Geoff Nunberg writes about the phenomenon seen in many extrapolations of technological change: vast strides forward in technology with apparently zero movement in sociological change. This effect is seen so often that Alex Pang makes the case for naming it the Nunberg Error. I’ll support that. Geoff Nunberg also likes the idea, and points to another pleasing example of the eponymous error.
Category: Society
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Scary Stuff
Via The Proper Study of Mankind, I came across the trailer to a new documentary film: Jesus Camp. Very scary stuff – all the more so because this is real, not fiction. PSOM’s comment on the film is worth reading too. Doubtless, halfway around the world is the mirror image of Jesus Camp: Allah Camp, equally scary, equally stoking the fires of human conflict. -
Two Data Points
The first is Johann Hari’s column on Shazia Mirza (a Muslim woman stand-up comic), and by extension, the unattractive face of Islamic fundamentalists.The second is Muhajababes, a book by Allegra Stratton, which illustrates the multiple facets of Islamic youth.Which is true? Why, they both are. That’s the panoply of humanity: good, bad, wacked and sane… -
Only Connect
Houtlust has a link to an interesting Ad campaign in Germany. Martin worked with mentally handicapped children and adults for years. He knew how to behave with them. I did my best, but I think I tried too hard at times. Sometimes I should just go with the flow… -
The Commitment To Development Index
Ethan Zuckerman, over at the WorldChanging blog, draws our attention to the annual report from the Center for Global Development on how well countries commit to international development and global aid. It’s worth reading his take on the results. The overall leader, when measured against the various dimensions, is the Netherlands. However, as he points out, while it leads in many measures, it is only average in the measure of Migration (The movement of people from poor to rich countries provides unskilled immigrants with jobs, income and knowledge. This increases the flow of money sent home by migrants abroad and the transfer of skills when the migrants return). Worse still, its score on this measure has been falling rapidly over the past three years. Methinks I detect the baleful influence of the lovely Rita Verdonk at work here. -
Positive Blasphemy
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The Definition Of Child Abuse
OK, so this is fourth hand; me quoting a journalist quoting a Microsoft manager who quoted a "Norwegian psychologist" as saying:“taking a mobile phone away from a teenage girl is the same as child abuse.”Um, hello, what planet of hyperbole is this person from? I feel my inner Victor Meldrew struggling to let rip. However, let me treat it with the disdain that it deserves and turn to the broader point that the Microsoft manager, Anne Kriah, was making. And that was that the upcoming generation of jobseekers expect, as of right, to have internet access at their place of work. If their prospective employer doesn’t offer this, then in her words:“These kids are saying: forget it! I don’t want to work with you. I don’t want to work at a place where I can’t be freely online during the day.”
I would say, let’s define the word "freely" pretty carefully. If I am at work and I have access to the internet in order to do my job effectively, then fine. But if I am simply surfing the net (or spending hours on the phone chatting with friends) instead of doing my job, then I am hardly fulfilling my side of the bargain with my employer. -
Twisty Faster – I’ll Have Some Of That
My favourite spinster aunt shows why she is the bee’s knees of lucid thinking. Nike and fashion – two words guaranteed to make me foam at the mouth. -
Terror Has No Religion
Zeid Nasser, over at Ad Blog Arabia, draws our attention to a new Ad campaign targeting Iraq. The television commercial is pretty powerful stuff, but I really wonder how effective it will be at influencing those who commit the violence. Via the blog, I was led to another blog: Houtlust – a blog devoted to non-profit advertising and social campaigns. My eye was immediately caught by this entry pointing to confrontational advertising protesting against the act of stoning to death. Also very powerful. -
Paranoia Is The New Reality
Yet another example of the current wave of paranoia sweeping through airline travel. Note how, even once the cause has been shown to be totally innocent, "the process" must be followed at all costs.(hat tip to Bruce Schneier) -
Will Everyone Just Calm Down?
Bruce Schneier says it all really. Of course, since he wrote that we’ve had the incident here in The Netherlands where 12 people have been arrested after an aircraft returned to Schiphol. Doubtless that will turn out to be utter nonsense as well.Update: Yep, it was utter nonsense… -
Mothers – Aren’t They Wonderful?
Most men, I feel sure, are slightly in awe of their mothers, and wouldn’t want to embarrass them in any shape or form. That, I’m sure is what went through the mind of Madin Azad Amin when he was stopped by airline security. Unfortunately he failed to engage his brain with his mouth when he replied to their question about what was in his luggage. -
Two Data Points
The first data point: today is the first Dutch Naturalisation Day for "new" citizens. So low key that I totally didn’t realise that it was going on until I read this story on the Radio Netherlands web site. And of course, the lovely Rita is milking it for all she’s worth. This story in the NRC has a nice picture that sums up most people’s feelings about it all.Which brings me to the second data point, also on the Radio Netherlands web site, the fact that between 20 and 30 women each year visiting Morocco from the Netherlands are abandoned there by their husbands or fathers. And Rita features yet again. She met with some of these women when she visited Morocco in June 2005, and promised to take some action. But of course, Rita Verdonk, with her "hot head and cold heart" (the words of Amsterdam’s Mayor, Job Cohen) has done sod-all for them. Why am I not surprised? -
Stripperless Funerals
Apparently, the authorities in the Chinese province of Jiangsu have banned the use of strippers at funerals. Killjoys. I always think that funerals should have an element of celebration, and not be too po-faced. -
Irrational Fear, Again
Lionel Shriver, writing in today’s Guardian, has a good article on the irrational fear of terrorists. It’s a companion piece to the article by Jonah Lehrer that I mentioned earlier this month. Ms. Shriver also weaves in two other strands of the story that I think are valid. First, as she says, all the banging on about terror by Bush, Blair and the media simply drives up the level of irrational fear in the population at large. And second, that the psychological profile of a typical suicide bomber is probably very similar to how she describes them:"They suffer from equal parts self-pity and grandiosity. They have chips on their shoulders. They feel underestimated and nourish a private sense of superiority. They glorify their own view of the world, which they fantasise about shoving down everyone else’s throat. They covet celebrity, and even the posthumous kind will do. They’re actually very imitative, and suggestible, but they think of themselves as exceptional, as special, as elect. It’s a type. It’s not just an Islamic type. You find it in every ethnicity, all over the world".And, I would add, they are usually male. The female of the species seems to be slightly more balanced, although there is probably little to choose between the Tricoteuses and the serried ranks of women clad in black burqas urging on their menfolk -
All Boys Together
Ophelia puts her finger on it. There is something ineffably mad, sad and bizarre about groups of men bonding under some misguided belief that what they are doing is righteous and holy. It is, as she says, stupid guy stuff. Ptuii. -
Reverse-Engineering Religion
Who designed the cow? That’s the question that Daniel Dennett posed when he began his address to the audience at this year’s TED conference. He uses it to examine the memes of religion. It’s worth watching and pondering. I was pleased to see that the lancet fluke manipulating the ant made an appearance.
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Spot-On, Marina!
Marina Hyde, in this piece for the Guardian’s Comment is Free, muses about the reports that terrorists have not only been training in far-off Pakistan, but also on Beatrix Potter’s doorstep, in England’s Lake District.
I share her view that really, there is something risible about these narcissistic losers bonding in the daffodils on the shores of Lake Windermere. But her point is absolutely to the point:
It does not belittle murder to admit that that murder is being planned by a bunch of intense, lost, silly boys. But it should absolutely affect our response. Is it truly worthy of us to dismantle long-cherished legal freedoms for this lot?
Absolutely not, is of course my reaction. And I totally agree with her when she writes:
This should not for a moment suggest that the danger from such people is not real. But being unable to laugh at it is a danger itself. It implies a critical lack of self-belief, suggesting virtues and values to be so tenuous that they can be shaken by Mittyish socio- or psychopaths, when the reality is that we will never be able to fully protect ourselves against some kinds of ingenuity.
Er, Tony, are you listening?
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Granny Gets a Vibrator
May I just draw your attention to a blog: Granny Gets A Vibrator. It’s written by a woman who is by no means a spring chicken or in the best of health, but who is seizing life by the throat and shaking it heartily. You go, girl!I can’t recall now whose blog I read with the pointer to granny, but thank you, whoever you were. -
Terrorism and Irrational Fear
Jonah Lehrer, over at The Frontal Cortex, makes some interesting points about people’s reaction to terrorism. We do seem to be irrationally afraid of it (and this irrational fear is of course well exploited by terrorists themselves). Statistically, as he points out, the numbers of people killed in terrorist acts in a year is not much more than the number of Amercians who accidentally drown in their bathtubs each year, and yet there is no Department of Bathtub Security.One person who comments on the piece writes that the difference is that in one case there is a human agency (the terrorists) actively working to kill people, while in the other, the causes of death (car crashes, bathtub drownings) are pure chance and random events. But as Jonah retorts, while the basis of the fear may be valid – terrorists do blow up trains and planes – the fear itself remains irrational, simply because it is so very unlikely to happen to you (I am talking about a "you" who lives in a capital city in the West, of course – statistically speaking, a "you" living in Baghdad is much more likely to suffer a terrorist act).I think he’s right, we do behave irrationally over the risks – and this is a fact exploited not only by the terrorists, but by the authorities who seem to be more intent on amplifying the fear than damping it down. I really do feel that we are beginning to live in the world of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil.
Geoff Coupe's Blog 