Why Richard Dawkins is no fun

Recently, Richard Dawkins was interviewed in Salon, promoting his new anti-religion book.

There is nothing terribly surprising in it, but this section is intriguing:

[Salon]: But it seems to me the big "why" questions are, why are we here? And what is our purpose in life?

[Dawkins]: It's not a question that deserves an answer.

Well, I think most people would say those questions are central to the way we think about our lives. Those are the big existential questions, but they are also questions that go beyond science.

If you mean, what is the purpose of the existence of the universe, then I'm saying that is quite simply begging the question. If you happen to be religious, you think that's a meaningful question. But the mere fact that you can phrase it as an English sentence doesn't mean it deserves an answer. Those of us who don't believe in a god will say that is as illegitimate as the question, why are unicorns hollow? It just shouldn't be put. It's not a proper question to put. It doesn't deserve an answer.

I don't understand that. Doesn't every person wonder about that? Isn't that a core question, what are we doing in this world? Doesn't everyone struggle with that?

There are core questions like, how did the universe begin? Where do the laws of physics come from? Where does life come from? Why, after billions of years, did life originate on this planet and then start evolving? Those are all perfectly legitimate questions to which science can give answers, if not now, then we hope in the future. There may be some very, very deep questions, perhaps even where do the laws of physics come from, that science will never answer. That is perfectly possible. I am hopeful, along with some physicists, that science will one day answer that question. But even if it doesn't -- even if there are some supremely deep questions to which science can never answer -- what on earth makes you think that religion can answer those questions?

On reflection, this is probably just a statement of some version of positivist philosophy, which is nothing new. However, hearing it stated this way seems to unintentionally make it sound like, at best, a terribly dull philosophy, and at worst, a heartless and almost dehumanising one.

Actually, reading the sequence of questions makes me think that maybe Dawkins has oversimplified the question (when he says "if you mean, what is the purpose for the existence of the universe..") into such a form that he can claim it to be a nonsense question. But in doing so he seems have dismissed a personal concern for purpose in one's own life as being just as illegitimate as demanding that the universe as a whole have a purpose.

Does he really believe that? If he does, the interviewer was right to express some astonishment.

Anyway, even if he is not as dry a positivist as this interview makes him sound and he allows some legitimacy to the question of how people may find purpose in their life, his dismissal of the relevance of purpose to the universe does not sit well with modern discussion of the anthropic principle in cosmology. It is the apparent co-incidences of the physical constants of our universe that lead to such speculation. Yet Dawkin's attitude would seem to deny that this is a fair question to even ask. At the very least, thinking about ideas like the anthropic principle and the possible multiverse strikes me as intellectual fun, yet it would seem Dawkins attitude seems rather a wet blanket on the issue.


Maybe it would just annoy Dawkins too much if it turned out that the religious impulse had intuited a truth about the universe that science took a few thousand years to confirm, so he just dismisses that as a possibility out of hand.


For the record: I am actually only lukewarm on the anthropic principle and have not really followed the intelligent design argument with much care. I don't think ID in terms of biological evolution is a valid science topic in a school science curriculum, but am happy for the anthropic principle to be covered if any high school science spends much time on cosmology now.


I also know how atheists go on about not needing God to have a sense or awe and wonder from the scientific understanding and observation of the universe. No one need point out to me that Dawkins would say this. Being thrilled by nature is probably a natural impulse that is shared by everyone. The issue of how humans are valued and treated within nature is the more interesting point where materialists and the religious can start to wildly diverge.

Getting off drugs

Theodore Dalrymple has been going on about his quite contrarian views about illicit drugs for a few months now; I think I have not previously mentioned it.

This article gives a summary of his idea: that addiction to drugs (heroin in particular) has been long romanticised, and that the modern assumption that it can only be overcome with medical treatment is wrong:

When, unbeknown to them, I have observed addicts before they entered my office, they were cheerful; in my office, they doubled up in pain and claimed never to have experienced suffering like it, threatening suicide unless I gave them what they wanted. When refused, they often turned abusive, but a few laughed and confessed that it had been worth a try. Somehow, doctors—most of whom have had similar experiences— never draw the appropriate conclusion from all of this. Insofar as there is a causative relation between criminality and opiate addiction, it is more likely that a criminal tendency causes addiction than that addiction causes criminality.

Furthermore, I discovered in the prison in which I worked that 67% of heroin addicts had been imprisoned before they ever took heroin. Since only one in 20 crimes in Britain leads to a conviction, and since most first-time prisoners have been convicted 10 times before they are ever imprisoned, it is safe to assume that most heroin addicts were confirmed and habitual criminals before they ever took heroin. In other words, whatever caused them to commit crimes in all probability caused them also to take heroin: perhaps an adversarial stance to the world caused by the emotional, spiritual, cultural and intellectual vacuity of their lives.

He goes on to defend his position in this article.

It is certainly a controversial view, and an interesting one from someone who seems so conservative on this point but who is not personally religious. He was interviewed by The Brussels Journal recently, and it is well worth reading.

Moving up in life

Why should only Islam be getting all the bad publicity? It's good to see some attention being given to this aspect of Hinduism:

Like tens of thousands of other untouchables — or dalits — across India yesterday, Mr Cherlaguda ritually converted to Buddhism to escape his low-caste status....

"Untouchability" was abolished under India's constitution in 1950, but the practice remains a degrading part of everyday life in villages.

Dalits in rural areas are often bullied and assigned menial jobs such as removing human waste and dead animals.

The sometimes intense violence against them has led to a migration to the cities, where caste is easier to submerge.

At yesterday's mass conversion of dalits — almost 200,000 changed religion — they all repeated 22 oaths, including never worshipping Hindu gods and never drinking alcohol.

So, you have to give up alcohol to get out of being on the bottom of the social scale. Must be a hard choice for some.

This was from The Age, taken from The Guardian.

Rudd's first hand experience

Kevin Rudd's first hand experiences with North Korea make for very interesting reading in today's Australian. Jasper Becker's background piece is good too.

Japan's economic sanctions have been decided:

Japan's measures include a ban on all North Korean ships entering Japanese ports, a ban on North Korean imports, and barring entry by North Korean nationals other than those living in Japan.

I wonder how this is going to go over in Pyongyang.

The corkscrew into Baghdad

Air and Space Magazine seems to have a lot of its content online. From their website comes this description of the corkscrew approach aircraft landing at Baghdad still use:

Once the plane arrives at about 18,000 feet—still safely beyond the range of weapons like the SA-7 shoulder-fired missile—the pilot banks sharply and descends toward the runway in a slow, tight circle, like someone walking down a spiral staircase. During the spiral the crew keeps an eye out for other air traffic, and for anything coming at them from the ground. After several turns, the pilot pulls out of the rotation with careful timing, straightens out, and lands. The whole thing takes seven to 10 minutes, roughly the same as a regular approach, but it all takes place directly overhead, instead of beginning 20 miles from the runway....

....for passengers, particularly those making their first landing in Baghdad, the corkscrew can be intimidating. “You have no forward-looking vision,” notes Neuenschwander, “so if you’re looking out the side windows, you’re seeing either the sky or the ground. A lot of people tense up, especially if they don’t have much flying experience.” Flying into Baghdad on an Air Serv aircraft, journalist Betsy Hiel recalls “a woman across the aisle gritting her teeth so hard that she snapped one tooth off.”

Ouch.

A spoon full of sugar

Hmm, this is just one of those days where I find little on my scan of the WWW that seems worth blogging about.

Here's a couple of minor things barely worth mentioning:

* a review of a biography of "Mary Poppins" author PL Travers notes that she was not that nice a person (and a real pest for the Disney company, even though they made her rich):

Travers was hardly all sweetness and light. She could be imperious and dictatorial - she bullied illustrator Mary Shepard when they worked together - and was notoriously tough to interview. She would blithely lie about her age and upbringing (she liked to claim her dad owned a sugar plantation). Like her famous creation, she boasted that she "never explained" anything.

...Travers's troubled relationship with her adopted son, Camillus, is more hinted at than detailed. (She failed to adopt his twin brother and then never told him that he was adopted or had a twin. The twins found each other by chance in a pub when they were 17.)....

After long coveting the rights to "Mary Poppins," Disney finally got what he wanted. The deal made Travers a millionaire, but she was deeply conflicted about the movie. She harangued Disney and the writers with pages of notes about items she felt were untrue to the spirit of her books. At the première (which she attended, although not at Disney's invitation), the 65-year-old Travers wept.

* The Departed, Scorsese's return to gangster territory, gets rave reviews, except (oddly) from Margaret on At The Movies. She comments:

It's so violent, it's so vile in the language, you know, particularly the sexual language.

Generally, I have always felt Scorsese is over-rated. I used to think maybe I had to be older to appreciate him, in the same way I came to like some of Woody Allen as I aged. But it hasn't really happened for me. He is obviously very knowledgeable of cinema history, and seems basically a nice enough man, but I find it hard to warm to his subject matter.

* In the Baldwin family, there is no middle ground. Salon reports that Stephen Baldwin is the complete opposite of evil brother Alec, in that he is a born again Christian (of a particularly nutty variety, it would seem) with the ear of the White House. (Well, if you can believe Salon on that sort of thing.) Very odd.

Cats control the population

Long time readers know of my interest in the ongoing research into the weird effects of toxoplasma infection.

Now it turns out that it seems to affect the gender balance of offspring from infected mothers!:

The parasite, toxoplasma, infects around 15% of Britons, but up to 80% of the population in some countries. It is spread by contaminated cat faeces, but also lurks in uncooked pork and beef.

Researchers in the Czech Republic collected medical records from 1,803 newborn babies between 1996 and 2004 and checked them for information on the mothers and babies including gender, the number of previous pregnancies, and the mother's levels of toxoplasma antibodies.

They discovered that women whose antibody count was high - suggesting a substantial infection - had a much higher chance of having baby boys. In most populations the birth rate is around 51% boys, but women infected with toxoplasma had up to a 72% chance of a boy. Toxoplasma causes congenital defects in newborns and can trigger miscarriages, but a link with the gender of newborns has never been identified before.

What other surprises about this bug are out there yet to be discovered?

By the way, this fairly recent study, if I read it right, implicates strong maternal toxoplasma infection with schizophrenia in their adult children. I believe men are much more likely to get schizophrenia than women. Does the discovery that the maternal infection favours boy babies account for this higher rate in men?

Repeat after me: cats really are evil.

About the Iraqi death figures

It's interesting to compare the BBC's report on the latest survey with the report in Nature.

According to the BBC, the latest estimate of 600,000 odd dead:

...is vigorously disputed by supporters of the war in Iraq, including US President George W Bush.

True, but wording it that way gives the impression that it is only supporters of the war who are disputing. Later in the article it makes mention of "critics" and never gives any indication of who they are.

Nature, on the other hand, gives a clear indication that there are critics who are unlikely to be considered "war supporters":

"I doubt it is large as they say," says Jon Pedersen, a social scientist at Fafo, an independent research centre is Oslo, Norway. Pedersen helped run a United Nations study that concluded between 18,000 and 29,000 people died as a result of violence between the start of the war and May 2004.

He says that violence has become more frequent since his study, but doubts whether the real number can be so much bigger than media reports suggest. Iraq Body Count, a website that collates mortality figures from media sources, puts the current figure at around 45,000.

"We are told about at least 30 to 40 deaths per day just from news reports," says Pedersen. "But 500 per day is very different."

Pederson also points out that the pre-invasion death rate recorded by the Al Mustansiriya team is very low. Figures from the United Nations Children's' Fund from before the war put the number at around 13 deaths per thousand per year. If correct, this suggests almost no increase that can be attributed to the conflict.

Further down, the report notes:

Debarati Guha-Sapir, director of the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters in Brussels, says that Burnham's team have published "inflated" numbers that "discredit" the process of estimating death counts.

Of course, Tim Lambert's unerring faith in statistics, how they are collected (and the objectivity of scientists) leads him him to support the study to the hilt. Funny how a science person can seem to lose all sense of common sense skepticism of their own field. (Can't say he ever shows a sense of humour, or any other likeable characteristics either.)

Here's one thing that strikes me as a bit fishy: the Lancet authors say that the deaths claimed by the families were backed up by death certificates in 92% percent of cases (according to Nature.) Given the poor infrastructure in Iraq since the war, what is the reliability of the information in death certificates? Frankly, I am a little surprised that there were even that many death certificates issued. Is there a financial incentive for relatives to falsely claim a death in the family?

Also, who is responsible for burying the dead in Iraq? Is there the equivalent of an undertaker's profession there? Or do Mosques have a role in this? Is this survey method really the best way they think they can up with to estimate deaths?

Just saying...

A suggestion about STD's

Bad news today on the increasing rate of new sexually transmitted diseases in Australia, including HIV.

Whenever figures like this come out, the experts say that safe sex (at least as far as HIV is concerned) has probably decreased because everyone knows that being HIV positive is more or less treatable now. This sounds very plausible, but the same doctors usually say that the treatment for HIV is not easy, and there are often significant side effects, so people have no reason to be complacent. (Especially when some drug resistance is starting to become more evident, a recent Melbourne study said.) A quick Google search brings up this site with a very long list of articles dealing with various side effects. Doesn't sound like a walk in the park in many people.

So, isn't the issue of the possible unpleasantness and uncertain success of treatment of HIV infection the thing that they ought to be advertising now to discourage people from taking the risk of contracting it in the first place? Maybe they do conduct campaigns of that sort in gay targetted media, but I have my doubts. If they don't, I wonder if it is out of concern for depressing people who are just diagnosed.

It might be the same for chlamydia, in that it is relatively easy to treat but still carries risks of infertility. It's the side effect that should be emphasised then.

A free Big Mac for Peter Singer

For once, Peter Singer says something that I don't object to:

The Princeton University professor - whose book, Animal Liberation, sparked the animal rights movement 30 years ago - told The Guardian he would choose McDonald's over a small independent takeaway because "a big chain has a national and international reputation to protect".

"I see big corporations following what consumers will buy," Professor Singer said.

"If you have sufficiently educated consumers, you can get ethical food from big corporations."

Some suggestions about how to deal with North Korea

These are from another interesting blog I just found, In From the Cold. He suggests various ideas about how to deal with North Korea. Guess we will find out soon enough what the US and China actually will do.

Very cool space station pictures

Found via Futurismic (a blog newly added to my roll) is this site by a guy who takes photos and movies (through his telescope) of the international space station transiting the moon and sun.

I didn't know your amateur telescope could show so much detail of a thing 260 miles away. Very interesting.

Economic growth good for the environment

This short article from Seed would be good to wave around at the next Greens conference. An extract:

The root of the deforestation problem is social and economic. Rather than creating a conflict over resources, economic growth has given the Dominican Republic the opportunity to protect its wild places and to plan its development around them. The Dominican Republic has national parks, and eco-tourists enjoy a wide range of wild areas and the native plants and animals they support. This is due in large part to development—as measured in roads built, high wages, and industrial production. The existence of a stable government encouraged this sort of long-term thinking and has made the ongoing protection of forests possible.

Makes sense really.

Now there's a poison you don't hear about much

Botulism toxin in carrot juice has poisoned a couple of people in Canada.

For some reason, I remember an old episode of Quincy in which some bad chilli was sucked up in a hose left near a public water fountain. People drinking from the fountain got botulism poisoning that way.

Why I remember that episode in particular is not at all clear.

More on defending Islam

Karen Armstrong's continuing "crusade" in defence of Islam was the subject of a long post here on 18 September.

The next day there was a much more detailed criticism of her Guardian article from someone who actually does know a lot more Islamic and Crusades history. It's a very good read, seemingly confirming most of my suspicions about the (un) reliability of Armstrong on this topic.

The writer, Robert Spencer, also has a more recent article on the criticism of Jack Straw's very mild comments against the veil. It's also well worth reading.

Your iPod understands you

Guardian Unlimited Arts | Arts special reports | Steven Levy on the secrets of the iPod shuffle

See above for an interesting article about randomness, meaning and iPods.

A backgrounder on North Korea

The New Yorker: The Critics: Books

I have posted about this lengthy review of a couple of books on North Korea before, but Blogger search seems to no longer work properly here.

Anyway, it is worth remembering just how crazy North Korea is when thinking about what to do with a (possibly) nuclear armed North Korea.

Also, a few months back I heard Phillip Adams interview one of the very, very few academic semi-apologists for modern North Korea. That's how I read the conversation with Gavan McCormack anyway. Unfortunately, no transcript is available. However, look at what he writes in this article:

It scarcely needs to be said that the main victims of the DPRK state are, and have always been, the people of North Korea. There is general agreement on the basic facts. Approximately 200,000 people—just under 1 per cent of a population of around 23 million—are thought to be held in labour camps. Between one and two million—5 to 10 per cent—are estimated to have died of starvation, and hundreds of thousands of refugees have fled, mostly to China. Although the DPRK’s peculiar blend of terror, mobilization and seclusion has been slowly losing its coherence since the end of the Cold War, the system still stands, held together by the absolute authority of the ‘Dear Leader’, Kim Jong Il.

Yet set in a historical context, North Korea’s record on this score pales before the sum of suffering inflicted by Japan and the superpowers—not least the US—on the Korean people.

But : the difference is the current nightmare of North Korea is self imposed. It makes little sense to "put in context" a vicious and cruel government that lets ideology lead to mass starvation (see the New Yorker article above) by talking about how much it has suffered under Japan decades ago.

But he does criticise the USA, and that is always enough for someone to be a guest on Adam's show.

UPDATE: this commentary piece from The Times seems pretty well argued to me.

It's not just sharks, snakes, crocodiles, spiders and stingrays

Boy's fight for life after octopus encounter | NEWS.com.au

This happened just north of Brisbane. It's been a while since someone was killed by a blue ringed octopus, but I remember one adult was when I was a child.

Yuck 2

Guardian Unlimited | Science | Stem cell experts seek licence to create human-rabbit embryo

It's hard to keep up with stem cell research issues, but is it any wonder that people do bring up the animal/human embryo issue with headlines like this?

I still have my hunch that, like the "war on cancer" from the 1970's, stem cell research will go on for decades without any sense that it has lived up to its hype.

Not all killer asteroids found yet

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | UK to join 'killer' asteroid hunt

I wonder whether people are starting to feel that most major asteroids with potential to hit the earth are already identified, given that every couple of years there is mention of one that might hit the earth sometime in the future. (With later calculations often showing it shouldn't happen after all.)

The story above warns that in fact there is a lot of small rubbish still not spotted:

"The current generation of search telescopes are designed for the objects about 1km across and larger, because if one of those hits, it could cause instant global climate change," said Alan Fitzsimmons, a professor of astronomy at Queen's University Belfast.

"The smaller objects need a larger telescope and a more efficient camera system - they're the kinds of objects Pan-Starrs has been designed to detect.

"Even though they're smaller and don't cause as much damage, there are more of them and they hit more frequently."

Although sub-1km asteroids might not cause devastation on a global scale, they could cause death and destruction at a local and regional level, potentially wiping out millions of lives.

The last significant event like this occurred in 1908, when an asteroid or comet exploded above the Tunguska region of Siberia. The area was sparsely populated and, as a result, did not cause extensive loss of life.

Learning to love the maggot

Pour on 'maggot juice' to help heal wounds - tech - 09 October 2006 - New Scientist Tech

From the story:

Bandages containing fluids secreted by maggots could help accelerate the body's healing process, research suggests.

Live maggots are sometimes applied to chronic wounds because they eat dead tissue, but leave healthy tissue alone, boosting healing. But now it has been demonstrated that the fluids produced by maggots also contain enzymes that actually accelerate tissue repair.

Armed with the new findings, researchers in the UK hope to produce wound-dressings impregnated with the active maggot components. The idea is that, as well as protecting the wound, the dressings will speed up healing without the "yuk factor" involved with using live maggots.

I thought "yuk" was spelt "yuck".

Progressives need their space

The Corner on National Review Online

I noted a couple of weeks ago that Time mentioned in passing that Marko Moulitas (of Daily Kos fame) is talking of building "meeting halls" for thousands of his pals to, well, meet in. (The critical lack of big venues for people with political interests to gather in is something that had previously escaped anyone's attention.)

This weird sounding plan now gets a mention at The Corner (see above). The idea is as nutty as it first sounds:

...he'll turn to building communities in the real world, a chain of giant meeting places "replicating megachurches for the left" – complete with cafés and child care. Moulitsas has shown he can harness people's enthusiasm, but he says he doesn't want a leadership role in these "democracy centers"...

...he plans to embark next year on building real-world destinations for progressives and liberals throughout the Midwest, "cultural outposts" designed to attract thousands of like-minded liberals. "Each one of these would have a vast left-wing conspiracy component," he says, like leadership training or discussions on progressive issues.

I'ld like to see how the fund raising for this is going to go. I can just see Markos turning up on TV at 3am running the Markos Moulitas Salvation Show, with lots and lots of invitations to donate.

For people who are really into rice

The Japan Times Online - Go with the grain at Kokoromai

I've been to the beach for a couple of days, and oddly enough can't find anything much to blog about from the news over the weekend.

Instead, the link is to a story that illustrates Japan's food culture, where they care a great deal about their rice.

It's a review of restaurant that specialises in rice:

This simple yet chic little restaurant...features rice the way other places specialize in, say, chicken, eel or beef tongue. Instead of relegating it to a bit part, an afterthought to round off the meal, Kokoromai elevates it to the starring role.

Rice, of course, is not a singular noun in Japan. Dozens of different strains exist, with climate and geography determining the flavor and character just as terroir does for grapes and their resulting wine. Kokoromai serves eight varieties of plain white rice, each identified by the prefecture of its origin and even the name of the farmer who grew it.

OK, maybe this is only marginally interesting to most readers, but like I said my mind is still in holiday mode.

The humourless Council

And the gays went in two by two . . . - Britain - Times Online

This sounds like a silly beat up and I would have doubted that the Councillors really had been offended, except for the fact that Times has extensive direct quotes from the utterly humourless Liberal Democrats Councillors in question.

Yay for Fox

Fox News: Enraging Liberals for 10 Years - Los Angeles Times

How nice: the LA Times runs an opinion piece that praises the success of Fox News.

The decline of the rocket belt

The men who want to fly. By Larry Smith - Slate Magazine

This is a nice, but too short, article about a recent "rocket belt" convention in the States. I wonder if younger readers know that the rocket man one made flying appearances at the RNA show in Australia during (I think) the 1960's.

Sadly, there is no mention of the much needed research into the development of better personal flying devices. If only I ran the world...

Islam and chastity (of women)

Comment is free: Chastity and choice

This is an interesting personal article from The Guardian about one woman's views on Muslim over-concern about their daughters' chastity.

That Muslims value chastity is not really the issue at all. It is the extent to which they go to "protect" their daughters from the world. I also think it is a demeaning view of young men to believe that none of them can ever be trusted to be alone with a girl, even in public. As an adult male, when I see a Muslim wife covered head to toe, I feel insulted that either she (or, more likely, her husband) seem to feel that even if see her face I am going to immediately lust after her.

Of course, there are degrees of common sense in this; I feel as many do that a lot of Western parents have gone too far in the other direction of not wanting to interfere at all in their teenager's behaviour. I don't particularly like dress that is obviously sexualising, especially in young girls, even though this is a bit of a tricky subject in that different parts of the body can be the object of particular sexual interest in different cultures. However, in my opinion covering the face is over the top for any culture, as it practically removes all human identity from the person. Maybe that is not the intention, but it is the effect, I reckon.

Europe to Iran: tell us if you want to stop talking about it

BBC NEWS | Middle East | EU warns Iran 'time running out'

Some very decisive action from the European Union:

Mr Solana has had a number of meetings with Iran's top nuclear negotiator since Tehran refused a 31 August deadline from the UN to halt enrichment.

The US and key EU powers now say they will seek a fresh UN resolution imposing sanctions.

Mr Solana told parliament: "This dialogue I am maintaining cannot last forever.

"It is up to the Iranians now to decide whether this time has come to an end."

Limbo into history

Limbo to be put out of its misery | World Wide Weird | The Australian

It looks like the Catholic idea of Limbo is to be given the boot. The reasons given in this article are interesting:

The evidence suggests Benedict XVI never believed in limbo anyway. But in the evangelisation zones of Africa and Asia, the Pope - an authority on all things Islamic - is aware Muslims believe the souls of stillborn babies go straight to heaven.

Looking to spread the faith in countries with high infant mortality, now is a good time to make it clear the stillborn babies of Christian mothers go to heaven, too...

Christians hold that heaven is a state of union with God, while hell is separation from God. But they have long wrestled with the fate of unbaptised children, and what happened to those who lived a "good life" but died before the time of Jesus.

Next of the list of possible revisions might be the idea of Purgatory. Personally, I've always favoured the idea that CS Lewis liked, (that Purgatory was just really a part of Hell, with all souls being able to end their self imposed time there, at least until the return of Christ to Earth when the gates would be shut forever.) It's a kinder, gentler Hell. Sort of.

Irony, I think

Jim Nolan: Howard kinder to conservative leaders than history | Opinion | The Australian

Jim Nolan, one of the few Labor identities to strongly support the Iraq war, argues in this article how it was those on the Left side of politics who were originally pushing the Right in the US to "do the right thing" in the Middle East and elsewhere in the 1980's and 90's. He therefore is upset that it is the Right that is now claiming to have the moral high ground in removing dictators, preventing genocide, etc.

But his final point is his best:

Of course this would be all the more nausea-inducing were it not for the fact that just at the crucial moment of Bush Jr's conversion, the broad Left, which had been so morally indignant at Saddam's brutality through the '80s, went missing and has remained in a quagmire of irresolution and defeatism since.

It sticks in the craw that the intellectual Left has become so debased that a Tory Prime Minister can make a telling point at their expense by quoting the words of socialist intellectual George Orwell. They have become the Bourbons of modern politics, having learned nothing and forgotten nothing.

Be prepared for a fright

Cindy Sheehan Blog

Click on the link above if you really want a fright.

(I thought I had seen all of Cindy Sheehan's web sites before. Maybe the awful picture has been up there for ages, but if so I have missed it until now.)

Dead at last

BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Australian 'Labor tree' poisoned

The BBC reports that the Australian "Tree of Knowledge" is officially dead.

The apparent poisoning was reported earlier this year, and it has always puzzled me as to the motive of the poisoner. That the Labor Party likes to create a quasi-religious aura around the people, and even the inanimate objects, which were on hand at the time of its creation seems to me a matter of wry amusement, but it is hardly something that a normal conservative would want to put an end to by poisoning. Furthermore, if conservatives are more inclined to be the business owners in any small town, it seems they would not be interested in killing a tourist attraction.

Maybe it was just a nut.

A George Monbiot article of interest

Guardian Unlimited | Comment is free | I'm pleased the case against this ranting homophobe was dropped

Monbiot complains that legislation brought in under Labor in England is flawed and being misused. He is happy that charges have been dropped against anti-gay campaigner Stephen Green:

Green had been handing out leaflets to the revellers at the Mardi Gras gay and lesbian festival in Cardiff at the beginning of September. By his standards they were pretty mild. They quoted Leviticus and Romans, compared homosexuality to incest and claimed that "by faith in Jesus it is even possible to be healed of homosexual desires ... you do have a choice as to whether you continue in a lifestyle which leads to hell, or whether you decide to put yourself right with God through belief in the Lord Jesus Christ."

He was arrested and charged under the Public Order Act 1986 with using "threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby". On Thursday, however, the Crown Prosecution Service decided to drop the case.

It is not clear why the CPS let him go, but it is probably because it knew the prosecution would fail. Green's leaflets, though offensive to gays and lesbians, used no threatening or abusive words, and he did nothing but seek to persuade people to take them. So it was dim of the police to have thrown the Public Order Act at him.

Indeed.

As an aside, he mentions that Green has threatened to sue Channel 4 "over its plans to screen Gunther von Hagens' (admittedly pointless and stupid) crucifixion of a corpse." !!

von Hagens is the crazy looking character who makes a living from flaying dead people, (including perhaps dead convicts from China) "plasticising" the bodies and then touring them around the world. He also seems to have a more or less permanent gig on Channel 4 doing televised autopsies. (His first turned up recently on SBS in Australia, to no media attention at all as far as I can see.)

That his "work" and motives no longer attract that much attention says a lot about the modern Western world, and none of it very good.

Australian cinema to wreck havoc

Our sun, sand and surf image remade for Japan - Arts - Entertainment

This is a longish and not all that interesting story about a new attempt to get Japan interested in Australia as a place of arts and culture. It will include a "the largest collection of contemporary Australian art to ever travel to Japan". There's more:

The exhibition is the centerpiece of the Australia Festival, to be held in Tokyo throughout October. There will be performances by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and the Australian Dance Theatre ...

fine so far, but why do they have to ruin all that effort with:

... the first retrospective of Australian film in Japan for 30 years.

A simple idea

Scientists create more efficient nuclear power fuel. 01/10/2006. ABC News Online

From the story above:

The scientists changed the shape of the fuel from solid cylinders to hollow tubes, adding surface area that allowed water to flow inside and outside the pellets, increasing heat transfer.

They claim new fuel design is also much safer because it reaches an operating temperature of about 700 degrees Celsius, much lower than 1,800 degrees for conventional fuel and further from the 2,840 degrees melting point for uranium fuel.

Dr Hejzlar, a principle research scientist in MIT's Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, said it could take up to 10 years to commercialise the new fuel concept.

Seems odd that such a simple idea had not been thought of before.

Jews in Iran

The limits of tolerance | Jerusalem Post

This is an interesting article on the Jewish community in Iran. It seems that they are pretty much left alone to observe their religion, apart from the occasional long term imprisonment for no good reason. (Well, that happened to 13 in 1988.)

Worth reading.

The things they litigate about in the US

Supreme court opens term, rejects appeal on sex toy

From the above story:

The U.S. Supreme Court began a new term on Monday in which it will rule on landmark social cases, and it rejected about 1,900 appeals that piled up during its summer recess including a constitutional challenge to a Texas law that bans the sale of sex toys....

In the sex toys case, an employee of an adult bookstore in El Paso was arrested in 2003 for selling a vibrator to undercover police officers. He was charged under the Texas law that bans the sale of an "obscene device" designed primarily "for the stimulation of human genital organs."

His attorney challenged the law as unconstitutional, claiming it violated the right to sexual privacy without government interference. The court, which rejected a challenge to a similar Alabama law last year, denied the appeal without any comment.

Surely this shows that:

* Southern legislators have too much time on their hands;

* the Texas police asked to enforce such laws must find it a big joke;

* the fact that it would result in litigation in an attempt to overturn the law shows the ridiculous lengths to which some Americans see the judiciary as the solution to sorting out issues that should be dealt with in the ballot box.

Dubious legal claim of the day

Independent Online Edition > Americas

Another passenger mistaken for a possible terrorist story.

Of course I feel sorry for the guy:

The drama unfolded less than an hour into the flight. As he settled down with a book and a ginger ale, the father-of-three was grabbed from behind and held in a head-lock.

"This guy just told me his name was Michael Wilk, that he was with the New York Police Department, that I'd been acting suspiciously and should stay calm. I could barely find my voice and couldn't believe it was happening," said Mr Stein.

"He went into my pocket and took out my passport and my iPod. All the other passengers were looking concerned." Eventually, cabin crew explained that the captain had run a security check on Mr Stein after being alerted by the policeman and that this had cleared him. The passenger had been asked to go back to his seat before he had restrained Mr Stein. When the plane arrived in New York, Mr Stein was met by apologetic police officers who offered to fast-track him out of the airport.

From an earlier part of the story:

He has since been told by airline staff he was targeted because he was using an iPod, had used the toilet when he got on the plane and that his tan made him appear "Arab".

But his reaction - to look at suing the airline for failing to protect him - seems a little silly. I mean, it sounds as if the "police officer" told the crew of his suspicions, and they did not want him to act. What should they have done, handcuffed him (the alleged police officer) to his seat? I imagine that might not have done much to ensure a trouble free flight, especially if he started yelling.

It's also interesting to note that Mr Stein is painted as somewhat of an interior design celebrity. I assume this happened in first or business class then. If so, I am guessing he was not humiliated in front of all of economy class. (Maybe it's a moot point as to which class it is worst to be humiliated in front of?)

Anyway, it is indeed a worry for arab looking people flying at the moment. I am not sure what can be done about it, though.

Possible pizza crisis looms

Millions of anchovies die on Spain beach

An odd feature of Congress

Rep. Mark Foley's Shocking Downfall - Newsweek National News - MSNBC.com

Over the weekend, a gay Republican resigns over some (apparently) explicit E flirting with a male teenage page.

From the Newsweek story:

Foley's sexual leanings were also well known, or at least suspected, by a particularly vulnerable group on Capitol Hill. Every year Congress hires about 100 pages, who can be seen in their distinctive blue uniforms scurrying through the halls, running errands for lawmakers. The pages have been embroiled in earlier sex scandals. In 1983, a pair of congressmen admitted to sexual relations with underage pages (one with a girl, one with a boy). After that, the pages were housed in a dormitory and fairly closely chaperoned. A former female page, who asked not to be identified to protect her privacy, told NEWSWEEK that she and other pages had regularly seen Foley stop and talk to pages on the House floor and in the cloakroom, lingering with them and asking them to describe their experiences in Congress. "We just gradually figured out he was flirting with the guys," said the page. "It made a lot of the guys uneasy. He was kind of creepy."

Why employ teenagers as pages anyway? Seems an odd feature of Congress to me, maybe more appropriate to an earlier era where kids did routinely go out to start making a living while a teenager.

A lifestyle to envy

A couple of weekends ago we went camping not too far from Brisbane, just for one night, mainly as a "proof of concept" for my sceptical wife who had previously avoided the joys of nights under canvas since we married. (My tent is about 18 years old, but as far as I can tell, still waterproof.) As I expected, it was a big hit with the kids.

This mob of kangaroos hung around the campsite. It struck me while watching them that modern day kangaroos have a pretty easy life as far as wild animals go. An undemanding diet, no need for plenty of water, and a lack of significant predators apart from the odd dingo and the two legged variety of hunter. (A sign in the shower block said there were dingos in the area and to avoid them. I didn't see any.)

They really just spend the day nibbling and resting in the shade. Good work if you can get it.

Recycling aircraft

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Where old aeroplanes go to die

This is just a good article on what they do with old passenger aircraft. It's all interesting, just go and read it.

Probably my first post on sport

I don't talk about sport here because if it didn't exist, I don't think I would miss it.

That said, I am from Brisbane, was forced into playing rugby league at primary school, and so have some vague familiarity with the game. (It always seemed to me that the talent of throwing yourself at the ground with a ball in such a way that you had confidence that you would not hurt yourself was something that was already mysteriously evident by the age of 8. I never had that confidence. Is it like taking your first proper head-first dive into a swimming pool? Did those kids who would throw themselves on the thin August turf with abandon have fathers who taught them the trick of how to do it without breaking ribs? I don't recall it being a matter of coaching.)

Anyway, after paying no attention to the code for many years, I think I was in my 20's when I stumbled across a particularly close grand final match on TV one Sunday (I forget what year and which teams), but since then I have usually followed State of Origin games and grand finals, and maybe one or two other "crucial" matches a year. Maybe a total of 4 to 6 games a year, then.

The Brisbane Broncos have always been an easy team to like. As far as I can recall, they have always avoided the sleazy sex incidents (although for all I know that may be more by good fortune than good behaviour). Coach Wayne Bennett has huge popularity, but seems such a self effacing, fatherly character (with the well publicised background of having raised kids with serious disabilities) it is impossible not to like him.

(If anyone overseas is reading this and is interested in Bennett's personal story, the transcript of the 1999 ABC "Australia Story" is here.)

This is all preamble to explaining that tonight, the Broncos won the rugby league grand final in pretty convincing fashion, and it makes me, even with nearly as low an interest as you can get in sport, pretty happy.

I still don't think I am ever in danger of actually going to a stadium watch a match, though. Hearing the individuals in the crowd clearly may well put me off again.

Odd court case of the day

How two Roman soldiers 'did battle' in bath house - Britain - Times Online

Maybe too much emphasis on asteroids

Impact from the Deep -- Strangling heat and gases emanating from the earth and sea, not asteroids, most likely caused several ancient mass extinctions. Could the same killer-greenhouse conditions build once again?

Well you get the picture of what this Scientific American article is about, don't you. As to whether humans could build up CO2 to such high levels as to cause extreme extinctions, we have a little way to go yet:

Although estimates of the rates at which carbon dioxide entered the atmosphere during each of the ancient extinctions are still uncertain, the ultimate levels at which the mass deaths took place are known. The so-called thermal extinction at the end of the Paleocene began when atmospheric CO2 was just under 1,000 parts per million (ppm). At the end of the Triassic, CO2 was just above 1,000 ppm. Today with CO2 around 385 ppm, it seems we are still safe. But with atmospheric carbon climbing at an annual rate of 2 ppm and expected to accelerate to 3 ppm, levels could approach 900 ppm by the end of the next century, and conditions that bring about the beginnings of ocean anoxia may be in place. How soon after that could there be a new greenhouse extinction? That is something our society should never find out.

Yes, well, saving life from massive extinctions does seem a pretty good reason for trying to keep levels fairly well below 1000 ppm.

About that NIE report

TigerHawk

TigerHawk short take on the leaked NIE report makes is very good. He's a smart commentator.

I would add this: surely most voters would guess that with intelligence assessments (especially when they are dealing with a general level of threat, such as the report in question) they are likely to be rubbery and rather subjective. It's inherent in the nature of the intelligence business that it is not a precise science.

Sometimes leaders have to make a call on intelligence material anyway (such as in the decision to invade Iraq) and the fact that such decisions involve a degree of uncertainty is what makes them hard decisions.

For opposition parties to crow about this current report may be expected, but (in my opinion) it does not really endear them much to the sensible swinging voter.

UPDATE: Michael Costello's column about the report is also good, and not entirely supportive of his mate Kim Beazley's take (as evidenced in the previous link.) This paragraph by Costello is very apt:

The NIE states: "We assess that the Iraq conflict has become the cause celebre for jihadists." Well, let's assume that's correct. My question is: And? What follows from that assessment? Israel is also a cause celebre for jihadists. Does that mean we should abandon it? If the answer is: "No, that's a ridiculous proposition", then it is logically equally ridiculous in the case of Iraq.

Painters beware

ScienceDaily: Solvent Exposure Linked To Birth Defects In Babies Of Male Painters

From the above report:

The study focused on questionnaires filled out by a random sample of 398 painters exposed to a mixture of chemicals present in organic solvents and 302 carpenters with little or no exposure, in the period of three months before the last pregnancy. Workers employed as painters three months before their partners became pregnant were on average six times more likely than the carpenters to father congenitally malformed babies (e.g. defects of cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, urogenital and central nervous systems.)

In addition, the painters exposed to the chemicals were 50 to 100 per cent more likely to produce low birth-weight babies, depending on the level of exposure, compared to unexposed carpenters....

Of particular concern, said Dr. Burstyn, is that all of the levels of exposure to solvents investigated in the study were well within Dutch regulations and occupational exposure limits established in the United States and Canada. Therefore, they had previously been considered safe.

Office work has its upside.

About drugs policy in Sweden

News.com.au Gotcha Blog

This is an interesting story on the relative success of Sweden in dealing with illicit drugs:

...Sweden moved down the path of enforcement and rehabilitation with the aim of not just lowering drug abuse, but eliminating it. Legislation removed the discretion from prosecutors to decide whether to press charges, unless the amount of drugs such as cannabis or speed claimed to be for personal use could not be subdivided. Charges for possession of heroin, morphine, opium or cocaine were virtually never waived. Penalties for possession of drugs were increased, with one year minimum jail sentences.

At the same time Sweden poured extra funding into social programs for those most at risk of drugs. Social welfare authorities were also given the legal power to force users into six-month long detox and rehabilitation programs.

The result was a dramatic decline in illicit drug usage. The number of 15-16 year olds saying they had tried drugs at least once fell from 15 per cent in 1971 to three per cent in 1989. The number reporting they had used drugs in the previous month fell from five per cent to 0.5 per cent over the same period.

Always pleasing to see (relatively) conservative approaches working...

This is a worry

BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Organ sales 'thriving' in China

This article is about buying transplant organs in China. Note that at the right hand side of the article, there is a link to another BBC story in March which says China was to ban the sale of transplant organs by July. Evidently did not happen.

I may have overlooked posting about the recent investigation into Falun Gong claims that they in particular are being harvested for organs. Lateline had a good interview about this in August.

It would seem that this story is rather hard to keep the public interested in. Startling claims are made, governments talk about the need for independent investigation and seek re-assurances that it is not happening, and then it slips off the radar. However, maybe an unintended conseqence of the Olympic Games coming up is that there is good reason for the media to keep doing stories about human rights in China.

Flying and greenhouse gas

Is flying really evil? from Guardian Unlimited: Travelog

There is a bit of a push going on, especially in Europe, to make flying much more expensive as a way to reduce greenhouse gases.

(I wonder if modern day Zeppelins would be more fuel efficient. There is a theory, although Wikipedia tells me it is highly controversial, that a large part of the Hindenburg's flammability was to do with the construction materials, not so much the hydrogen. I suspect that helium might be too expensive and rare to seriously use on a large scale. Also, surely modern materials could increase airship's carrying capacity mightily. Just a thought...)

Anyway, the writer of the above article notes this:

Reading the papers you would think that air travel is the single biggest cause of global warming. In fact, air travel accounts for less than 5% of carbon dioxide emissions. We must look to every sector to reduce emissions, but if we really want to target the biggest culprits then we need to look at homes, which account for nearer 25% of emissions, and power stations, the UK's largest coal-fired version of which wastes two-thirds of the energy it generates.

We've shown before how a few simple changes made in your home can save double the carbon emissions of a return flight to Egypt. In seeking to reduce our emissions we need to examine our entire lifestyles, not just our flying habits. The trouble is that it's sexier to write about planes than lagging your loft.

Indeed.

The second comment to the article is also interesting:

The aviation industry has always, and continues to work extremely hard to be good 'climate citizens'. Aircraft designs produce HALF the CO2 emissions that they did forty years ago. Current research and new aircraft aim to produce 50% less CO2 per aircraft by 2020. That is a massively ambitious target, and billions of UK, EU and US funding is being spent to reach this goal. Not only that but an 80% reduction in NOx and 50% reduction in noise are other targets.

This represents a doubling of the rate of improvement in environmental performance, i.e. achieving what previously took 40 years in 20 years (targets are relative to 2000).

I may still be able to take a holiday in 15 years time, then.

On swearing in Japanese

The Japan Times Online - Be warned: we're talking rather rude Japanese

As you can see from the above article, swearing in Japanese seems sort of complicated, depending very much on the context of when and where an expression is used.

(I have had troubles myself in explaining the relatively simple Australian concept of "swear words" to Japanese people. Now I understand why a bit better.)

Freakonomics looks at doctors handwashing

Selling Soap - New York Times

A fun read from the NYT about the famous Cedars-Sinai Medical Centres efforts to increase doctors' hand washing habits.

Amongst other measures:

They started a Hand Hygiene Safety Posse that roamed the wards and let it be known that this posse preferred using carrots to sticks: rather than searching for doctors who weren’t compliant, they’d try to “catch” a doctor who was washing up, giving him a $10 Starbucks card as reward. You might think that the highest earners in a hospital wouldn’t much care about a $10 incentive — “but none of them turned down the card,” Silka says.

They then moved onto doing an agar plate culture of some doctors' hands after lunch:

The resulting images, Silka says, “were disgusting and striking, with gobs of colonies of bacteria.”

The administration then decided to harness the power of such a disgusting image. One photograph was made into a screen saver that haunted every computer in Cedars-Sinai.

A nicely creative approach.

Jim Holt on the problems of string theory

The New Yorker: The Critics: A Critic At Large

Jim Holt is an excellent science writer. (His old articles in Slate are well worth looking up.)

In the New Yorker, he has a long review of the 2 anti string theory books out recently, and it is very good reading. (Peter Woit, who wrote one of the books, likes this review much better than the one in Slate that I mentioned some posts back.)

The difficulties of anti drug programs

A White House drug deal gone bad. By Ryan Grim - Slate Magazine

Better late than never. I missed this a few weeks ago, but the article talks about the contradictory effects of anti drug programs in America. (They either don't work or actually seem to result in more use.)

I had heard of such research before, but have never gone looking for more information. It does cross my mind often, however, especially when I take calls at my office from the some group seeking donations to help its anti-drugs educational program in schools here. (I think the police visit and distribute an anti-drugs booklet.) They probably would not appreciate me advising them that their efforts may well be counterproductive.

Controlling the behaviour of people is such tricky business, isn't it?

Poor rats

Future Mars astronauts have radiation on their minds - space - 25 September 2006 - New Scientist Space

The likely serious problems with cosmic radiation on the long trip to Mars is, by my reckoning, good reason to be concentrating on settling the Moon underground first. (Provided that the effect of low lunar gravity can be shown to be less serious than radiation effects.)

Some rats are already being irradiated to see what happens:

These are more difficult to shield against than lighter elements, and Rabin's studies suggest that they are more potent in affecting the brain. The team beams heavy particles into the brains of rats using particle accelerators, then tests the rats to see how the radiation affects their cognitive abilities.

Rats whose brains have been exposed to heavy particle radiation perform more poorly in navigating mazes and have a harder time learning to press a button to get a food pellet. They also are more easily distracted and experience more anxiety in stressful situations.

Maybe in the future, snobby earthlings will deride the intelligence of space settlers in much the same way jokes are made here about settlers inbreeding in remote areas.

As I have mentioned before, one of the first things I want to see done back on the moon is a breeding colony of rats to see how the low gravity affects their offspring.

Bad news for Iran?

BBC NEWS | Middle East | Israel 'holds secret Saudi talks'

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has held an unprecedented meeting with a senior member of the Saudi royal family, Israeli officials say.

The meeting 12 days ago has not been confirmed by Saudi Arabia, which has no official contacts with Israel.

Israeli media say they discussed Iran's nuclear programme and a Saudi peace plan adopted by Arab states in 2002.

Barry Cohen's lunch with Mark Latham

Barry Cohen: Prepare to be blessed with a new Marksism fantasy | Opinion | The Australian

Don't you love it when former supporters of Latham tell personal anecdotes of Mark's behaviour? For the amusement of the nation, Latham should continue with this self defeating series of books at the rate of one a year.

From Cohen's column:

I was alerted that I had been given a spray in The Latham Diaries when it was released late last year. As a friend and supporter for many years, guest speaker at a dinner in his honour and having been publicly thanked by him for urging him to run for the leadership, one would expect nothing less.

Stadiums and storms

News in Science - Sports stadiums may focus lightning damage - 20/09/2006

Some time ago I promised my story of stupid behaviour in storms. It's still on its way.

Fiddling with the atmosphere

Fake volcanoes could combat global warming | COSMOS magazine

When it says "fake volcanoes" I'm not sure exactly what mechanism it suggests to get the sulfates into the high atmosphere. (I have suggested before nuking volcanoes that no one wants, but no one pays any attention to me!)

Anyway, the idea of deliberately polluting the high atmosphere to help fight global warming must horrify Greenies.

Stephen Hayes on Saddam & al Qaeda

How Bad Is the Senate
Intelligence Report?

See above for a very lengthy and detailed Stephen Hayes article criticising the Senate report which claimed no connection between Saddam and al Qaeda.

Mark Steyn on the UN follies

U.N. shows why it's incapable of reform

An amusing and interesting Steyn column on recent appearances at the UN.

A funny line about Chomsky:

He [Chavez] denounced Bush as an "imperialist, fascist, assassin, genocidal" and also "the devil," he held up a copy of some unreadable Noam Chomsky book, gave it a big plug and subsequently regretted that he couldn't meet with the late Professor Chomsky. Chomsky isn't late, he's alive and well. Granted, it's easy to get the impression he's been dead for 30 years, since he hasn't had a new idea since the early '70s.

Skepticism on Netroots

TIME.com: The Netroots Hit Their Limits -- Oct. 2, 2006 -- Page 1

This article expressing scepticism on how far the Netroots movement in the States can go is interesting.

The oddest part is this:

...Markos Moulitsas, who runs Daily Kos, is talking about building real, bricks-and-mortar gathering halls where progressives can meet and organize political activities in person.

There's a shortage of "gathering halls" in America? Or is it that netroots need dedicated halls that are unsullied by too many people of other ideologies having met there in the past? Some further checking about this would be interesting, but no time right now.

For those with an interest in the 60's

For Pete's sake - Sunday Times - Times Online

This is an extract from a new book by the former wife of English comedian Peter Cook.

Lots of name dropping of 1960's famous people. Lots of easy sex with men that left the women sad and feeling exploited. (Given how often that is acknowledged now it's amazing it took the fast women of that time a decade or so to realise it.)

But for me the most surprising thing is that the former Mrs Cook suspects that there was a brief fling between Jackie Kennedy (while still with the President, it seems) and Peter Cook!

I find it hard to imagine an odder coupling.

The Sun goes quiet?

The Observer | UK News | Cooling Sun brings relief to sweltering Earth

Slattsnews has already spotted this article. I meant to post about the topic last week, when the New Scientist paper edition carried an article about it. (It was only available on line to subscribers.)

Anyway, the point is that it is believed by several credible scientists that the Sun is about to go into one of its quieter periods, which means few sunspots, and although the exact mechanism is not certain (more cosmic rays causing more clouds is the main theory,) this seems to coincide with periods of global cooling.

The great advantage is that, just when the earth may be starting to heat up from greenhouse gases, the sun may give us 50 to 100 years of cooler weather to get our low emission technology on line. (To ignore greenhouse gases in that period could be a big mistake, as the sunspots and "normal" weather will return sooner or later.)

Over at Real Climate, they seem to rather downplay the importance of this, as evidenced by this recent post. However, if we have the Thames freezing over again within 5 years, the public will be paying a lot of attention!

Mark Latham's wit and wisedom - Phwaw

Look out, toss-bags, Latham's back - National - smh.com.au

From the above article about Lathams new book:

Conga Line is revealing for what its choice of material tells us about Labor's fallen idol. Latham has a particular fixation with Richard Nixon and this shows in the frequency of entries for the Watergate president.

And under "Women" there are five entries, two belittling the female brain, one extolling a woman's place in the home and two reminding us of the origins of the phrases "damned whores" and "God's police", used by the feminist Anne Summers as the title of her watershed book.

I hope Julia Gillard is rushing out to buy a copy. (Maybe Mark sent her one as a gift.)

Mark himself is given a column in the SMH this morning, in which he says:

Even the title of this book is under attack. Writing in one of Rupert Murdoch's American rags earlier this year, the neo-conservative Christian commentator Paul Gray described "a conga line of suckholes" as "possibly the ugliest expression used by an Australian MP". Poor, prissy Paul had better not read the rest of this book. It has too many dinky-di, ridgy-didge Australian expressions for this politically correct petal to absorb.

It's probably not the ugliest expression ever used by an MP, at least in private. It would, however, have to be right up there with anything used by an Australian MP in Parliament.

A Latham Prime Ministership would have been rather like having Sir Les Patterson as leader.

Steyn (and me) on the 9/11 conspiracies

Macleans.ca | Culture | Books | Call me crazy. I blame terrorists.

I missed Mark Steyn's column a few weeks ago about this. I had not realised that the theories had become quite as loopy as those he cites.

The apparent popularity of the 9/11 conspiracies should, I think, be of greater concern to Western governments than it apparently is.

That many in the Islamic world should refuse to believe the "official version" is one thing; after all, there the ongoing promotion of centuries old conspiracy theories against the Jews is a solid groundwork for disbelief of any government that supports Israel.

But for Western nations to have a substantial proportion of its own citizens preferring fantasy over reality is surely corrosive to those nations' democracy. Moreover, Islamic conspiracy believers would doubtless take encouragement from this too.

My feeling is that this is serious enough that it should not be simply ignored, or left to the private market to deal with the matter. (Such as the worthwhile work Popular Mechanics has put into this.) I think there is a justifiable role for government in this, to support publicly the work of anti-conspiracists, and to make plain statements that conspiracy theorists are causing harm, whatever their intentions may be.

Sure, such an active government role would be cited by some as further evidence of the conspiracy. But one would hope that the government explaining its reasons for getting involved in the argument (to the help preserve and better serve the very democracy under which the conspiracy theorists live) would persuade most. In any event, I find it hard to believe that active government role would cause more people to fall under the sway of conspiracy theorists than exist already.

UPDATE: I have just read this excellent and thought provoking article from Tech Central Station about why conspiracy theories are so popular. It's quite long, but well worth reading in full.

Here's the final couple of paragraphs, if you don't have time to look at it all:

I would suggest, then, that the post-Enlightenment pretense of hostility to authority, tradition, and common sense as such, and especially the extreme form of it represented by the likes of Marx and Nietzsche, is what really underlies the popularity of conspiracy theories, particularly those involving 9/11. The absurd idea that to be intelligent, scientific, and intellectually honest requires a distrust for all authority per se and a contempt for the opinions of the average person, has so deeply permeated the modern Western consciousness that conspiratorial thinking has for many people come to seem the rational default position. And it also explains why even mainstream outlets like Time and Vanity Fair, while by no means endorsing the views of the conspiracy theorists, have tended to treat them with kid gloves, as if they were harmless and well-meaning eccentrics instead of shrill and hate-filled crackpots. The belief that extremism in the attack on authority is no vice has a powerful appeal even for suit-wearing journalists and media executives (especially if they are liberals), even if they have too much sense to follow it out consistently.

Yet no civilization can be healthy which nurtures such delusions, for they strike at the very heart of a society's core institutions - family, religion, schools, political institutions, and so forth - and replace the (sometimes critical) allegiance we should feel for them with a corrosive skepticism. Conspiracy theories are only the most extreme symptom of this disease. Less dramatic, but in the long run more dangerous, is the relentless tendency of the Western intelligentsia to denigrate the Western past and present, massively exaggerating the vices of their own civilization and the virtues of its competitors, and putting the worst possible spin on the motives and policies of its current leaders while minimizing or excusing the crimes of its enemies. This would be dangerous under the best of circumstances. It is doubly so while we are at war with enemies who know no such self-doubt and self-hatred.

Why micro black holes might be safe, but I am not relaxed and comfortable yet

LiveScience.com - Despite Rumors, Black Hole Factory Will Not Destroy Earth

Greg Landsberg, a physicist who actually did bother corresponding with James Blodgett (who runs the "Risk Evaluation Forum" that got me interested in possible danger from micro black holes) gives this recent explanation as to why he thinks any MBH created at CERN will not be any danger to the Earth:

"Still, let's assume that even if Hawking is a genius, he's wrong, and that such black holes are more stable," Landsberg said. Nearly all of the black holes will be traveling fast enough from the accelerator to escape Earth's gravity. "Even if you produced 10 million black holes a year, only 10 would basically get trapped, orbiting around its center," Landsberg said.

However, such trapped black holes are so tiny, they could pass through a block of iron the distance from the Earth to the Moon and not hit anything. They would each take about 100 hours to gobble up one proton.

At that rate, even if one did not take into account the fact that each black hole would slow down every time it gobbled up a proton, and thus suck down matter at an even slower rate, "about 100 protons would be destroyed every year by such a black hole, so it would take much more than the age of universe to destroy even one milligram of Earth material," Landsberg concluded. "It's quite hard to destroy the Earth."

These figures sound good, but I tend to worry that they may be made on a set of expected results (regarding, for example, the number that would have earth escaping velocity, the exact dimensions and behaviour of MBH, the conditions inside the Earth where the slow ones stay, and possible interactions with each other) which are far from worst possible estimates.

Given that its the fate of the earth at issue, it seems to me that some calculations should be done on worst case scenarios to be confident of the outcome.

I suppose it is possible that Landsberg has done that, but I am somewhat suspicious that he hasn't. After all, he really believes there is no reason to doubt Hawking Radiation will take care of the problem, so this further exercise is perhaps done on the basis that you don't really have to take it too seriously.

One thing I also don't understand is why it takes an estimated 100 hours for a MBH to absorb a proton.

Maybe it irritates physicists to have a lay person doubting their figures, but I feel it is worth pressing on with the issue none the less.

The fact that there is a lot of uncertainty about the expected precise behaviour of MBH can easily be seen by the number of papers that show up on an arxiv search for "black holes".

On the loss of will in Europe

Confronted by the Islamist threat on all sides, Europe pathetically caves in - Comment - Times Online

It could almost have been written by Mark Steyn, but this column about European "loss of will" is good stuff.

In relation to the Pope, I like this paragraph:

I actually heard a senior member of the British Government chide the Pope this week for what he described as his unhelpful comments. This minister went on to say that the Pope should keep quiet about Islamic violence because of the Crusades.

It was a jaw-dropping observation. If it was meant seriously its import is that, because of violence perpetrated in the name of Christ 900 years ago, today’s Church, and presumably today’s European governments (who, after all, were eager participants in the Crusades) should forever hold their peace on the subject of religious fanaticism. In this view the Church’s repeated apologies for the sins committed in its name apparently are not enough. The Pope has no right, even in a lengthy disquisition on the complexities of faith and reason, to say anything about the religious role in Islamic terrorism.

Well worth reading all of it.

Conflict and Islam

A few weeks ago, prior to the Pope's recent speech, there was an interview on ABC Religion Report with an Australian Catholic priest who lives in Pakistan. The transcript is here.

The whole interview was very interesting. This priest believes that the conflict between Sunni and Shia branches of Islam is going to be a major issue in future, as is evident within Iraq (and also Pakistan.) Also, the issue of the use of the Koran in relation to violence gets an airing:

Stephen Crittenden: I'd be very interested to hear what you have to say about the comments that George Pell made recently, saying 'As an exercise I read through the Qu'ran and I put it down eventually, page after page after page of exhortation to violence.' He's right, isn't he?

Robert McCulloch: Well if you look in Sura 5 , you've got the statement the Muslim take neither Christian nor Jew for friend. Now we can see that certainly as Christians in the Bible there are similar sort of conflictual statements, especially in the Old Testament, but we can put them within the context of when the text was written and exegeses accordingly. But when you have fundamentalist preachers picking up this text, as they do in Karachi, one hears it every Friday in the preaching, in the afternoon. They hear the text, well if these people can't be your friends, it means they're your enemies. If they're your enemies, they must be God's enemies, and if they're God's enemies, well what must we do with them?

That of course is not what all Muslims hold, but I mean one hears it. It's part of the dynamic of threat, fear, which seeps in as you asked right at the beginning, that seeps into the fabric of the society. And I wouldn't like to say because there's violence there, I wouldn't like to be giving the impression that this is a horrible place to live. I've lived there for 28 years, and I look forward to going back there. It's a place of blessing as well, it's a place of violence but it's a place of blessing.

As someone who has lived there for 28 years, he would seem a very credible voice to listen to.

Neo-neocon on Chavez

neo-neocon: A psychiatrist for Chavez:

An amusing post by neo-neocon on that Chavez speech in the UN.

New nuclear reactors, again

Popular Mechanics - The Next Atomic Age

Found via Pajama Media, this Popular Mechanics article talks about new nuclear reactor designs, including my favourite, the Pebble Bed.

How not to get ahead in broadcasting

CBC head quits after defecation, bestiality remarks

More detail from the Calgary Sun:

Fournier incorrectly claimed in a magazine article that men in Lebanon are permitted to have sex with animals "as long as they are female. Doing the same thing with male beasts can result in the death penalty."

The erroneous suggestion sparked outrage in Montreal's Lebanese community.

During an interview aired on a popular Radio-Canada television show last Sunday, Fournier sang the praises of a good "poop." He said the pleasure of a bowel movement is longer-lasting and more frequent than sex.

Weird parole decision

Secret crimes of sex-swap killer | NEWS.com.au

I'm not normally one to double guess sentencing or parole decisions based on media reporting. However, this case really makes you wonder about the risk the parole board is prepared to take, and well deserves public attention.

More about his/her case is here.

The Guardian loses the plot

Of course it's a left-ish paper, but even by its standards The Guardian has had a remarkable run this week on opinion pieces attacking the Pope for his recent speech.

Apart from Karen Armstrong, whose piece I discussed a few posts ago, there has been Madeleine Bunting saying this:

In his remarks last week, the Pope re-awoke the most entrenched and self-serving of western prejudices - that Muslims have a unique proclivity to violence - a claim that has no basis in history or in current world events, a fact that still eludes too many westerners.

Does she think the word "uniquely" let's her make this claim? If so, why do we have thousands of books on all the non-Muslim violence of recent history - the legacies of Mao and Stalin, the Holocaust and Pol Pot. (Not to mention the concern about North Korea at the moment.) I think the West has a pretty good grip on the idea that it doesn't require being a Muslim nation to have tyranny and violence.

However, there is one aspect of Muslim violent behaviour that is pretty unique at the moment, namely the default riot mode for perceived criticism or insult.

Along similar lines to Bunting was the piece by Jonathan Freedland, in which he notes:

...he [the Pope] should have known, given who he is, that it would have the most calamitous results.

That's not because Muslims are somehow, as their accusers have written, uniquely touchy.

Bah...

What makes me shudder about the Pope's Regensburg lecture is that he appears to join Osama bin Laden in this effort to cast the current conflict as a clash of civilizations. Complicatedly, and dense in footnotes, he is, at bottom, trying to establish the superiority of one faith over another. His argument is that reason is intrinsic to Christianity, yet merely a contingent part of Islam. ..

There can be no happy medium in matters of core belief: Muslims cannot meet Christians halfway on their belief that God spoke to Muhammad, just as Christians cannot compromise on Jesus's status as the son of God. Most religious leaders have long recognised that, and agreed to tiptoe politely around each other, offering a warm, soapy bath of rhetoric about "shared values" and "interfaith dialogue". Of course they have known that, if pushed, they would be obliged to say their own faiths are better than the others, but they have avoided doing so. Now this Pope has broken that compact - and who knows what havoc he has unleashed.

This is moral cowardice of a high order, and just rubbish.

The upside of this is that many readers comments at the Guardian are attacking these columns with some vigor.

The euthanasia debate, again

Legal safeguards can make euthanasia a legitimate option - Opinion

Peter Singer's pal Leslie Cannold, the pro-choice and pro euthanasia ethicist, has a pro euthanasia article in The Age today.

(By the way, I am a little cynical about any "ethicist" who is exclusively on one side or the other of the big moral "life and death" issues. This is not just a comment against Cannold; it also applies to Australian Nick Tonti-Fillipini, who can always be relied on to present the Catholic view of bioethics on any matter. If you approach ethics from entrenched philosophical positions, your ethical judgments are almost entirely predictable, and paying such a person to be a professional "ethicist" seems rather a waste of money unless he or she is going to come up with something surprising now and then.)

Anyway, Cannold uses this evidence from Oregon as support:

Data from Oregon suggests that the most frequently given reasons for choosing physician-assisted suicide by the approximately 30 people who die this way every year are "loss of autonomy" (87 per cent ), "loss of dignity" (80 per cent) and "loss of the ability to enjoy the activities that make life worth living" (84 per cent). This data, which suggests that mental rather than physical suffering is the main driver of decisions to die, undermines the assertion of anti-euthanasia forces that the effectiveness of modern-day palliative methods obviates the need for legal reform.

But this emphasis on mental suffering is surely a double edged sword, especially that last category "loss of the ability to enjoy the activities that make life worth living". Just which activities do we consider important enough for people to make valid decisions that they should kill themselves? In the case of Nancy Crick, it always seemed clear that she was wildly exaggerating how bad her quality of life was.

In another highly publicised case, Dr Nitschke had no major qualms about helping guide a healthy 79 year old to top herself, just because she was bored with life.

For a conservative, an emphasis on mental suffering being the main reason the people in Oregon wanted assistance to die is probably more of a reason to be against euthanasia, because such suffering would presumably in many cases be amenable to counseling and additional support. (No doubt many -or all - of them had physical suffering too, so I am not suggesting that their cases were as bad as Crick's.)

Just as no sensible person encourages a healthy friend with suicidal ideation to let their mental suffering guide them to action, it seems a dangerous path to say that something as malleable as loss of enjoyment of a certain activity should guide sick people to euthanasia.

All about the Shebaa Farms

TCS Daily - Down on the Farms

This is a good read about the background to the issue of who own the Shebaa Farms.

The article makes a good case that the issue is being manipulated by Syria and Hezbollah to justify the continued presence of Hezbollah in Lebanon. (And the UN recent security resolution hasn't helped at all.)