Monthly Archives: November 2016

Any idea on what these might be? Send your guesses to me in mail, using the link to the right, or huewhite.umb@gmail.com.

Laura Spinney in NewScientist (15 October 2016, paywall) reports on an effort to encode and process history. It’s named Seshat, for the old Egyptian god of wisdom:

Why was the New Kingdom so advanced, and what triggered its downfall? There is no shortage of theories, and each has its champions. This is the way history tends to work: theories are put forward, their strengths and weaknesses are discussed, and then they line up alongside all the alternative ideas. Like old sailors, they never really die. A new project called Seshat, after the ancient Egyptian goddess of knowledge, aims to change that.

Seshat is a vast and growing database of historical and archaeological knowledge that can be explored using scientific techniques. That makes it a powerful tool for testing and ultimately discarding hypotheses. “A cemetery for theories,” is how Seshat co-founder Peter Turchin at the University of Connecticut in Storrs describes it. By making history more evidence-based, he and his colleagues hope it will become more relevant. They believe that understanding the forces that have shaped human societies in the past will give us more power to predict the future – and perhaps even to direct it by advising politicians and lawmakers on how to avoid the pitfalls of the past.

I find that last line particularly interesting, because it’s another step along the way to specialization. They’re trying to remove any requirement that politicians have training in history, and replace it with simple advice. I have mixed feelings on this, since experts are more likely to get it right – while this would seem to be a core competency for a politician.

Which may, in fact, be one of the silliest statements I’ve ever made.

But I can’t help but remark on some of the best politicians, such as Churchill, had an active interest in history; while today, some of the worst seem motivated only by ideology and not by any well-grounded view of history. Oh, they may think their historical knowledge is excellent – but is it? My experience is that it’s often skewed. I particularly beware of auto-didacts, who tend to have strong, wrong opinions.

From the Seshat web site:

We believe that our approach is the best way to provide meaningful answers to some of the most important questions about the human experience – how and under what circumstances does prosocial behavior evolve in large societies? What roles do religion and ritual activities play in group cohesion and cultural development? What is the impact of climatic and the environmental factors in societal advance? What mechanisms translate economic growth into quality of life improvements for the average person?

Of course, “facts” can be open to dispute. Spinney explains:

The unit of information is a “fact”, which can take the form of a binary choice (presence/absence of writing, for example), a numerical value, or a range of values. Each fact is based on the consensus of specialist historians who meet periodically at workshops, first to decide which variables to consider, and then to validate the facts collected. Facts can be accompanied by text that expresses uncertainty or controversy and, critically, provides sources. The data spans 10,000 years from the dawn of agriculture to the eve of the modern era in 1900.

A fascinating foray into an area not easily modeled mathematically.

There’s no shortage of ridiculous claims the world over. Here’s a recent one from Turkey, as reported by Pinar Tremblay inAL Monitor:

Al-Monitor reported in June that Islamist groups in Turkey have intensified their efforts around the Hagia Sophia. Today, the urging to open it as a mosque and for Erdogan to lead Friday prayers there has reached fever pitch. For proponents of the change, the Hagia Sophia as a museum symbolizes Turkey in chains; for independence to be complete, it must become a functioning mosque. A group called “Free Hagia Sophia” tweeted after the July 15 coup attempt, quoting a prominent religious scholar, “If we turn Hagia Sophia back into a mosque, all Turkey’s hard times and troubles will end.”

The Hagia Sophia is a former Greek Orthodox Church and Imperial Mosque, but now a museum. Precisely how returning it to its former status as a imperial mosque will end the hard times of Turkey is not entirely clear; it might be better understood that, rather than Turkey, the hard times for Muslims in Turkey will end. In other words, if Islam is not the pinnacle of political power in Turkey, if Turkey is still perceived as a secular nation, then Islam is suffering.

Thus religion as a vehicle for political ambition. And, by shifting away from the secular ladder of power to the religious ladder of power, the person whose qualifications are in the religious realm gains over those with secular qualifications. Not that I’m deluded to believe the latter is always more appropriate – politics can do strange things – but a religious qualification is, strictly speaking, never useful except for evaluating candidates for loyalty. I do not care if someone worships the Flying Spaghetti Monster when he’s flying a fighter jet – they’d better have the technical qualifications or that jet’s going to end up as a smoking heap of junk.

And the Hagia Sophia was an imperial mosque, denoting not only its official governmental function, but a certain military aggressiveness. So much for Turkey’s NATO ambitions…

MPR reports on the rising insurance rates:

Insurers have seen short-time policy holders drop their coverage and stop paying premiums after completing expensive medical treatments, said Schowalter, a former Minnesota budget commissioner.

Which defeats the purpose of insurance — which is to pool the resources and pay the costs of those who incur them from the group. But I suppose those doing that think they’re being smart; it might not hurt to announce that those folks will be remembered and placed in more expensive plans in the future. Even if they don’t actually follow through.

He also said there is evidence people in government health coverage are being steered into the private insurance market because their providers will get paid more that way. “That’s a serious concern that state regulators have been looking at as well as federal regulators.

This is opaque to me.

Since 2014, two carriers have pulled out of Minnesota’s individual market after suffering heavy losses. Those that remain have average premium hikes ranging from 50 to 67 percent, depending on the carrier. Most have limited the number of people they’ll cover.

Limiting the number of people they’ll cover … given how insurance works, either I don’t understand something or that’s madness.

Minnesota insurers underpriced their products initially to capture a bigger share of the individual market Wagner said. But since the federal Affordable Care Act changes took effect in 2014 they’ve collectively lost hundreds of millions of dollars on individual and family coverage.

So where does this money go? MPR’s expert, health economist Jean Abraham, closes the report with a warning:

The last drabs we found on Iglehart…

A reader comments on the ongoing ACA problems:

While I’m not among those that want to throw the ACA out completely, I still believe the health care _insurance_ system is completely broken.

All these $100/month people?! In what imaginary place is that? The first year (last year) I was on non-employer sponsored coverage, it was about $800/month. This year, it was over $1000/month. Next year, it will be $16000/month. That’s a 25% increase over last year to this year and a 60% increase from this year to next. And this is Minnesota.

And this is for a plan that has not paid any money yet, despite surgery and many thousands of dollars in bills, because the deductible is so high. If next year goes like this year, I will pay $20,000 for the privilege of being insured, and the only “benefit” I will get is “discounted” bills from the doctors but bills I have to pay nonetheless. At this rate, I will go broke before I can qualify for Medicare. Medicare, which if I can make it that long, may be the only chance I have of saving my financial health.

I’ve read that for most people in the America these days that life is a one strike and you’re out game — i.e. one health care disaster and you’re homeless.

So it’s not ACA that’s really broken, but rather a question of why rates continue to rise.

A reader sent this video on how a Diebold voting machine can be manipulated.

Technically, it’s not much – but the reaction of the one lady is quite affecting.

navajo on The Daily Kos continues his (?) her coverage of the pipeline dispute at Standing Rock:

A large grassfire was started last night, October 29-30, around midnight west of the main Oceti Sakowin Camp on a nearby hill. The startled Water Protectors were calmed by forest firefighters in the camp who quickly assessed that the fire would burn itself out. Video shows the fire was deliberately set as a long-range camera shows numerous dollops of new fires being started on the outskirts of the fire.

So warfare against American Indians continues for those who worship at the idol of money.

The Vincent Price vehicle War-Gods of the Deep (1965, aka City Under the Sea) is, at its heart, about a chicken. Not a rooster, but an everyday chicken named Herbert, who is the pet of a mediocre artist. Set in perhaps the late 19th century or early 20th, we see the artist kidnapped while searching for a missing woman, and in its sudden effect on the chicken, we see how impulsive actions most often lead to deleterious effects.

But Herbert keeps her chin up, and in so doing inspires the artist, a naturally retiring, even timid, man into the rescue of the aforementioned missing woman. Despite the great mass of water above the caverns in which the chicken finds herself, and the great volcano that is threatening this underground city and its inhabitants, the occasional appearance of her head poking from her picnic basket permits her to lead the two men, who find themselves in a predicament of an imminent volcano on one side, and the threats of a smoothly mad Captain (Price) on the other, out of danger.

How can we tell the Captain’s mad? Having found his way down to the caverns 100 years ago, the atmosphere has subtly changed him and his men, so that now he’s immune to aging – but can no longer return to the surface, where he left his wife. All that is a subtle hint, but we know madness, smooth and subtle, has descended upon him when he learns there’s a chicken within his reach – one he could eat, after more than a lifetime of fish.

And he makes no move to confiscate and fricassee our heroic chicken.

Desperate to save his city, the Captain has been using another race of beings (oh, it’s logical, really, it’s logical) to steal books on tectonics, hoping to snuff the volcano, and in one book he discovers the artist’s sketch of the woman – she’s a dead ringer for the Captain’s dead wife (it’s all so apropos). Thus, he has kidnapped the woman.

Under the steady encouragement of Herbert the chicken, the artist leads the rescue of the woman, and then, as the volcano hiccups, they make a break for the surface. The path is via the sea, and our human protagonists must wear ornate diving costumes worthy of the Nautilus.  For a moment, my Arts Editor and I wondered: was this when we would see our heroic hen, Herbert, sacrifice herself for the greater good? We saw no dive costume fit for a chicken!

But, no, for it turns out Herbert likes hands-on management, and shares the diving helmet of the artist. And so Herbert helps throughout the confusing battles between the escapees, the other race of men, and the immortals armed with dart guns. The jiggling of the camera and the anonymous costumes left us considerably bewildered as to who might be winning in this epic battle.

Then our protagonists return to the city (ummm?) in time for a showdown with the Captain; however, it is spoilt as the volcano, ever the screen-hog, intervenes with tremors galore, rendering most of the Captain’s men (those he hasn’t executed out of hand) hors de combat. Herbert’s very life is imperiled, but at the last moment all is risked to save her neck, and then we get a bonus: at this juncture we reach the climax of the movie: the Captain is groped in a truly Trumpian manner, as the giant hand of a stone statue falls and imprisons him.

Once again, there’s a lumbering exit from the city via the sea, another encounter with underwater warriors, with more definitive results, and a final pull from the grasping ocean. Meanwhile, the Captain meets his final fate (one would think a Trumpian goose would be enough).  As he sees the sun for the last time, he withers with age and dies.

No doubt, Herbert lobbied to take a victorious peck at the Captain, but the director gave Price the dignity of his character’s death. Meanwhile, the volcano finally achieves climax in a wonderful gasp of fire and clouds; perhaps, we may hope, a new island is to be born, fit to become … a chicken sanctuary.

And if you think this review is a recommendation to see this movie, go back and read it again.