java volcano goes sky high and kills another few thousand, at least dramatic pictures of an eruption gets attention, I suppose.
Leaving the dying for dead on Mt Everest
Missing from the record books: the unsung feats of everyday life - Opinion
Richard Glover's Saturday column about this incident was amusing, but only because the poor guy left for dead is in fact alive. Richard had spoken to Sir Edmund Hillary about it on his radio show:
He [Hillary] is particularly uneasy about the attitude of "get to the top at any cost" - itself a reflection of the big fees being paid to guides. Inglis's achievement - reaching the top with his artificial legs - may be remarkable, but it's been soured by his admission that he walked past a dying mountaineer on his way up.
For Hillary, that shows a value system that's all wrong: people "just want to get to the top [and] don't give a damn for anybody else in distress".
Inglis has defended his own actions - pointing out that his party at least paused to help the dying man. About 40 other mountaineers simply walked past.
Forty! Suddenly Everest seems like the Pitt Street of the Himalayas. Forget climbing it; I want the Starbucks concession. Indeed, Hillary told me there are often 60 people at the summit. You'd be more secluded in the Cross City Tunnel.
Hope he (the near dead guy) gets a good media deal to tell his story.
UPDATE: here's another odd thing that may, or may not, have happened on Mt Everest recently. (Why a sherpa would get naked there is not explained at all.)
UPDATE 2: OK, maybe I don't always pay close attention. When I first posted, I did not realise that two climbers had been left for dead in the last week, but the first (British one) actually did die.
Richard Glover's Saturday column about this incident was amusing, but only because the poor guy left for dead is in fact alive. Richard had spoken to Sir Edmund Hillary about it on his radio show:
He [Hillary] is particularly uneasy about the attitude of "get to the top at any cost" - itself a reflection of the big fees being paid to guides. Inglis's achievement - reaching the top with his artificial legs - may be remarkable, but it's been soured by his admission that he walked past a dying mountaineer on his way up.
For Hillary, that shows a value system that's all wrong: people "just want to get to the top [and] don't give a damn for anybody else in distress".
Inglis has defended his own actions - pointing out that his party at least paused to help the dying man. About 40 other mountaineers simply walked past.
Forty! Suddenly Everest seems like the Pitt Street of the Himalayas. Forget climbing it; I want the Starbucks concession. Indeed, Hillary told me there are often 60 people at the summit. You'd be more secluded in the Cross City Tunnel.
Hope he (the near dead guy) gets a good media deal to tell his story.
UPDATE: here's another odd thing that may, or may not, have happened on Mt Everest recently. (Why a sherpa would get naked there is not explained at all.)
UPDATE 2: OK, maybe I don't always pay close attention. When I first posted, I did not realise that two climbers had been left for dead in the last week, but the first (British one) actually did die.
Sunday, May 28, 2006
Death for shorts?
Update 10: Iraqi Athletes Killed for Wearing Shorts - Forbes.com
If this report is true, Muslim extremists are even more screwed up than I thought:
Last week, gunmen in Baghdad stopped a car carrying a Sunni Arab tennis coach and two of his Shiite players, asked them to step out and then shot them.
Extremists have been distributing leaflets warning people in the mostly Sunni neighborhoods of Saidiyah and Ghazaliyah not to wear shorts, police said.
I assume this is talking about males not wearing shorts. How exactly is wearing shorts an activity deserving death? I thought from previous posts I made about Saudi Arabia that the thing with women having to be covered from head to toe was based on the idea that men just couldn't control themselves if all those seductresses showed so much as square centimeter of flesh. But why are men's legs a moral danger?
If this report is true, Muslim extremists are even more screwed up than I thought:
Last week, gunmen in Baghdad stopped a car carrying a Sunni Arab tennis coach and two of his Shiite players, asked them to step out and then shot them.
Extremists have been distributing leaflets warning people in the mostly Sunni neighborhoods of Saidiyah and Ghazaliyah not to wear shorts, police said.
I assume this is talking about males not wearing shorts. How exactly is wearing shorts an activity deserving death? I thought from previous posts I made about Saudi Arabia that the thing with women having to be covered from head to toe was based on the idea that men just couldn't control themselves if all those seductresses showed so much as square centimeter of flesh. But why are men's legs a moral danger?
Friday, May 26, 2006
X men over-analysed?
X-Men: The Last Stand reviewed. By Michael Agger
I made it clear some posts back that I don't care much for movies based on Marvel of other comic heros. For me, it's a phenomena that should have been put down, oh, 20 years or so ago.
Therefore, I haven't seen the X men movies (other than snippets in the background while I while was doing something else.) So this opening section of the Slate review of the new X Men three surprised me, but it sounds sort of plausible:
Mirror, mirror on the wall, what's the most gay-friendly blockbuster series of them all? No, not Batman. And not The Lord of the Rings (which is more pre-sexual than anything else). Consider another series, one in which teenagers discover that they are "mutants" and long to run away from home and be with others like them. At a finishing school in the countryside, they learn to wear tight leather suits and follow Hugh Jackman. Plus, if you touch the hottest girl at the school (Anna Paquin), you die. Consider also that the director of X-Men, Bryan Singer, stages scenes in which the word mutant is an obvious stand-in for homosexual—most famously, in X2, when a mother asks her son: "Have you ever tried … not being a mutant?"
I made it clear some posts back that I don't care much for movies based on Marvel of other comic heros. For me, it's a phenomena that should have been put down, oh, 20 years or so ago.
Therefore, I haven't seen the X men movies (other than snippets in the background while I while was doing something else.) So this opening section of the Slate review of the new X Men three surprised me, but it sounds sort of plausible:
Mirror, mirror on the wall, what's the most gay-friendly blockbuster series of them all? No, not Batman. And not The Lord of the Rings (which is more pre-sexual than anything else). Consider another series, one in which teenagers discover that they are "mutants" and long to run away from home and be with others like them. At a finishing school in the countryside, they learn to wear tight leather suits and follow Hugh Jackman. Plus, if you touch the hottest girl at the school (Anna Paquin), you die. Consider also that the director of X-Men, Bryan Singer, stages scenes in which the word mutant is an obvious stand-in for homosexual—most famously, in X2, when a mother asks her son: "Have you ever tried … not being a mutant?"
Nuclear debate is here
N-power 'viable, economical' | Science & nature | The Australian
The report above indicates that the question of nuclear power's economic viability in Australia is perhaps not the problem that many in the government think it is.
Labor's (with its foreshadowed scaremongering about where a nuclear plant might go) thinks it is on a winner already. I doubt it. It seems entirely possible to me that as global warming fears go up over next year or two, nuclear will start to smell better and better to a small but growing contingent of greenie types. With some environmentalists on side, the government's willingness to consider it will look good.
The report above indicates that the question of nuclear power's economic viability in Australia is perhaps not the problem that many in the government think it is.
Labor's (with its foreshadowed scaremongering about where a nuclear plant might go) thinks it is on a winner already. I doubt it. It seems entirely possible to me that as global warming fears go up over next year or two, nuclear will start to smell better and better to a small but growing contingent of greenie types. With some environmentalists on side, the government's willingness to consider it will look good.
Are we a in a braneworld?
ScienceDaily: Scientists Predict How To Detect A Fourth Dimension Of Space
An interesting article that shows that there are tests that can soon be done to see if the universe we live in is a braneworld.
I wonder if braneworld ideas will ever lead to suggestions of a physical location for heaven on another brane. (Just as the ideas of a 4th dimension lead to some supernatural style speculation in the 19th century.) Of course, if you follow Tipler's Omega Point ideas, you don't need a physical location as such, since it is all in a cyberspace which gets to subjectively last forever at the end of the universe. Cyber heaven also lets it be anything God wants it to be, whereas a physical type of one has still got pesky physical laws to deal with.
Braneworld ideas are presumably not consistant with Omega Point theories.
An interesting article that shows that there are tests that can soon be done to see if the universe we live in is a braneworld.
I wonder if braneworld ideas will ever lead to suggestions of a physical location for heaven on another brane. (Just as the ideas of a 4th dimension lead to some supernatural style speculation in the 19th century.) Of course, if you follow Tipler's Omega Point ideas, you don't need a physical location as such, since it is all in a cyberspace which gets to subjectively last forever at the end of the universe. Cyber heaven also lets it be anything God wants it to be, whereas a physical type of one has still got pesky physical laws to deal with.
Braneworld ideas are presumably not consistant with Omega Point theories.
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Shuttle launch
Over at Bad Astronomy is a nice time exposure pic of a an old shuttle launch. What interested me, never having seen a rocket launch, was how curved the trajectory is. I guess it's not just up, up and out of sight like (I think) most people would have expected.
Hurry up, I said...
BBC NEWS | World | Middle East | Aziz testifies for Saddam defence
From the above report of renewed games at Saddam's trial:
The latter accused the judge of "insulting a woman" by throwing out defence lawyer Bushra al-Khalil in the previous session.
"Sit down. If you continue with this I'll throw you out," the judge told Barzan al-Tikriti.
Saddam Hussein added: "Do you want to shut people's mouths this way?"
"Quiet. You are a defendant," the judge shouted.
"I am Saddam Hussein, your president, and you did elect me," the former leader shouted back.
Result: encouragement to armed Saddam loyalists to go shoot up a few more people.
From the above report of renewed games at Saddam's trial:
The latter accused the judge of "insulting a woman" by throwing out defence lawyer Bushra al-Khalil in the previous session.
"Sit down. If you continue with this I'll throw you out," the judge told Barzan al-Tikriti.
Saddam Hussein added: "Do you want to shut people's mouths this way?"
"Quiet. You are a defendant," the judge shouted.
"I am Saddam Hussein, your president, and you did elect me," the former leader shouted back.
Result: encouragement to armed Saddam loyalists to go shoot up a few more people.
Drinking with baby ..again
Further evidence suggesting that no level of alcohol is "safe" for a fetus:
Drinking under half an alcoholic beverage each day while pregnant can reduce the IQ of offspring by up to 7 points.
Consuming alcohol -- even small amounts -- especially during the second trimester of pregnancy produced pronounced IQ deficits among 10-year-olds surveyed for a study released Wednesday in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.
(An earlier post about another study to the same effect is here.)
Drinking under half an alcoholic beverage each day while pregnant can reduce the IQ of offspring by up to 7 points.
Consuming alcohol -- even small amounts -- especially during the second trimester of pregnancy produced pronounced IQ deficits among 10-year-olds surveyed for a study released Wednesday in Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research.
(An earlier post about another study to the same effect is here.)
Some more on aboriginal housing
Blacks lose out as cash diverted: report - National - smh.com.au
Well, thank goodness the "report" mentioned above is an internal Labor memo. Gives it much greater credibility.
NT Leader Clare Martin's petulant reaction to the aboriginal abuse issue is doing her far more harm than good. It's interesting that she choses to try to divert argument into inadequate housing when, as I indicated in an earlier post, there are cultural and other issues relevant to why aboriginal housing seems to always be in crisis.
For example: how much of an issue is the abadonment of houses for a substantial period after a death? Has anyone ever come up with an answer to that if it does cause serious temporary shortages? I think I have heard it suggested that sometimes the number of people in a house is by choice or preference rather than need (eg, a desire to keep the whole extended family together.) If this is correct, have government or aboriginal funding bodies ever properly dealt with this in design of housing?
It has been an old theme that housing provided has to be extremely robust because of the rough treatment that alcohol or drug addled people can give it, and also because of the lack of maintenance skills usually found on reserves. How well has this issue been addressed? Is inappropriate construction style still taking place? (I would have guessed that a simple concrete block construction with whitewashed walls would have a lot going for it. Steel sinks and toilets probably the go too. Maybe new houses are built like this - I just don't know.)
How long will demountables that the Commonwealth is offering the NT (leftover from Woomera) last anyway? (I suspect, a very short time indeed.)
I am sure that all these issues have been discussed and considered by different bodies from time to time over the years. It's just that I think the general public should also be aware of all of these cultural issues so they can properly understand the problem and why better progress has not been made.
Well, thank goodness the "report" mentioned above is an internal Labor memo. Gives it much greater credibility.
NT Leader Clare Martin's petulant reaction to the aboriginal abuse issue is doing her far more harm than good. It's interesting that she choses to try to divert argument into inadequate housing when, as I indicated in an earlier post, there are cultural and other issues relevant to why aboriginal housing seems to always be in crisis.
For example: how much of an issue is the abadonment of houses for a substantial period after a death? Has anyone ever come up with an answer to that if it does cause serious temporary shortages? I think I have heard it suggested that sometimes the number of people in a house is by choice or preference rather than need (eg, a desire to keep the whole extended family together.) If this is correct, have government or aboriginal funding bodies ever properly dealt with this in design of housing?
It has been an old theme that housing provided has to be extremely robust because of the rough treatment that alcohol or drug addled people can give it, and also because of the lack of maintenance skills usually found on reserves. How well has this issue been addressed? Is inappropriate construction style still taking place? (I would have guessed that a simple concrete block construction with whitewashed walls would have a lot going for it. Steel sinks and toilets probably the go too. Maybe new houses are built like this - I just don't know.)
How long will demountables that the Commonwealth is offering the NT (leftover from Woomera) last anyway? (I suspect, a very short time indeed.)
I am sure that all these issues have been discussed and considered by different bodies from time to time over the years. It's just that I think the general public should also be aware of all of these cultural issues so they can properly understand the problem and why better progress has not been made.
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Gore bore?
news @ nature.com- Al Gore: Eco matinee idol�-An Inconvenient Truth showcases science of climate change.
From the above review about Al Gore's global warming doco:
If you find Gore to be a refreshingly un-phoney politician with more brains than most whole administrations, you will love this film. If you find Gore boring, annoying or prone to strange shifts in tone, you may well tire of shots of him gazing into the middle distance and ruminating, in voice-over, about the tragedies he's known and how each eventually taught him something about global warming.
Sounds a good bet that I would fall into the second category.
In the film, Gore gives his presentation in front of an audience from which sympathetic murmurs can be occasionally heard. One audience member wears a T-shirt that reads 'Sweet Jesus, I hate Bill O'Reilly', referring to Fox News' famously conservative talking-head. If these people are going to be the only ones buying tickets, Gore will be preaching to the choir.
As to the science in it, the review defers to the Real Climate review, which gave most of the science a tick.
They also note that:
Much of the footage in Inconvenient Truth is of Al Gore giving a slideshow on the science of global warming. Sound boring? Well, yes, a little.
I don't think I will be rushing to check it out.
UPDATE: This Slate article on the problems with the movie is well worth reading.
From the above review about Al Gore's global warming doco:
If you find Gore to be a refreshingly un-phoney politician with more brains than most whole administrations, you will love this film. If you find Gore boring, annoying or prone to strange shifts in tone, you may well tire of shots of him gazing into the middle distance and ruminating, in voice-over, about the tragedies he's known and how each eventually taught him something about global warming.
Sounds a good bet that I would fall into the second category.
In the film, Gore gives his presentation in front of an audience from which sympathetic murmurs can be occasionally heard. One audience member wears a T-shirt that reads 'Sweet Jesus, I hate Bill O'Reilly', referring to Fox News' famously conservative talking-head. If these people are going to be the only ones buying tickets, Gore will be preaching to the choir.
As to the science in it, the review defers to the Real Climate review, which gave most of the science a tick.
They also note that:
Much of the footage in Inconvenient Truth is of Al Gore giving a slideshow on the science of global warming. Sound boring? Well, yes, a little.
I don't think I will be rushing to check it out.
UPDATE: This Slate article on the problems with the movie is well worth reading.
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
On the Code
Amongst the many articles about the historical "claims" in the Da Vinci Code, the one in Slate recently seemed to me to be one of the better summaries.
(I started the book, but the writing style has put me off coming back to it. I think it is worse than Michael Crichton on a bad day, and that's saying something.)
UPDATE: For the most savage, and very funny, review of the movie read Anthony Lane's in The New Yorker. There are so many lines I would like to quote, I just don't know which one to pick. Just go read it.
(I started the book, but the writing style has put me off coming back to it. I think it is worse than Michael Crichton on a bad day, and that's saying something.)
UPDATE: For the most savage, and very funny, review of the movie read Anthony Lane's in The New Yorker. There are so many lines I would like to quote, I just don't know which one to pick. Just go read it.
Our anti war protesters just aren't in the same league
You may have heard about how Japan and Korea are having a confrontation of sorts over some disputed islands. There have been some weird anti-Japanese protests by Koreans as a result, but perhaps covering yourself with (so he says) 187,000 bees and jumping on a Japanese flag takes some beating. (Watch the video at the link.)
If only Cindy Sheehan were so creative.
If only Cindy Sheehan were so creative.
3 interesting science stories
All from today's Science Daily:
1. Bad news: a study suggesting that the high end of climate change predictions are more likely. Time to start work on big space umbrellas as a possible solution.
2. Cats are evil in so many ways: Children who are exposed to cats soon after birth may have an increased risk of developing eczema. But exposure to dogs? Being exposed to two or more dogs at home suggested a slightly protective, but not significant, effect on children's risk of developing eczema.
3. Plug in hybrid cars certainly seem a good idea. Plug them into the wall overnight while you are home, and the heaps of people who travel no more than 40 km per day might never use petrol. (In fact, the model described here can run on ethanol solely. No oil at all. Take that, Saudi Arabia.)
1. Bad news: a study suggesting that the high end of climate change predictions are more likely. Time to start work on big space umbrellas as a possible solution.
2. Cats are evil in so many ways: Children who are exposed to cats soon after birth may have an increased risk of developing eczema. But exposure to dogs? Being exposed to two or more dogs at home suggested a slightly protective, but not significant, effect on children's risk of developing eczema.
3. Plug in hybrid cars certainly seem a good idea. Plug them into the wall overnight while you are home, and the heaps of people who travel no more than 40 km per day might never use petrol. (In fact, the model described here can run on ethanol solely. No oil at all. Take that, Saudi Arabia.)
Matt Price line for the day...
Happy Chappy enjoys seat of power | Matt Price | The Australian
Labor, we were told by Julia Gillard before the resumption of parliament, would be giving the Treasurer a comprehensive working over.
"It's Peter Costello's first day in the big chair," she said, referring to Happy Chappy's stint as Acting Prime Minister. "Labor will be taking Peter Costello outside his very narrow comfort zone."
And it's true. By the end of question time, Costello's comfort zone had been upgraded from unsealed bush track to four-lane bitumen freeway.
Labor, we were told by Julia Gillard before the resumption of parliament, would be giving the Treasurer a comprehensive working over.
"It's Peter Costello's first day in the big chair," she said, referring to Happy Chappy's stint as Acting Prime Minister. "Labor will be taking Peter Costello outside his very narrow comfort zone."
And it's true. By the end of question time, Costello's comfort zone had been upgraded from unsealed bush track to four-lane bitumen freeway.
Why is this singer successful?
Madonna's new move: crucifixion - Music - Entertainment - smh.com.au
No need for emetics when instead you could just read the above description of Madonna's new stage show.
I have never, ever, understood her appeal. Must be that people just like quasi-political, nutty-mystical, pretend-slutty singing acts in a way I can't figure.
And will she be even-handed in her silly use of religious icongraphy? How about a flash of a depiction of Mohammed during the show?
No need for emetics when instead you could just read the above description of Madonna's new stage show.
I have never, ever, understood her appeal. Must be that people just like quasi-political, nutty-mystical, pretend-slutty singing acts in a way I can't figure.
And will she be even-handed in her silly use of religious icongraphy? How about a flash of a depiction of Mohammed during the show?
Monday, May 22, 2006
Bad news from Syria
Guardian Unlimited | World dispatch | Arrested development
From the article:
Syria is in the throes of one of its biggest crackdowns on dissidents in many years. As many as 12 reformers and writers have been arrested this month in a new show of strength by the regime.
From the article:
Syria is in the throes of one of its biggest crackdowns on dissidents in many years. As many as 12 reformers and writers have been arrested this month in a new show of strength by the regime.
And it's not because of pregnancy...
Menstruation Is Fast Becoming Optional - Yahoo! News
From the above (quite lengthy) story:
Still, surveys also show most women consider monthly periods normal. Small wonder: Girls learn early on that menstruation is a sign of fertility and femininity, making its onset an eagerly awaited rite of passage.
The period is "way over-romanticized," says Linda Gordon, a New York University professor specializing in women's history and the history of sexuality.
Not by men, that's for sure.
From the above (quite lengthy) story:
Still, surveys also show most women consider monthly periods normal. Small wonder: Girls learn early on that menstruation is a sign of fertility and femininity, making its onset an eagerly awaited rite of passage.
The period is "way over-romanticized," says Linda Gordon, a New York University professor specializing in women's history and the history of sexuality.
Not by men, that's for sure.
Housing issues
Homes 'unfit for animals' | News | The Australian
It seems to rarely be mentioned in media reports about housing quality issues in aboriginal communities, but isn't one of the problems here (at least in some areas of Australia) the complicating cultural issue that a house in which a person has died will be abandoned for some time (months I think) before any person will re-occupy it? I actually forget who was telling me about this - I remember discussing it with a brother, but maybe I have read about it somewhere else.
I don't know how big a problem this really is, but with death rates in some communities being what they are, it certainly would mean you would have to have a hell of a lot of "spare" housing to deal with this issue.
I know I have heard from time to time of projects to create really rugged remote aboriginal housing that needs virtually no maintenance, as the care and maintenance of the housing is a very big issue. However, this does nothing to address the issue of abandonment. I remember suggesting to my (lefty) brother that maybe the solution would be a very sophisticated style of tent (with a portable solid floor?) that could be moved off the spot where someone had died. That I would suggest that they live in something less than solid house dismayed him. But honestly, some really creative solutions to the housing issue are needed, aren't they?
(Of course, how to stop tents catching alight if a fire is lit inside is another issue. But I think there must be a model of temporary housing from some indiginous community somewhere in the world that could be adapted.)
It seems to rarely be mentioned in media reports about housing quality issues in aboriginal communities, but isn't one of the problems here (at least in some areas of Australia) the complicating cultural issue that a house in which a person has died will be abandoned for some time (months I think) before any person will re-occupy it? I actually forget who was telling me about this - I remember discussing it with a brother, but maybe I have read about it somewhere else.
I don't know how big a problem this really is, but with death rates in some communities being what they are, it certainly would mean you would have to have a hell of a lot of "spare" housing to deal with this issue.
I know I have heard from time to time of projects to create really rugged remote aboriginal housing that needs virtually no maintenance, as the care and maintenance of the housing is a very big issue. However, this does nothing to address the issue of abandonment. I remember suggesting to my (lefty) brother that maybe the solution would be a very sophisticated style of tent (with a portable solid floor?) that could be moved off the spot where someone had died. That I would suggest that they live in something less than solid house dismayed him. But honestly, some really creative solutions to the housing issue are needed, aren't they?
(Of course, how to stop tents catching alight if a fire is lit inside is another issue. But I think there must be a model of temporary housing from some indiginous community somewhere in the world that could be adapted.)
A standard response
The familiar echo of Aboriginal condemnation - Opinion - theage.com.au
The article above takes the "standard" old style aboriginal interest group response to the aboriginal abuse issues raised last week.
Rather than acknowledge the longstanding structural disadvantage experienced by remote Aboriginal communities, the complicity of the Australian Government in their creation and neglect, and a national responsibility to make real changes, Brough's immediate response to Rogers' revelations was to announce the existence of a pedophile ring of senior Aboriginal men. No evidence has been produced, and it seems clear that none exists.
Where did Brough's allegation come from? Such a "ring" would, of course, give the minister a convenient solution to his need to be seen to be doing something: an evil group of Aboriginal men, a target small enough to rapidly identify and punish, would serve as a scapegoat and provide a quick fix for his problem. But if we look further back into the long history of Aboriginal-white relations, it becomes clear that such claims have often helped governments to justify interventionist indigenous policies.
Is the writer suggesting that "non interventionist" policies have never been tried, even under the long reign of Labor and ATSIC? Does she really want the solution to this to be left up to the same bunch of aboriginal leaders and academics who have been around for the last 30 years worrying more about land rights, and whether Aboriginal cultures 200 years ago were abusive to women or not, than what's going on now?
The article above takes the "standard" old style aboriginal interest group response to the aboriginal abuse issues raised last week.
Rather than acknowledge the longstanding structural disadvantage experienced by remote Aboriginal communities, the complicity of the Australian Government in their creation and neglect, and a national responsibility to make real changes, Brough's immediate response to Rogers' revelations was to announce the existence of a pedophile ring of senior Aboriginal men. No evidence has been produced, and it seems clear that none exists.
Where did Brough's allegation come from? Such a "ring" would, of course, give the minister a convenient solution to his need to be seen to be doing something: an evil group of Aboriginal men, a target small enough to rapidly identify and punish, would serve as a scapegoat and provide a quick fix for his problem. But if we look further back into the long history of Aboriginal-white relations, it becomes clear that such claims have often helped governments to justify interventionist indigenous policies.
Is the writer suggesting that "non interventionist" policies have never been tried, even under the long reign of Labor and ATSIC? Does she really want the solution to this to be left up to the same bunch of aboriginal leaders and academics who have been around for the last 30 years worrying more about land rights, and whether Aboriginal cultures 200 years ago were abusive to women or not, than what's going on now?
About Marsden
Case for the damnation of Marsden - Opinion - smh.com.au
Paul Sheehan did not like John Marsden.
What Sheehan's brings up was already on the public record. I don't recall the part about witness intimidation though.
If what Sheehan says is a correct version of what the trial judge at the defamation action found [that Marsden had on the balance of probabilities - which is the standard of proof in a civil case - asked a prisoner to get a witness to change his position,] why was Marsden allowed to still practice as a solicitor at all?
I still predict some new, damaging, information about Marsden will come out soon.
Paul Sheehan did not like John Marsden.
What Sheehan's brings up was already on the public record. I don't recall the part about witness intimidation though.
If what Sheehan says is a correct version of what the trial judge at the defamation action found [that Marsden had on the balance of probabilities - which is the standard of proof in a civil case - asked a prisoner to get a witness to change his position,] why was Marsden allowed to still practice as a solicitor at all?
I still predict some new, damaging, information about Marsden will come out soon.
Sunday, May 21, 2006
Scruton on Mills
OpinionJournal - Featured Article
If you missed it, Roger Scruton has an essay above on John Stuart Mill. Scruton is always worth reading (especially if you a conservative!)
If you missed it, Roger Scruton has an essay above on John Stuart Mill. Scruton is always worth reading (especially if you a conservative!)
Mountain coming through
LiveScience.com - Land Speed Record: Mountain Moves 62 Miles in 30 Minutes
A mountain near the Montana-Wyoming border once moved 62 miles in a half-hour in a catastrophic scenario that could be repeated elsewhere, scientists say...
"We think the slide motion was catastrophic," Aharonov told LiveScience. "According to our calculation, the motion took less than 30 minutes."
I guess being overtaken on a freeway by a mountain would be catastrophic.
A mountain near the Montana-Wyoming border once moved 62 miles in a half-hour in a catastrophic scenario that could be repeated elsewhere, scientists say...
"We think the slide motion was catastrophic," Aharonov told LiveScience. "According to our calculation, the motion took less than 30 minutes."
I guess being overtaken on a freeway by a mountain would be catastrophic.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
At last - Mission:Impossible 3
I finally got to see MI3 tonight. My comments:
Good points: script is quite good really. The acting is more even than in previous M:I movies, and in fact I would say Cruise and Phillip S Hoffman actually do very good acting, within the limits of this kind of material. Exotic locations are used (although shown very briefly - see my comments below,) and there is very seamless and unintrusive use of computer effects. (You know that certain things can't be being done "for real", but it is almost impossible to tell where the artifice begins. For example, one very cleverly done scene almost makes you believe those super realistic rubber masks could really work. There is also a jumping off a building sequence which - at least initially, before the editing starts cutting it up too much - looks as real as it possibly could.) The movie has some (limited) humour, and some scenes of human warmth, and in that sense is more "realistic" than M:I1. However, its tone is darker, with a genuinely sadistic villain, and as such ends up being not as much fun.
But, there is a lot to like.
Bad or distracting points: the direction. For the last few years, I have seen very few one hour shows on TV. I am therefore unfamiliar with the popular work of JJ Abrams. However, direction of M:I3 is claustrophobic, for want of a better term. It seems he is inordinately fond of close to medium length shots, where it looks like the camera is no more than a few meters from the actors.
This is fine for some sequences, where it can help rack up the tension, especially in the opening scene. But after 30 minutes or so, I really found myself wondering why this movie was shot so tight for so long. Especially during the action sequences, I longed for wider shots to make better sense of what was going on around Cruise.
There is also a quasi-handheld sort of style for all of the action sequences. It's not exactly jittery, but I did start longing for smoother camera movement in many sequences, and less choppy editing.
I hate overly fast editing. It is, to my mind, the major problem with younger action movie directors since the 1990's, and is the special "trademark" of directors who have come from an advertising or music video background. (I especially despise it in dance and musical numbers, where it takes away all sense of the quality of the dancing itself.) M:I3's action sequences are nearly all edited too quickly (especially parts of the Shanghai sequences,) but (fortunately) not so quickly as to ruin the movie.
I mentioned in an earlier post how well I thought Brian De Palma directed the first M:I movie, and it was this more "traditional" style of direction and editing that I missed.
I don't think I have (yet) read any reviewer who has mentioned the "tightness" of so many of the shots, which I find surprising. (To me, it seemed such an obvious and distracting feature of Abram's style.) Slate's review did say: "The action scenes are thrilling in the modern, quick-cut, disorienting way." I can agree with that.
Overall: I have lingered on the downside for too long. Many people don't notice this sort of thing anyway. And overall, I was happy to have seen it and would happily see another M:I installment. Still, M:I 1 stands clearly ahead as my favourite. The less said about M:I 2 the better, although it does help M:I 3 look very good by comparison.
UPDATE: It's not just me. Here's one reviewer (who really didn't like the movie at all):
It's filmed almost entirely in close-ups and medium shots, in extremely shallow focus with no depth of field. (It's something of a sick joke that Abrams elected to use the extra-wide CinemaScope aspect ratio, as he tends to obscure or blur out anything that isn't smack dab in the center of the frame.) There's no oomph to the images, and the monotonous, confusingly edited action scenes just lie there, dead.
I don't agree that the action sequences "lie dead"; I just thought they could have been better with a different director. But certainly, he seems to have almost no interest in the composition of shots.
Good points: script is quite good really. The acting is more even than in previous M:I movies, and in fact I would say Cruise and Phillip S Hoffman actually do very good acting, within the limits of this kind of material. Exotic locations are used (although shown very briefly - see my comments below,) and there is very seamless and unintrusive use of computer effects. (You know that certain things can't be being done "for real", but it is almost impossible to tell where the artifice begins. For example, one very cleverly done scene almost makes you believe those super realistic rubber masks could really work. There is also a jumping off a building sequence which - at least initially, before the editing starts cutting it up too much - looks as real as it possibly could.) The movie has some (limited) humour, and some scenes of human warmth, and in that sense is more "realistic" than M:I1. However, its tone is darker, with a genuinely sadistic villain, and as such ends up being not as much fun.
But, there is a lot to like.
Bad or distracting points: the direction. For the last few years, I have seen very few one hour shows on TV. I am therefore unfamiliar with the popular work of JJ Abrams. However, direction of M:I3 is claustrophobic, for want of a better term. It seems he is inordinately fond of close to medium length shots, where it looks like the camera is no more than a few meters from the actors.
This is fine for some sequences, where it can help rack up the tension, especially in the opening scene. But after 30 minutes or so, I really found myself wondering why this movie was shot so tight for so long. Especially during the action sequences, I longed for wider shots to make better sense of what was going on around Cruise.
There is also a quasi-handheld sort of style for all of the action sequences. It's not exactly jittery, but I did start longing for smoother camera movement in many sequences, and less choppy editing.
I hate overly fast editing. It is, to my mind, the major problem with younger action movie directors since the 1990's, and is the special "trademark" of directors who have come from an advertising or music video background. (I especially despise it in dance and musical numbers, where it takes away all sense of the quality of the dancing itself.) M:I3's action sequences are nearly all edited too quickly (especially parts of the Shanghai sequences,) but (fortunately) not so quickly as to ruin the movie.
I mentioned in an earlier post how well I thought Brian De Palma directed the first M:I movie, and it was this more "traditional" style of direction and editing that I missed.
I don't think I have (yet) read any reviewer who has mentioned the "tightness" of so many of the shots, which I find surprising. (To me, it seemed such an obvious and distracting feature of Abram's style.) Slate's review did say: "The action scenes are thrilling in the modern, quick-cut, disorienting way." I can agree with that.
Overall: I have lingered on the downside for too long. Many people don't notice this sort of thing anyway. And overall, I was happy to have seen it and would happily see another M:I installment. Still, M:I 1 stands clearly ahead as my favourite. The less said about M:I 2 the better, although it does help M:I 3 look very good by comparison.
UPDATE: It's not just me. Here's one reviewer (who really didn't like the movie at all):
It's filmed almost entirely in close-ups and medium shots, in extremely shallow focus with no depth of field. (It's something of a sick joke that Abrams elected to use the extra-wide CinemaScope aspect ratio, as he tends to obscure or blur out anything that isn't smack dab in the center of the frame.) There's no oomph to the images, and the monotonous, confusingly edited action scenes just lie there, dead.
I don't agree that the action sequences "lie dead"; I just thought they could have been better with a different director. But certainly, he seems to have almost no interest in the composition of shots.
In the Sydney Morning Herald today
A few items of note in the paper today:
Richard Glover, the lefty but sometimes amusing columnist/broadcaster (I quite like his writings about his family), has a very worthwhile column in which he points out that the media (and politicians) love to let accidents become the story. For example, in relation to the Private Kovco lost CD incident:
The lost CD is not a story about corruption. Or laziness. Or self-interest. Or malevolence. It is the story of an accident. That simple.
By leaving a CD in a computer drive, did the officer indicate disrespect for Private Kovco, or a lack of attention to her work? If anything, the opposite. She grabbed a few minutes before a flight to go over her report...
In ethical terms, who has behaved badly here? The defence officer who fell foul of an accident or the two people who made conscious decisions to make sure that accident had maximum impact?
And in relation to the the aboriginal stories of this week:
On Tuesday night, Mal Brough, the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, said he believed that pedophile rings were operating in some Aboriginal communities.
Everyone agrees there are pedophiles in these communities, and that they turn a blind eye to each other's crimes. Yet some believed Brough had used the wrong word in describing this as a "ring". And so we spent the rest of the week on the topic of whether Brough had accidentally used the wrong word.
Here's what was notable: officials in the Northern Territory seemed more passionate and angry about Brough's verbal accident - variously described as "ignorant", "offensive" and "a disgrace" - than they were about the hideous crimes themselves.
And so we prefer trivia to substance; an accident to a complex debate. Heads must roll. Brough must apologise.
I agree with Richard, but I can't see that he would display the same generosity of spirit towards any errors in intelligence leading to the Iraq War.
Mike Carleton for once says something that is worthwhile, and which seems not to have been said elsewhere (although I haven't paid very close attention to the story). This is about the claims of LTCDR Robyn Fahy that the Navy has treated her very badly (and had a Navy reserve doctor find her mentally ill, when others could not):
But Fahy also claimed she had been beaten up "on a daily basis" while a student at the defence force academy. "I can't remember a day where I wasn't punched, or hit, or slapped, or spat upon," she said.
To my mind and experience, this doesn't ring true. Bashed every day for three years? It stretches credibility, suggesting there are two sides to this story. Which I understand is indeed the case.
But here the Defence Force is in a bind. While Fahy is able to go public - and fair enough - the navy is gagged by the privacy laws, which prevent any detailed response to her.
From what I saw of it, the 7.30 Report story on her expressed no scepticism of this. I also heard Fahy's father, after Labor had called for a full judicial inquiry, say that the family did not want this, they just wanted the Navy to admit a mistake had been made and apologise. This suggested to me that the father thought her daughter's obsession with vindication had become unhealthy. What Carlton says is exactly right; the defence force is in a bind in PR terms in these type of cases, and media attention does nothing to really help the "victim".
Finally, Alan Ramsey continues to earn a pay cheque by writing an opinion piece comprised of enormous slabs of other people's words, and some really clever name calling of politicians (John Howards gets called "toad" today, in what is such a ridiculous introduction I can't be bothered re-printing it.)
Of more interest to me is Ramsey's take on the aboriginal issues. His political analysis is highly nuanced:
The multiplicity of official reports in the last 15 to 20 years dealing specifically or in part with the sexual abuse of Aboriginal children would make you weep. They are there, in government files and on the public record, by the number. What have the politicians done about them? Not a bloody thing, really.
This is "talkback radio" analysis. The point is not that nothing has been attempted in this area at all, just that what has been done has not been working, or (for any programs that have worked, such as the improvements in communities that have gone "dry") they have not been applied widely enough across all States and territories.
No, it's always much more gratifying for Alan to call a politician a name:
And all the ignorant chest-beating that went on this week from John Howard's young Brisbane cabinet minister, Malcolm Brough - who is known behind his back as "Mal-Bro", after the macho cigarette commercial of 25 years ago - disregards the mass of evidence available to government that institutionalised neglect is destroying Aboriginal families and reducing its people to exploited drunks, layabouts and sexual predators. It's not a failure of "law and order", always the easy fallback of lazy politicians with not a clue what else to do.
He's right to the extent that the problems are complex; but he's wrong to pander to lefty activists by suggesting it is all government's fault because not enough is spent on aborigines generally.
And despite this childish swipe a Brough, Ramsey goes on to quote (with approval) an old report that does claim there are pedophile rings in parts of aboriginal Australia:
"The existence of pedophile rings operating in a number of country areas of NSW is a major concern. (One Aboriginal-family-violence worker interviewed, stated she knew of children who had 'disappeared' with men who had driven into towns and taken them away with them.) This problem of predatory behaviour is not just confined to rural NSW, but has been identified as being prevalent nationwide."
Does Ramsay give Brough any credit for bravely saying something that the (Labor) Northern Territory government denies vehemently? Not at all.
Why is he still employed? He has been Australia's most embarrassing "serious" political commentator for so long.
Richard Glover, the lefty but sometimes amusing columnist/broadcaster (I quite like his writings about his family), has a very worthwhile column in which he points out that the media (and politicians) love to let accidents become the story. For example, in relation to the Private Kovco lost CD incident:
The lost CD is not a story about corruption. Or laziness. Or self-interest. Or malevolence. It is the story of an accident. That simple.
By leaving a CD in a computer drive, did the officer indicate disrespect for Private Kovco, or a lack of attention to her work? If anything, the opposite. She grabbed a few minutes before a flight to go over her report...
In ethical terms, who has behaved badly here? The defence officer who fell foul of an accident or the two people who made conscious decisions to make sure that accident had maximum impact?
And in relation to the the aboriginal stories of this week:
On Tuesday night, Mal Brough, the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, said he believed that pedophile rings were operating in some Aboriginal communities.
Everyone agrees there are pedophiles in these communities, and that they turn a blind eye to each other's crimes. Yet some believed Brough had used the wrong word in describing this as a "ring". And so we spent the rest of the week on the topic of whether Brough had accidentally used the wrong word.
Here's what was notable: officials in the Northern Territory seemed more passionate and angry about Brough's verbal accident - variously described as "ignorant", "offensive" and "a disgrace" - than they were about the hideous crimes themselves.
And so we prefer trivia to substance; an accident to a complex debate. Heads must roll. Brough must apologise.
I agree with Richard, but I can't see that he would display the same generosity of spirit towards any errors in intelligence leading to the Iraq War.
Mike Carleton for once says something that is worthwhile, and which seems not to have been said elsewhere (although I haven't paid very close attention to the story). This is about the claims of LTCDR Robyn Fahy that the Navy has treated her very badly (and had a Navy reserve doctor find her mentally ill, when others could not):
But Fahy also claimed she had been beaten up "on a daily basis" while a student at the defence force academy. "I can't remember a day where I wasn't punched, or hit, or slapped, or spat upon," she said.
To my mind and experience, this doesn't ring true. Bashed every day for three years? It stretches credibility, suggesting there are two sides to this story. Which I understand is indeed the case.
But here the Defence Force is in a bind. While Fahy is able to go public - and fair enough - the navy is gagged by the privacy laws, which prevent any detailed response to her.
From what I saw of it, the 7.30 Report story on her expressed no scepticism of this. I also heard Fahy's father, after Labor had called for a full judicial inquiry, say that the family did not want this, they just wanted the Navy to admit a mistake had been made and apologise. This suggested to me that the father thought her daughter's obsession with vindication had become unhealthy. What Carlton says is exactly right; the defence force is in a bind in PR terms in these type of cases, and media attention does nothing to really help the "victim".
Finally, Alan Ramsey continues to earn a pay cheque by writing an opinion piece comprised of enormous slabs of other people's words, and some really clever name calling of politicians (John Howards gets called "toad" today, in what is such a ridiculous introduction I can't be bothered re-printing it.)
Of more interest to me is Ramsey's take on the aboriginal issues. His political analysis is highly nuanced:
The multiplicity of official reports in the last 15 to 20 years dealing specifically or in part with the sexual abuse of Aboriginal children would make you weep. They are there, in government files and on the public record, by the number. What have the politicians done about them? Not a bloody thing, really.
This is "talkback radio" analysis. The point is not that nothing has been attempted in this area at all, just that what has been done has not been working, or (for any programs that have worked, such as the improvements in communities that have gone "dry") they have not been applied widely enough across all States and territories.
No, it's always much more gratifying for Alan to call a politician a name:
And all the ignorant chest-beating that went on this week from John Howard's young Brisbane cabinet minister, Malcolm Brough - who is known behind his back as "Mal-Bro", after the macho cigarette commercial of 25 years ago - disregards the mass of evidence available to government that institutionalised neglect is destroying Aboriginal families and reducing its people to exploited drunks, layabouts and sexual predators. It's not a failure of "law and order", always the easy fallback of lazy politicians with not a clue what else to do.
He's right to the extent that the problems are complex; but he's wrong to pander to lefty activists by suggesting it is all government's fault because not enough is spent on aborigines generally.
And despite this childish swipe a Brough, Ramsey goes on to quote (with approval) an old report that does claim there are pedophile rings in parts of aboriginal Australia:
"The existence of pedophile rings operating in a number of country areas of NSW is a major concern. (One Aboriginal-family-violence worker interviewed, stated she knew of children who had 'disappeared' with men who had driven into towns and taken them away with them.) This problem of predatory behaviour is not just confined to rural NSW, but has been identified as being prevalent nationwide."
Does Ramsay give Brough any credit for bravely saying something that the (Labor) Northern Territory government denies vehemently? Not at all.
Why is he still employed? He has been Australia's most embarrassing "serious" political commentator for so long.
Humour
Canadian culture in heavyweight division | Matt Price | The Australian
Matt Price makes me laugh. From this morning's column:
Absurd talk about Bill Shorten being parachuted in to replace Kim Beazley. Why can't people believe the union leader's earnest denials as revealed in interviews with channels Seven, Nine, Ten, SBS, the ABC, community television, Southern Cross radio, Hello, GQ, Better Homes and Gardens, Vanity Fair, Tattoo Monthly, the Beaconsfield Bugle, CNN and anybody else who bothers to ask.
Matt Price makes me laugh. From this morning's column:
Absurd talk about Bill Shorten being parachuted in to replace Kim Beazley. Why can't people believe the union leader's earnest denials as revealed in interviews with channels Seven, Nine, Ten, SBS, the ABC, community television, Southern Cross radio, Hello, GQ, Better Homes and Gardens, Vanity Fair, Tattoo Monthly, the Beaconsfield Bugle, CNN and anybody else who bothers to ask.
Friday, May 19, 2006
Reading the noosphere
RedOrbit - Science - Can This Black Box See Into the Future?
The Global Consciousness Project does not seem to have attracted much publicity. However, it is the sort of highly speculative science project that appeals to me.
Above is a very non-critical article about it, which quotes quite a few scientist sounding types who are (apparently) believers.
I would not take the article on face value at all, but have a look at the site for the project itself, which is more cautious in its claims.
(The term "noosphere" is explained here.)
The Global Consciousness Project does not seem to have attracted much publicity. However, it is the sort of highly speculative science project that appeals to me.
Above is a very non-critical article about it, which quotes quite a few scientist sounding types who are (apparently) believers.
I would not take the article on face value at all, but have a look at the site for the project itself, which is more cautious in its claims.
(The term "noosphere" is explained here.)
A strange one
Turkey is as good a place as any to die: solicitor's journey ends abroad
Controversial gay and drug taking Sydney lawyer John Marsden has died.
I have only ever seen media stories about him, which included some interviews. To me, his character seemed grating in the extreme, yet he had a significant circle of supporters in high places.
I see that High Court judge Michael Kirby will speak at his funeral. Of course, the matter of their sexuality will feature highly.
Now that he is gone, I half expect that with a personal life as hedonistic as Marsden's, there will be some further revelations about his personal affairs.
Controversial gay and drug taking Sydney lawyer John Marsden has died.
I have only ever seen media stories about him, which included some interviews. To me, his character seemed grating in the extreme, yet he had a significant circle of supporters in high places.
I see that High Court judge Michael Kirby will speak at his funeral. Of course, the matter of their sexuality will feature highly.
Now that he is gone, I half expect that with a personal life as hedonistic as Marsden's, there will be some further revelations about his personal affairs.
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