What is it driving this Anti-Vaxxer phenomenon? I too am, I think, healthfully skeptical of the pharmaceutical lobby when it comes to rigour, transparency and the production of medicines as lifestyle accessorisers (potions to counter all those self-inflicted ailments), but I don’t feel that we ought to take for granted the science that’s really enabled population health in manner that’s seen little precedence in human history and risk resurgence of otherwise preventable diseases.
I feel that this anti-science drift, for what it’s worth, which includes the climate-change deniers—and no, questioning does not belie conspiracy but I think rather than educating themselves, some go along with the propaganda they know and see the counter-arguments as mere propaganda, too, evidence fabricated and institutions manipulative—has parallels in the last wave of worry—which although far from hysterical can and has been displaced by this movement of distrust for drugs and doctors. Americans were passionate about being spied upon—though the lack of outrage when they bought the lie that such eavesdropping activity was limited to overseas solicits little sympathy, and the tantrum subsided rather quickly. I am not sure how the revelation was received that the intelligence agencies are not staffed with savants and are bound by the same laws of mathematics that allow encryption to work and remain virtually imperviously to prying, and it was only that the big telecommunication conglomerates giving the secret agents the secret-knock that allowed them to get inside. Service providers may not have willingly surrendered to government pressure but certainly did not disclose the scale of collaboration either, and they managed to escape suffering too much damage to their reputation over public ire. We of course tell on ourselves too, and refrain passing judgment on the real peddlers of snake-oil.
Quartz Magazine features a very engrossing and inspiring profile of the unsung inventor, John Bannister Goodenough, who gave the world its mobility and galloping pace of miniaturisation with the lithium-ion battery. This robust and rechargeable power-source is in every electronic gadget worldwide and in the motors of hybrid vehicles, and I could imagine that the world might look very different if Goodenough had not found the right balance and combination to improve upon the transistor. Goodenough achieved his breakthrough at the age of fifty-seven—and now at the age of ninety-two, he’s far from ready to retire, believing that he can develop the next generation of storage-medium that could help finally wean the world off oil and start to reverse climate change. I wager that he’ll be about to deliver.
Though the popular myth that no one expected the Spanish Inquisition has been dispelled for the most part, it’s a pretty fun thing to proclaim and the phrase might have its origins in another Church culture struggle. In 1875 on this day, Pope Pious IX issued the encyclical called Quod Numquam, “What we never Expected” to Chancellor Otto von Bismarck and Prussian King Wilhelm I during the height of what was known as the Kulturkampf, the systematic dissolution of Church holdings in Protestant territories and discriminatory measures taken against the congregation, including the forced exile of priests and bishops. What was never expected was that the House of Prussia might turn its back on Catholicism, and though no on the level of the Crusades, clerics ignited a holy war to sue for the freedom of religious worship.
Via Reddit, an older speculative post on a blog called the Wood between Worlds by the self-described world’s worst scientist puts forward such a profoundly baffling psychological blind-spot that the imaginative explanation—that we are in our own parallel universe, seems pretty plausible.
A consortium of architects and civil engineers and some elements that advocate for the welfare of senior citizens in Germany are proposing (DE) that one way to address the housing shortage in metropolitan areas would be to provide pensioners with support and an incentive to move out of apartments that have gotten to be too big for them that would better accommodate young families with children. No one is proposing to force homesteaders out and of course retirees have the liberty to do what they want, but the logistical and financial help, finders’ fees and helping to arrange and pay for relocation, may prove amiable to some who feel otherwise tied to too big a place. What do you think about this idea? Most Germans are apartment dwellers and no one is occupying a McMansion but that still comprises a vertical neighbourhood, and I am sure something changes when the most veteran residents leave and are replaced with up-and-comers.
Back to World War III—though it’s hard to say when the declaration came, the sort of false urgency lent to housekeeping items that really could and ought to be tabled until cooler consideration can be paid, like breaking the internet or pushing through a shambles of a shady trade deal with international ramification usually seem to herald its beginning—it seems that the US is poised to directly, rather than its usual proximate warfare, supply armaments to certain factions in Ukraine.
Here’s a rather disheartening romp through the US public education system, now tossed into a Romano-Briton gladiatorial ring and pitted against the Christian text book publishing racket.
The poor defanged beasts hardly stand a chance, with what little financial support allowed to them siphoned off by quasi-private institutions that placate and patronise God-fearing parents with creationist curriculum. The twenty-two theses levied against the syllabus in the article illustrate not only droning ignorance but also unchecked propaganda and nutty conspiracies—which are not unique to this group’s agenda or even this day and age. Rather what appears most tragic in all of this, outlandish claims included, is in the disdain and contempt for which the programme holds for free-thinking and independent thought. Parents, both in the US and UK, may believe that their children are schooled nearer to God (or maybe at least a safe distance away from those Sharia magnet schools that everyone’s talking about) but it’s about as far as one can stray, since the instruction is very disengaging and fosters no curiosity, intellectual or spiritual.
