Norman Greenbaum

Before "Spirit In the Sky" with its fuzz bass, Norman Greenbaum was part of Dr. West's Medicine Show and composed this half-psychedelic, half-Roaring 20s novelty hit. 

Believers noted "Spirit in the Sky" was theologically weak right from the start. No Christian would say "Never been a sinner, I never sinned."  It seemed to be one of those California Jesus Freak things. People now know Greenbaum grew up in an observant Jewish family - big surprise, I know. But still...California or maybe Colorado or something. 

Well, there is even more to the story than that.  He was from Malden, MA, and was obsessed with Westerns as a boy.  What he was picturing was being inspired by a cowboy "dying with his boots on." Looked at from that perspective, a vague, general I've been a good person would be about what an average Jewish boy might think of Cowboy Christianity.

Less Parenting

 The Free Press has a new article The Secret to Parenting:  Do Less of It. I don't need to read it to know that I agree with it.  I often say to young couples about children "Have more children and pay less attention to them.  They'll be fine." It is analogous to the Rules of the House of God in the book of the same name about medical residency after med school.  The chief resident would tell the first years do as little medicine as possible. This was not laziness, but wisdom.  Over time, the author learned that the second half of the lesson was save it for when you really need it. The same applies for parenting.  Some children will require a lot (though even those should have as mujch time on their own as can be managed). All children will have episodes where they requirte more parenting. We found that once we mutually reached the conclusion that the current behavior required some sort of heightened response, defining what was wrong usually pointed to the answer.

I wish we had learned the lesson earlier.  Our first son in particular could have benefited from less pressure.  He would have done as well with half the effort. The three adopted sons all had periods when they needed more intervention, but we had learned to back off more by then and it was doable. 

Another Aspect of Concern For The Poor

 We discussed the restoration of Lazarus to life this morning, and specifically the oft-mentioned verse "Jesus wept." Why would he weep?  He knows that he is going to raise him.  Everything will be good again. At first glance it makes no sense.  Lewis offers that it is because Death is still the ultimate indignity. We skip too quickly over that part when we contemplate our own resurrection.  It wasn't supposed to be this way. Jesus was there for the creation of life and the creation of man, and he knew better than any other what was lost. That is in fact why his rising again is important. Without it, the good creation, Life, goes under the waves and is lost forever.  Everything was for naught. Joy would have meaning only for a moment, and suffering would have no meaning at all. 

I have always thought that the fatalist "death is part of life" is a twisting of the meaning. Death is not part of life; the new life transcends death, it does not negate it. 

Jesus does not evade this, he leans into it.  People are always dying, always being born blind, always going hungry.  When he says "the poor you will have with you always" he emphasises this. This world and perhaps the whole of creation is fallen and that will never be fixed, only transcended, especially on the last day.

This is why looking to fixes in this world is dangerous.  The fantasy is that if we just allowed the market to work freely, or just taxed the 1% more, or created more technical marvels then things would be fixed.  Even if we scale that back to "well, I mean pretty much fixed" the temptation is unchanged. It is the desire to get away from the shared pain, to have done with it all and be able to go outside and play. 

Any of our endeavors might help, and we should put great effort into that because of the life that we share with all the others.  But the temptation to want things to be fixed eventually descends into horror and cruelty, because we will excuse great cruelties and injustice in order to achieve this unachievable goal. I don't know how many tip-offs there are of this, so that we might recognise in ourselves that this demon has inhabited us.  But one is certainly when we believe that it is someone else who must fix it, that we have no part in the work at all. 

I had a patient years ago who was so delusional that he was unemployable. He collected a disability check, but felt he still should always do what he could for others. He got up every morning and swept the sidewalk on his block. It was the landlords' job, and the city's job, and the shopkeepers' job, but it was something he could do, so he did it. In the winter he would shovel it before sweeping it.  When he got old and could not shovel so much he felt bad about it. He also thought because he had food he should always give some away. When manipulators and thieves would take advantage he hit upon a new scheme.  He made a little extra each meal and would bring that little down to street level and look for someone to give it to.  I only knew bob a short while forty years ago but his example has stuck with me.  He had found a way to not only give back, but to be part of.  

We are called to be forever part of helping. Solving is a skill that can greatly aid helping, but solving is also a great temptation that leads to despair, and anger, and blaming others. The bastards.  Everything would be solved if it wasn't for them.

Shadow of My Own Heart

 

I had not ever heard of her.  Janis Joplin was considered the pioneer of white-girl-sings-the-blues, but Rose brings more style, more pain, a few years earlier. Come to think of it, I'll bet there were plenty before Joplin, but not in my ken.

Was Aethelred Really That Unready?

Aethelred only partly-deserves his bad rap in the history books.  His military actions are generally condemned, but even at that, he had a harder road than most other kings.  The Danish invaders were more formidable in the late 900s than even the Great Heathen Army of 865.  Aethelred bought them off for much of his reign, but did choose to fight them in ineffective ways intermittently. Buying them off was probably the best strategy most of the time - history teaches that wars are always more expensive than we pretend when we go in - but in retrospect historians thought this only encouraged the Danes to look at England as a renewable resource for raiding.  Better, they thought, to have defended fiercely at some earlier times. Yet he turned the tide a bit by hiring some Danes to protect England against other Vikings. While this is always a risky strategy, it can work for a long time.

So easy to say in retrospect. The disastrous Battle of Maldon was under Aethelred and considered partly his fault, but as the poem commemorates, the decisions of others were the problem.  It is one thing to say later if we were going to fight so arrogantly and stupidly it would have been better to buy them off this time as well, had the English fought and won then the subsequent raiding would probably have been different.  In that context, the execution of many already-settled Danes was a second disaster, because it gave the invaders reasons for revenge in addition to loot. None of it worked out, and it is agreed that he was not a good judge of character and chose terrible advisors.  This was ironic given that his name Aethel-red means "nobly-advised." 

Yet that is the real meaning of "Unready" at the time. It meant poorly-advised.  (Those who took German or know a bit of its history will recognise Rathaus as "advice-house" or town hall.) When he wasn't supporting the various nobles who were out for themselves rather than for him or for England, he did reasonably well. Despite the attacks and hemorrhaging money the institutions of government, not created by him but still new and potentially insecure, continued to function so that trade, law, the Church, and agriculture held up through it all.  More recent scholarship has tried to describe how exactly Aethelred accomplished this, but it is first noted that the whole thing might have collapsed but it didn't.  He must have done more than a few things right. Then, as now, people take for granted that life goes on and has some day-to-day predictability. But survival and success are never guaranteed. The take wisdom and effort to remain in place.

Sunday Links

Universal Basic Income has little to no effect in developed countries, but yet another study shows effectiveness in a poorer country 

A couple of years ago I highlighted the gathering of obesity research done at SMTM that point to chemical exposures, primarily lithium, as being the main culprit for weight gain. At the time, there was not much that consistently worked for weight loss, only calorie reduction and increased activity, which tends not to be sustainable. It sucks when reversing what got you into this mess doesn't seem to help get you out of it.  In response to a collection of criticisms, SMTM updates its defense, and I think the case looks even stronger now.

Why Is Switzerland So Rich? 

It's not just that Wikipedia gets it wrong, it's that they won't back down   

Jonny Steinberg on South African Crime and Punishment, the Mandelas' Marriage, and the Post-Apartheid Era.  "The writer of one of Tyler’s favorite books of the last decade on cops who won’t police, a marriage that shaped a nation, and the optimistic case for South Africa." I liked the podcast because it revealed how wrong my supposed knowledge about South Africa was. Oppressions I believed in were false, and ones I hadn't thought about were true.

Wind Off the Hilltop

 Earl has placed new material on his site, and surprised me with poems by Dorothy Parker.  I admit, I have only known her as a wit and an epigrammist (Asked to use the word horticulture in a sentence she said "You can lead a horticulture, but you can't make her think.") But her poetry! 

 The Little Old Lady in Lavender Silk
 

I was seventy-seven, come August,
  I shall shortly be losing my bloom;
I’ve experienced zephyr and raw gust
  And (symbolical) flood and simoom.

When you come to this time of abatement,
  To this passing from Summer to Fall,
It is manners to issue a statement
  As to what you got out of it all.

So I’ll say, though reflection unnerves me
  And pronouncements I dodge as I can,
That I think (if my memory serves me)
  There was nothing more fun than a man!

In my youth, when the crescent was too wan
  To embarrass with beams from above,
By the aid of some local Don Juan
  I fell into the habit of love.

And I learned how to kiss and be merry—an
  Education left better unsung.
My neglect of the waters Pierian
  Was a scandal, when Grandma was young.

Though the shabby unbalanced the splendid,
  And the bitter outmeasured the sweet,
I should certainly do as I then did,
  Were I given the chance to repeat.

For contrition is hollow and wraithful,
  And regret is no part of my plan,
And I think (if my memory’s faithful)
  There was nothing more fun than a man! 

 

Some others

Sanctuary 

Song of Perfect Propriety 

Inventory 

Concern For The Poor

I know people who do nothing I can see for the poor but are very quick to illustrate how much they care about them by complaining that other people don't care about the poor. I don't think I need to give examples. I was going to accuse them of desiring simple solutions that don't cost them much personally because they actually don't care about the poor.  They want something that allows them to stop having to think about it. I thought this about the Affordable Care Act, because of which Son #5 has had to spend lots of money his entire adulthood to purchase insurance that doesn't get him much medical care. Yet so many people breathed a sigh of relief when it was passed because they could now pretend it was solved and not think about it.

But this is what writing is good for.  In marshaling my arguments against these people, I recognised a lot of holes in my case. I don't know what these people actually do for the poor, or for humanity in general.  They may give a great deal in secret. (Okay, the ones I am thinking of almost certainly do not, but it's a slippery slope.) They may have relative they support who would be in dire straits without them. That in turn reveals that I don't have a clear definition of what I even mean by "caring for the poor." They may time or concern or prayer that I know nothing about. They might also not be avoiding doing anything as already shouldering the burden for some relative and not wanting it to get worse. If we all helped just a bit it would be a big deal for them. It's hard to accuse that group of selfishness. 

Lastly, the accusation looks back over its shoulder at me: "An' what are you doin' for them, mate?" 

The people who want those simple solutions are likely those with the better imaginations who are haunted by the suffering of others - and who wants to be haunted? The realise there isn't much they can do themselves, so they hope that taxing billionaires or improving the local tax base or overthrowing capitalism will bring them peace. When I make it personal like this I understand their motivation better.  They want it to go away because it hurts. It is tough to accept that the poor will always be with us, that we will always hurt, and that we cannot get away from it by leaving it to others. Trying to do that only deadens us. 

Saturday Links

 From ACX October links: T Greer on Trump’s flip-flopping Ukraine-Russia policy (X): “Every administration since Clinton comes in determined to reset US-Russian relations, to clear away old legacies and bad blood. Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump I, even Biden. It is the swampiest of all swampy ideas, resetting relations with the Russians. It never works.” 

A Billion Years of Sex Differences 

The Science of Snickers  Caramel has to be done at 240-245 degrees Fahrenheit. That seems like a narrow window.

Political Extremists are the same under the skin 

Political Symbolism and Social Order The study argues that Confederate monuments actually reduce violence against Blacks because they reinforce the white supremacist order and white people feel comfortable with that.  Tearing them down makes the white people insecure and they get more violent to reassert supremacy.  I think a couple of things are being missed here. First, white-on-black crime is very low to begin with, and political versions are even lower, so the amounts being measured are small.  Secondly, the whole study is related to data from Reconstruction and a century ago, with this hand-waving idea "and it's just the same now." The modern data is...more sparse. Thirdly, if you go into any town and start tearing down its monuments there is going to be a baseline level of people who feel interfered with and annoyed, and that doesn't seem to be accounted for here. All measured violence is because of white supremacy, not for the insults, accusations, assumptions, or disruptions. The study does have formulas which give it an air of precision, though.

It's Official

 There has been a language change, from progressive exaggeration.  When someone now says "Well, it's official..." they mean something near the opposite. It is no longer used to signify that some authority has certified a thing, it means some new occurrence has brought to the point of no return, or sometimes, the people I disagree with have admitted how evil they really are.  

We hear it most often about politics, but it's multipurpose.

"Well, it's official, the Democrats have declared war on the rest of the country."

"Well, it's official, Donald Trump is cancelling the 2028 elections."

"Well, it's official, the Presbyterians have denied the gospel of Jesus Christ."

"Well, it's official, the school board doesn't care about special-needs children."

This will be followed by some minor and often obscure news that they want you to pay attention to, because it proves what they have been saying all along. As with most hyperbole, there was originally some meaning behind it, treating some major event as the final straw, that everything but an official declaration had occurred, and we should be aware of our real situation.  But of course that is just too delicious to leave alone.  It's fun to perceive things that others have missed, to look smarter than the rest. The temptation is to prove yourself a True Princess by detecting the pea under so many mattresses. Progressive padding was likely inevitable. 

The Way Old Friends Do

 

The Mississippi Miracle

A few South Central states - Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Alabama - have all seen recent gains in measured school testing.  They have been among the worst for years and are now average or better. I am suspicious of any education miracles, because they tend not to scale up, or persist, or measure what they say they do.  OTOH, even small well-distributed improvement is much to be desire. 

Here is some of the debate, courtesy of Astral Star Codex

Kelsey Piper stresses that it is literacy and continuing education for teachers focused on curriculum.

Freddie deBoer reminds us that there are no education miracles. (And he's got a list, which probably includes your favorite solution that you are just sure would work)

Derek Deek thinks there might be a little something to it, but not much. 

Natalie Wexler insists that phonics only gets you so far She likes the better teacher training, though.

Kelsey Piper shares some of the critics' doubts but still defends the strategies 

So many good observations and arguments were made that I don't want to muddy the waters much. I will note the following:

Some of the data is over more than a decade of (slower but sustained) improvement.  Some of it is flashy but only a few testing seasons.

Improvement was concentrated among but not confined to the worst students. 

Teacher training has included untraining - stressing that some popular things have been shown to be ineffective.  Note that these are not necessarily damaging, as critics sometimes accuse, but simply ineffective. 

Thursday Links

 Brain Difference Between Psychopaths and Normals Psychopaths have a 10% larger striatum than non-psychopaths, suggesting biological differences in brain structure. This enlargement is tied to impulsivity and a higher craving for stimulation. I wonder if this is part of what we see in the differences in criminality and violence that I have posted about recently. In some domains I have higher impulsivity and need for stimulation.  I'll have to think about what that means and where the divide it.

Parallel Parking Championship  I sent this to Son #5, Kyle, who is masterful at this.

Go over and check out a few controversial topics at Grokipedia versus Wikipedia. Bernadine Dohrn (21 mentions of violence, 16 mentions of bombings) versus Bernadine Dohrn (no mentions of violence except in the footnotes, one mention of bombing). Or compare Alger Hiss versus Alger Hiss.

In Almost All Fictional Worlds, God Exists, by Robin Hanson at Overcoming Bias, linked by Rob Henderson  It’s not that a deity appears directly in tales. It is that the fundamental basis of stories appears to be the link between the moral decisions made by the protagonists and the same characters’ ultimate destiny.  

The tylenol/autism brouhaha is an escape hatch for RFK Jr. who wanted to claim it was vaccines but had to settle for this, which is going to amount to a medication long off-patent having to put a warning label on.  To repeat: the increase in autism diagnoses is a product of progressively milder symptoms being allowed for diagnosis. It doesn't mean they "aren't real" - there were misdiagnoses fifty years ago as well. Behavior is complicated. 

Model Cities

Articles about Model Cities are usually just "great ideas some people have" plus some drawings and proposals.  But ACX is keeping track of things worldwide - it is clearly a topic that Scott Alexander has a fondness for - and gives updates on actual projects, some with land, buildings, and people.  The Bahamas, California, Honduras, Sierra Leone, and brief reports on a few others. 

Wednesday Links

 People Versus Things I am not surprised that there is a preference between men and women, but I am surprised how strong it is. More freedom equals more revealed preference rather than constrained preference.  In poor countries both sexes are under pressure to choose whatever pays more.  Not so in developed societies.

Asch's Moral Conformity effect also holds when the companions are online. It worked for half the dilemmas, anyway. It is easier to go along with the group.

TL:DR Will AI Solve Medicine? Is AI saving us any time if we have to read about it so much? The little I did read was interesting. It sould be a great podcast if you are taking a five-hour round trip anytime soon.

Bird Dog is back from France and wherever, so Maggie's Farm is back up. 

I don't read books anymore.  I'm in two book clubs and have to force myself to read things that should interest me.  I am reading Hidden Gospels by Philip Jenkins and loving it each time I pick it up - which is seldom.  I am not who I was. Part of it is falling asleep. Most of it is that I want summarised information, which is now available in abundance. 

The Psmiths review John McWhorter's Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue, which I read years ago and liked. It is thorough enough that it is actually a summary of the book - in case you also prefer that now. But she does give some outside information as well, such as Have I mentioned that John McWhorter is a language contact specialist? If you move in the right circles, his theories about creoles are more contentious than his thoughts on affirmative action. Fun to know.

Water Skiing

 This was my era on skis, beginning at Baptist Pond in Westford in 1959. 

The high point of this one is seeing Princess Margaret smoking with a cigarette holder about halfway through.

 

Technology Replacing Us

 David Foster has a review of Peter Gaskell's Artisans and Machinery, which Tyler Cowen also recently reviewed (interior link). Gaskell is very worried about the social changes that are already under way that are destructive to jobs, to the family, and to morals.  In Great Britain in 1836. I picked up quickly what Foster highlights about the changes. Gaskell rhapsodises about the age of Squires and good fresh air.

Gaskell explicitly states that he does not mean to portray the pre-industrial times as any kind of Arcadian paradise, but to a considerable extent he does just that. His almost entirely positive portrayal of the Squire would, I suspect, have been roundly mocked by those living within the domains of a fair number of real-life squires. 

I thought of Dickens's London (and Blake's "dark satanic mills*"), which in detailing the horrible conditions of the poor in the cities neglects that people have come to these places of their own free will.  However bad conditions were, they preferred them to life in the country. Steam power may have been replacing the employment of weavers, but the weavers did not go back to the farm. 

We will naturally think of comparisons to our own day and the dire warnings about AI and robots. I'll not say that it won't be true this time just because it wasn't true then.  After all, the arrival of my ancestors in Europe in the 3rd Millennium BC wiped out a more advanced civilisation, as did the Sea Peoples in 1187BC.  It's not all upward trajectory. But David touches on that only briefly.  He stays put in the Industrial Revolution and its effects because there's plenty to reflect on there.  It's a fun read.

*In the popular understanding.  Blake's meaning is more complicated. 

Update:  Right on cue just after I hit "post," Aporia sent me Video: You're Going to Be Replaced I haven't looked at it, I only note the irony.

Tuesday Links

 Banning cell phone use during class resulted in higher test scores. As Gurwinder says, it's an easy intervention, and unlikely to do any harm. 

The microplastics worry is based on sloppy studies. 

Tyler Cowen has a theory that had not occurred to me about Trump's foreign policy goal: A unified Western Hemisphere as a counter to China's rising power.  Well, it's a theory.  And it's a fascinating new way to look at things. It does rather fall into the "first, catch your rabbit" category.

Bskings True Crime Part 5 is up. 

Seth Dillon of the Babylon Bee sees bad ideas, particularly antisemitism, rising on the Right.  This ties in to my previous comments about double-siloing. The internet allows groups within groups to talk almost exclusively with each other, having little contact with larger trends. Not only are these not your grandfather's conservatives, they aren't even your children's conservatives. There was something of this among both evangelicals and libertarians in the 80s and 90s