So I'm more Marxist than I knew?

I don't always find Yanis Varoufakis that good in interviews:  I sometimes find his economic advice a bit hard to follow.

But here in an article that shows us The Guardian as the wild mix of the silly and the sensible that it is (see my previous post),  Varoufakis calls himself an "erratic Marxist" and seems to me to make much sense.   (I thought Jason Soon respected his views - but I hadn't realised what a polar opposite of a small government proponent he is.)   Take this paragraph, for example:

“Because what Australians do not understand is that there is a major disconnect between the United States’ official ideology and its practice. The ideology is one of free market, but the practice is one of a state that is extremely activist, and is investing very heavily in whole networks of innovation and production: the military industrial complex, the medical industrial complex, even the prison industrial complex. They are investing heavily through the state to create networks of value creation, and actually producing things. And Australia is moving very rapidly into divesting itself of actual production.”

And how about this paragraph (which would mark him in the mind of Sinclair Davidson and the IPA as the economic Anti-Christ):

The idea that individuals create wealth and that all governments do is come along and tax them is what Varoufakis calls “a preposterous reversal of the truth”.
“There is an amazing myth in our enterprise culture that wealth is created individually and then appropriated by the state to be distributed.
“We are conceptualising what is happening in society as if we are an archipelago of Robinson Crusoes, everybody on an island, creating our own thing individually and then a boat comes along and collects it and redistributes it. It’s not true. We are not individual producers, we produce things collectively.”

 He sounds also as if he would be completely in favour of the Labor policy on negative gearing.

I like him more than I realised. 

Every time you think we've reached "Peak Guardian", it turns out wrong

Look, I'm a bit reluctant to give this publicity, but the reason the article is a new "peak Guardian" is not so much that it appears on their site per se, but the way the opening paragraph invites sympathetic understanding:

It’s easy to laugh at a grown man in a rubber dog suit chewing on a squeaky toy. Maybe too easy, in fact, because to laugh is to dismiss it, denigrate it – ignore the fact that many of us have found comfort and joy in pretending to be animals at some point in our lives.

As you might expect, though, the comments thread is very active, and very mocking.

Quantum saves free will - again?

New Age-ish books on quantum physics in the 70's and 80's, as well as the quantum mind theory of Penrose and Hameroff,* seemed to provide grounds to argue that, in one way or another, quantum effects could be key to consciousness, and even free will.

This likeable use of quantum theory (well, for those of us who think the concept of free will is important) has  become unpopular with modern physicists and hard nosed, atheistic, philosophers, with the likes of Sean Carroll, Sabine Hossenfelder, Sam Harris and a host of others arguing that, basically, you're a doofus who doesn't understand science properly if you think there could possibly be true free will, or "downwards causation" by the mind.

[And, by the way - I have my doubts that they are being consistent - or honest - when they argue that the lack of true free will does not mean you have to give up on notions of morality and socially important things like punishment for crime.  But that should be a matter for another post.]

Anyhow, this is all preamble to a link to a paper on arXiv which, as papers at that site go, is understandable for quite large sections, and argues that, properly understood, quantum mechanics does indeed mean there are emergent new properties, and "downward causation".

Now, I have read it through once, and do not understand every point.  Or perhaps even the key point, properly.

But it doesn't sound nutty - much of what they cover I have read enough to know is not nonsense - and it seems that the authors promise another paper specifically on free will.

I have to say this paper appeals strongly to me because of the frequent reaction I have to the anti free will physicists:  it's very odd that they are perfectly willing to ask me to swallow logs of intuitive nonsense (such as it being quite possible that there are continually created versions of me wandering off into non accessible multiple universes of the Many Worlds Theory) while at the same time calling me an idiot for believing the speck that is most naturally intuitive thing in the world - that I am free to choose whether to write this post, or not.   And yes, although it sounds paradoxical at first, but the wildly non intuitive results of quantum theory does seem to be the "natural" place where one might find something that feels intuitive, but on paper isn't supposed to be there.

Am I making sense?   (I wondered the other day, incidentally, whether the idea of the entire universe "downward causing" itself in a giant time loop that future intelligence creates - I am still fond of Tipler's Omega Point ideas - might have some implication for believing in more localised downward causation.)

Who knows:  this might be an important paper for the rehabilitation of free will amongst physicists, and those who doubt their own experience of life.

Here's the abstract:

We show that several interpretations of quantum mechanics admit an ontology of objects and events. This ontology reduces the breach between mind and matter. When humans act, their actions do not appear explainable in mechanical terms but through mental activity: motives, desires or needs that propel them to action. These are examples of what in the last few decades have come to be called "downward causation". Basically, downward causation is present when the disposition of the whole to behave in a certain way cannot be predicted from the dispositions of the parts. The event ontology of quantum mechanics allow us to show that systems in entangled states present emergent new properties and downward causation.

Now, I should re-read it to see if more sinks in... 

* Their microtubules and quantum effects theory is not, by the way, entirely dead yet.  See this report from 2014.

Will it last?

As more states legalize marijuana, adolescents' problems with pot decline: Fewer adolescents also report using marijuana -- ScienceDaily

Interesting to read that marijuana use amongst teens in America overall seems to have declined a bit from 2002 to 2013.  Is there a reason it has become not so cool to try or use it?

In any event, with the high profile change in State law in Colorado taking effect only in late 2013, and with other States following, it will be interesting to see if this holds up.

Oooooh

Spielberg to speak at 365th Commencement | Harvard Gazette

I'll be looking out for the Youtube of that...

Update:  and to further bolster my belief that he is a genuinely nice guy, as well as being the most talented  director who has ever lived, a comment from actor Mark Rylance, who has worked with him twice now:  

Sex and the law

I take it from this article that, with reform of Queensland laws, the effective age of consent in all Australian states will be 16, regardless of the type of sex involved.  No, wait a minute, it's still basically 17 in South Australia, apparently.  And Tasmania.

I see that some Australian States do have the sense to also have "Romeo and Juliet" laws, which provide a defence if the age difference is not more than 2 (or 3, or even 5[?!]) years.  (In fact, it is Tasmania with the high age of 17 that has laws allowing a defence if up to 5 years age difference.  Odd.)

Queensland doesn't, though.   Wouldn't that seem a sensible reform?   If even Texas has it, can't we?

On a related issue, I did feel sorry for the old guys who appeared in the report on 7.30 last night who attended the Victorian government's apology for past governments having criminalised homosexual sex.  From this point in history, it is a little hard to understand the intense interest in policing such activities in the mid 20th century.   I guess part of it may have to do with people hating the idea of public sexual activity, which is something still to be disdained; but the irony is, I suppose, that making it a crime even in private almost certainly encouraged secretive and opportunistic liaisons in public.    

We all love reading about ancient toilets, no?

From an interesting feature article at Nature News, about ancient toilets:

Asteroid uncertainty?

How Big Are Those Killer Asteroids? A Critic Says NASA Doesn’t Know. - The New York Times

Can you imagine the Gamergate guys' reaction to this?

It's Bond, Jane Bond: Gillian Anderson throws hat into the ring to be next 007 | Film | The Guardian

Stop paying attention

My feeling is that there are way too many words being written about Donald Trump. 

He's a joke who was helped to get where he is with minimal spend because of the fascination of the media with how far a joke campaigner could go.  Now the media is full of "maybe he's not a joke after all!" semi-panicked writing from all and sundry, on the basis of a polling boost from winning the nomination.   (Even though American polling is fraught with complications and a post nomination boost is not unusual.)

All this attention gives him a de facto credibility he doesn't deserve.   Not only that, it feeds his attention seeking bad behaviour.

I would suggest pundits ignore him til the Democrats stop squabbling and settle on Clinton;  perhaps even longer, to see how he performs in a head to head debate with her. 

I remain very calm that there is no way he will become President.

Not very encouraging

Chinese banks sitting on $1.7 trillion debt time bomb - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

At least, I suppose, in China you get a sense of active government involvement to head off any crisis.  In the West, it seems you don't enough economists even recognising the possibility of a crisis (and hence no government action) until it happens.

The IPA seeking fools, and their money

I won't post the video directly, but here, you can view it on the IPA's virtual blog.

A few observations:

*  does the IPA have some sort of grooming rules?   They tend to do their PR with young, very well groomed, men and women, with nary a hair out of place.   (Or, in the case of Sinclair Davidson, with nary a hair.)    Chris Berg is perhaps the exception - his slightly shaggy "do" puts him a bit on the outer.

*  I'd love to see the membership broken down by age - the video suggests a bit of a numbers gap in the middle age range.  The organisation is either for young, foolish, idealists (sort like the way the libertarian movement in the US attracts some of the college set, with some rebelling against their parent's views, no doubt), or the over 60's cashed-up-too-old-to-be-idealists-but-defiantly-foolish-despite-their-age set.

*  the video quite heavily promotes its credentials as a voice against climate change action.  When might the media (and which means the ABC, by and large) start  actively calling out the talking heads from that organisation for their involvement with an organisation that has spent years trying to persuade the public that climate change does not even exist?

I'm pretty sick of this:   as I'm sure I have complained before, why let the affable Chris Berg off the hook when he wants to present as Mr Reasonable Dry Right on matters economic and political when he is working for an organisation that has a position that is already completely unreasonable, if not down right evil, in terms of promoting the interests of the mining sector over humanity's long term interests?

Rise of the Kraken

Cephalopods like it hot, apparently:

Gillanders noted that after the El Niño and La Niña phenomena of 1997-98, for instance, warm Pacific waters apparently affected whole populations of Humboldt squid (also known as jumbo flying squid): unusually large Humboldts were found in large numbers swimming off Mexico, Peru and Chile.
The squid, which live longer than most other squid (two years, rather than one), can grow to nearly 5ft: after El Niño, they were found weighing between 25lb and 88lb.
More than a decade later, the long-lived squid were found to have adapted to the 2009-10 El Niño by moving 100 miles north of their usual territory. Others moved into the open ocean and began breeding much earlier than normal.

10 Degrees in Two Hundred Years?

I suppose a couple of cautions are in order:   I haven't seen any of the big names in climate science comment on this yet, and one of the authors is a Greens politician;  but still, this seems an interesting look at what may happen if you were to burn all fossil fuel reserves.  The abstract:

Concrete actions to curtail greenhouse gas emissions have so far been limited on a global scale¹, and therefore the ultimate magnitude of climate change in the absence of further mitigation is an important consideration for climate policy². Estimates of fossil fuel reserves and resources are highly uncertain, and the amount used under a business-as-usual scenario would depend on prevailing economic and technological conditions. In the absence of global mitigation actions, five trillion tonnes of carbon (5 EgC), corresponding to the lower end of the range of estimates of the total fossil fuel resource³, is often cited as an estimate of total cumulative emissions^{4, 5, 6}. An approximately linear relationship between global warming and cumulative CO₂ emissions is known to hold up to 2 EgC emissions on decadal to centennial timescales^{7, 8, 9, 10, 11}; however, in some simple climate models the predicted warming at higher cumulative emissions is less than that predicted by such a linear relationship⁸. Here, using simulations¹² from four comprehensive Earth system models¹³, we demonstrate that CO₂-attributable warming continues to increase approximately linearly up to 5 EgC emissions. These models simulate, in response to 5 EgC of CO₂ emissions, global mean warming of 6.4–9.5 °C, mean Arctic warming of 14.7–19.5 °C, and mean regional precipitation increases by more than a factor of four. These results indicate that the unregulated exploitation of the fossil fuel resource could ultimately result in considerably more profound climate changes than previously suggested.

Just don't do it

Three-person embryos may fail to vanquish mutant mitochondria : Nature News & Comment

Once again, I ask - why do this at all?   It's a bit sad that it's not safe for every mother to be able to have their own genes in their children, but with the ability to carry an embryo (via egg donation) with at least their partner's genetic heritage, they can still have the experience of carrying a child.

It's pretty much like the ultimate "First World problem", and I don't understand why medical science is so interested in fiddling with genetic material to solve it.

I still don't understand the dairy industry (and a segue into Heat In India)

There are two recent articles about the problems with the Australian dairy industry:   one in Fairfax by Peter Martin, and this one in The Conversation:  Murray Goulburn and Fonterra are playing chicken with dairy farmers, but I still don't really understand what is going on.

To do so, I need to understand more about dairy internationally. What happens to all the New Zealand exported dairy, for example? And I thought that to a large extent, New Zealand's recent financial success had largely been built on the back of their cows. If there are some international changes hurting the industry there, how will it affect their farmers, and budget bottom line?

It's funny, though, how it would seem that the sense most people have probably had for a few years now, that the price of supermarket milk just seems too cheap to be viable, may finally be being shown to be true.

Or, I could be wrong on that, too. I mean, I also find the price of carrots hard to believe; and have my doubts about how asparagus farmers in California, Mexico or Peru could find it worth their while to fly produce to Australia.  The economics of food seems full of surprises, to me...

Update:  by the way, which country do you think would be the world's biggest producer of milk?   According to the Times of India:

NEW DELHI: Dairy business provides livelihood to 60 million rural households in India and the country continues to be the largest producer of milk in the world, but global warming could result in adversely impacting the overall output in the coming years. 

 Speaking of India and climate change:  did you see the new all time record set last week of 51 degrees?   It's hard to believe that this is not killing hundreds of people there, but that aspect of the recent heat is not getting much publicity.  

Oh, here we go, a recent news story confirming the deaths caused in just one city:

NEW DELHI: Even Dante would’ve winced. Since the last week, with temperatures climbing  to 47 degree Celsius, Delhi is hot as hell. Around  350 have died on the streets. Water shortage of 7,949 lakh litres a day is dehydrating the city; a family uses 225 liters of water a day. Power outages are up to five hours daily as a result of a 20 per cent increase in demand up to 6,044 megawatts. But “no sweat” is the attitude of the Delhi government, which has no on the ground to handle the situation. In 2014, the Delhi High Court constituted a Joint Apex Advisory Committee (JAAC) to look into lack of summer shelter homes, but the committee has not held a single meeting in the last two years. The reason being Delhi government officials are too busy in “some other work” to even participate in any initiative to address the issue. But Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, who has promised to compensate those affected by unscheduled power cuts issued a threat to power companies and asked them to limit power cuts to two hours on Saturday. “I have copies of official communication from Delhi government where it has said that the JAAC meeting can’t be held as officials are busy in other work. It seems that government is not concerned about people dying on street because of heat,” said Sunil Kumar Aledia of Centre for Holistic Development (CHD).
A majority of heat related deaths were of the homeless, their bodies found on roads, pavements and other open areas like parks, says CHD. The organisation works with the state government’s Delhi Urban Shelter Improvement Board (DUSIB) for improving the conditions in shelter homes.

 I get the feeling that the lack of news reporting about deaths caused by heat waves may be explained by a couple of things - that it happens to some extent most summers, and also, the politicians don't like it to be publicised.

Weekend round up

*  Finally managed to bribe my kids to accompany me in seeing The Jungle Book, but only one of them so far is admitting that it was an enjoyable movie.  (The other is deliberately depriving me of the pleasure of saying "you were right:  I did like it.") 

It's hard to believe that anyone could really take a positive dislike to it - it has charm; looks great; the animated animals do such good animated animal acting (it really is amazing to think how much the people who create these in the computer must think about it - they sometimes just convey meaning through the slightest movement of the eyes, for example); and it has a certain gravitas that I like to see in children's movies.  If any reader does see it, you must also stay during the credits to listen to some good versions of the songs which play on over them.   I was very impressed.

*  Made good osso buco in the pressure cooker.  This is easy, but my special ingredient is - when frying off the meat (liberally dusted in seasoned flour) in the pressure cooker first, near the end throw in a teaspoon of fennel seeds, and maybe half a teaspoon or so of cumin seeds. 

The rest of the recipe:  take the meat out, then fry up some diced onion, celery and carrot, as well as cup or two of skinned diced roma tomatoes.   (I think fresh tomatoes give a nicer result than canned, but of course, they'll work quite well too).  Then put the meat back in, top up the liquid with some wine (a cup or so?), put the lid on and cook at pressure for 30 minutes or so.  Very tasty.

By the way, it was on some cooking show by an American Italian mother (I forget her name) that she recommended a bit of sugar when cooking tomatoes into a sauce.  Helps bring out the flavour, she said.   I tend to do that myself now, but on Saturday, I also used a not very dry rose for the osso buco - a somewhat sweeter wine than would usually be recommended for cooking meat.   But maybe that was why the sauce seemed to come out particularly nice this time?    I'm not sure...

*  Election round up - I heard it said on Insiders that polling for Labor in Queensland is not looking good.  Can this account for why the betting markets seem increasingly sure of a Coalition win, but Newspoll keeps showing a very close result, with national TPP in favour of Labor?

Why would the Queensland voters have turned strongly against Labor?   It's not as if any defence spending has been thrown Queensland's way, and how can Labor take the blame for Clive Palmer's failure to keep his plant open in Townsville?   I have long said that voters in Queensland are just weird and fickle.  They can never be properly understood.

What fool in the AFP made this decision?

It's absurd to think that it would have not have occurred to the AFP that conducting a "raid" on a Labor Senator and Labor staff on a matter not relating in any way to national security during an election campaign would be potentially politically damaging to the raided party.

And although the primary risk of political harm is to Labor,  there is a chance that Turnbull is also annoyed, given a risk of "blowback" due to suspicion that the government had a role in the timing, no matter how improbable that might be.

[Oh, I hear someone thinking - well, if the political risk is to both parties, then the AFP may as well go ahead anyway.   I would not agree - if the investigation is into a non urgent matter, not relating to national security, and has obvious potential to influence voter's perceptions no matter how it is explained them, then it is foolish of the AFP to be raiding any political party during an election campaign.]

I am curious as to what the Right wingers in the media will say about this.  I don't have high hopes - they are completely on side with Border Force bribing people smugglers on the high seas, and acting completely without public scrutiny under cloak of fake "operational matters" secrecy; but I could be wrong....

Update:  happily, I was wrong, in that even Andrew Bolt is questioning the AFP decision.

Oh dear

Henry Kissinger’s War Crimes Are Central to the Divide Between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders

I didn't realise when I mocked Trump saying he'd meet Kissinger for foreign policy advice that Hilary Clinton says she sought his "counsel" when she was Secretary of State!

I also had missed this part of the Kissinger sin (from the same article above):

Personal involvement in a plan to kidnap and murder a journalist living in Washington, D.C.

I see from Googling Hitchen's book on Kissinger, that this was to do with Greek journalist Elias Demetracopoulos, and it was a Greek government plan which, by virtue of some pretty strong indirect evidence, Kissinger had approved.  

A bit of a worry...

England’s chief medical officer warns of ‘antibiotic apocalypse’ | Society | The Guardian