Wednesday: Hili dialogue

July 26, 2023 • 6:45 am

Good morning on a hump day (কুঁজ দিন in Bengali), Wednesday, July 26, 2023, and National Bagelfest. If you don’t live in Montreal, good luck in getting the real thing:

The real thing, dense, chewy, cooked over a wood fire, and boiled with a bit of honey (with schmear):

It’s also Aunts and Uncles Day, National Coffee Milkshake Day, World Tofu Day, and Esperanto Day, celebrating ” the publication of Unua Libro, the first book in the Esperanto language, by the language’s creator, L. L. Zamenhof on this day in 1887. As Wikipedia notes, “Esperanto was created in the late 1870s and early 1880s by L. L. Zamenhof, a Polish-Jewish ophthalmologist from Białystok, then part of the Russian Empire, but now part of Poland.”  I tried to learn it when I was a kid, but gave up quickly, and I know nobody who speaks it now.  But it still has official uses, for example by the Chinese government.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the July 26 Wikipedia page.

Reader Rick writes in saying that it’s George Bernard Shaw’s birthday, and sends a quote:

I have never thought much of the courage of a lion tamer. Inside the cage he is at least safe from other men. There is not much harm in a lion. He has no ideals, no religion, no politics, no chivalry, no gentility; in short, no reason for destroying anything that he does not want to eat.

-George Bernard Shaw, writer, Nobel laureate (26 Jul 1856-1950)

Da Nooz:

*Israel is still recovering from the legislature’s passage of a law that weakens the power of the nation’s Supreme Court, and politicians are plotting their next move.

After a night of furious mass protests, Israelis on Tuesday confronted a divided nation, some celebrating and some seething over the passage of a highly contentious law that limits the Supreme Court’s ability to check governmental power.

Quiet generally prevailed across the country, as supporters and opponents of the law — the first step in a broader effort by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ultraconservative government to curb judges’ influence — considered their next moves in a political standoff that could take weeks or months to play out.

Even as most demonstrators who had camped outside Parliament left after an eviction order, leaders of the protest movement, which has held mass rallies for 29 consecutive weeks, have vowed to fight on. Thousands of doctors scaled back medical operations in much of the country on Tuesday, hundreds of high-tech industry leaders said they’re considering moving their businesses abroad and the country’s biggest union said it was still considering a general strike.

How the deeper political crisis might be resolved remains unclear. Opposition activists said they had already asked Israel’s Supreme Court to review the law limiting its powers. A decision could take months, but the case would set up a crisis among the branches of the Israeli government.

And the doctors are on strike, too, which seems very unfortunate as the issue is a political, not a medical one:

The Israeli Medical Association, which represents 97 percent of Israel’s doctors, declared a strike in much of the country for Tuesday, saying its members outside Jerusalem, the capital, would handle only emergencies and critical care needs.

Israelis in the military have threatened to strike, though so far few have done so.

More than 11,000 Israelis in the military reserve said last week they’d resign if the government’s judicial overhaul went ahead. But now that the law has been passed, military officials and experts say it will take time to test the sincerity of those warnings.

The military says that the vast majority of those who participated in the joint declarations last week have yet to either send in their resignations or formally turn down direct call-ups. Since most reservists only get called up a few times a year, it may be weeks or months before significant numbers are forced to follow through with their threats.

“It’s still too early to say,” said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, an Israeli military spokesman. “People still seem to be sleeping on the decision.”

In the meantime, the military is trying to persuade the relatively few who have already withdrawn to change their minds, Colonel Hecht said. “We’re saying to them: ‘We need you, only together can we defend this house,’” Colonel Hecht said.

If you were an Arab state bent on eliminating Israel, you’d now be thinking about invading. But somehow I can’t imagine Israeli reservists refusing to defend their country.

*A federal judge has overturned Biden’s new immigration policy, which was aimed at restricting immigration at the southern border by regularizing the way immigrants applied for admission. This seems to be a blow to Biden but a boon to “progressive” Republicans:

A federal judge struck down on Tuesday a stringent new asylum policy that officials have called crucial to managing the southern border, dealing a blow to the Biden administration’s strategy after illegal crossings by migrants declined sharply in the last few months.

The rule, which has been in effect since May 12, disqualifies most people from applying for asylum if they have crossed into the United States without either securing an appointment at an official port of entry or proving that they sought legal protection in another country along the way.

Immigrant advocacy groups who sued the administration said that the policy violated U.S. law and heightened migrants’ vulnerability to extortion and violence during protracted waits in Mexican border towns. They also argued that it mimicked a Trump administration rule to restrict asylum that was blocked in 2019 by the same judge, Jon S. Tigar of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.

Judge Tigar stayed his order for 14 days, agreeing to a request by the Biden administration to give it time to appeal.

. . . A migrant surge could open up President Biden to attacks from Republicans, as campaigning gets underway for the presidential election next year. This policy, in particular, did not diverge greatly from the one introduced by President Donald J. Trump, according to legal experts.

. . . Even so, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit could put Judge Tigar’s ruling against the policy on hold while the government appeals, and the case could ultimately reach the Supreme Court.

Once again, I fault Congress for failing to pass sensible immigration legislation; there seems to be no will, especially among Democrats, to do so. And even that legislation might have to be adjudicated by the Supreme Court.

*This is past history by now, but the news has just been reported. According to the Washington Post, when  Yevgeniy Prigozhin, head of the mercenary Wagner Group, started his mutiny and March on Moscow, Putin was paralyzed with indecision, a distinctly un-Putinlike behavior.

When Yevgeniy Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group, launched his attempted mutiny on the morning of June 24, Vladimir Putin was paralyzed and unable to act decisively, according to Ukrainian and other security officials in Europe. No orders were issued for most of the day, the officials said.

The Russian president had been warned by the Russian security services at least two or three days ahead of time that Prigozhin was preparing a possible rebellion, according to intelligence assessments shared with The Washington Post. Steps were taken to boost security at several strategic facilities, including the Kremlin, where staffing in the presidential guard was increased and more weapons were handed out, but otherwise no actions were taken, these officials said.

“Putin had time to take the decision to liquidate [the rebellion] and arrest the organizers” said one of the European security officials, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence. “Then when it began to happen, there was paralysis on all levels … There was absolute dismay and confusion. For a long time, they did not know how to react.”

This account of the standoff, corroborated by officials in Western governments, provides the most detailed look at the paralysis and disarray inside the Kremlin during the first hours of the severest challenge to Putin’s 23-year presidency. It is consistent with public comments by CIA Director William J. Burns last week that for much of the 36 hours of the mutiny Russian security services, the military and decision-makers “appeared to be adrift.”

It also appears to expose Putin’s fear of directly countering a renegade warlord who’d developed support within Russia’s security establishment over a decade. Prigozhin had become an integral part of the Kremlin global operations by running troll farms disseminating disinformation in the United States and paramilitary operations in the Middle East and Africa, before officially taking a vanguard position in Russia’s war against Ukraine.

As the local authorities didn’t get any information from the Kremlin, they assumed the Wagner March was okay with Putin, and let Prigozhin’s band march on.  Not good leadership. However, the Post adds that it also speaks as well to widespread dissatisfaction within Russian forces with Putin:

The disarray in the Kremlin also reflects a deepening divide inside Russia’s security and military establishment over the conduct of the war in Ukraine, with many including in the upper reaches of the security services and military supporting Prigozhin’s drive to oust Russia’s top military leadership, the European security officials said.

Putin appears to have righted himself, but the dissatisfaction within the Russian military and security services is heartening to supporters of Ukraine—unless those people are even bigger aggressors than Putin.

*From the Heterodox Academy comes a short essay by David Sacks, a Stanford Law School student, “How universities should consider diversity after SSFA” (the court decision in “Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. vs. President and Fellows of Harvard College“)

Diversity-related values, such as promoting a diverse academy or ensuring equality of opportunity, are laudable. In many ways, Justice Powell’s view recommends itself to those of us who embrace the Heterodox Academy’s values of viewpoint diversity and academic freedom. However, I see two problems with Powell’s approach: The Court is right about Affirmative Action’s unconstitutionality, and relatedly, it is functionally the wrong approach for promoting diversity. . .

An emphasis on diversity of experience better captures the values Justice Powell aimed to capture in Bakke — and it better accords with HxA’s values too. Diversity of experience not only can prepare students for a university’s academic rigor — it makes a more interesting student body, promoting viewpoint diversity. The university exists primarily to encourage students’ intellectual and spiritual growth, and to promote thoughtful, novel research.

Thus, there’s nothing wrong with prioritizing diversity in admissions — a student body with the widest variety of interests, perspectives, abilities, and worldviews will create a richer educational environment inside and outside the classroom. But doing so based on race misses the point. Eliminating this crude proxy may create more work for admissions committees to ensure that deserving disadvantaged students can earn their spot in the institution. But this work is worth the time it takes. It is the privilege of the university to elevate deserving candidates across all groups, and in so doing, create a richer, more viewpoint-diverse student body.

This, of course, will eliminate the number of minority students in elite colleges, for there are plenty of other students who have diverse viewpoints, and it’s fatuous to believe that, say, all blacks or Hispanics share a single homogeneous viewpoint. (Were that the case, then increasing ethnic diversity would decrease “viewpoint diversity.” Fortunately, I don’t accept this patronizing view of minorities. In the end, there’s no substitute for the hard work of going through application by application, ensuring that all are good enough to pass a bar of merit but then confecting a truly diverse student body.

*World Aquatics, the governing body of the sport, has announced that it has created an “open” category for transgender swimmers.

Swimming will set up an “open category” that will include transgender competitors, the governing body of the sport said Tuesday.

World Aquatics president Husain Al-Musallam said the event would take place in the future but gave no details. Reports suggest it could be this year.

“This is a very complex topic,” Al-Musallam said at the World Aquatics Congress. “But I am delighted to tell you today that we are now making plans for the first trial of an open category, and we hope to be able to confirm all the details soon.

“Our sport must be open to everybody,” he said.

World Aquatics had previously banned transgender competitors from major events such as the Olympics and world championships.

The topic has been divisive and many governing bodies in major sports have avoided it. And there will be many questions to answer as the first trial event unfolds under the eyes of lawyers and scientists.

“It was very important that we protected fair competition for our female athletes,” Al-Musallam said. “But you have heard me say many times there should be no discrimination. Nobody should be excluded from our competitions.”

This isn’t ideal, as it pits transgender male swimmers against transgender female ones, with the latter probably having an inherent advantage. But it at least allows trans people to compete in athletics—something that’s essential to have fairness for everyone in athletics.  I suspect more sports federations will be going this route.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn. I asked Malgorzata what Hili, lying on the windowsill, was kvetching about, and got this response, “To quite a lot of phenomena but mainly to wokeness and to behavior of Israeli elites (she read the article by Bret Stephens and marveled about the way this very intelligent man’s mind works).”

Hili: I have new data.
A: On what topic?
Hili: The rise of the level of irrationality among the enlightened.
In Polish:
Hili: Mam nowe dane.
Ja: Na jaki temat?
Hili: Wzrostu poziomu irracjonalności w populacji oświeconych.

********************

From The Cat House on the Kings:

If you know your Oppenheimer, you’ll recognize this phrase, where and when Oppenheimer said the original, and where it came from. From Kristin:

And, given the day, this is appropriate. From Pet Jokes & Puns (or GTFO!):

Lagniappe: go here.

From Masih; the brave women of Iran #7,562. She’s not wearing a hijab, either.

I found this one. There’s either water or salt on that turtle’s head:

From Simon, who says “But why?” (Good question!). He adds, “I think the slow motion hurts even more!”

From Malcolm. But why is this cat angry? (sound up).

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a 30-year-old man who lived but two weeks in the camp before dying:

Tweets from Dr. Cobb, about to have cataracts removed and new lenses installed. In the first one, Matthew likes the bear but I was more interested in the skunks.

Sound up. But why are these soldiers in England?

A byproduct of Matthew’s research on his Crick biography. The solutions, of course, involved how are proteins made, followed by the discovery of DNA, followed by the deciphering of the genetic code, the discovery of messenger RNA, and the way that proteins are synthesized on ribosomes.

 

Another duck update

July 25, 2023 • 11:10 am

The dorm ducks are still doing well, and we still schlep over a cart full of food and water to the dorm plaza three times a week. Here’s a full cart ready to go: there are about ten gallons of water, a large quantity of duckling pellets (also good for mom, though she flies off every day, presumably to feed and bathe in a nearby pond), some freeze-dried mealworms, and spare food dishes and paper towels.

Yesterday the whole brood of ducklings (well, teenage ducks) was waiting by the door, and when we came in they ran toward us. They were clearly hungry, and the first thing they did was eat a huge meal. While they were doing that, my job was to take the pools and water dishes, empty them out, and take them in the restroom to scrub them clean with soap and water. It’s a nasty job because the ducks aren’t particularly sweet-smelling (their leavings smell like fish!). While I’m doing that, the other members of team duck clean out the “swimming pools” and replenish them with water.  After that, I return with clean dishes and vessels, and we leave out a bunch of food and clean water.

By then the  ducklings have eaten their fill (for the moment) and they have a swim.

Maria, the mother, was there yesterday, and was watchful as usual. They’re all getting tamer, now to the point where I can dump fresh water into the small “pool” while a duckling is swimming in it. Here’s one having a fine old time splashing, dipping, and dunking:

Only about eight of the ten can fit in this pool, but yesterday we put a larger one (a “cement mixing tub” from Home Depot) in the shade on the grass, under a tree.

Maria is always between us and her babies, but she trusts us quite a bit now. She’s a great mom!

After food and a swim, the ducklings repair to a shady spot to preen and then have a nap. This order of tasks is invariant. Note Maria between us and her brood.

When Mom is there, they scatter about a bit, but when she’s gone they huddle close together. That’s clearly an adaptive behavior:

The lovely Maria and some of her babies:

Look, they have most of their feathers now! And we haven’t lost a duckling (“no duckling left behind” is our motto”).

They still have down on their backs, but they’re about 2/3 the size of Mom. Two in the pool. The one with the orange-yellow beak is likely a female (hen), while the one in the foreground, with more green in the beak, is probably a male (drake):

A snoozing duckling. Note the down on its back.

We’re going to have a hot three days this week, so extra water is called for.

Why did Twitter become “X”?

July 25, 2023 • 9:30 am

Among the things Elon Musk is doing to Twitter, he appears to have changed the logo to, yes, “X”! The NYT explains:

Elon Musk has made one of the most visible changes to Twitter since he took control of the social media company last fall: replacing its widely recognized bird logo.

In a tweet early Sunday morning Eastern time, Mr. Musk said that “soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.” About 24 hours later, a stylized, black-and-white X appeared on the company’s website in place of the blue bird logo.

Twitter’s corporate accounts also adopted the new branding, which was projected onto the side of the company’s headquarters in San Francisco overnight. “Lights. Camera. X!” Linda Yaccarino, Twitter’s chief executive, posted on the site, accompanying a photo of the building.

“X” is a term for what Mr. Musk has described as an “everything app” that could combine social media, instant messaging and payment services, akin to the popular Chinese app WeChat.

Mr. Musk has said that buying Twitter is “an accelerant to creating X,” and the corporate entity he created to purchase and control Twitter is called X Holdings.

Mr. Musk spoke on a Twitter audio livestream early Sunday to say he was changing Twitter’s logo. “It should have been done a long time ago,” he said. “Sorry it took so long.”

A few hours later, Mr. Musk said in an email to Twitter’s employees that “we are indeed changing to X.”

“This is my last message from aa Twitter email,” he wrote, before signing off with a salute emoji.

. . . . Mr. Musk has had a long affinity for the letter X. In 1999, he co-founded X.com, an online bank, and later merged it with another start-up to create PayPal. In 2017, he said that he repurchased the X.com domain from PayPal.

This makes no sense to me, although I’m not a businessman. It’s like naming Coca Cola the “X Drink”.  And, sure enough, all my birdies have been replaced by Xs:

From Chrome:

From my Twitter feed (arrow is mine). There used to be a bird!

This is bad. No more birds, and we can’t even say “Twitter”: we’ll have to say “X”.  Nor can we “tweet.” What do we do instead, “emit Xs”?

Unlike many, I don’t hate Musk. He seems a bit cold, and is also arrogant and imperious, as well as rich (which some people cannot stand), but he’s clearly made great innovations like SpaceX and Tesla.  After watching a video of him talking to Bill Maher, below, I like him a bit more.  I watch his machinations with interest, but I can’t work up any strong dislike for him.

Here’s his 21-minute appearance on “Real Time.” Maher is a bit of a sycophant when encountering the world’s richest man, but I don’t see any real humanity in Musk. Maybe he’s been subject to too much sycophancy. He laughs quite a bit, showing the “sense of humor” that Maher praises, but even Musk’s laughter creeps me out a bit.

I do like Musk’s stands on free speech and the “woke mind virus,” which you can hear starting at 5:20.

In general, I think the world is a better place because of Musk, though there are those who say that his immense wealth (over 200 billion dollars!) must have come from exploiting people. I don’t agree: he creates what people want to pay for.

Readers’ wildlife photos

July 25, 2023 • 8:15 am

Inspired by the contributions of Paul Edelman and John Avise, ecologist Susan Harrison nominates her most photogenic bird, which isn’t a songbird but I’ll allow it. Her defense is indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them. Feel free, if you have good bird pictures, to join the competition.

Western Screech-Owls

They’re not technically songbirds, but they are tiny (5 ounces), eat a lot of insects, live in suburbia, and sing beautifully.   I nominate Western Screech-Owls (Megascops kennicottii) for Most Photogenic Songbird in the “Slightly Demonic-Looking” category.

These four Screech-Owls reside in Ashland, Oregon backyards where the homeowners have put out nest boxes.   The first two, in adjacent redwood trees, are a father and one of his youngsters.  The second two, sitting under the eaves, are a mated pair.

Tuesday: Hili dialogue

July 25, 2023 • 6:45 am

Welcome to the Cruelest Day: Tuesday, July 25, 2023, and National Hot Fudge Sundae Day, a classic American treat. It was invented in the U.S., but five cities contest for place where the ice cream sundae was invented. The one below needs about four times more fudge topping:

It’s also Culinarians Day, National Wine and Cheese Day , International Red Shoe Day, and International Afro-descendant Women’s Day

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the July 25 Wikipedia page.

Wine of the Day (Insomnia has reduced my drinking a bit, but only temporarily. Here’s a wine I almost never see, much less drink: a rosé Rioja! It’s Alegre y Valgonon – Rioja Blanco from 2018, but it’s more pink than blanco. It cost $22 and was a bargain at that price, absolutely unidentifiable by taste alone. It was dry but with a lemon and peach flavor, and the red grape (Garnacha, only 10%) came through the white grape (Virua, 90%) clearly.  It was a great complement to chicken breast, broccoli, and rice, and I wish I’d have bought at least half a case. It was five years old but I suspect could age a few years longer.

Here’s one review, which seems pretty accurate to me, though I don’t know from “back half”.

Fresh tangerine, dried pear and white peach on the fragrant nose, with a spicy element emerging slowly. Juicy and silky in texture, offering fresh orchard and citrus fruit flavors that tighten up slowly on the back half. Closes with strong, stony persistence and very good lift, leaving an appealing floral note behind.

All I can say is that I rarely come across Rioja Blanco (white Rioja), though I drink a lot of its red relative. I’ll be looking harder! Some of the whites age well, and if you’re looking for a change of pace, read this piece about them.

 

Da Nooz:

Israel may be on the threshold of disappearing as a country, either through civil war or invasion of its weakened state. We’ll know soon (I’m supposed to visit for a few weeks starting September 2), but everything is up in the air.

*The next item tells you that Netanyahu’s bill curbing Israel’s Supreme Court has passed, but before we get to that, the AP tells us what the bill really says.

On Monday, parliament approved a bill that takes away the Supreme Court’s power to override government decisions that the court finds “unreasonable.”

Proponents say the current “reasonability” standard gives judges excessive powers over decision making by elected officials. But critics say that removing the standard, which is invoked only in rare cases, would allow the government to pass arbitrary decisions, make improper appointments or firings and open the door to corruption.

. . .The overhaul calls for sweeping changes aimed at curbing the powers of the judiciary.

The proposals include a bill that would allow a simple majority in parliament to overturn Supreme Court decisions. Another would give parliament the final say in selecting judges.

Netanyahu’s ultranationalist and ultra-Orthodox religious allies say the package is meant to restore power to elected officials — and reduce the powers of unelected judges.

Protesters, who make up a wide cross section of Israeli society, fear the overhaul will push Israel toward autocracy. They say it is a power grab fueled by various personal and political grievances by Netanyahu, who is on trial for corruption charges, and his allies.

Two other things that the article didn’t mention: the Supreme Court previously had the power to nominate its own judges, and parliament and the Prime Minister haven’t done that, so it’s sort of a self-perpetuating judiciary. Also, the Court can, without giving reasons, reject the nomination of a government minister as itself “unreasonable.” (They have sometimes given reasons for such rejections, though.

Now, onto the fracas in Israel:

*The Israeli parliament, following Netanyahu’s wishes, passed the controversial law curbing the power of the nation’s Supreme Court.

Masses of Israelis blocked roads in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and around the country on Monday night, furious over what they called an affront to democracy after the Israeli Parliament passed a law earlier in the day limiting the Supreme Court’s ability to overturn decisions made by government ministers.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was hospitalized to receive a pacemaker over the weekend, had sought to quell the intensifying unrest in a televised address to the Israeli people on Monday evening. Speaking from his office, he suggested that he would table until late November a broader judicial overhaul plan being undertaken by his government, the most right-wing and religiously conservative in Israeli history.

. . .Israeli police are deploying water cannons against thousands of protesters demonstrating against the judicial overhaul who have gathered near the Supreme Court in Jerusalem. Waving Israeli flags, some protesters are calling back “for shame!” in scenes broadcast live on Israel’s public broadcaster.

The situation is particularly dire because the military itself is divided on this bill, with some, like the Air Force Reserve, refusing to do their service should Netanyahu’s bill pass. It would be the height of irony if the Israeli military and Israeli citizens destroyed the country through civil war. Many would be delighted, of course, but not I.

*Thomas Friedman has published his op-ed, “Only Biden can save Israel now“, too late. The bill restricting the Supreme Court has already passed. But let’s see what Friedman said, written in the form of a letter to President Biden:

Fifty years later, Mr. President, this Jewish democracy urgently needs another airlift to save it from being destroyed from the inside. It needs an urgent resupply of hard truths — something only you can provide.

And what are those truths? That if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues trying to ram through a bill that would strip Israel’s Supreme Court of its most important legal authority — to check extreme appointments or decisions of Israel’s political echelon — and do so without a semblance of national consensus, it will fracture Israel’s military and undermine not only shared values between the U.S. and Israel but also vital U.S. interests.

But I’m afraid this Israeli government needs another dose of your tough love — not just from your heart but from the heart of U.S. strategic interests as well.

Because Netanyahu is plowing ahead despite your urgings. Despite a warning from more than 1,100 Israeli Air Force pilots and technicians that they will not fly for a dictatorship. Despite an open letter signed by dozens of former top security officials, including former heads of the Israel Defense Forces, Mossad, Shin Bet and police beseeching the prime minister to stop. Despite Israel’s top business forum warning of “irreversible and destructive consequences on the Israeli economy.” Despite fears that this could eventually fracture unit cohesion in the base of the Israeli Army. And despite a remarkable, largely spontaneous five-day march by everyday Israelis from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the likes of which had never happened before.

If I may suggest, Mr. President, what is needed is that your secretary of state, your secretary of defense, your Treasury secretary, your commerce secretary, your secretary of agriculture, your U.S. trade representative, your attorney general, your C.I.A. director and your Joint Chiefs call their Israeli counterparts today and let them know that if Netanyahu moves ahead — without a consensus, fracturing Israeli society and its military — it will not only undermine the shared values between our two countries but also do serious damage to our own strategic interests in the Middle East.

And U.S. interests are very much our business. Because as the Knesset moves to vote on this issue on Monday, something very important could break in Israel and in our relationship with Israel. And once it’s gone, it will never come back.

I hope that it is not already too late.

But it is too late much of the bill has passed. Actually, I can see both sides on this issue; the bill isn’t 100% horrible (does the Supreme Court really have to choose its own members? can the Court reject any legislation as “unreasonable” without giving a reason), but it does put more power in the hands of the Prime Minister. I don’t have a big dog in this fight, but I don’t want Israel to go up in smoke over this issue, either.

To see a counterargument to Friedman’s thesis, two law professors (one of them the U of C’s Richard Epstein) has a National Post op-ed called “Opponents of Netanyahu’s judicial reforms want government by tantrum.”

*The war between Russia and Ukraine is turning nastier: a drone of unknown origin (probably Ukrainian) hit a skyscraper in Moscow, while Russia keeps pounding Odessa with missiles and drones.

A drone struck a skyscraper in Moscow early Monday, shattering glass on the 17th and 18th floors, Russian officials reported. The wreckage of a second drone was found on Komsomolsky Prospect, a thoroughfare in central Moscow. Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said two nonresidential buildings were struck but there were no casualties.

Is Ukraine targeting civilian infrastructure—a war crime? We don’t know from this report as the nature of the skyscraper isn’t specified. But this is surely a Ukrainian operation.

Moscow downed the drones, Russia’s Defense Ministry said, blaming Ukraine for the attack. Drone strikes are a rarity for the Russian capital, and a similar attack earlier this year on two residential buildings there was widely considered a prelude to further escalation in the war.Though Ukraine denied responsibility for the drone attack in May, the event struck a chord among Russians, who for the first time witnessed wartime hostilities trickling into residential parts of the city.

And, on the other side:

The incident comes after another night of attacks on Ukraine’s Odessa region. Drones targeted port infrastructure along the Danube River, injuring six people and destroying a grain hangar, said Oleh Kiper, the regional governor.

. . . The overnight drone attack in Odessa lasted four hours,Ukrainian officials said on Telegram, part of a string of attacks in the port region since Russia pulled out of a U.N.-backed grain export deal. An earlier bombardment razed several parts of the southern Ukrainian port city, killing at least one person and injuring 21, including four children.

While Ukraine has taken back about half the land that Russia took over earlier, the Russians are enlisting children in the war effort:

Russia is putting a “renewed emphasis on military induction for children,” Britain’s Defense Ministry said, citing the move by Russian authorities to add lessons on how to operate combat drones to a forthcoming mandatory school syllabus. The ministry said the policy is more about cultivating “a culture of militarised patriotism” in Russia and less about teaching children to operate drones. But the focus on the unmanned aerial vehicles “does highlight how Russia has identified the use of tactical UAVs in Ukraine as an enduring component of contemporary war,” it said.

*Private Second Class Travis King, who “defected” to North Korea after getting in legal trouble in South Korea, remains in the DPRK, and their government has said nothing.

The United Nations Command has begun talking with North Korea about an American soldier who crossed the border from South Korea without authorization last week, the deputy commander said Monday.

British Army Lieutenant General Andrew Harrison told a briefing on Monday that conversations have begun through a communication line established under the armistice agreement that ended combat in the 1950-53 Korean War.

Private 2nd Class Travis King, 23 years old, has been detained in North Korea since he crossed the border while on a tour last Tuesday of the Joint Security Area, part of the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas.

“The primary concern for us is Private King’s welfare,” Harrison said. He said he remains optimistic, but declined to provide details on the talks, citing their sensitivity.

. . .The day before he crossed the border, King had been set to fly Texas for disciplinary actions and a potential discharge following two alleged assaults last year, officials said last week. He had been held at a detention facility in South Korea for 47 days.

North Korea has said nothing publicly about King.

One thing is for sure: if King has a lick of sense, he’ll get his butt out of North Korea. Even military prison in the U.S. is better than a lifetime of deprivation in the DPRK.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is admonishing Andrzej:

Hili: You are writing too much, you are reading too little.
A: I can’t read. You are not letting me come to the computer.
Hili: Go and read some books.
In Polish:
Hili: Za dużo piszesz, za mało czytasz.
Ja: Nie mogę czytać, bo nie puszczasz mnie do komputera.
Hili: Idź i czytaj książki

********************

From The Atheist Experience and the Non Prophets:

From Jean, a Barbara Smaller cartoon:

From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0. Click to enlarge. I’m glad he was charged with animal abuse, too!

From Masih, and do read the Guardian article linked in the Tweet (or is it “the X”?). A quote from the piece:

“I felt indifferent to the news that the ‘morality police’ have been reinstated. Western media insists on telling us Iranians that Gasht-e-Irshad was abolished, but I don’t know a single Iranian friend of mine who believed that,” says a 22-year-old from Rasht.

“They [the morality police] were never gone and were being deployed as security personnel in universities or as civilians in public places. What the world sees is a tiny glimpse of what’s happening here. Although everything looks normal to the ones who don’t care about us women, if you notice, they are everywhere.

From Robert: girl rescues duckling, and then adopts two more:

From Peter Boghossian:

From Malcolm, a domino effect with kittens:

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a Czech woman who died at forty:

Tweets from the diligent Dr. Cobb, beavering away on his Crick biography. Look at this long nudibranch!

Chicago!

A VERY selfish cat:

The National Science Foundation budgets millions to fight a problem not demonstrated to exist: systemic racism in STEM

July 24, 2023 • 11:30 am

The other day I posted about what I saw as a divisive and ineffectual paper published in Nature Chemistry, a paper called “Critical Race Theory [CRT] and Its Relevance for Chemistry.” The author wasn’t a chemist, but rather an educational psychologist at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Nor did the paper have anything to do with improving chemistry: its thesis was that inequity of minority representation in chemistry was due to ongoing structural racism, and these inequities could be repaired only by thoroughly imbuing chemistry instruction with CRT.  (As one colleague noted, ““I wonder what would happen if chemists started writing papers about the need to use the scientific method in education, and published them in top educational journals.”)

At any rate, other colleagues looked up the author’s c.v., and found that he’d garnered a huge amount of funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF).  Here are the grants listed.

National Science Foundation: 2140901, Collaborative Research: EHR Racial Equity: Examining Blackness in Postsecondary STEM Education through a Multidimensional-Multiplicative Lens. Education and Human Resources Directorate, $8,826,392, Principal Investigator

National Science Foundation: 2217343, RCN-UBE: Deepening and Expanding the Mission and Outcomes of the Re-Envisioning Culture Network. Division of Biological Infrastructure, $500,000, Principal Investigator

National Science Foundation: 2100823, Community for Advancing Discovery Research in Education (CADRE): Expanding the Reach and Impact of Innovations in STEM Education. DRL – Discovery Research K-12, $3,307,943, Co-Principal Investigator

National Science Foundation: 2020709, Louis Stokes Regional Center of Excellence for the Study of STEM Interventions. Division of Human Resources Development, $1,000,000, Co-Principal Investigator

Total: $13,634,335

The researcher’s papers are also listed on the c.v. page, and you can check them out for yourself.

To some scientists who strive (and usually fail) to get NSF grants for doing “regular” science, this whopping pot of money, aimed at achieving equity in STEM, seemed unfair. (Note: I was always funded not by the NSF, but by the NIH.)  At the expense of finding out more about the universe through genuine science, the NSF is busy engaged in achieving social justice. And to do that, it appears, as you’ll see below, that they’re spending a lot of money on “solutions” that in all probability are useless.

Well, you can respond that “It’s the NSF’s job to evaluate these proposals, not the job of other government agencies. After all, the NSF evaluates proposals scientifically, and who better to judge ways to reform STEM?” That’s all well and good, but it’s reasonable to suspect that the standards for evaluating proposals like those above and below may be more lax than evaluating regular science.

But what I want to emphasize here is that the NSF is busy evaluating proposals to study a problem that is likely not even a problem: the problem of “systematic” (or “structural”) racism in STEM, which probably doesn’t exist. Yes, scientists can be racists, but “systematic racism” comprises features of science that are installed and maintained to keep minorities out. As everyone in science now realizes, the field is falling all over itself competing to hire minority professors and students, and this argues against the idea that science is trying to keep minorities out. In fact, it’s just the opposite!

A scientist sent this email after seeing the grant windfall above (and the existence of many other NSF programs addressing “structural racism” in the sciences, like the one below):

In the last couple of years, NSF established a $25 million program to fight systemic racism in science.  Not to find out if there IS systemic racism, not to document it.  No, that was assumed.  This is to fight something that hasn’t even been demonstrated to exist.  If I based a research program entirely on an untested assumption, with no intent to actually test it, I’d be laughed out of the profession.

Everyone knows how hard it is to get funding for doing science. But peddling CRT under the guise of science education — a windfall. This partially explains why universities are willing to hire these people.

Here you can read about that $25 million program (actually, it says the funding will be between $15 million and $25 million), and its aim to dismantle structural racism. Click on screenshot below (I replaced vanished one with one on the same site; figures may be somewhat different now):

It’s a long solicitation, and you can read it yourself, but note in the excerpts below the emphasis on the importance of addressing “systemic racism” in STEM, as well as the aim to advance equity (proportional representation). The assumption is that systemic racism is the cause of inequity.  The guidelines for the proposal are much longer than this, but you can see the implicit assumption that science is riddled with built-in forms of racism.

Bolding is mine (I haven’t bolded “inequities” as it would be too confusing, but note the word):

All proposals should conceptualize systemic racism within the context of their proposal and describe how the proposed work will advance scholarship of racial equity and address systemic racism

All proposals should have a knowledge generation component.

All proposals should be led by or in authentic partnership with those who experience inequities caused by systemic racism.

All proposals should center the voices, knowledge, and experiences of those who experience inequities caused by systemic racism.

. . . Collectively, proposals funded by this solicitation will: (1) substantively contribute to institutionalizing effective research-based practices, policies, and outcomes in STEM environments for those who experience inequities caused by systemic racism and the broader community; (2) advance scholarship and promote racial equity in STEM in ways that expand the array of epistemologies, perspectives, ideas, theoretical and methodological approaches that NSF funds; and (3) further diversify project leadership (PIs and co-PIs) and institutions funded by NSF.

. . .Efforts to address systemic racism in STEM education are complementary to NSF’s efforts in Broadening Participation in STEM. The portfolio of projects funded by this program should be diverse in theoretical approaches, epistemologies, and methodologies, yet all proposals should 1) conceptualize systemic racism in the context of the project, 2) be led by or in authentic partnership with communities impacted by systemic racism, and 3) articulate a rigorous plan to generate knowledge and/or evidence-based practice via fundamental or applied research.

Conceptualizing Systemic Racism: EDU recognizes that systemic racism is multifaceted and can be addressed in various ways, requiring varied approaches and diverse perspectives. Approaches may include but are not limited to how systemic racism influences STEM knowledge generation, STEM participation and experiences, and access and outcomes in STEM. As the constructs of systemic racism and racial equity may have different meanings in different settings, each proposal should conceptualize systemic racism within the bounds of the project context and indicate how racial equity is advanced by the proposed work. Contexts may include, but are not limited to: preK-12, two-year and four-year undergraduate, and graduate institutions; municipal organizations; STEM workplaces; and informal STEM contexts, such as museums, community organizations, and media.]

. . .Solicitation-Specific Review Criteria: For all Racial Equity projects, the proposer can decide where to include the information that addresses the following questions:

  • How does the proposal conceptualize systemic racism with respect to the proposal topic or context? In what ways will the proposed work advance scholarship of racial equity and address ssystemic racism?
  • In what ways are the voices, knowledge, and experiences of those who experience inequities caused by systemic racism are at the center of the project?
  • How is the project led by or in authentic partnership individuals and communities who experience inequities caused by systemic racism?

I’m calling attention to this just to show you how the NSF, which is part of the government, is using taxpayer dollars in what is likely to be a futile exercise in social engineering.

And, once again I hasten to add that scientists can be racists, and that might act to prevent minority scientists from succeeding. If that is the case, it’s reprehensible and should be addressed. But before you conclude that any racism is “systemic,” you’d better ensure that such is the case. As Davy Crockett said, “Be always sure you are right – then go ahead.”

Could Mātauranga Māori advance quantum physics?

July 24, 2023 • 9:30 am

I suspect the answer to the title question is “No way!”, but the incursion of Mātauranga Māori (“MM”, or Māori “ways of knowing”) into New Zealand’s science is reaching ludicrous depths. Even in the U.S.A. we don’t see headlines like the one below. (Note that “complement” is misspelled as “compliment”.)

Why am I so sure this endeavor won’t work? Simply because there is nothing about quantum physics in MM, and I can’t envision any MM-derived insights into the discipline that could advance it beyond what modern physicists are doing already.  Of course Māori physicists, like the one below, could well make contributions to quantum mechanics, but it’s hard to see that those insights would come from MM, a mixture of trial-and-error knowledge gained from living (gathering plants and fish), theology, superstition, tradition, and ethics.

Nevertheless, the termites have dined so well that we see things like this, coming from Waatea News, Auckland’s Māori t.v. and radio station.

Read and weep; I’ve reproduced the whole article (indented), including its errors in English.

The first Māori quantum physicist says he hopes more Māori join the field to incorporate mātaraunga Māori into quantum physics.

Dr Jacob Ngaha, completed his PhD in Quantum Physics at Waipapa Taumata Rau, the University of Auckland, becoming the first Māori quantum physicist.

He says quantum physics explains how this work [sic] on an atomic level, and mātauranga Māori is based on lived experiences and observations which could compliment [sic] western scientific discipline.

“There’s always more than one way to do things. If you’re doing an experiment, depending on what you want out of an experiment there are different methods you take, different tools you use and I think science is overruled and no different. Mātauranga Māori is definitely better at looking at certain things, especially from a Māori lens. I think also, depending on what you’re looking at and what area you’re in there’s a stronger foundation of mātauranga Māori. I think those were the sort of things our tūpuna [ancestors] were doing, you know we’re talking about biology, genetics and environmental science. Those are very lived experiences.”

Jacob Ngaha says in the western space, mātauranga Māori is very new and with more Māori in quantum physics, mātauranga can be expanded more with quantum physics and vice versa.

And. . . . ? What’s missing, of course, are specific examples of how MM can help quantum mechanics.  On his Auckland Uni page Ngaha explains his thesis:

“I’m in the field of theoretical quantum optics – more specifically cavity quantum electrodynamics. I study the interactions between light and matter using quantum mechanical principles.

For my thesis topic, I’m currently studying signal processing in a quantum optics setting. Essentially I’m developing a computational model that will allow us and others to better filter frequency signals in quantum optics simulations. Experimentally this can be done quite easily but we would like a theoretical tool that can, in principle, do even better.

Although Radio New Zealand touts Ngaha as a rising star, and he may well be, their article gives us no more insight into how quantum mechanics can progress faster through the infusion of Māori-derived knowledge.

Meanwhile three critics of the educational system in NZ wrote the following article in BreakingViews.co.nz.  Click to read:

One excerpt, some of which you’ve probably seen in other places:

In 2000, New Zealand was one of the top performers in the world. Our results were above the average of the world’s most developed countries and we placed third in mathematics and fourth for reading in a group of 41 countries. When the latest PISA results were published in 2018, the decline had progressed so much that in science and reading New Zealand was only marginally above the OECD average. In mathematics we are now below average. Of the larger group of 78 participating countries, New Zealand ranked low, at 27th (Hartwich, 2022).

Reading is similarly in trouble. For example, the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) shows that the reading skills of New Zealand students continue to decline. In 2021, New Zealand recorded its lowest score since the inception of PIRLS in 2001 (e.g. Scoop, 2023).

. . . . The decline has now been exacerbated by moves to centre the school curriculum on the Treaty of Waitangi, and universities declaring themselves Te Tiriti-led and prioritising the inclusion of matauranga Māori in degree courses.  Left-wing ideologies, combined with post-modern ideas and a dangerous mix of Critical Social Justice theory and Diversity, Equity and Inclusivity (DEI) policies, now appear to be more important to decision-makers than teaching basic skills and knowledge (P. Raine,2023), and will exacerbate the observed steady deterioration. A more holistic approach in teaching and research is now favoured or even mandated, and merit-based assessment used internationally for many decades has been called into question on the basis that it inherently disadvantages minorities and indigenous people (Abbot et al., 2023).

When you see “holism” praised and “merit” denigrated in the same sentence, run for the hills!

And I’ll add a few examples of what’s happening in N.Z. science education. I can vouch for all these assertions save the last anecdote.

The many anti-science statements coming from the post-modern corner are best illustrated by a few examples:

–       Māori May Have Reached Antarctica 1,000 Years Before Europeans (Wehi et al, 2022). This statement made it into the headlines, such as the New Zealand Herald, the Guardian and even the New York Times. It was debunked shortly after (Anderson et al. 2022).

–       From the beginning of creation, to the children of Ranginui and Papatūānuku, and descending to our ancestors, all aspects of creation have whakapapa  [genealogical lineages]…  This allows us to consider whakapapa for each of the elements on the periodic table (NZASE resource). While this is nice storytelling that favours creationism, it does not belong in a science class. The abundance of the elements in our universe and on our planet Earth is well understood from basic nuclear physics.

–       Mauri is an energy which binds and animates all things in the physical world. Without mauri, mana cannot flow into a person or object (Te Ara, The Encyclopedia of New Zealand). This leads to the claim that Everything has a Mauri. A life force. When we are ill, our life force has been compromised (Māori Healers) and The Mauri is the power that allows these living things to exist within their domain. It is also known as a spark of life, the active component that gives life.  A critical discussion on the Mauri concept proposed by the government’s NCEA panel for chemistry teaching in our schools has been provided recently by Professor Paul Kilmartin of The University of Auckland (Kilmartin, 2021). Among other issues, Professor Kilmartin has objected to the inclusion of Mauri (a life force) in our Chemistry curriculum, because it conflicts directly with science.

–       A recent article in the Guardian (Graham-McLay, 2023) on celebrating Matiriki, stated that Māori books only survived because old people hid them from the colonists, who it is implied wished to suppress or destroy them. No evidence for this claim was given and, in any case, like all other Polynesian languages (except for the Easter Island), Māori had no written form or books until the introduction of writing by missionaries (Harlow, 2007).

–       And – at a very basic level, in March 2023 a New Zealand child came home from school and told their parents that they had learned two important facts in science that day, namely that water has a spirit and memory – another introduction of animist confusion into what should have been a science lesson

And there we have it brothers and sisters, comrades and friends: the upcoming infusion of teleology into all the sciences (note “mauri” above).