Saturday: Hili dialogue

April 16, 2022 • 7:00 am

Welcme to Cat Sabbath: Saturday, April 16, 2022: it’s Passover, too, so all the cats get gefilte fish! It’s also National Eggs Benedict Day—a dish that Anthony Bourdain said never to order (he despised brunch) because it, and most of brunch, is made up of leftovers.

It’s also National Librarian Day, Save the Elephant Day, National Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day, and World Semicolon Day, and World Voice Day

Stuff that happened on April 16 includes:

  • 73 – Masada, a Jewish fortress, falls to the Romans after several months of siege, ending the First Jewish–Roman War.

Below are the remains of Masada (a World Heritage site), and the legend goes that the siege ended because the remaining Jews all killed themselves. This is what I believed for years, but now I learn that it might not be true.

Quimby (below) was the first woman to get a pilot’s license in the U.S., and died in an airplane crash at 37. If this picture from Wikipedia shows her in her flying clothes, those are some pretty fancy duds!

  • 1919 – Mohandas Gandhi organizes a day of “prayer and fasting” in response to the killing of Indian protesters in the Jallianwala Bagh massacre by the British colonial troops three days earlier.

That massacre, a despicable and bloodthirsty attack of the British Army, is vividly depicted in the movie “Gandhi” (below). Estimates of the killings range between 379 to 1500 victims—or more. 120 dead were pulled out of the well you see.

As for General Dyer, he was removed from duty, but remained a hero to many Brits who hated Indians.

Gandhi in 1918:

  • 1943 – Albert Hofmann accidentally discovers the hallucinogenic effects of the research drug LSD. He intentionally takes the drug three days later on April 19.

He was a very strait-laced man to have discovered this drug, but so it goes:

  • 1945 – World War II: The Red Army begins the final assault on German forces around Berlin, with nearly one million troops fighting in the Battle of the Seelow Heights.
  • 1947 – Bernard Baruch first applies the term “Cold War” to describe the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union.
  • 1961 – In a nationally broadcast speech, Cuban leader Fidel Castro declares that he is a Marxist–Leninist and that Cuba is going to adopt Communism.
  • 1963 – Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. pens his Letter from Birmingham Jail while incarcerated in Birmingham, Alabama for protesting against segregation.

You can read that famous letter here.

Here’s the last three minutes of Jordan’s last game. Sadly, he didn’t do that well and the Bulls lost, but what a career the man had. I’m sad that I never saw him play.

Breivick killed 77 people and got the maximum sentence: 21 years in jail. But it can be extended indefinitely in increments if the prisoner isn’t deemed safe to release, and I suspect that Breivik will be in for life. This is one reason:

Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people on July 22, 2011, in a bomb attack in Oslo and a mass shooting at a summer camp for children. (Lise Aaserud/AP)
  • 2012 – The Pulitzer Prize winners were announced, it was the first time since 1977 that no book won the Fiction Prize.

There was no prize given for International Reporting, either.

Notables born on this day include:

  • 1844 – Anatole France, French journalist, novelist, and poet, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1924)
  • 1867 – Wilbur Wright, American inventor (d. 1912)
  • 1918 – Spike Milligan, Irish actor, comedian, and writer (d. 2002)
  • 1939 – Dusty Springfield, English singer and record producer (d. 1999)

This is my favorite of her songs, though Dusty’s most popular release was “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me“, which reached #1 on the British Pop Charts.

  • 1971 – Selena, American singer-songwriter, actress, and fashion designer (d. 1995).

Here’s Selena Quintanilla Pérez , live in Houston and singing a disco medley. Wildly popular, she was shot at just 23.

Those who became extinct on April 16 include:

  • 1828 – Francisco Goya, Spanish-French painter and illustrator (b. 1746)
  • 1958 – Rosalind Franklin, English biophysicist and academic (b. 1920)

One of Franklin’s favorite hobbies was trekking; here she is on a hike in the Alps:

  • 1991 – David Lean, English director, producer, and screenwriter (b. 1908)

What can you say about a man who directed The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), and Doctor Zhivago (1965), all of them epics and all of them terrific (Lawrence of Arabia isthe best)? I know the second two movies almost by heart. I looked at a number of clip from Zhivago (I’ve seen Lawrence too many times), and decided to put this one up. (The “wife” of Strelnekov turns out to be Lara, with whom Zhivago has an affair.) I think Strelnekov is modeled on Trotsky. The best of these movies is Lawrence, but they’re all good.

  • 1994 – Ralph Ellison, American novelist and critic (b. 1913)

Here’s a short documentary on Ellison, who wrote one good novel (“Invisible Man”), but it’s a doozy:

*There is no banner headline in the NYT today, but here’s the upper-left corner headline—the most important. And it’s not good news. Click on screenshot to read:

Here’s the NYT’s news summary:

A large explosion rocked Kyiv early Saturday, and the Ukrainians claimed to have shot down missiles aimed at Odesa in the south and Lviv in the west — a reminder that even as Russia prepares for a large-scale offensive in eastern Ukraine, it can still strike targets across the country.

The targeting of military-related facilities across Ukraine with precision munitions came as Russia continued to move equipment and forces into position for a renewed offensive. The moves appeared to be aimed at degrading the Ukrainians’ military capabilities in advance of the anticipated assault, which military analysts have warned could be both long and bloody.

I still think that the whole country, and not just the eastern bit, will be taken over by Russia. Putin is desperate and has tactical nukes, and is now threatening the U.S. if we keep giving weapons to Ukraine. My fingers are crossed. But in his latest Substack column, Andrew Sullivan proposes his own peace solution, which I don’t like:

How does this unwind itself without a more widespread catastrophe? The key, it seems to me, is to keep our focus on a feasible settlement: a pledge never to admit Ukraine to NATO, a referendum — conducted by international bodies — in the two eastern provinces to determine their future in Russia or Ukraine, and a guarantee of Ukraine’s neutrality. But we are fast walking backwards into something far larger: a Western attempt for regime change in Russia, with Ukraine as the lever. That could make the war truly existential for Russia. Which means, with a nuclear power, truly existential for the world as well.

Worried about a much wider war, Sullivan is urging Ukraine to promise not to join NATO and to hold elections that could (and would, given Russian perfidy) hand over much of eastern Ukraine to Russia.

*In other news, the U.S. is now convinced that the Russian cruiser Moskva was indeed sunk by Ukrainian missiles, and there is much rejoicing, which I share. But remember that people are starving in Mariupol and the body count of Ukrainians will be rising fast–and soon. There is really not much to celebrate. The governor of Donestsk pronounced that Mariupol “has been wiped off the face of the earth”.

*Elon Musk has been trying to effect a hostile takeover of Twitter, though I’m not sure what changes he proposes to make. At any rate, according to the Wall Street Journal, Twitter is fighting back:

The company on Friday adopted a so-called poison pill that makes it difficult for Mr. Musk to increase his stake beyond 15%. The billionaire founder of Tesla Inc. TSLA -3.66% ▼ already owns a more-than 9% stake that he revealed earlier this month.

PayPal Chief Executive Peter Thiel, left, and founder Elon Musk, right, pose with the PayPal logo in 2000.PHOTO: PAUL SAKUMA/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Poison pills, also called shareholder-rights plans, are legal maneuvers that make it hard for shareholders to build their stakes beyond a set point by triggering an option for others to buy more shares at a discount. They are often used by companies that receive hostile takeover bids to block an unwanted suitor or buy time to consider their options.

Twitter said in a statement that the rights plan doesn’t prevent the company from engaging with potential acquirers or accepting a takeover bid if the board determines it is in the best interest of shareholders. It earlier confirmed it received Mr. Musk’s offer and is rewriting it.

As long as Musk doesn’t ban cat tweets, I’m not overly concerned.

*Talk about the demonization of the godless! CNN reports that a Nigerian atheist pleaded guilty to blasphemy in the neighboring state of Kano, and was sentenced to 24 years in jail (both countries are majority Muslim).  (h/t Paul)

Charges against Mubarak Bala are linked to comments he posted on Facebook in April 2020 that were critical of Islam and which authorities in Kano considered blasphemous and an insult to the religion, his lawyer said.

Bala, who heads the Humanist Association of Nigeria, was arrested at his home in the northern Kaduna state two years ago and was then moved to neighbouring Kano, a majority Muslim and conservative state.

*The Guardian reports that, due to the paucity of chemicals needed for lethal injections (drug companies won’t sell them to prisons), firing squads are making a comeback. (h/t Steve)

 On Thursday, South Carolina scheduled the execution of Richard Moore – convicted of murder in a 2001 convenience story robbery – for 29 April. Because state officials say they have not been able to secure lethal injection drugs, they will give him the choice between the electric chair and the firing squad.

Man, there’s no choice there: take the firing squad! Or better yet, have them shoot you in the back of the head with a single bullet. But of course all this is pilpul because I’m adamantly opposed to capital punishment.

Until now, Utah was the only state still using firing squads, and the last execution was in 2010.

This all comes from a recent Supreme Court decision that “if prisoners want to fight an execution method, they need to propose a ‘known and available’ alternative in court.”  They thus become complicit in their own death.

It is true that if you’re going to kill someone painlessly, either give them pure barbiturate, as they do with assisted suicide in Switzerland, or shoot them, which often kills them more quickly than does lethal injection. But no form of capital punishment is acceptable. (The reason people object to firing squads is that it’s messy) And if we’re going to have it, we should televise it. Let people see what they’re in favor of!

*Over at Freddie de Boer’s Substack, he argues that “Self-actualization is not the sole purpose of human existence.” He’s pushing back against “the notion that healthy, well-adjusted people are possessed of absolutely deranged self-confidence and pursue their desires with remorseless and violent ambition”; and sees this instantiated in some Disney films. He’s got a point, in that one must take others into account, but I think he goes a bit overboard.

*A snide characterization of some lousy news from reader Ken: “Turns out, a good guy with a gun is the only way to stop a nine-year-old girl from having her picture taken with the Easter Bunny at the mall.”

A Southern California shoe store owner opened fire at two shoplifters, police said, but mistakenly shot a 9-year-old girl about to get her picture with a mall Easter Bunny. The store owner fled the state and was arrested in Nevada, authorities said Wednesday.

Marqel Cockrell, 20, was chasing the shoplifters out of the store Tuesday evening at the Mall of Victor Valley in the small city of Victorville when he “fired multiple shots at the shoplifters,” Victorville police said in a statement.

“Cockrell’s shots missed the shoplifters and instead hit the 9-year-old female victim,” the statement said.

First of all, you don’t fire at shoplifters. Second, if you can’t fire properly, don’t use a gun. Third, the poor girl, who will live (she had three wounds), may have permanent nerve damage.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili’s been unsuccessful in her hunting:

Hili: I’m losing hope.
A: What for?
Hili: That something tasty will come to me.
In Polish:
Hili: Tracę nadzieję.
Ja: Na co?
Hili: Że coś smacznego samo do mnie przyjdzie.

Here’s Karolina grabbing Kulka:

And Szaron with book by Anjuli Pandavar that arrived in Dobrzyn yesterday–translation by Malgorzata. The title in Polish is Islam – faith and humanity. Malgorzata says, “The original title was Muslim’s inner struggle. It’s about how in every believer in Islam, a Muslim is fighting with a human. And humanity often loses.”

From Jesus of the Day::

From Facebook:

From Doc Bill:

From my magical Twitter feed: puppy imitates rabbit:

From Barry; this is new to him and to me, too. The cat is apparently feigning injury to get back in the house!

From Ginger K.:

From Simon, who says the guy probably just pissed off the ants:

Tweets from Matthew. Is the one on the left really a Ukrainian stamp?

A lovely arthropod that is not an insect:

It’s lunchtime for the eels:

This is proposed as a solution to the trolley problem, but I don’t think this is one choice. Translation: “How to save everyone in the ‘trolley problem’ How about such an answer?”

Matthew found this on the Auschwitz Memorial site:

Here’s my DNA results: Surprise—I’m descended from Ashkenazi Jews!

April 15, 2022 • 12:00 pm

I forgot to mention that my 23andMe DNA results arrived just before I left for Antarctica.  Today I’ll just give the general overview of where my genes come from. There will be more later on the physical traits predicted from the DNA, but I deliberately didn’t ask for health information, as I don’t want to know what I’m going to die from!

I paid $100 for this?

Where my genes come from. Well, one thing’s for sure if these results be correct: I have NO IRISH ANCESTRY. So much for that theory about inter-faith copulations! But I have genes from the area that’s now Poland and perhaps Ukraine. Here’s the map:

And the rest—bupkes!

Finally, I’m not even above the median in my Neanderthal gene composition!

Yep, I’m pretty much a full-blown Ashkenazi Jew descended from Eastern Europeans.

In the next installment, when I feel so inclined, I’ll talk about the physical traits they prognosticate for me from my DNA. (Most are accurate.)  I also have a few matches for first cousins once removed, and have to decide whether I should contact them.

NYT op-ed proposes ditching the idea of God because He’s “hateful”

April 15, 2022 • 10:15 am

Well I’ll be blowed, as a sailor might say: the New York Times has published a full-on article calling for atheism—the rejection of God. The author, brought up as an orthodox Jew, says we should simply give up the idea of God because the Biblical God, at least as portrayed in the Passover/Exodus story, was “hateful”.

It’s an old and classic argument, but not one you expect to see in the New York Times. Click on the screenshots to read:

You surely know the Jews-in-Egypt story and the Passover tale. Here’s the Wikipedia summary:

In the Book of Exodus, the Israelites are enslaved in ancient Egypt. Yahweh, the god of the Israelites, appears to Moses in a burning bush and commands Moses to confront Pharaoh. To show his power, Yahweh inflicts a series of 10 plagues on the Egyptians, culminating in the 10th plague, the death of the first-born.

This is what the LORD says: “About midnight I will go throughout Egypt. Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of Pharaoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn of the slave girl, who is at her hand mill, and all the firstborn of the cattle as well. There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt – worse than there has ever been or ever will be again.”

—Exodus 11:4-6

Before this final plague Yahweh commands Moses to tell the Israelites to mark a lamb‘s blood above their doors in order that Yahweh will pass over them (i.e., that they will not be touched by the death of the firstborn).

Those were some formidable plagues on the Egyptians, including frogs, boils, hail, locusts, pestilence, and so on. And each time Pharaoh was on the verge of giving in and releasing the Jews, God would “harden Pharoah’s heart”, so he wouldn’t let those Israelites go.  Finally, after the “passover” incident, in which God killed every first-born Egyptian (Jews were “passed over” by marking their doors with lamb’s blood), Pharoah’s heart softened, and he let the Jews go. It is this incident that’s celebrated by Passover.  This year Passover begins this evening and lasts until the evening of April 23.

(We’ll ignore the four decades of wandering in the Sinai, which is inexplicable.)

The thing is—and I believe I mention this in Faith Versus Fact—all those deaths and plagues and boils were God’s fault! It was God Hmself who hardened Pharoah’s heart. He didn’t have to do that–he could have made Pharoah let the Jews go after the first plague. But he didn’t! God kept hardening his heart, over and over again.

And this is what bothers Auslander (as well as another perfidy):

Two aspects of the Passover story have troubled me since I was first taught them long ago in an Orthodox yeshiva in Monsey, N.Y. I was 8 years old, and as the holiday approached, our rabbi commanded us to open our chumashim, or Old Testaments, to the Book of Exodus. To get us in the holiday spirit, he told us gruesome tales of torture and persecution.

“The Egyptians,” he told us, “used the corpses of Jewish slaves in their buildings.”

“You mean they used slaves to build their buildings,” I asked, “and the slaves died from work?”

“No,” said the rabbi. “They put the Jewish bodies into the walls and used them as bricks.”

This is the part that should make a rational person give up God:

. . .God, it seems, paints with a wide brush. He paints with a roller. In Egypt, said our rabbi, he even killed first-born cattle. He killed cows. If he were mortal, the God of Jews, Christians and Muslims would be dragged to The Hague. And yet we praise him. We emulate him. We implore our children to be like him.

Perhaps now, as missiles rain down and the dead are discovered in mass graves, is a good time to stop emulating this hateful God. Perhaps we can stop extolling his brutality. Perhaps now is a good time to teach our children to pass over God — to be as unlike him as possible.

“And so God killed them all,” the rabbis and priests and imams can preach to their classrooms. “That was wrong, children.”

“God threw Adam out of Eden for eating an apple,” they can caution their students. “That’s called being heavy-handed, children.”

Cursing all women for eternity because of Eve’s choices?

“That’s called collective punishment, children,” they can warn the young. “Don’t do that.”

“Boo!” the children will jeer.

This is a simple argument. If God is benevolent and omnipotent, He could have prevented this misery and death.  That means that if he exists, he’s either cruel or relatively powerless, and that’s not the conception of God held by any in the Abrahamic faith.

The existence of moral evil, like one human killing another, has been excused by various theologians as an unavoidable consequence of the free will vouchsafed to us by God, or by other sneaky and ludicrous devices of theodicy. But none of them explain physical evil—deaths by tsunamis, earthquakes, childhood cancer, and so on. And in this case, it’s not moral evil unless you conceive of God Himself as immoral—for it was God himself who caused all this suffering and death.  Again we run into a problem.

So it’s not just physical evil that is a death blow to the Abrahamic conception of God, but also God’s own maliciousness as described in scripture, Jewish, Christian, and Islamic alike. Who wants to believe in a God who lets innocent people suffer and die? “God’s ways are mysterious,” answer the theologians, but yet they seem to know everything else about God. It’s just the hard-to-understand stuff that they fob off as “mystery.”

Auslander’s ultimate lesson is to be kind and try to mend the divisions between humans:

This year, at the end of the Seder, let’s indeed throw our doors open — to strangers. To people who aren’t our own. To the terrifying them, to the evil others, those people who seem so different from us, those we think are our enemies or who think us theirs, but who, if they sat down around the table with us, we’d no doubt find despise the pharaohs of this world as much as we do, and who dream of the same damned thing as us all:

Peace.

Well, though Auslander’s  intentions are good, he’s wrong here. Not everybody dreams of peace. I know of certain Russians, for example, who dream of war.  So I’ll let Auslander have his “Imagine” moment here, but what I’d like NYT readers to take on board is Auslander’s argument against God from evil. It’s a syllogism:

a. God is omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent (assumption)
b. But the world isn’t organized as if it’s run by an omniscient and benevolent God (observation)
c. Therefore we must either conceive of a God who is malicious, weak, or sadistic, or else deny the existence of God.

I vote for the “no god” part of “c”. It’s more parsimonious.

I also vote for more such atheism in the NYT. After all Tish Harrison Warren spews her Anglican palaver in the op-ed section once a week. How often do we see an article like this? Shouldn’t atheism at least get equal time, especially given the absence of evidence for god?

h/t: Enrico

The Royal Society of New Zealand blows off those complaining about its treatment of the Satanic Seven; refuses to apologize for mistreating them

April 15, 2022 • 8:15 am

I don’t want to recount the whole story about how seven professors at Auckland University, three of them members of the Royal Society of New Zealand (RSNZ), wrote a letter to a magazine (“The Listener”) questioning whether Maori “ways of knowing” (Mātauranga Māori, or “MM”) should be taught along with and coequal to science, as the government is planning.

Because they questioned whether MM,, which is a collection of myths, superstition, legend, morality, some practical knowledge, and misinformation (i.e., creationism) should be taught as “science”, the “Satanic Seven” were largely demonized as racists. Two of the members (one recently died), were chastised in a tweet from the RSNZ, and then were investigated by the RSNZ because there were ludicrous complaints that their letter caused “harm”. They were eventually exculpated, but at the beginning the RSNZ put this statement on its website:

This statement criticizes the signing members by asserting that MM is science, that the modern definition of science is “outmoded” (presumably it should include creationism), and simply rejecting the assertions of their three members. This announcement is invidious, and eventually the RSNZ, after what seems to have been a complaint from London’s Royal society, took it down.

You can read more about this, and see the petition described below, at an earlier post. In the meantime, 73 fellows of the RSNZ—a substantial portion of the members—signed a petition complaining about the Society’s behavior  and making three motions:

We therefore move that:

1. Both the Society and Academy write to Professors Cooper and Nola, and to the Estate of Professor Corballis, and apologise for its handling of the entire process.

2. The Society reviews its current code of conduct to ensure that this cannot happen again, and in future the actions of the Academy/Council are far more circumspect and considered in regards to complaints concerning contentious matters.

3. The entirety of the RSNZ/RSTA entity be reviewed, examining structure and function and alignment with other international academies, and the agency given its Fellows upon whom its reputation rests.

The RSNZ responded that it would hold a special meeting on Wednesday to consider this petition. It did, but, as the notes below show, the RSNZ didn’t do squat, much less even vote on the motions.

An RSNZ member who will remain anonymous conveyed these notes to me abut the meeting. (Note: “RSTA” in the text below, which stands for “The Royal Society Te Apārangi”, is the same thing as what I’ve been calling RSNZ—”Royal Society of New Zealand”—whose full name is “Royal Society of New Zealand Te Apārangi.” The notes taken by the member are indented, while the are mine. Note the quotes from Māori experts affirming that MM is not science!

Notes on RSTA meeting 13 April 2022

The RSTA meeting involved about 100 people on site in Wellington and over 100 people online.

The meeting was held under the Chatham House Rule, which means participants can report on the “information received” but not on the identity of the speakers or their affiliation. This is supposed to facilitate open discussion. Of course participants were not allowed to discuss the Rule.

The next procedural matter participants were told was that there could not be a vote on any of the motions proposed.

One of the two facilitators explained that the President of RSTA, Brent Clothier, and the Chair of Academy Council, Charlotte Macdonald, would not be answering questions since this was about “you having your say.” To many it seemed, rather, that the facilitators were there to serve the RSTA executive in damage control. In accord with this rule the President and Academy Chair did not have to answer questions, repeatedly put, about how the message they both signed, denouncing the Listener letter-writers for things they did not actually say, and kept on the RSTA website for months, was decided upon and worked out.

After the mover of the motions spoke to them at length and corporate governance was then also spoken to, there was a little discussion of the ruling that there could be no vote on any of the motions proposed. But further discussion was blocked (except for one objection) when it was reiterated by the “independent” facilitators that it was “inappropriate” to have votes today, “not possible” because the rules of the Society do not allow it. True enough: this was one of the complaints, of course, that there is almost no way Fellows can have input, either by putting items on an AGM or calling for another meeting (at least RSTA agreed to this meeting, knowing that the widely-supported request for it had already become an embarrassingly public fact) or voting on issues.

There was some discussion of mātauranga Māori and science, including one early speaker who claimed that there were racist tropes in the Listener letter [JAC: You can read the letter here.] because it claimed that “indigenous knowledge is not science” and this was like saying “indigenous art is not art.” It was not said at the meeting that it is very strange to claim that it is racist to suggest that “indigenous knowledge is not science,” in view of the fact that leading Māori advocates of mātauranga Maori, Professor Sir Mason Durie, and of the decolonisation of education and research, Professor Linda Tuhiwai Smith, say the same thing:

“You can’t understand science through the tools of Mātauranga Māori, and you can’t understand Mātauranga Māori through the tools of science. They’re different bodies of knowledge, and if you try to see one through the eyes of the other you mess up. “

Sir Mason Durie, Vision Mātauranga Rauika Māngai [2nd Ed], 2020, p. 26

“Indigenous knowledge cannot be verified by scientific criteria nor can science be adequately assessed according to the tenets of indigenous knowledge.  Each is built on distinctive philosophies, methodologies and criteria.”

Durie, M. (2004) ‘Exploring the Interface between Science and Indigenous Knowledge’. 5th APEC Research and Development Leaders Forum. Capturing Value from Science.

And from the intellectual leader of the decolonisation movement, Linda Tuhiwai Smith (2016):

“[S]ome aspects of IK mātauranga are fundamentally incommensurate with other, established disciplines of knowledge and in particular with science, and are a much grander and more ‘mysterious’ set of ideas, values and ways of being than science.”

Smith, L., Maxwell, Te K., Puke, H., Temara, P. (2016)  ‘Indigenous Knowledge, Methodology and Mayhem: What is the Role of Methodology in Producing Indigenous Insights? A Discussion from Mātauranga Māori’. Knowledge Cultures 4(3): 131-56.)

But it was said that while it would now be racist to claim that indigenous art is not art, partly because art has fuzzy boundaries and because indigenous art contains such treasures, science has much sharper boundaries and rules, especially that anyone can propose or challenge ideas in science, and that there is no final say—positions directly at odds with the claims about mātauranga Māori by leading Māori:

“Māori are the only ones who should be controlling all aspects of its retention, its transmission, its protection.”

Aroha Te Pareake Mead, Rauika Māngai, A Guide to Vision Mātauranga, p. 33)

Most of the discussion of MM (and there wasn’t much) consisted of affirmations that it is valued (often as if this is an argument for its being science). No one of course argued otherwise at the meeting, and the Listener letter writers had explicitly affirmed its value, including for science, and that it should be taught—just not as science.

More of the discussion was on governance and RSTA’s engagement, or lack of it, with Fellows, and discouragement of free speech. There was certainly widespread agreement that there was insufficient engagement or space for input or discussion among Fellows.

A number of Fellows independently called for the apology to Garth Cooper, Robert Nola and Michael Corballis’s estate in motion 1 to be sent out by RSTA, and no one spoke against it. No one maintained that the RSTA acted correctly in their website denunciation or the removal of the exoneration of any suggestion of bad faith on the fellows’ part from the report of the Investigating Panel. To many, however, it seems unlikely that RSTA will take this request on board, although signed by the seventy-plus signatories of the letter to RSTA and supported again viva voce in the meeting.

On the other hand it does seem likely that the RSTA officers will have to take on board the widespread criticisms of the lack of accountability and engagement. But that seems entirely up to them and their readiness to move beyond protecting their positions. There is no concrete pressure on them except the moral pressure they may feel from the unhappiness of many about the current system.

The two “independent” facilitators will write a report to go to the RSTA executives, which they can then do what they like with it.

Those present at the meeting in person or online have also been given an email to write to, until late (5pm? midnight?) on April 14 (i.e. the day after the meeting) where they can send in written comments to the RSTA executive. [JAC: Of course I don’t have this email, and even if I did I would not publish it because it is for Fellows alone.]

So there it is: a meeting RSTA didn’t have to call (although it would have elicited still more international embarrassment had they not), but with the predetermined rule that there was to be no vote on any motion; and with wide affirmation of MM and RSTA’s support for it (whether or not as science was much less clear); and wide criticism of RSTA’s corporate structure and lack of accountability, of its poor engagement with its Fellows and discouragement of free speech; and an emphasis on the RSTA’s need to clarify its function and to shape its form to fit this function. But this criticism is at this point to be responded to entirely as they see fit by a self-policing executive.

In other words, the Royal Society of New Zealand feels no responsibility to respond to its members’ motions, or to investigate its own behavior. It can if it wants, but if it doesn’t want to—and I suspect this will be the case—it doesn’t have to. They’re likely hoping the kerfuffle will blow over. As for “meeting”, it was simply window-dressing: giving its members a chance to blow off steam.

The RSNZ has come out of this with not just egg on its face, but a massive omelet draped over its body.  They were wrong to demonize and publicly disagree with their members, they were wrong in their characterization of MM as “science” (do they even know what science is?), and they were wrong to stonewall and not respond to the members’ call for apologies and structural form.

The two members who were investigated, Drs. Robert Nola and Garth Cooper, have resigned from the RSNZ. A large number of the other members are disaffected. The RSNZ won’t do the right thing because it would be considered “racist”.

The institution is ridiculous and and should be mocked.

Hili dialogue mis-posted again

April 15, 2022 • 6:47 am

If you subscribe to this site and have a phone (or computer), you’ll have received an email message that the Hili dialogue was posted, but the link given probaably doesn’t work.  That’s because, for a reason I can’t fathom, the computer posted it as if it were April 14, so it would be in yesterday’s lineup.

I’ve fixed it now, and if you’re using a computer you’ll find today’s Hili post right below this one, or at this link.  It’s in the proper place, as all things should be.

The problem is under investigation, but all is well for now.

—Professor Ceiling Cat (Emeritus)
Proprietor

Friday: Hili dialogue

April 15, 2022 • 6:30 am

Good morning on the end of the “work week”: it’s Friday, April 15, 2021, National Ham Day. Note that after sundown today but before midnight, it is in special conflict with the Jewish sabbath. (Ham is unkosher and forbidden to religious Jews.) Here’s a ham-related joke (ask me about my bacon joke.)

An elderly rabbi, having just retired from his duties in the congregation, finally decides to fulfill his lifelong fantasy–to taste pork.

He goes to a hotel in the Catskills in the off-season (not his usual one, mind you), enters the empty dining hall and sits down at a table far in the corner.  The waiter arrives, and the rabbi orders roast suckling pig.

As the rabbi is waiting, struggling with his conscience, a family from his congregation walks in!  They immediately see the rabbi and, since no one should eat alone, they join him.

Shocked, the rabbi begins to sweat.  At last, the waiter arrives with a huge domed platter. He lifts the lid to reveal-what else?–roast suckling pig, complete with an apple in its mouth.

The family gasp in shock and disgust, they quickly turned to the rabbi for any type of explanation.

“This place is amazing!” cries the rabbi. “You order a baked apple, and look what you get!”

I’ll be here all year, folks! It’s also ASL Day, Good Friday, Jackie Robinson Day (see below), National Glazed Spiral Ham Day, National Griper’s Day, National Rubber Eraser Day, National That Sucks Day (indeed!), World Art Day. and Universal Day of Culture.

Stuff that happened on April 15 includes:

A good-condition first edition of this classic work will run you between $25,000 and $65,000:

  • 1865 – President Abraham Lincoln dies after being shot the previous evening by actor John Wilkes Booth. Vice President Andrew Johnson becomes President upon Lincoln’s death.

From Smithsonian Magazine, here’s a photo of the gun that Booth used to kill Lincoln:

Well, here’s the opening ceremony. The games were a great success, and USA fans would be pleased because Americans won the most medals:

  • 1912 – The British passenger liner RMS Titanic sinks in the North Atlantic at 2:20 a.m., two hours and forty minutes after hitting an iceberg. Only 710 of 2,224 passengers and crew on board survive.

Here’s the route up to the point where she sank (yellow star):

  • 1923 – Insulin becomes generally available for use by people with diabetes.

The first person to be treated with it for the disease was 14-year-old Leonard Thompson, injected on January 11, 1922 (this is the 100th anniversary of the substance used as a drug). He would have died within weeks without the drug; with it he lived 13 more years. Here’s an early vial:

He started on opening day, and although he went hitless, he scored the winning run (on base after an error) against the Boston Braves. Robinson went on to bat .297 for the season and was named Rookie of the Year. Many great black players never got a chance to play in the “major league” because of sheer bigotry. Here’s a short video about Robinson’s debut:

The oldest McDonald’s still in operation is this one, labeled “The oldest operating McDonald’s restaurant was the third one built, opening in 1953. It’s located at 10207 Lakewood Blvd. at Florence Ave. in Downey, California.” Remember, too, that Downey, California is where the Carpenters are from. Here’s the still-operating restaurnt; I implore a reader to go visit.

I still remember when burgers were 15¢, as were shakes and fries. Your whole meal: 45¢:

  • 1989 – Hillsborough disaster: A human crush occurs at Hillsborough Stadium, home of Sheffield Wednesday, in the FA Cup Semi-final, resulting in the deaths of 97 Liverpool fans.
  • 2019 – The cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris in France is seriously damaged by a large fire.

I saw it intact shortly before it burned, and I still can’t believe it happened. Here’s a news report about the fire, and we still have no idea what started it:

Notables born on this day include:

This contemporary portrait by Francesco Melzi gives us the only idea of what Leonardo really looked like:

  • 1707 – Leonhard Euler, Swiss mathematician and physicist (d. 1783)
  • 1772 – Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, French biologist and zoologist (d. 1844)
  • 1889 – Thomas Hart Benton, American painter and educator (d. 1975)

Benton liked jazz, and here’s his “Portrait of a Musiciian” painted in 1949:

  • 1894 – Bessie Smith, African-American singer and actress (d. 1937)

Here’s Smith’s hit “Downhearted Blues” from 1922:

  • 1907 – Nikolaas Tinbergen, Dutch-English ethologist and ornithologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1988)
  • 1912 – Kim Il-sung, North Korean general and politician, 1st Supreme Leader of North Korea (d. 1994)

Go to Wikipedia and have a look at all of his titles.  And he’s still considered the President of Korea!

  • 1922 – Harold Washington, American lawyer and politician, 51st Mayor of Chicago (d. 1987)
  • 1933 – Roy Clark, American musician and television personality (d. 2018)
  • 1959 – Emma Thompson, English actress, comedian, author, activist and screenwriter

I adore Thompson; here’s a top 10 compilation of her performances.

Those who Met their Maker (or not) on this day include:

  • 1764 – Madame de Pompadour, mistress of King Louis XV (d. 1764)[21]
  • 1865 – Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of the United States (b. 1809)
  • 1888 – Matthew Arnold, English poet and critic (b. 1822)
  • 1889 – Father Damien, Belgian priest and saint (b. 1840)

Father Damien tended the lepers of Moloka’i, and contracted leprosy, from which he died. Here’s a photo of Father Damien (now St. Damien) shortly before his death. The signs of leprosy are clearly visible:

There’s a list of the notable ones at the April 15 site.

  • 1980 – Jean-Paul Sartre, French philosopher and author, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1905)
  • 1986 – Jean Genet, French novelist, poet, and playwright (b. 1910)
  • 1990 – Greta Garbo, Swedish-American actress (b. 1905)

Greta Garbo had some friends, but she really did prefer solitude, not even showing up at the Oscars when she was nominated:

Here’s his gravesite. Given that he killed about 20% of his own people, it’s amazing that it still stands intact. Wikipedia labels it “Pol Pot’s grave in the Anlong Veng District of Oddar Meanchey Province”

The man was a cat lover for sure:

  • 2001 – Joey Ramone, American singer-songwriter (b. 1951)

News:

*Here’s today’s top-left headline in the digital NYT; click on screenshot to read:

And the news summary (I’ve posted more of it than usual):

Russian forces on Friday appeared close to capturing the strategic port city of Mariupol, a development that would be a significant victory for Moscow after a series of setbacks this week, including a tentative but looming European Union ban on Russian oil and the loss in the Black Sea of its flagship vessel, which Ukraine said it struck in a missile attack.

If confirmed, the strike on the Russian guided missile cruiser Moskva would be a serious blow to Moscow both militarily and symbolically — proof that its ships can no longer operate with impunity, and another damaging blow to Russian morale.

However, if Mariupol falls, Russia will be able to claim the land route from Crimea that it seeks. It could then send reinforcements to the eastern Donbas region, where it is now concentrating troops for what analysts predict will be a major offensive.

But Russia’s setbacks are real, leaving President Vladimir V. Putin so desperate for a victory that he could potentially turn to limited nuclear weapons, the director of the C.I.A. warned on Thursday.

It looks as if the promised evacuation of Mariupol never took place. The Ukrainian troops have been bottled up in two areas, and it looks as if the city is lost—for the time being.

The loss of the Russian cruiser is indeed a blow to Moscow, as it’s a setback for Russian plans to control the Black Sea coast and its city of Odessa, but I wonder if all the celebrating about it is symbolic: it is a nice Ukrainian victory, but won’t win the war for them. And it’s also a setback for Christianity, as the sunken vessel is supposed to have carried a piece of the True Cross! (I hope they saved it.    ). All I can say is either God works in mysterious ways, He hates the Russian troops (as he should) or that it wasn’t really a piece of the true cross, but one of a gazillon fakes:

*The Washington Post is tracking the progress of anti-abortion bills across America, and there’s a useful chart at their site. There are two new ones, pushed by Republicans, of course:

Two states this week approved bills that ban abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy, the latest actions as Republican-led states move swiftly to restrict abortion access. Kentucky’s ban, passed by the Republican-led legislature over the Democratic governor’s veto, took effect immediately. Florida’s governor signed a ban this week that is set to take effect in July.

Here are the states that have passed or are in the process of passing “15-week bans”, i.e. fetal heartbeat bills, which according to Roe v. Wade adhere to the Constitution:

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to predict that this fall we’ll see the demise of Roe v. Wade, and all hell will break loose as Republican legislatures vie with one another to enact the most draconian antiabortion laws.

*A NYT op-ed extols the story of the Exodus of the Jews from the Old Testament, saying that it’s pivotal in helping us argue against slavery and build a “just society”. But of that narrative, the Bible offers much more support of slavery. The problem for author Sharon Brous, a rabbi, is of course that the Exodus never happened: it’s fiction, a myth.  Doesn’t it matter that a made-up story is sad to inspire people to create a more just society? Perhaps that’s possible, but Brous never admits that the story of the Exodus is false.

*A 26 year old father of two (black) was shot to death by a Michigan policeman (white) after resisting arrest and trying to grab the cop’s taser. This followed a traffic stop. If you look at the video here, (in the Post article, though, you’ll see that it doesn’t look like the cop’s life was endangered. The officer wound up sitting on the guy’s back, who was face down, and fired a shot into the guy’s head.  I won’t say the cop was guilty until there’s an investigation or a trial, but do watch the video. Yes, it was a confusing arrest and the guy didn’t cooperate, but cops should pull their sidearm and fire only when they think their life is endangered or they’re at risk of serious injury.  Again, let’s see what the investigation yields (the cop’s body camera apparently was inactivated at some point during the tussle.)

*NJ.com reports that two women at a New Jersey women’s prison are pregnant via consensual sex. It wasn’t the guards who participated in the deed, but a transgender inmate who identified as a woman and thus got was entitled to be housed in the prison. (h/t Williams)

The developments follow a settlement agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of New Jersey last year, which stipulates that transgender prisoners should be housed in line with their gender identity.

That settlement stemmed from a lawsuit by a transgender woman who was sent to a men’s prison, where she alleged she received inadequate medical care and was abused by male inmates and staff.

Advocates hailed the agreement as necessary reform that moved New Jersey to the forefront of trans rights along with states like California and Massachusetts that have implemented policies on how transgender prisoners should be housed and medically treated.

The majority of transgender inmates in the United States are housed in prisons according to their gender assigned at birth and are often subjected to violence and harassment, according to an NBC News investigation published in 2020.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, I’m told that a new cat has shown up that looks much like Szaron. This has caused some confusion for Hili and Kulka:

Hili: Szaron is over there.
Kulka: You can’t be certain.
In Polish:
Hili: Tam jest Szaron.
Kulka: To wcale nie jest pewne.

Here’s a photo of Karolina from Kyiv reading, with Andrzej’s caption, translated by Malgorzata:

Karolina is looking for the best method of reading books in languages she doesn’t know yet.

In Polish: Karolina poszukuje najlepszej metody czytania książek w językach, których jeszcze nie znamy.

From Nicole and Stephen: A genuine “Bible bookplate” to paste in your Bible to facilitate learning it. Only $7.95 here, and waterproof! (Yes, it’s real, sold by a religious stuff store.) Click to enlarge:


An Easter photo from Bruce. I’d be scared too if I were in the clutches of a giant rabbit!

I haven’t read this article yet, but it’s in the WaPo and Bari Weiss said it was “couragenous” of the paper to publish it. That’s good enough for me; let’s read it together:

From Irena. Does anybody know what bird this is?

God is Hawking (those three words are a complete sentence) his new book, just out (buy it here for $20 in hardback, $11.99 in Kindle), and gives us a sample:

Here are the reviews on the Amazon page. I’m surprised Publisher’s Weekly liked it! (Of course, in America there’s no possibility for a starred review for such a book!)

“Wickedly funny…Readers who haven’t injured themselves laughing will be relieved to hear that doggie heaven is real, though it “doubles as mailman hell…No sacred cow goes untipped in this sidesplitting work.”—PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

“Those familiar with God’s Twitter, @TheTweet of God, know to expect the sacred but mostly the profane. Nothing is off the table… for those who finds truths twisted by sacrilege their cup of wine, well, bless you.”—BOOKLIST

“To die for!” — JOAN OF ARC

“Better than the Koran! I especially loved the nude picture of me on page 87!” — MUHAMMAD

“I stand corrected: God is back!”  — NIETZSCHE 

A tweet sent in by Ron:

From Gravelinspector, who notes the truefact that “Instagram is really cracking down on fake accounts and underage users.” He adds that “Instagram is going to demand a copy of the library’s driving license as proof of existence and age. Because you can’t exist without a driving license.”

From Simon: another academic take on an animal meme. Like Simon, I’m not sure who’s depicted as better here!

From Ginger K. who said she hoped this was satirical, and it is; Snopes gives us the details. Still, it’s funny:

Oh, Sarah, say it ain’t so!  Leonardo? Michelangelo? Raphael? Caravaggio?

This is the F**k you ship, and it’s now at the bottom of the harbor. The Ukrainians sank it! A tweet from and by Matthew:

Another tweet from Dr. Cobb:

 

Adelie penguin defends Emperor penguin chicks

April 14, 2022 • 1:45 pm

I haven’t seen Emperor Penguins in the wild, as their breeding spots on the ice are far away from tourist access, and that’s fine.  But they do have a long march to the sea when they’re growing up. In this video clip from BBC Earth, a group of juvenile Emperors is having their March to the Sea when they’re attacked by a giant petrel.  He doesn’t succeed in hurting them, though, and for several reasons. First, they form a defensive circle facing outwards, and one of the chicks takes a protective stance with its wings out. (I find this amazing, but surely it’s hard-wired into the juvenile nervous system.)

And then an aggressive Adelie penguin shows up, further protecting the Emperors. Adelies are very small but they don’t take guff. What I don’t get in the video is that the fluffy chicks, who haven’t yet molted into adult plumage, are said to be ready to swim. They’re not. They won’t start swimming and fishing until they get their adult plumage.