Bill Maher offers some constructive criticism to Democrats

March 17, 2018 • 3:30 pm

“The Democrats are to political courage as Velveeta is to cheese.”
—Bill Maher

In this segment of Bill Maher’s latest show, he calls out Democrats for their lack of courage.  To a large extent I agree with him. Americans are in favor of more gun control, want reasonable controls on immigration, and yet the Democrats are timorous on these issues. To listen to Democratic politicians, you’d almost think they favor completely open borders, something that’s insupportable.

And Democrats allow Republicans, and much of the country, to characterize Nancy Pelosi as a liability despite her remarkable effectiveness as both Speaker of the House and Minority Leader. It’s the Democrats’ fault that they haven’t defended Pelosi more vigorously, and, in truth, I don’t know why (I refuse to believe it’s because she’s a woman, for that would make me deeply ashamed of my party).

At any rate, does anybody really want to call Maher an “alt-righter” after a tirade like this?

My ducks

March 17, 2018 • 2:30 pm

I don’t think my new mallard hen is Honey, but she sure has a handsome boyfriend! I was afraid that my four-day absence would drive the ducks away, but, sure enough, they were in the shallow end of the pond this afternoon, waiting for their mealworms and corn (no, they won’t eat peas).  And they look as if they’re getting into better condition. I make sure to give the hen extra food as she may be incubating some eggs.

Here are the latest photos:

Isn’t he a handsome lad? His emerald-green head glistens in the sun.

And the adorable hen. I need names for both of them.

The happy couple. They seem to get along very well, sharing their food and not pecking each other:

I like this one, as it shows a vigorous shake:

Is religion “superstition”?

March 17, 2018 • 1:00 pm

The other day somebody out for blood accused me of being disrespectful to religion because I called it “superstition”. Presumably the person was thinking of “superstition” as those secular forms of belief, like carrying a rabbit’s foot or not stepping on cracks or not walking under ladders that are completely irrational but thought to have tangible effects on one’s life.

But that’s exactly what religion is! When you pray, or daven, or wash your feet before Islamic prayers, or eat a wafer at Mass, you’re performing actions that are thought to be salubrious, but they’re just as irrational as looking for a four-leaf clover for luck.  In fact, the Oxford English Dictionary—my go-to site for definitions—has this for the “religious” connotation of superstition:

And here’s the secular rabbit’s-foot definition:

Ingersoll, as you saw in the quote I gave this morning, also equated religion with superstition. And indeed it is, harsh as that may be to the ears of believers. Religions are irrational, unfounded, based on fear and ignorance, and full of “excessively credulous belief in and reverence for the supernatural.” Further, they are all false, so far as we can tell: at the very minimum only one can be true. Ergo, religion is superstition. And believers are “superstitionists”:

The reason people bridle at equating religion with superstition is not because the latter word is inaccurate, but because they still retain an unwarranted respect for faith.

QED

Social Justice Warrior would rather let someone die than donate her organs, because they might go to rich or “overeducated” people

March 17, 2018 • 12:00 pm

Well, I’ll be! I’ve never heard a believer, especially one concerned with social justice, be this dumb and this petulant. I’m referring to Kristel Clayville, who wrote a new piece at Religion Dispatches, “Why I’m not an organ donor“.  First, let’s establish that Clayville is indeed a Christian; her bio says this:

Kristel Clayville is a visiting assistant professor of religion at Eureka College and a fellow at the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at the University of Chicago. She is also ordained in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

The University of Chicago?  That’s my school, and she apparently got her Ph.D in the Divinity School here. And indeed, she is at the MacLean Center for Medical Ethics at the U of C. But her article is an embarrassment to herself, to my University, and to the faith she purports to hold. Her Eureka College biography also notes that Clayville is “an ordained minister in the Disciples of Christ tradition.” (Eureka College is a Christian school in Eureka, Illinois.)

So why isn’t Dr. Clayville an organ donor? In short, because she says the organ donation system is biased towards the wealthy, the well connected, and the educated. And the system is subjective. So she’d rather let people die than save someone’s life who might be in one of those groups.

Of course Clayville realizes that such a stand doesn’t look that good, so she defuses her opponents by going on the offensive

I anticipate some of you saying, “But I thought you were a good person. I thought you cared about people.” And of course you will say this with a perplexed look that suggests you don’t know how I could be so callous, or even worse: anti-science. I know this look well because I’ve been the recipient of it before, usually across a dinner table with my progressive, liberal, overeducated, friends (PLOFs) who suddenly wonder whether they’ve misjudged my character for years.

I’ll leave aside the snarky term “overeducated” (is it possible for someone who likes to learn to be “overeducated”?), and go to her argument, which hinges on “social justice”:

Being an organ donor doesn’t just potentially save someone’s life. You can focus on that aspect of it—and maybe you should—but there are significant social justice issues involved that aren’t apparent on the surface. Among them is distribution—or what the transplant community refers to as allocation. Most of us are aware that there’s an organ shortage, but then who gets a transplant and who doesn’t? And who decides?

. . . But these financial issues obscure a larger problem: to get an organ transplant in the US, you are subjected to medical and social review by a transplant team. This multidisciplinary team consists of surgeons, organ specialists, social workers, nurses, psychiatrists, hospital administrators, and sometimes a chaplain. The medical criteria for getting an organ can be thought of as objective, though also relative to the skills of the local transplant surgeons and the level of risk they’re willing to take. The social review by the team is highly subjective, even in the best scenarios. Since donated organs are a scarce resource, the goal is often to find the best host (recipient) for the organ so that it does not go to waste.

In that environment, organs tend to go to people who can have a full-time caregiver, has family who will help with care, doesn’t take personal risks, and has a medical history of doing what doctors tell them to do. All of these fuzzy criteria require that there is someone on the transplant team who recognizes a potential patient’s behavior as understandable and relatable. Ultimately, these criteria become ciphers for minority status and financial means. Can your spouse take months off of work to take care of you? Mine can’t. Can you afford to pay an in-home caregiver? I can’t.

So the telescopic story is one of free resources and the skills of highly-trained professionals (skills gained with tax-payer subsidies) helping the well-insured and financially well-off overcome diseases and extend their lives, while medically qualified candidates without financial and social means run out of options. From a social justice perspective, this story mirrors the story of the United States in general: most of the resources flow up to the haves rather than trickle down to have-nots.

According to an AP report, “Wealthy people are more likely to get on multiple waiting lists and score a transplant, and less likely to die while waiting for one, a new study finds.” Getting put on multiple transplant lists is not the only way that the haves can get ahead in the current system; they can also move to regions where the organ shortage is not as severe. Doing so can shave years off the waiting time.

Yes, I’m sure there are inequities in the system, and wealthier or savvier people may have a better chance of getting organs. But those who get donations aren’t all that way: I’ve seen enough poor and marginalized people on the news getting a lease on life through new organs to know that the poor do benefit from this system. Yes, it’s subjective, as Clayville says, but it has to be; after all, beyond the medical considerations you’re judging the value of a present and future life, and there’s no objective way to do that. But are these reasons to diss the whole system, one that involves other chaplains, social workers, psychiatrists, and so on?

Apparently so.  Because of these inequities, and the “subjectivity” aspect, Clayville will simply keep her own organs after she dies, thank you. (Perhaps she wants to meet Jesus with an intact liver.) But have a gander at her conclusion, which is about as selfish and mean-spirited as one can get. In short it says this: “Because the system isn’t perfect, I’d rather keep my organs and let people die.” In other words, she’s letting people die out of simple spite (my emphasis):

Should you be an organ donor? It’s not mine to say. Organ donation saves lives; it really does. And the professionals involved in organ transplantation are well aware of the social justice issues. Many are working on reforms. In the interim, you get to decide which story you want to be a character in: the microscopic version where you are an organ donor to a particular person in need, or the telescopic version where your organ becomes a resource in an economy that privileges those with financial means.

To return to AJ’s case, it seems that he and his father had been put on the back burner by the transplant team for social reasons. Though the organ wasn’t a scarce resource—it was donated to AJ specifically—their social situation wasn’t recognizable to the team as “normal.” AJ only received the transplant after a significant public outcry. Given that these are the fuzzy social criteria in play, until there’s a significantly revised system of review of transplant candidates I’m keeping my PLOF-y organs.

This is the epitome of social justice gone wrong: because the system isn’t perfect, Clayville prefers to subvert it by withholding potentially lifesaving organs. What kind of Christian is she? When she meets Jesus, will she explain, “Lord, I thought it was better to let someone die than to tolerate the injustices of organ donation”?

h/t: Diane G

Susan Jacoby’s biography of Ingersoll

March 17, 2018 • 10:30 am

On my train rides up to and back from Madison, I polished off Susan Jacoby’s 2013 short (211 small pages) book on Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-1899). Ingersoll was an author, freethinker, and perhaps America’s most spellbinding orator of the 19th century, despite the fact that he was absolutely godless and spent much of his writing and speaking criticizing religion.  Click on the screenshot to go to the Amazon page, where you’ll see it’s been rated highly by readers:

It’s a good book, concerned more with Ingersoll’s ideas than his life, and well worth reading to see a true antecedent of the “New Atheists”. As Jacoby says in her antepenultimate chapter, “A Letter to the ‘New’ Atheists”, the hallmarks of what I see as New Atheism—its love of and use of science in dispelling religion as well as its uncompromising and in-your-face godlessness and antitheism—were all present in Ingersoll’s writings and speeches. And yet despite his atheism, which denied him the possibility of any public or elective position despite his fierce intelligence and drive, he regularly sold out his lectures, so wonderful a speaker was he. Further, most of his audience, unlike those attending the talks of people like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, or me, weren’t nonbelievers: many religious people came to see Ingersoll because of the power of his rhetoric.

Ingersoll was impressive in many ways. He was apparently as close to a perfect human as one could get: a devoted husband and father, a faithful friend, and someone whom even his enemies couldn’t fault. His virtues extended to his views: he was an ardent opponent of slavery and any law or behavior that discriminated against blacks, a strong promoter of women’s rights—complete equality with men—and a great popularizer of Darwin’s work. (Jacoby considers him a better explainer of evolution to the average person than was Thomas Henry Huxley, for Ingersoll had no scientific training and so was able to gauge and address people’s ignorance.) Ingersoll constantly emphasized the Founders’ view of the First Amendment, fighting against the incursion of religions such as Catholicism into government. Finally, he was also a lover and supporter of the arts, especially fond of Shakespeare and—his one flaw, in my eyes—Walt Whitman.

Jacoby feels, rightly, that all of us heathens should be aware that a New Atheist existed long before the genre got its name, and tells us why in her “Letter” chapter. I’ll let you read that for yourself. Although Ingersoll’s reputation waned after his death, and few modern atheists know much about him, it’s salubrious to see a man of our stripe being “strident” (the adjective doesn’t really apply: he didn’t have a mean bone in his body) and changing minds well before the rise of Fundamentalism.

After reading that book, I wanted to go further into Ingersoll. For those who feel likewise, here’s some other material you might essay (screenshots take you to Amazon page)

Here’s a half-hour interview of Jacoby about her Ingersoll book (by Chris M**ney); click on screenshot:

Finally, near the end of his life Ingersoll visited the laboratory of his friend Thomas Edison and recorded seven short bits of oratory. At the site below (click) you can hear the three ones that remain. The quality is poor, but at least you can get an idea of his voice and his cadences. (Remember, Ingersoll spoke to large audiences without a microphone.)

I end with a photo of The Great Agnostic himself (Ingersoll said there was no difference between an agnostic and an atheist) as well as my very favorite quote from him—about the “compatibility” of science and religion. I often use this quote in my talks about faith versus science:

There is no harmony between religion and science. When science was a child, religion sought to strangle it in the cradle. Now that science has attained its youth, and superstition is in its dotage, the trembling, palsied wreck says to the athlete: “Let us be friends.” It reminds me of the bargain the cock wished to make with the horse: “Let us agree not to step on each other’s feet.”

Robert G. Ingersoll

Caturday felids: Cat-on-the-head guy; a sad book about cats and a dying woman, if cats could text

March 17, 2018 • 9:15 am

From the website “Texas, a Parisian Cat in America,” we have the story of a man named Charlie Parisi, who, as of 2014, had been walking the streets of New York City with his cat Charlie balanced on his head. Parisi lost his job, and figured that if he could train his cat to balance on his head, he might be able to ask people for dosh. It worked.

Mr. Perito said he was just another victim of the recession and increasing joblessness, though he also admitted to problems with the law and addiction. A Staten Island native, he said he worked for years fixing air-conditioning and heating systems, but recently lost his job. So he taught Nicholas the balancing act and proceeded to use the gimmick to balance his budget.

Mr. Perito said it was not the first time around with the old “lose the job, train the cat” trick. He has lost other jobs and trained other cats before, he said. Anyway, Nick is pretty cute, and the whole thing looks pretty amusing, so Mr. Perito makes out pretty well.

Charlie is a fine-looking tuxedo tom, and I hope he gets well fed and good vet care. After all, the cat is the one who makes the money!

Here are two videos of Charlie and his staff, which attest to the great balance of cats:

x

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Michael Korda, a well known writer and editor in New York, wrote a book about the death of his wife from brain cancer, and how his cats helped his wife as she neared the end. This is described in a heartbreaking six-minute NPR segment about Korda’s book, Catnip: A Love Story.

An excerpt:

Michael Korda’s new book Catnip: A Love Story is drawn from scribbles that amused in a time of anxiety. Korda’s wife, Margaret, was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. She went riding most days of what turned out to be the last year of her life, and each day, he sketched cartoons of their cats on the back of old manuscripts in the tackroom.

Cats cooking and dining, cats in cowboy hats, cats playing musical instruments and dancing the cat-can. Margaret shared photos of those cartoons, drawn in love and intended to distract and delight. “I should make it clear … that I am fond of cats, but I’m not a natural cat person,” Korda says. The cats came via Margaret, who always had at least one. “And I’ve gotten used to cats, and even been very fond of some of the cats, though they were not always fond of me. And so when it came time to find something that would amuse her, I decided to do little cat cartoons.”

Margaret, once the first two brain surgeries had failed to halt the advance of the brain tumor, elected, very strongly desired to die at home in her own bedroom, in her own bed. And I made that possible, supported that decision. And the cats knew she was dying. And they absolutely were supportive of that, 24/7, there would always be one of them lying next to her in the bed, even though most of them resented the presence of a 24/7 nurse. But one of them always stayed close, to the very end. And I was very impressed by that, because you don’t necessarily always think of cats as being warmly sympathetic, and cats do tend to be aloof in character. But Margaret’s were not. And I wanted to somehow convey in this short book the feeling that was going on between the cats and Margaret.

Two drawings (there are five at the site):

The book:

 

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This is a wonderful piece of humor called “If cats could text”:

 

 

h/t: Frank, Taskin, Orli

Readers’ wildlife photos

March 17, 2018 • 7:45 am

Reader Tom Carrolan sent some cool raptor photos, which constitute part I of a two-part raptor series. As Tom notes, “All are my images or are from my DigiBanding Project or I have longstanding permission to use them.”   His IDs and other notes are indented:

The Northern Goshawk (Accipiter gentilis) is easily the most misidentified raptor in North America. I get send images of supposed Goshawks in the Fall and Winter, that are not. eBird has pages of info on why your accipiter is likely not a Gos. Most are Cooper’s Hawks.

This is my standard image for aiding in the ID of juvenile accipiters. From left to right: Sharp-shinned Hawk (Accipiter striatus), Cooper’s Hawk (Accipiter cooperii), Northern Goshawk. The breast streaking is the best feature, not the size or tail barring, and certainly not the presence of a supercilium (eye stripe):
Here are some Goshawks. First, juvenile Goshawks in flight. All are heavily streaked.
Here’s a subadult female in flight. She has a washed out gray eyeline and a less than blood-red iris. . . typical of this plumage.
Here’s a juvenile Gos, in hand at a banding station north of Rochester NY. This and the following in hand images are from my DigiBanding project. In the early 90s, as digital SLR cameras were coming down in price, several bird photographers posted ways to make sure you got an image that was “color accurate”. These were involved. I started my project by giving three point-and-shoot digital cameras to the hawk banding station at Braddock Bay, north of Rochester, where one of my students was their first professional hawk counter and then a lead bander. The photo numbers was placed on the banding form, along with all the measurements and the band number. The project requirement was that each bird be imaged front and back with one wing held open. I have several hundred images from this. In addition, as this was digital, any other shots could be taken, like this goshawk head shot.
Here are three images of a subadult female Goshawk in hand showing typical incomplete molt. Here we first see the adult iris color: blood red. Then we see a well-marked breast pattern, telling us it’s a female.
This open wing shot shows soft gray adult flight feathers with lots of brown, or not adult feathers.
From behind we see the non-adult brown feathers that will likely finish changing over to the full gray plumage later this year. These are all spring images. The tail contains all non-adult feathers that will also be replaced. It is common to see this plumage patterning in females, where a lot of feathers still have to be replaced at this age.

All three North American accipiter species can have strong eyelines or superciliums. In the Goshawk the white explodes behind the eye, making it the defining feature for this species.