A depressing report in today’s Guardian from Natasha Walter about the position of women in today’s Afghanistan. It would seem that the euphoria felt after the fall of the Taliban is turning out to be a false dawn. The Taliban are regrouping and, along with that, the lives of women who dare to seek out education are at risk.
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Getting The Message Across
I’m currently watching the series of videos made of the Beyond Belief conference. Session 3 had a rather nervous and hesitant presentation by Professor Joan Roughgarden, which caused something very interesting to happen. Richard Dawkins was asked to respond off the cuff to what he had just heard. He did so in his usual "take-no-prisoners" approach, and the body language of Roughgarden displayed very clearly her level of discomfort, and I would infer, her feeling of being under personal attack from Dawkins.Later in the session, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson comments on his own reactions to Dawkins’ speech. Tyson was seated at the back of the room, and he was also able to observe the reactions of the audience. Tyson observes that Dawkins’ "commentary has a sharpness of teeth" that he did not expect and "I felt you more than I heard you". I have to say that I had a similar reaction. He makes the very good point that Dawkins is "Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford, not the Professor for Delivering Truth to the Public." I think Tyson is on to something here, though it pains me to say it. I sometimes think that our American friends go too far towards "respecting sensitivities", and spend endless hours treading on imagined eggshells, but I do agree with Tyson that the manner of saying can help enormously with the reception of the message. I just feel more aligned with Dawkins at the "blunt speaking" end of the spectrum.Tyson’s comments have been extracted from the complete video of session 3, and are shown in a shortened video here. Dawkins, to his credit, accepts the rebuke, but can’t resist an impish anecdote to show that he is not the worst practitioner of the take-no-prisoners approach.This is the first time that I’ve seen Tyson, and I must say I am impressed at his capabilities as a communicator. Another attendee refers to him as "Father Neil", and there is something about his manner of delivery that reminds me of a good old-fashioned preacher, albeit one without the fire and brimstone, but filled with the ability to extol the wonders of a most marvellous universe.2 responses to “Getting The Message Across”
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Maybe this is why I don’t much like Dawkins. Nail on the head. I’m all for hearing and listening to the views and experiences of others, but I can’t stand it when people (of any view or opinion) hammer others with ‘I’m right, no question, you’re wrong and what’s worse, you’re stupid kind of approach. It also makes me suspicious when there is a level of ‘violence’ in opposition – why? He also never seems to allow the slightest possibility that the great Dawkins may either be in any way wrong, or in any way just lacking the experience or understanding of others and therefore, its their error, not his. I think you’ve nailed why I don’t take to the man, views irrelevant.
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Gelert, I think you are responding to Dawkins’ manner, rather than what he’s actually saying. I honestly think he is a most rational man, and the baldness with which he often states things is not so much as "I’m right, you’re wrong" as "here are the facts, take them or leave them". That’s why I think Tyson’s remark was spot-on. Dawkins is also a good scientist, in the sense that if you do show him evidence to refute his hypotheses, he will take it on board, unlike many (most?) on the other side of the debate. But I accept that it doesn’t seem to come across that way.
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Loony Zunes
Thus far, I’ve successfully avoided the siren song of the Apple iPod and not bought one. And I fully intend to keep it that way. Now, of course, Microsoft has arrived in the same market space with its Zune device. I was asked by a friend recently, knowing of my love/hate relationship with all things Microsoft, whether I would be buying myself a Zune. My instant gut reaction was to classify it in the "hate" camp. Now I’m pleased to see that I will be able to quote evidence to back up my initial intuition, courtesy of Andy Ihnatko’s review of the Zune in the Chicago Sun-Times.Leave a comment
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The Periodic Table
I’ve placed this under the category of Art, since it goes a step beyond mere Science.Leave a comment
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Big Brother
It transpires that here, in the Netherlands, Big Brother is not only watching you, but listening to you as well.Leave a comment
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Philosophical Musings
David Byrne places his entry for the 20th November in his Journal into the "Philosophical Musings" category. It’s an interesting read, ranging from climate change, the economy of China, to the wellsprings of religion. I do quibble with one thing he writes, however. He claims that Dawkins, Dennett and Harris "deny that the propensity for people to believe (i.e. have religious faith) is innate". He quotes the latest books by the trio as evidence of this denial.That’s odd, because Dawkins’ "The God Delusion" has a whole chapter called The Roots of Religion, with over 40 pages exploring various hypotheses as to why religion may be innate. And while I haven’t read either of the latest books by Harris and Dennett, the latter has certainly explored hypotheses for the causes of religion – see the section: The Diversity of Darwinian Explanations in his book Freedom Evolves, for example. Methinks David Byrne is the one in denial here.Leave a comment
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Retired Husband Syndrome
Interesting piece by a BBC reporter about Retired Husband Syndrome – a condition seen in some Japanese wives. I can well believe that having a retired husband suddenly cluttering up your personal space can be unnerving, and given certain aspects of Japanese society, it can amplify into a syndrome. Thus far, Martin and I have managed to avoid it. Not living in a two-room flat probably helps.2 responses to “Retired Husband Syndrome”
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This I can well believe. But you’re much too interesting to make anyone sick mate.
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From what I have read regarding Japan’s urban planning policy and its
history of building ’60s New Towns’, that catered for a middle class,
baby boomer generation who desired for suburban 3room or 2room LDK
detached and semi detached housing has actually been fundamental in
creating a psychological and geographical divide between marital
couples. The marital couple, through the distance created as a
consequence of the sprawl of the suburban New Towns were left to lead
almost entirely separate lives from each other as the man spent most of
his time commuting and working late and the women found means of
supplementing and replacing his absence through the social networks of
other desperate housewives in the sprawl of the suburbs. Cultural
pressures which are anti-divorce and the expectations of the role of
the wife probably aided the impact of the retiring husband, but
non-the-less a two bedroom flat may have been more advisable in
maintaining a stronger social integration. Just my thought.
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Leonids Video
As I mentioned, my attempt to watch the Leonid meteor shower was foiled by the weather. However, some people got lucky, and there’s even a video to prove it.Leave a comment
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Little Recipes for Little Cooks
And here’s another book – this time from the 1930s. Funny how the assumption is that only girls want to cook…2 responses to “Little Recipes for Little Cooks”
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,, yess i agree,,and since i work in a nursery,, we still trying to change that view ,,believe it or not ,,parents still not keen on boys playing with the dolls or girls with the trains ,,,ohh,,well it will change one day hopefully,,,,nice site,,xdee
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Denise, glad to hear that you are giving the children the opportunity to explore their capabilities. Cheers!
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Things Girls Like To Do
That’s the title of a book published in 1917. As you can imagine, the things are limited to housekeeping and needlecraft. The book is published as part of the Uplift Vocational Series. And as expected, the boys get the better part of the deal; their book is called Things Boys Like To Make, and is in two parts: Carpentry and Woodwork, and Electricity and its Everyday Uses.Leave a comment
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The Revelations of a Rat Catcher
Ike Matthews was a professional rat catcher who worked in Manchester, and who published a book distilling his 25 years in the trade in 1898. It’s become available online and is an interesting read. I probably need to pick up a few tips in order to keep a proper eye on the outhouses, although I’m relieved to say that so far we just seem to have the occasional mouse appear in the traps.I note that Ike recommends keeping ferrets. I do hope it won’t come to that. I don’t want to end my days being the crazy old man in the pub who puts ferrets down his trousers as his party piece.2 responses to “The Revelations of a Rat Catcher”
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I had a go at racing ferrets at Alnwick castle once. Really nice little beasts.
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Racing ferrets? Clearly you have hidden sides to your character, Gelert.
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World AIDS Day
Just six days to go to this year’s World AIDS Day on the 1st December. The theme for this year is accountability. The EU Commission has also launched its AIDS – Remember me? web site – a somewhat odd little web site aimed at yoof.Leave a comment
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Death In The Woods
I’ve mentioned before that at this time of the year I regularly see crops of mushrooms in the woods. Today’s Guardian has an article by Giorgio Locatelli extolling the delights of gathering, cooking and eating wild mushrooms. Trouble is, I don’t feel confident enough to be able to identify them, even though I have illustrated guides on my bookshelves. Knowing my luck, I’d probably pick poisonous varieties. I mean, when it’s something like the Fly Agaric mushroom (see below), then it’s easy to identify and obvious what it is. But how about Amanita virosa – also known as the Destroying Angel? It looks so innocent. Richard Eshelman thought he knew his mushrooms. Read about what happened to him here.
The Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria) mushroom – poisonous and obvious2 responses to “Death In The Woods”
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yea, amanita muscaria is not poisonous. It’s an ethnogen. It’s psychoactive and have been used in that sense since ancient times.http://www.erowid.org/plants/amanitas/amanitas.shtml
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Yeah, fine, it’s psychoactive, but also unpredictable in its effects. I’ll continue to think of it as something to be approached with extreme caution, thanks very much. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanita_muscaria
A glass of wine, a log fire, good friends and good conversation. That’s enough for me.
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How To Avoid Nightmares
Here’s the FurReal Friends Butterscotch Pony for every little girl who’s ever dreamed of having her very own animatronic pony. But doting parents would be well advised to heed the warning:Adults take note: Pony comes unassembled in box with head detatched. You may wish to not open the box around your children if they may be frightened by a box with a decapitated horse inside.Yes, I can see how that might not go down well with most little girls.(hat tip to Improbable Research)Leave a comment
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Our Daily Bread
Pruned draws attention to a film by the German director Nikolaus Geyrhalter: Our Daily Bread. It looks interesting, but will probably put you off your food.Leave a comment
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Cute Lies
There’s a buzz in the blogsphere at the moment about a forthcoming documentary that purports to show animal foetuses developing in the womb. There are some cute pictures floating around, which seem to have been untimely ripped from Cute Overload. Er, but hang on, what’s this "representations using ‘computer graphics’" all about? You mean that real life is not quite as cute and in such sharp focus? Real life is in fact messy and slimy and murky in the womb? And the womb isn’t the big space that all the cute foetuses have such a grand time swimming about in? Yes, Virginia, real life isn’t quite like that. Get used to it. It has its own attractions, but lying about it doesn’t improve it.Leave a comment
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Electoral Deadlock
So, the Dutch Electorate have spoken. Trouble is, they have not spoken with a clear voice. No one party has control, so we’re going to have yet another coalition government. And the ingredients are even more like chalk and cheese, or sodium and water.I’m pleased that the Socialist Party has made substantial gains (added a further 17 seats); dismayed that the far right party of Geert Wilders has won 9 seats, and rolled my eyes that, only in the Netherlands, the party for animal rights has won two seats.I watched the "results debate" on Dutch TV – the leaders of the parties talked about the results together at midnight last night. Wilders was audacious enough to propose that it would be a good idea for Balkende to include his members in the government. You could feel the waves of distaste rolling from everyone else seated around the table. Mark Rutte, leader of the VVD (liberal) party, couldn’t contain himself, and expressed what I’m sure everyone else was thinking. It was, I thought, interesting that Balkende himself kept his counsel, but was happy for Rutte to leap in and say what needed to be said.Leave a comment
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Beyond Belief
There’s been an interesting conference that took place earlier this month: Beyond Belief: Science, Religion, Reason and Survival. There’s a number of reports appearing on the web. This one from the New York Times and this one from the New Scientist. Best of all, the videos from the sessions are becoming available. I look forward to watching them through the miracles of the Internet and computers.While there could have been more believers than atheists at the conference, it appears as though the discussions were, shall we say, spirited, with Richard Dawkins coming in for the usual criticism over his "take no prisoners" approach. Me? I’m with Professor Dawkins. Call a spade a spade, I say.Leave a comment
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The Ten Worst Science Books
And following on from the editors of Discover magazine listing their 25 greatest Science books, John Horgan, a blogger with Discover, has an entry in his Horganism blog for the top ten worst Science books. It’s actually quite tricky to come up with a list that includes only genuine science books. There are thousands of books that claim to be about genuine science, but are simply pseudoscience. Anything by Deepak Chopra, for a start. So Horgan’s list is quite interesting.I can readily believe that some of his nominated books are pretty dire. Anything that I’ve read by Ray Kurzweil, for example, usually has my eyes rolling by the end of the second paragraph. And I suspect I would agree with Horgan about the Tao of Physics – I have another of Capra’s books that had my eyebrows raising, and not in a good way. But I’ll reserve judgement on the nomination of Brian Greene’s The Elegant Universe. Clearly, Horgan thinks it’s a load of tosh, and it is quite true that string theory pushes one’s sense of credibility to the limits. I quite liked the book. Greene explains things well. What we need, of course, is some experimental evidence to show that the theories of Greene and his fellow string theorists have some validity. We may get some of that once the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva becomes operational next year.Leave a comment
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CAPTCHAs
CAPTCHAs are those little checks that you see on web pages where you are asked to recognise the word shown in a graphic image and type it in.Mindhacks has a fascinating blog entry about them – including how spammers are using human weakness for sex into breaking the protection of CAPTCHAs.Equally fascinating is the update to the entry pointing to a Google video of Luis von Ahn talking about them. But I note the irony that the human responsible for captioning the talk made a transcription error over von Ahn’s name…Leave a comment
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