10 young schoolgirls killed by landmine

December 17, 2012

This was today.

AFP – Ten young girls were killed when a landmine exploded Monday while they were collecting firewood in eastern Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province, officials said. 

The girls, aged between nine and 11, died when one of them accidentally struck the old mine with an axe, Chaparhar district governor Mohammad Sediq Dawlatzai told AFP.

Nangarhar, Afghanistan or Newtown, Connecticut — No difference really for the children and their parents and families and communities.

But what should I make of  the “lavish” media coverage in the one case and the non-coverage in the other? or when  private grief is intruded upon while an outpouring of public grief seems stage-managed for TV cameras?

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Posted in Afghanistan, Behaviour, Media | Comments Off on 10 young schoolgirls killed by landmine

Nash Papyrus, Newton’s notebooks, Kalpasutra go on-line

December 16, 2012
Nash Papyrus at Cambridge

Nash Papyrus at Cambridge

(Reuters) – A copy of The Ten Commandments dating back two millennia and the earliest written Gaelic are just two of a number of incredibly rare manuscripts now freely available online to the world as part of a Cambridge University digital project.

The Nash Papyrus — one of the oldest known manuscripts containing text from the Hebrew Bible — has become one of the latest treasures of humanity to join Isaac Newton’s notebooks, the Nuremberg Chronicle and other rare texts as part of the Cambridge Digital Library, the university said on Wednesday.

“Cambridge University Library preserves works of great importance to faith traditions and communities around the world,” University Librarian Anne Jarvis said in a statement.

“Because of their age and delicacy these manuscripts are seldom able to be viewed – and when they are displayed, we can only show one or two pages.”

The university’s digital library is making 25,000 new images, including an ancient copy of the New Testament, available on its website (cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/), which has already attracted tens of millions of hits since the project was launched in December 2011.

The latest release also includes important texts from Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism.

In addition to religious texts, internet users can also view the 10th century Book of Deer, which is widely believed to be the oldest surviving Scottish manuscript and contains the earliest known examples of written Gaelic.

Treasures of the Library

Nash Papyrus

The Nash Papyrus is a second-century BCE fragment containing the text of the Ten Commandments followed by the Šemaʿ. Prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls it was the oldest known manuscript containing a text from the Hebrew Bible.

Kalpasutra

Traditionally attributed to Bhadrabāhu, the Kalpasūtra is a major canonical text of the Śvetāmbara Jains, composed in ArdhamāgadhīPrakrit, in a mixture of prose and verse, and containing the life-stories of the twenty-four Jinas, in particular Neminātha, Pārśvanātha and Mahāvīra.

Kalpasutra

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Posted in History | 1 Comment »

A “right” to bear arms must be constrained not to be a “freedom” to kill

December 16, 2012

I don’t believe there is any such thing as a “fundamental” human “right” or “freedom”.

Of course any society can establish whatever laws or rules and regulations it likes and insist – if it can – that its members follow these. Societies can define and adopt long lists of “fundamental human rights” or “freedoms” as privileges for their members. The granting of such “rights” does not – in itself – guarantee that members of that society always enjoy the rights accorded. Compliance with laws and rules and regulations is not in-built as with natural laws. Many of these “rights” and “freedoms” are contradictory and can be in conflict with each other. Some rights are used by some members to breach other rights and freedoms accorded to others. “Fundamental” freedoms are found to be unworkable and are then constrained or subjugated to other laws or rights. Some are made applicable to some and not to others. The will of the majority is expressed as laws for the majority which are sometimes used as a means for the oppression of minorities. Rights granted to individuals are subjugated to the rights assumed by the state. (It strikes me also that any “law” which does not in itself guarantee compliance is just a made-up rule and has no special “sanctity”. The “sanctity” of human laws is fundamentally suspect.)

None of the so-called human rights or freedoms are in fact fundamental or absolute in practice. Nor should they be. Common sense dictates that they must be constrained and circumscribed. But common sense is lost when the fanatical defense of any particular “right” takes on ideological proportions.

  1. The “right to life” is never absolute and is always circumscribed. States – and their organs – ascribe to themselves the right to take life in specific circumstances. Exceptions are made in cases of self-defense or abortions or accidents or actions in the service of the state.
  2. The “right of universal suffrage” is never absolute. There are always groups of individuals who are denied the right to vote (children, mentally disabled, resident non-citizens, criminals, certain occupations….)
  3. “Freedom of speech” is never absolute. What society considers to be libel, slander, blasphemy, hate or even politically incorrect is banned under pain of punishment.
  4. “Freedom of thought” is not as absolute as one may think. Thinking “terrorist” or “conspiratorial” thoughts is a punishable crime in many societies.
  5. The “right to liberty” is always constrained by the right of a state to incarcerate those it considers dangerous to society. Parents are allowed to curtail this right for their children. Doctors and hospitals are allowed to curtail the movement of their patients.

In the US it is self-evident that the “right to bear arms” is not sufficiently circumscribed. In spite of its implied “freedom to kill” it is fanatically defended to the point of absurdity.

The latest tragedy at Sandy Hook is part of a  long history of school shootings in the US  but the almost religious fanaticism surrounding  gun rights has so far held common sense at bay.

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Leaked IPCC draft report shows that global warming models are codswallop

December 15, 2012

The draft IPCC AR5 report has been leaked and is available on the net.

IPCC AR5 draft leaked, contains game-changing admission of enhanced solar forcing – as well as a lack of warming to match model projections, and reversal on ‘extreme weather’ 

Of course this is only the draft report and AR5 is not due to be final till the end of 2013. The political summaries are not yet finalised and there is still plenty of time for data to be cherry-picked to support the conclusions to be drawn. But what is clear is that climate models are a load of old codswallop!

Observations just do not support the alarmist global warming models. The impact of solar forcings are beginning to be acknowledged. The role of carbon dioxide emissions is nothing but conjecture.

One picture tells the tale.

Model predictions versus observations

Model predictions versus observations

Here is the caption for this figure from the AR5 draft:

Estimated changes in the observed globally and annually averaged surface temperature (in °C) since 1990 compared with the range of projections from the previous IPCC assessments. Values are aligned to match the average observed value at 1990. Observed global annual temperature change, relative to 1961–1990, is shown as black squares  (NASA (updated from Hansen et al., 2010; data available athttp://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/); NOAA (updated from  Smith et al., 2008; data available at http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cmb-faq/anomalies.html#grid); and the UK Hadley  Centre (Morice et al., 2012; data available at http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcrut4/) reanalyses). Whiskers  indicate the 90% uncertainty range of the Morice et al. (2012) dataset from measurement and sampling, bias and coverage (see Appendix for methods). The coloured shading shows the projected range of global annual mean near surface temperature change from 1990 to 2015 for models used in FAR (Scenario D and business-as-usual), SAR (IS92c/1.5 and IS92e/4.5), TAR (full range of TAR Figure 9.13(b) based on the GFDL_R15_a and DOE PCM parameter settings), and AR4 (A1B and A1T). The 90% uncertainty estimate due to observational uncertainty and  internal variability based on the HadCRUT4 temperature data for 1951-1980 is depicted by the grey shading. Moreover, the publication years of the assessment reports and the scenario design are shown.

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Posted in Alarmism, Climate, UN | 1 Comment »

Prolonging problems to keep selling the solutions?

December 12, 2012

While going through security checks at a number of airports this week, I got to wondering whether once a “commercial” solution to a “problem” has been “found” there is a tendency to keep the problem alive long after it is no longer a problem – just to keep the sales of a commercial solution alive. I was then sitting through a presentation by a start-up company in the carbon sequestration business and was struck by the fact the entire marketing strategy is built on building up a fear of carbon emissions and the strategy collapses if this false premise is abandoned. The  questions then started piling up:

  1. Airport Security – Is the vested interests of the security industry (manufacturers of scanning machines, security manpower companies etc.) such that the perceptions of security risks will never be allowed to diminish?
  2.  Computer security – Is there a vested interest of the virus protection software suppliers to ensure that perceptions of risks are never allowed to diminish? and does it extend as far as – directly or indirectly – helping the production of damaging viruses?
  3.  Renewable energy: All the billions spent in subsidising the development and deployment of  wind and solar power are in the pursuit of a solution to a problem that does not exist but where the vested interest is too strong to allow the perception of the problem to diminish or disappear.
  4. Carbon sequestration: As with renewable energy subsidies, the billions milked from tax money for the development of carbon sequestration systems now creates a vested interest in first denying that carbon sequestration is uselss for its stated objective and second that reduction of carbon dioxide emissions is irrelevant to trying to control climate (if at all such control is possible).
  5. Influensa vaccines. The benefits of vaccination against flu are dubious but the vested interest of the sellers of the vaccines in maintaining the fear of flu every winter  are obvious.

I feel sure there must be many cases where solution providers work to keep the problem alive and well.

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With malice aforethought

December 9, 2012

After 18 hours of travel I have been catching up on the news. I find I still can’t get Jacintha Saldanha out of my mind but the news today is still disturbing.  Now there are a number of apologists trying to play down the consequences of the hoax perpetrated by Mel Greig and Michael Christian and their radio station. Even Piers Morgan tried to play it down – but with his role in the hacking culture, that does not surprise very much.

 Daily Beast: “Prank calls have been going on for 50 years in the radio industry,” says Sandy Kaye, a spokeswoman for Southern Cross Austereo. “It is not designed to humiliate or embarrass.”

But of course it was meant to humiliate. 

 Globe and Mail: “As we have said in our own statements on the matter, the outcome was unforeseeable and very regrettable”. ….. 

Ms. Greig and Mr. Christian have both apologized. Rhys Holleran, chief executive of Southern Cross Austereo, said they were “shattered” and undergoing counselling.

Guardian: Editorials in Australian Sunday newspapers said the DJs were not responsible for the tragic death.

“While the prank may have been stupid, Mel Greig and Michael Christian surely did not mean to hurt anyone,” said the editorial in the Rupert Murdoch-owned Sunday Telegraph newspaper. “Prank calls are among the oldest tricks in radio. Occasionally funny, mostly cringeworthy, they usually result in mere pointless humiliation of a hapless victim.”

A columnist for the Fairfax-owned Sun Herald, Peter FitzSimons, said the death of Saldanha was a “tragedy of unspeakable proportions”. ….. He said there was not a shred of evidence there was any malice in the prank call. “Who could possibly have thought that a silly prank call like that – one of thousands of prank calls, no doubt, made by radio stations around the world on that day – would have led to the young woman taking her life?” wrote FitzSimons.

I got to wondering why I was getting so upset. And then I realised that it was because it was always the intention to humiliate someone for the sake of a few laughs. For the “prank” to succeed somebody had to get hurt. The humiliation was not unforeseen. The laughs were obtained. Whether Australians like it or not Mel Greig and Michael Christian represent the face of modern Australian humour.  And it wasn’t thoughtless as I have previously called it. It was a deliberate attempt – after legal consideration – to continue with the humiliation and for the station to play for the laughs even after she was dead.

I have heard regret about her tragic death but none of those responsible has expressed any regret or seen fit to apologise to her family for humiliating her. It is too late to apologise to her.

The perpetrators are to get counselling! Poor things! When in the depths of her humiliation and they were gloating on air, Jacintha Saldanha could have done with some but there was none forthcoming. A public birching or a period in the stocks might seem appropriate for these 2 bright sparks, but that just wouldn’t be right. But instead of getting counselling perhaps they could volunteer for a year or two at a hospital?

When Jacintha Saldanha filled in at the reception that night she had no reason to expect to be humiliated for doing what any conscientious nurse would have done. She should not have been. Malice at any time and even against the rich and famous cannot be  justified. But malice against someone defenceless and vulnerable is worse than contemptible.

For all the apologists for Mel Greig and Michael Christian and their radio station:

The humiliation was intended.

The laughs were obtained as intended.

With malice aforethought!

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Posted in Australia, Behaviour, Media | 2 Comments »

A short hiatus in warmer climes

December 8, 2012

Here in Sweden we are in the depths of winter and the days are getting pretty short. Sunrise is at 0834 today and sunset at 1503.

Still, in another two weeks the days will start getting longer again.

It’s been down to -20 °C and we have had our share of snow which needed some not inconsiderable shovelling but I probably needed the exercise.

Blogging will be very light for a week as I travel on an assignment to somewhat warmer climes.

I plan to be back before THE END OF THE WORLD.

Must be global warming

Must be global warming

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On murder by pranking

December 8, 2012

It is not the “prank” which disgusts.

It is the lack of thought by two giggling radio DJ’s and their managers. It is their juvenile behaviour. It is their lack of intelligence. It is their betrayal of the trust shown by someone trying to be helpful. And it is the utter disregard for what their victims might suffer.

It is the lack of thought for the consequences of deliberately trying to break the trust extended by the unfortunate staff who were the butt of their call. It should not be beyond the intelligence of even Australian radio DJ’s or their boss – Rhys Holleran – to have realised that in the event of their prank succeeding, some poor staff member would have faced the sack. It should not have been beyond their little intelligence that revealing the private medical details of a mother -to-be – no matter how famous the person – was a fundamental breach of an individual’s privacy. They deny the sapiens in homo sapiens.

Once many years ago my 5 year-old son fell on the ice and suffered a concussion while I was travelling in the US. He was kept in hospital overnight and my wife spent the night with him. By the time I got the message it was about 2am back home. I called the hospital and an extremely helpful nurse filled me in, reassured me and then woke my wife so I could speak with her. I am forever grateful to that nurse who took me at my word as to who I was. How else can a nurse – or a hospital –  operate except in an atmosphere of trust? How else could Jacintha Saldanha have reacted unless the hospital had routed all calls from all worried relatives through some faceless security system?

It was murder by pranking and Mel Greig and Michael Christian are guilty. Their legal advisors and the station management are also guilty. Jacintha Saldanha was their victim. This crime carries no legal penalty but it was a betrayal of trust. It was – in my book -criminal behaviour. Maybe it cannot be used to generalise about the media and their methods but it certainly does add to my view that the media are untrustworthy and many of their employees are unintelligent and unthinking. I doubt that they are capable of regulating themselves.

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Posted in Australia, Behaviour, Media | 2 Comments »

Nurse hoaxed by Australian call commits suicide

December 7, 2012

This is more than sad.

Update: The nurse has been named as Jacintha Sadanha. She was married with 2 children.

Update2: It is now early Saturday morning in Australia but there is as yet little regret for this childish prank gone horribly bad. Sky News Australia reports that “Sydney-based 2Day FM was continuing to promote its prank call on air during the early hours of Saturday morning in the city”.

The hoaxers, Mel Greig and Michael Christian will no doubt get away with it. After all it was just a clever prank call. They have been bragging about it all week. But can they really not have any responsibility? I can only begin to imagine the harassment and embarrassment and ridicule the poor nurse came under — which was probably multiplied several times by today’s social media.

Mel Greig and Michael Christian: image thesun.co.uk

The Independent:The nurse who took a prank phone call at the Duchess of Cambridge’s hospital has been found dead in a suspected suicide.

The woman received the phone call from two Australian radio presenters and, believing she was speaking with the Queen, passed it to a colleague who revealed private information about the Duchess’ condition.

An ambulance was called to the hospital this morning where the woman was found unconscious.

Paramedics made efforts to revive her but she was pronounced dead at the scene.

The nurse is understood to be the first person to be heard during a hoax call to the Edward VII Hospital from two presenters from the Australian radio station 2Day FM.

…. The woman nurse who has been found dead took the call from the radio DJs in the early hours of Tuesday morning saying: “Hello, good morning, King Edward VII Hospital.”

The presenter, Mel Greig, who was impersonating the Queen said: “Oh, hello there. Could I please speak to Kate please, my granddaughter?”

The woman answered: “Oh yes, just hold on ma’am.” ….

… The two hoaxers, Greig and Michael Christian, were put through to a second nurse who told them: “She’s sleeping at the moment and she has had an uneventful night. She’s been given some fluids, she’s stable at the moment.”

Update! Nurse named but hoaxers are silent

The hospital said in a statement: ““We can confirm the tragic death of a member of our nursing staff, Jacintha Saldanha.

”Jacintha has worked at the King Edward VII Hospital for more than four years. She was an excellent nurse and a well-respected and popular member of staff with all her colleagues.

“We can confirm that Jacintha was recently the victim of a hoax call to the hospital. The hospital has been supporting her at this difficult time.”

Hospital chief executive John Lofthouse said: “Our thoughts and deepest sympathies at this time are with her family and friends. Everyone is shocked by the loss of a much-loved and valued colleague.”

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Posted in Australia, Behaviour, Media, UK | 5 Comments »

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