Recommended viewing

I very much enjoyed the BBC doco last night on the futuristic looking Halley Research station in Antarctica on SBS.

It can be watched on SBS on Demand for the next couple of weeks.

The (possible) wonders of aspirin

Could an aspirin a day keep depression away?

The Thiel speech

I suppose one would not expect Gawker to give a glowing review of Peter Thiel's speech yesterday, but yes, they were underwhelmed.  (Something I noticed was that the Convention floor barely seemed to be paying attention for the first 2 or 3 minutes of a 6 minute speech.  He also is pretty terrible at teleprompter delivery.)

The Gawker article notes that Thiel makes for a peculiar libertarian, in that he longs for the days of some ultra big government projects such as Apollo.  But I see today that  he has said before that he's not ideological on the matter of size of government.  I suppose that should make me think he's at least an independent thinker, but actually it makes me think more that he's just a purely opportunistic, self interested one - he's a fan of space exploration generally, but because he has that odd idea that space colonies will, of course, establish a techno based libertarian utopia.  It probably comes from taking Heinlein too seriously, and I think it was a theme in Kim Stanley Robertson's Mars trilogy too?  (I only read the first book, though - I don't think he's that entertaining as a writer.)

Anyway, I just can't take Thiel seriously in light of his 2009 essay at Cato Unbound, where he dissed democracy, and regretted women got the vote because they're generally too pragmatic to be libertarian. (Well, you tell me what he meant if you think I'm being unfair.)  And in his postscript to that article, he wrote this, the first three sentences of which makes a joke of his support of a candidate who (with the one exception of not caring much about LGBT issues) is as intensely and deliberately divisive as possible:

I believe that politics is way too intense. That’s why I’m a libertarian. Politics gets people angry, destroys relationships, and polarizes peoples’ vision: the world is us versus them; good people versus the other. Politics is about interfering with other people’s lives without their consent. That’s probably why, in the past, libertarians have made little progress in the political sphere. Thus, I advocate focusing energy elsewhere, onto peaceful projects that some consider utopian.

He's also a fence sitter on climate change, although because nuclear power is all Gee Whiz technology, he still advocates for its massive expansion anyway.

I see that The Atlantic has a good article explaining his nonsensical positions, especially his Trump support.  Perhaps I should have just linked to that...

Update:   Vox criticised Thiel's speech and position, too, and included this paragraph:

It’s not just that Trump has a long string of business failures, from Atlantic City casinos to Trump steaks. Thiel himself described Trump as "symptomatic of everything that is wrong with New York City" just two years ago — he’s under no illusions that Trump is a great businessman.

Sounds about right

The Republicans waged a 3-decade war on government. They got Trump. - Vox

Paul Krugman noted this article, but points out that he called it much earlier on the Republicans, and cites the start of their intellectual downfall as being with the adoption of supply side economics.  

She writes well

I’m With The Banned — Welcome to the Scream Room — Medium

I don't know of Laurie Penny, and as a "queer feminist" I am I certain I would disagree with many of her views.

But this description of her meeting with Milo and assorted Republican hangers-on at the convention is very wittily written, and I strongly suspect explains him correctly.

Dream analysis not required

I certainly hope that dreams don't actually often mean that much, because last night I seemed to have a long one which involved getting a small tattoo from Pauline Hanson (!)   (It was actually to convert a large birthmark on my side - which does not exist in real life, btw - into a volcano.  But I did stop her after a short time, deciding it was a bad idea after all, and she wasn't very competent at it.  And please be assured, there was no erotic aspect - at all.)

And you thought an old white guy arguing with an empty chair was an embarrassing look for the Republicans...

Of course, there were many delusional Right wingers who thought Clint Eastwood's performance was a brilliant bit of biting Obama takedown, instead of the peculiar embarrassment that it was.  I wonder how many of that group think that this election's Republican convention is a success?   Surely even that group (with the catchy motto "United by Hate we Stand") has some within it that can see that this convention looks like a never ending disaster?

For goodness sake, even Charles Krauthammer thought the Christie led chants of "burn the witch" "lock her up" was a bad look.

As for Cruz:  one might almost say his position was principled, except no one seems sure whether it involved him lying about what he would say; and besides, it seems he genuinely is despised by about  95% of people who have had to work with him, which would suggest that his call that people should vote according to conscience means they would be right not to vote for him either.

Rich libertarian weirdo/eccentric* Thiel hasn't spoken yet, but I heard it speculated on the radio that he was going to call for the Party to get on board with gay rights?   I'm curious to see how that goes over...

Anyway, the Party is in the worst intellectual and moral position it has ever been, I reckon.  (Have a look at these bits of misogyny noted at Slate, as well as their story about the trainwreck that Trump is on foreign policy).  The Party blowing itself up like this might be a good thing, eventually...

*  aren't they all? - rich libertarians - or even just "libertarians", I mean

Okunoshima - my part in its downfall (not really)

Just after I finish my posts about Okunoshima, I see that someone has done a study of some kind arguing that the rabbits are being loved to death.  Population explosion!  No vegetation left!  Bloating them with cabbage!

“There are now about 1,000 rabbits on this two-mile island,” DeMello said. “They’ve destroyed the ecosystem.” As a result of the lack of vegetation and the inappropriate food that tourists provide for the animals, the rabbits suffer from a variety of health problems and now have a life expectancy of just two years, DeMello and her fellow researchers found.
The findings were presented on Wednesday at the World Lagomorph Conference in Turlock, California.

Well, I didn't know the word "lagomorph" before - so that's something useful.

Look, not that I can claim expertise on rabbit health, but my recent day and night on the island just makes me skeptical of these claims:

On Rabbit Island, DeMello and her fellow researchers found that the rabbits are fighting over even the least nutritious food provided by tourists. “Of the 728 rabbits that we counted on the island, 28 percent had visible injuries or illnesses,” she reported. The percentage grew to 50 percent in the areas of the island closest to humans. “The more humans interfered, the sicker and more injured the rabbits appeared to be,” she said.

In fact, I had been prepared to see a fair few rabbits with obvious illnesses - some other blogging visitors sometimes commented on seeing sick looking ones - but as I noted here, I was actually pleasantly surprised by the generally healthy appearance of the great majority of the furry inhabitants.  Compared to what we occasionally see jumping across the road in Australia, the Okunoshima ones seemed particularly fine examples of rabbit-hood.

As for "destroying the ecosystem" - another pleasant surprise was to see that the island looks so well vegetated despite supporting hundreds of rabbits.  Perhaps it's because in Australia wild rabbits have such a environment destroying reputation that I would not have been too surprised if the island featured baron sections chock full of holes, with mangy, starving rabbits lolling about desperate for a feed.   Well, OK, sometimes they are very keen on a feed, but while there are a rabbit divots on the lawn in front of the hotel, it's not the scene of rabbit devastation an Australian might expect, at all.

And did I kill any by feeding them cabbage?:

The tourists, she said, often come bearing cabbage, one of the cheapest vegetables in Japan and a big part of the Japanese diet. Cabbage is a bad food choice for rabbits, as it causes dangerous and potentially deadly bloat. It is also low in fiber, something rabbits require for what DeMello called their “very particular digestive system.”

Hmm.  It's odd, then that there seem to be a few million websites on Google - including from vets - saying that pet rabbits can be fed cabbage, some (but not all) mentioning that some rabbits might get bloat and be a bit cautious in introducing it.

There may well be an element of truth in this report - I wouldn't be surprised if increased tourists numbers has led to a slight population increase - but even then, I know that on a weekday in July, the island was hardly teaming with humans.  (Access being available only by a ferry, there will always be a natural limit on the number of people there each day.) 

Overall, this report just smacks too much of environmental doomsaying from a well intentioned, but exaggerating, animal welfare advocate.  A bit like the American pro-koala advocate years ago who I heard (or read) saying that Australians were hearing the wailing of treeless, dying koalas at night.

The situation for the rabbits and the island may not be ideal, but it doesn't look to me to be as bad as these people claim.

Update:  I see from this website that most wild rabbits actually live less than a year (!), although pet ones can last 8 to 10.   If the Okunoshima ones live for 2, they're doing better than average, although I would have guessed they would get closer to the pet rabbit age.   There's lots of interesting wild rabbit facts on that website, incidentally.

Good riddance

Milo Yiannopoulos: Twitter banning one man won’t undo his poisonous legacy | Technology | The Guardian

To be perfectly honest, I didn't even know who Yiannopoulos was until his recent appearance on Andrew Bolt's show.  But reading that he took the "gamers" side on Gamergate (about which I had read enough to have a view), worked for Breitbart, and seemed to primarily be about vacuous self promotion in the "culture war", I soon enough had his measure.  (Why is it that Right wing gay men - such as him, Jim Hoft and - I think no one doubts it - Matt Drudge - seem to be amongst the nastiest and dumbest Right wing culture warriors around?  I find that odd.)

The linked article is not bad in explaining his poison, although I think she's unduly pessimistic about the benefits of his Twitter banning.

Update:  the Vox explainer on the background to his banning is pretty good.  Of course, that Bolt would have him on his show just re-confirms my re-categorisation of him  - "Gone Completely Stupid and Offensive".

My election vote justified

Matthew Canavan says there is 'uncertainty' around impact of climate change | Australia news | The Guardian

I actually don't know how Malcolm Turnbull justifies the political compromises he has had to make to keep the PM job.  It's not as if The Lodge is that nice a house to live in.

I live for the day when a Liberal PM will say to his [update - I would normally say "or her" - but this is the Liberal Party we're talking about] party room - "That's it, climate change deniers and lukewarmer 'we can wait another 30 years before we decide what to do' advocates.  You're wrong, you've been wrong since the start, and you're too stupid or ideological to see or admit it.   Not only that, you've set up the world for irreparable harm for many, many generations.  You'll have no influence on policy and get out and sit on the cross benches if you don't like it."

Somewhat amusing

I am usually surprised at how likeable "The Feed" on SBS 2 is when I watch it - it plugs away with a tiny audience, and yet people like me continually forget to watch.   Anyway, 7.30 was dull last night, so I switched over, and was somewhat amused by this:

Movie critic noted

I should stop scanning Catallaxy, the blog for aging and generically angry sad sacks white men (plus the odd - and I mean odd - women who like that type).  But the occasional comment catches my eye, such as from long time Australian blogging identity CL, aka "The Only Man From the 1950's Who Was Born in the 70's."  Here's his comment on the new Ghostbusters:

I thought the clip was quite funny, as it happens.

Sounds to me like he'd fit right in at 4Chan...

Incidentally, the misogynistic outrage at remaking the movie with females was just the silliest controversy.  Apart from the loser dork-dom that fretting about women re-doing a film in their gender illustrates, as if it was worth dying on the barricades for the original movie in the first place.  It was just a mildly diverting, mildly entertaining movie, after all. 

Some people never change..

Gee. I reckon you can really see Sam the adult in Sam the boy...

The Okunoshima Post - Part 3

If I had paid more attention to what people said about Okunoshima (apart from "Rabbits!! - look at the rabbits!"), I would have realised before I got there that it is in a very scenic area, at the edge of the group of islands in what's called the Seto Inland Sea.  You'll start noticing how pretty the area is on the train (or bus) trip from Mihara to Tadanoumi, as it follows the coast line with lots of water and island views.  You can see this very large looking island spanning bridge in the distance, too:

[I see now that it is the Tatara Bridge, with towers 220 m high (!)]







So, I was pleasantly surprised by scenery such as this (all photos taken from the island):

It was foggy the next morning (in fact, it delayed the first ferry), but it made for a nice photo or two:

I think this is an old timer, enjoying the view too:

I read now that the larger islands in this area, being connected via bridges, are popular for cycling tourists.  Have a look at the photos from the bike path at this CNN Travel site.  I think this definitely looks like an enticing part of Japan to explore in more detail.

As for the hotel, here's a panorama pic of it on the foggy morning (if you click and enlarge it, you can try to count the rabbits, too):

The facilities are fine but certainly not top class.  In particular, the grounds had a "we're not ready for holiday season yet" feel, even though it was the start of July.  There is a pool, for example, which was closed and an odd shade of green; and although there are several tennis courts around the back, most looked shabby.   The grounds in front of the hotel are obviously a challenge to keep neat when there is strong competition for grass from 700 or so rabbits every day, but it didn't look like there was much attempt to tidy them up, either.

On the other hand, one of the cheaper ways to stay on the island is to camp on the quite tidy looking nearby camping ground with sea views, but still take your meals in the hotel.  The tent can either be your own, or even one supplied (and, I think, according to one internet account) erected for you by the resort staff.   I didn't see the amenities block, though. 

Not that it worries me, but I think nearly all rooms are Japanese style, which means sleeping on futons and a toilet in the room but no shower or bath, so it's off to the communal onsen style baths to get clean of an evening.

Did I mention before that the food in the buffet dining room is really pretty good?  Octopus is the local speciality, so expect it to turn up in various forms.

As for the other island's attractions:

* the small poison gas museum is worth seeing:  it takes the same "let this never happen again" polemic style of Hiroshima atomic bomb museum, not that there's anything wrong with that, of course.  Still, you'll only need about 20 minutes or so to read all of the english information available;

* the ruins around the island.  There are various bits of decaying infrastructure from the old poison gas days. 

They're a good reason to go on a bike ride. Put me in mind of the island being a suitable hideout for a small scale Bond villain.   It might be hard to keep up the evil aura while being followed by rabbits, however.

*  the nature education centre:  looks pretty new and is neat, but not much info in English.

But at the end of the day, it's hard to resist just wanting to be with the inhabitants:

A final note:  if the hotel sells rabbit food, I never saw a sign for it.  But I think the cafe might sell pellets?  In any event, they don't sell veges for rabbits, so buy some on the mainland before you get there, as per my previous post.

It seemed it was not only tourists who are besotted with the furry inhabitants (whose natural enemies, by the way, appear to be limited to crows.  My son and daughter, while bike riding, saw a crow threatening a baby  bunny, who escaped under a bush.)  There was an elderly Japanese (I think) couple who came over to the island with a huge bag and box of leafy vegetables.  I saw him perching them on a bicycle and heading off around the island to distribute his bounty.  I could happily imagine a retirement doing that, too..

The Okunoshima post - Part 2

First impressions on seeing the island are slightly marred by the huge power transmission towers that stand on it, but they're not so noticeable once you're there:

Nearly setting foot on the island now:

And finally, the welcoming committee:

The waiting bus takes you on the short-ish but slow (to avoid road rabbits - watching them a bit too casually getting out of the way causes anxiety to the newly arrived rabbit fans) drive to the hotel, where there's every chance more will be on the stairs near the entrance:

Now, of course I have scores of photos of happy rabbits being fed by my happy family, but privacy concerns prevent me putting them up; and besides, you can see heaps of similar photos elsewhere on the net so I won't bother - wait - who am I kidding, how can I resist?

Walk out in front of the hotel (they don't want you feeding them right at the entrance), shake your bag of pellets, and you'll be the centre of attention very quickly:

The websites say the origin of the rabbits is not known with certainty, but I do doubt the version that they are from the island's poison gas days.  They just look more like what I imagine they should from being from pet rabbit stock; and are, by and large, healthy looking and well behaved around people.  Signs indicate you shouldn't touch (or at least hold) them; but they are gentle and most are happy to be petted softly, as guests continuously do:

Hire a bicycle from the hotel and ride around the island (it's a pleasant, mostly flat, ride) and they're everywhere, often approaching if you stop. (Photo cropped for family privacy reasons):

This little guy, on the second day as it was getting hotter, lopped over to me even though I had no food, and promptly laid down between my feet for (I think) some useful shade:









How charming is that?

I didn't even see what rabbits are famous for doing to generate baby rabbits.  Maybe they leave that for the burrows?


If you have food, you'll easily get rabbits on your lap, if you want them there:

But - you do have to be sensible about not getting fingers too close to a hungry eating rabbit's mouth - my son somehow got bitten deep enough to bleed.   My daughter had a bite too, but not a bleeding one. Later I saw video from her phone where she was putting her fingers right up to a rabbit's mouth, it was like she was inviting it to have a bite.  They, rightly, did not blame the rabbits. 

As I say, they are generally well behaved, curious and lovely creatures.  The occasional bit of rabbit on rabbit fighting can be spotted, but by and large, it seems rabbit society is pretty orderly.

In the next part, I'll talk more about the island and hotel.

The movie review you weren't waiting for

Saw Spielberg's "The BFG" yesterday.

Positives:  looks terrific; the female lead is charming, as is Mark Rylance as the BFG;  well directed with all of Spielberg's talent with framing gorgeous shots and terrific (but not jarring) camera movement; makes allusions in various ways to his previous films, which keeps someone like me happy.

Negative:  it does lack narrative "push" in the middle section.  I read some reviewer saying the first 20 minutes were not that good - in fact, I would say they are great, but it slows down after that.  It then gains momentum and becomes pleasingly silly again in the last section when the Queen gets involved.

Overall I found it pretty charming, and felt it quite true to Roald Dahl (even though I haven't read the book).   But I do understand why it hasn't been a big commercial success - it is too long for the real young kids (although, it must be said, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was narratively languid in the same way and still seen as a success), and too kid fantasy-centric for broad success with teenagers and young adults.  (My own teenagers did see it with me, and grumbled afterwards about various aspects; but I don't doubt they were engaged and enjoyed much of it - it is a film of some depth that gives you much to talk about afterwards.  They just won't admit at school today that they saw it.  Especially my son...)

Speaking of CCBB - perhaps that is how the movie could have been improved - as the 1960's taught us, the addition of a handful of pleasing songs can help a long movie. 

I should add - although I don't consider it a complete success for the reason I explained, I did find it actually more interesting that the overly simplistic "Bridge of Spies".   I still say that while there was nothing really wrong with that movie, its narrative needed more complexity to be a great movie.   

The Okunoshima ("Rabbit Island") post - Part 1 - getting there

One of the highlights (OK, probably the highlight) of the recent Japan holiday was an overnight stay at Okunoshima, the island somewhat famous for being full of friendly, wild, rabbits.  (I say "somewhat", because it  still not unusual to find Japanese people, even on Honshu, who have not heard of it.  Which is a bit surprising, given the number of Japanese TV shows showing hosts visiting parts of the country, although that is usually to eat the local delicacy and say "oishii!")

Some websites say it can be done as a day trip from Kyoto or Hiroshima, but really, I think the average human will find the place so charming that only a few hours on the island will be a matter of regret.  A day trip from Kyoto in particular would likely take about 7 or so hours of travel, so it would be a long day out!)

We made the trip from Kyoto.  Here's a map (from the rather useful JR Rail pass map) with my arrows showing the big picture from Kyoto to Mihara:

This looks like a very simple trip on the one Shinkansen line, but actually, we had to change at Fukuyama as the train we took out of Kyoto (heading to Hiroshima) did not stop at Mihara.  (On the way back  from Mihara, as we had to get all the way back to Tokyo, we had to change Okayama.)   A map to show Fukuyama:

Also, bear in mind that the JR Rail Pass, which many visitors use, is not valid for Nozomi class trains on that particular Sanyo Shinkansen line.  This, together with the matter of which trains stop where, makes the trip a bit more complicated than it appears from the map alone.  But from Kyoto to Mihara, even with the change, was supposed to take about 3 hours 20 min, although actually, due to power outages on the system, it took a bit longer.)

Anyhow, once you get to Mihara, here's the more detailed map showing the local Kure line to get to the ferry terminal town of Tadanoumi:

(The Kure line train was not running on our visit, again due to the power system problems - caused by recent bad weather - and there was a bus put on from the train station instead.)

Because I want to make the life of the traveller to Okunoshima as simple as possible, here's a marked up map showing you how to walk from the train station at Tadanoumi to the ferry terminal.   (I was expecting this to more explicitly signed for the foreign visitor, but it didn't seem to be.  Maybe there is a map inside the station somewhere, but I missed it because we got delivered there by bus?):

I do recommend going first to the next door Family Mart and buying the rabbit food packs they sell - you can get cabbage leaves, pellet food and carrot sticks - and you should buy plenty. (The carrot sticks get eaten really quickly though - cabbage is more easily stretched out.)  The ferry terminal sells tickets to the island, and also pellet food for the rabbits.

A recent copy of the ferry timetable is at this site (but whether it is still current, don't ask me), but as you can it does run pretty frequently during the day.   The trip over only takes15 minutes at most, and then you in the land of rabbits.  Oh, and the ruins of a poison gas manufacturing plant.  More in part 2.

He doesn't make a very convincing case

Why You Should Believe in the Digital Afterlife - The Atlantic

At least he details the complexity of doing adequate brain scans to be able to replicate its state in order to create a digital upload of one's consciousness.   This is always the vaguest part in science fiction scenarios, and you can see why...

Islam - again (and Japan, too)

Oh no.  News of yet another terrible radical Islamic inspired attack in France.

While in Japan recently, I kept thinking what a security nightmare that country could be if Islamic terrorism was a serious issue there.   There are now specific announcements on their train system that security has been upgraded, but whether that is due to a terrorism concern, or just worry about crime generally, I'm not sure.   But seriously, that country has been trusting its own people for so long, they have practices in place that would just make a terrorist attack so easy and they are slow to change.

For example, luggage lockers are extremely common around train stations and (I think) even at Narita airport;  I presume they're not much available in Britain or the US any more?   Maybe they aren't such a good spot for a terrorist to think about causing maximum danger, given that the locker itself would have effect on the blast, and there are not usually that many people milling around them, but still...

The most obvious issue is on Shinkansen, which are terrific but do not provide adequate space for large baggage.  The few people with large luggage (usually foreigners, as most Japanese use their incredibly efficient internal luggage or parcel delivery services)  often do have to leave them in the space behind the last row of seats and the wall in each carriage.   (It's a pretty big gap, and can you fit a few large suitcases/backpacks in there.  I doubt it's intentionally there for luggage, but in practice, that's what it gets used for.)  This means you are often sitting far from your luggage, sometimes mixed up with other people's.

The announcements say that you should tell staff if luggage not with you is yours, and there are conductors often moving through the train, seemingly only tallying up the number of occupied seats and bowing as they enter and exit the carriage; but I know from direct observation that they just don't worry about the luggage sitting at the end of the carriage spot.  (I never bothered trying to tell them; but I saw some other foreigners doing so, to a conductor who just smiled and nodded and moved on.) 

It is, in other words, the perfect spot for a terrorist bomb; and one which does not even involve suicide tactics, given that you can move freely between carriages.

Should I be making this observation out loud?   I don't know, but I'm sure I can't be the only foreigner who has thought about this...

Anyhow, I see from the Japan Times, which I don't normally expect to have much about Islamic terrorism concerns, that the Japanese do not waste time fretting too much about privacy rights when it comes to monitoring Muslims.  In fact, it's pretty extraordinary:

Qureshi, like almost all of Japan’s roughly 100,000 Muslim residents, is no stranger to police surveillance. However, the true extent of the systematic profiling and surveillance of Japan’s Muslim community only came to light in 2010, when over 100 internal Metropolitan Police Department documents were leaked online.

The leak revealed that the police had compiled detailed profiles on 72,000 Muslims, including personal information such as bank account statements, passport details and records of their movements. The leak also showed that police had at times planted cameras inside mosques and used undercover agents to infiltrate Islamic nonprofit organizations and halal grocers and restaurants.

The leaked documents, which were made available unredacted online and included the personal profiles of dozens of Muslims, were downloaded more than 10,000 times in the first few weeks.

A detailed breakdown of Qureshi’s life was among the documents, but he says he wasn’t surprised. He had known he was being followed for a long time.

There are some judicial limits, but the basic idea is still OK:

After the 2010 leak, 17 of the Muslims named in the documents sued the government and police in a bid to have the widespread spying ruled illegal. In 2014, the Tokyo District Court agreed that the leak had violated the plaintiffs’ right to privacy and awarded them ¥90 million in compensation, but it also ruled that the intelligence-gathering was “necessary and inevitable.”

The court sidestepped the issue of blanket profiling by religion, as did the Tokyo High Court in an appeal the following year.

Earlier this year, the group asked the Supreme Court to rule on the constitutionality of the lower court’s decision.

The leaked documents refer to all those profiled as “suspects.” Their lawyers argued that spying solely on the basis of faith, rather than any suspicious activity, breached their plaintiffs’ rights to privacy, equality and freedom of religion. The Supreme Court dismissed the case on May 31.

In another Japan Times article of recent interest, a writer looks at the historic reasons why Muslims often don't trust other Muslims.  It starts with an issue I did not even realise existed (well, apart from the fact that Sunnis and Shiites may well want to kill each other):

The mistrust that pervades Middle Eastern societies is hard to miss. As controlled experiments confirm, Arabs have substantially less trust in strangers, foreign or domestic, than, say, Europeans. This hampers progress on many fronts, from business development to government reforms.

Low-trust societies participate disproportionately less in international commerce, and attract less investment. And, indeed, according to the World Values Survey and related research, trust among individuals in the Middle East is low enough to limit commercial transactions to people who know one another either personally or through mutual acquaintances. Because of their lack of trust, Arabs will often pass up potentially lucrative opportunities to gain through exchange....

One potentially important clue lies in the difference between perceptions of Muslims and Christians. To be sure, there are no official data quantifying the deficit; in most parts of the Middle East, too few Christians are left to make meaningful statistical comparisons. But casual evidence suggests that the region’s shoppers, merchants, and investors generally consider local Christians to be more trustworthy than local Muslims.

 This historical source of this, according to the writer, go back some way:

My work with the economic historian Jared Rubin exploring Istanbul’s 17th- and 18th-century Islamic court records may offer insights into why.

At that time, Istanbul was a cosmopolitan city; around 35 percent of its local residents were Christian, and 6 percent were Jewish. According to Islamic law (Shariah), Muslims had to do business according to Islamic rules, and if they wanted to adjudicate a conflict, they had to use an Islamic court. For their part, Christians and Jews could do business under their own rules, though they were free also to follow Islamic rules and to use Islamic courts, if they so desired. But, of course, if they were involved in a case against a Muslim, that had to be handled in an Islamic court.

When a Muslim and a non-Muslim faced each other in a trial, the Muslim enjoyed significant advantages. First, the judges’ training predisposed them to give the benefit of any doubt to a fellow Muslim. Second, the court staff was entirely Muslim, which meant that testimony was viewed solely from a Muslim perspective. Third, whereas Muslims could testify against anyone, Christians and Jews could testify only against another non-Muslim.

But these advantages had a downside. Because the legal system made it easier for Muslims to breach contracts with impunity, they were more often tempted to default on their debts and to renege on their obligations as business partners and sellers.

Meanwhile, non-Muslims, whose obligations were enforced more vigorously, gained a reputation for trustworthiness. To reflect differences in perceived risk, lenders, who were predominantly Muslim, charged about two percentage points less for credit to Christian and Jewish borrowers than to Muslims (15 percent annually, as opposed to 17 percent).

So it seems that perceptions of trustworthiness in the Arab world are rooted, at least partly, in the uneven enforcement of commitments under Islamic law. The sectarian differences in legal enforcement did not last. In the mid-19th century, Islamic courts gave way to what were essentially secular courts, at least with respect to commerce and finance. The enforcement of commitments then became more balanced.

Interesting.

Pre-post announcement