Ho Hum & the State of the Union

Didn't take notes, just listened.

First impression, before he started to speak: Did he look relaxed! Always his manner is smiling and confident, but always with tension too, visible in sweat and flesh. Not tonight. He looked like a man getting up to address the local Kawanis. If this was a big speech, make-or-break, somebody forgot to tell him. I've always been struck by the discipline by which he carries himself in good humor, but this was the first time ever that it looked like he was standing outside in the sun and the breeze and enjoying the fine day.

Do I make too much of this impression?

I don't think so. domestically it was a small speech. No revamping of Social Security this time, just a "bipartisan commission". It seems to me there were a number of commissions...? And tax cuts made permanent, and renewal of the Patriot act, and some new funds for this and that research and a general statement about immigration, its value but also the necessity of controlling the border. He commented on the ethics mess in the congress and complimented them on their efforts to clean up their mess. All-in-all it was domestic politics just as we presently have domestic politics and the struggle from this day forth will be exactly the struggle we've had up to now. He put in his oar but created no new direction. So, ho hum.

He did mention "clean, safe nuclear energy" which I enjoyed; and the Democrats stepped in it when they cheered his statement that "Social Security reform was defeated last year" and he responded "...and the problem hasn't gone away." It's so stupid for Democrats to cheer a statement that reform was defeated. From time to time Democrats are fun.

Foreign policy was solid as it always is. The statement that Hamas must renounce violence, disarm, and recognize Israel's right to exist was powerful given the forum; as was his statement of respect for the Iranian people and his call that they create a democratic government.

There were some good lines, none of which I will remember accurately: "Hindsight is not policy and withdrawal is not honor..." something like that. And of Alito: "A servant of the law, not a legislator." I'll get the qoutes accurately once I read the text.

And saw Tom Kaine for the first time. What a wuss. Not offensive, just a wuss.

And listened to the MSM for a while in sour bellyache, this and that. My oh my, have they lemon on the lips.

A useful speech. It's good to have one of these once a year.


Quotes, corrected:

"There is no peace in retreat and there is no honor in retreat."

"Hindsight is not wisdom and second-guessing is not a strategy."

"...judges must be servants of the law, and not legislate from the bench."

New Neanderthal, Continued

I wish the graph were larger but I couldn't make Blogger make it bigger. One of these days I'm going to have to put a little more effort into mastering a little more computer mechanics.

Note on the far left, far up, clustered above the zero (zero, because in geological time it's as if at that point no time has passed at all), are a number of small black squares. Those are Neanderthal. To the left of them, because more recent but still in geological time in effect above the zero of no time passing at all, are two little circles. Look closely. This graph is not large, and those little circles are rather far down. Once you spot them you'll note that they're the Greek symbols for male and female. They represent, by sex, the average brain capacities for modern man. To help in spotting them McHenry has helpfully put in vertical brackets "expressing the natural individual variation in modern human brain size." Now, really, why do you think McHenry so helpfully put in those brackets?

Next I turn to a pretty good website. Over the last two weeks I've had time to look at many dozens of such sites. But this is a new area for me. I have no background. It's been very hard for me to judge which sites are telling me the truth and which are not, but I judge this site to be pretty good. Note first some good data:

Range (cm3) Average (cm3)

chimpanzees 300-500 ----
australopithecines 400-540 ----
Homo habilis 509-752 610
Homo erectus 750-1250 958
Neandertals 1300-1750 1500
modern Homo sapiens 900-1880 1345 *

But then this:

There is a considerable range in body size among modern Homo sapiens, including large numbers of small people. Subsequently, the average brain size is smaller than would initially seem likely. However, the average for some modern populations (especially European and most African ones) is slightly larger than that of Neandertals. (My emphasis)

And then this:

CAUTION: It would be a mistake to assume that a minor difference in overall brain size is directly correlated with intelligence among archaic or modern Homo sapiens. However, the gross difference in cranial capacity between the earliest human species and recent Homo sapiens probably does reflect potential intelligence differences. In order to trace the development of intelligence, speech, and other mental capabilities, it is more useful to examine changes in specific brain regions.

Why? Do I detect...sensitivity?

This study, at least for a while, is going to be fun. I assert: The evidence is in, Neanderthal was smarter than man. Modern man, that is. Us. Modern man either; one, is an inferior species to what has gone before; or two, and this is going to be my working presumption, is in incredibly rapid evolutionary decline. I'll read more, and see where the argument goes.

But I like this idea, because it fits exactly with my personal philosophy, that I'm here but for a brief time and I'd better make my life count, at least in terms personal to myself. Man too, in the brief time he has left before his brain becomes that of a chipmunk, must do what he can in those things personal to man.

There are only three obvious oppositional arguments:

• The fossil record, accidentally, has preserved only large-brained individual variations, well within the variations that occur in modern man and so in size not superior to modern man.
• That there is no genetic contact between Neanderthal and modern man and that thus though Neanderthal may have had a larger brain than modern man the comparative data is not evidence of an evolutionarily diminution of brain size. Work is being done with mtDNA presumably with the intent of making this argument (Vive Boule). But we'll see. And there's still the problem of Cro Magnon, accepted as fully modern and thus a part of our genetic inheritance yet with an apparently larger brain.
• That at any rate our brains are superior because better organized. ("Size doesn't matter.") The proof that we're superior is that we have technology and Darwin.

(I would note, that the American Indian, undoubtedly a modern man, at the time of the discovery of the New World had neither technology nor Darwin but only stone implements. --I'm uncertain as to what degree they were superior to those of Neanderthal. One could mention Clovis.

And I wonder if there's been any similar diminution among any other primate? As I understand no ancient fossil of any ape, monkey, gibbon or chimpanzee has ever been found. Jungles apparently are not optimal for the preservation of a fossil record.

Whatever, this is fun. The arguments aren't certain and won't be certain. But it is fun. Vive ut Vivas.

New Neanderthal

On the right is a reconstruction of the La Chapelle-aux-Saints Neandertal skeleton, discovered in France in 1908, published in L'Illustration in 1909, and in the Illustrated London News about a week later. It was done by Frantisek Kupka, based on the work of Marcellin Boule. Monsieur Marcellin Boule was a fossil expert. He had the full skeleton before him. He knew that the gentleman Neanderthal had a larger brain than he did, yet in his description he created an ape. Why?












This is a reconstruction by Jay Matternes, from the October issue of Science, 1981. It's from the same skull. This man looks powerful, pleasant, bright. There's a difference. Why?
















And this incidentally, is a fully authoritive, fully authentic reconstruction of the average Neanderthal female. Vive la difference.






And now to numbers, without which there is not science. The graph is from McHenry. I know nothing about him other than that he has published in the Proceeding of the National Academy of Science. That should mean that academically he's at least within the range of the socially acceptable, so I'll take his data points as being accurate:


Graph from McHenry (1994), plotting brainsizes against time:
(Note: I can not get my blog to take text below the graph, so unfortunately, see New Neanderthal, Continued.)

Alito Is In: Reid Is An Idiot

This just from Fox:

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid called on President Bush Tuesday to "come clean" in next week's State of the Union speech and acknowledge "the costs of Republican corruption."

"In his 2000 campaign, George Bush promised to bring 'dignity' to the White House but we've since found that he brought Jack Abramoff instead....President Bush needs to quit stonewalling about his White House's connection to corruption, and finally tell us how he's going to reform Washington,"

I can't believe he's so stupid and I can't believe I was so worried. The only possibility the Democrats had of beating Alito was to demonize him in the public perception and so justify a filibuster and shake loose some Republicans. That meant demonization had to be their singleminded focus. I had thought Bush would counter that by simply by speaking out...on anything, just to distract the Democrats. But Harry Reid is doing that for him. Harry Reid has made Bush the focus, Alito is in.

I think I suffer from bad memories and my own misperception, the idea that Democrats are clever. They're dumb as stumps.

So it's over except for the nastiness. I'm not going to worry about it more.

Cro Magnon & the Goedel Theogany

Cro Magnon
1600cc







Mathematician
1350cc ?



Britannica Concise Encyclopedia, 2006
Neanderthals were short, stout, and powerful. Cranial capacity equaled or surpassed that of modern humans, though their braincases were long, low, and wide....Cro-Magnons were relatively more robust and powerful than today's humans, with a somewhat larger brain capacity.

Britanica 2004,
Although it appears that at the time of discovery the remains of more than 10 individuals existed at Cro-Magnon, only fragments from some five individuals were preserved and studied, among them the cranium and mandible of a male about 50 years old. "...the Old Man of Cro-Magnon, has been regarded as typical of the Cro-Magnon peoples....The cranial capacity is large, about 1,600 cubic centimetres."

"Encyclopedia Britannica, 1975, Volume V, page 298 reported that the cranial capacity of the Cro-Magnon man was 1,600 cubic centimeters, which is 18.5% larger than the male homo sapiens brain, which is 1,350 cubic centimeters."


The point of stating these primitive capacities is pure entertainment. Even presuming that everything as stated is unassailably true (they may not be), it still does no damage to Darwinian theory; it does do some damage to the preachment of that theory, because the theory in fact is faith, and this particular faith demands an absolute absence of intellect. To explain a reversion, or to explain away what seems to be a reversion, is certainly doable; but it does demand thought, it does cause a pause, and in a pause there can be a question, there can be a skepticism, and if ever Darwinism is faced with skepticism it loses force. Debate could ensue, and that is so...unnecessary.

And so that it will not be such an ill-bred bother for the Darwinians I will make their arguments for them:

--Neanderthal is extinct! Their genetic line, their genetic influence, is gone. They were a separate line, they died out, they're not part of the modern human evolutionary line so there can be no reversion so let me alone! Okay. Of course no one really knows if they were really a totally separate branch and that they passed without leaving a genetic ripple but that is the assertion and in this business assertion is fact and that's that. So no small-brained reversion from them guys.

--But that still leaves Cro Magnon...? Well, who says Cro Magnon had that big a brain? We know that there's individual variation, there aren't nearly so many Cro Magnon specimens as there are Neanderthal, how do we know that we haven't just gotten a few individual variations that were big in the brain? Okay... It is true that the brain size most often cited as representative of the set is taken from only one complete skull called Cro Mag 1. But it is spoken of as representative... It does seem that dismissing it as just an individual variation is going against what has been the anthropological assertion. But let that be. We do know two things: He is fully modern man, and thus is part of our gene pool; and our brains at least are not larger than his. And there is the question of what happened to him. Are we just Cro Magnon 10,000 years later, or did Cro Magnon interbreed somehow with something else...? I've heard it speculated that in fact he was large brained and interbred with a smaller brained human coming in from the East...? The point here probably is just that there's uncertainty.

In sum: Cro Magnon was just individual variation and Neanderthal can be ignored.

But to consider the ape-man a little more:

--We know that on average he had a larger cranial capacity than the modern human. We know that because we have many specimens and if the fossil record is to have any authority this must be so.

--We know that he went extinct and is not part of our gene pool... Of course, we don't know exactly what happened with Cro Magnon but we do know exactly what happened with Neanderthal. He's gone. This is fortunate, otherwise we would have to explain reversion to a smaller brain size, a devolution, and we couldn't quite so easily make fun of the pea-sized brain of the dinosaur when ours seems moving in the same direction.

It still is annoying that he had a larger brain than we have... Good thing he looked like an ape. That's how we know he wasn't smart.

Of course, he didn't look like an ape. He did not have bowed legs and a bent back, he stood upright just as we do, and whether he had hair like a gorilla or was a smooth as porcelain we simply don't know.

"Old Man", Homo sapiens neanderthalensis
Discovered by Amedee and Jean Bouyssonie in 1908 near La-Chapelle-aux-Saints in France. It is about 50,000 years old, with a brain size of 1620 cc. This nearly complete skeleton was reconstructed by Marcellin Boule, who wrote a definitive and highly influential paper on it which managed to be totally wrong in many of its conclusions. It exaggerated the apelike characteristics of the fossil, popularizing the stereotype, which would last for decades, of a stooping ape-man shuffling along on bent knees. This specimen was between about 30 and 40 when he died, but had a healed broken rib, severe arthritis of the hip, lower neck, back and shoulders, and had lost most of his molar teeth. The fact that he survived as long as he did indicates that Neanderthals must have had a complex social structure.

That he was ape-like was a Darwinian fantasy, sort of like Haeckel's embryos. Darwinians do this sort of thing. For the faith to be convincing it's necessary to have an apeman as a progenitor to modern man, and so they got one. This particular skeleton was uniquely suited to the need, for, to restate, it was a man severely crippled with arthritis, this explained the bowed legs and the bent back. The arthritis was ignored and the hairy body was added gratis and we had our first progenitor apeman and church going folks were outraged but put sputtering in their place and Darwinians were delighted. This public image has been allowed to remain but it is simply not true.

So I ask, if indeed Neanderthal were comely, who's to say they didn't interbreed with Cro Magnon? We know that they coexisted for thousands of years, then we know that they disappeared. Who's to say that their disappearance wasn't due to intermarriage rather than extinction? I am quite certain that there is no argument, other than assertion, that they either could or could not have interbred.

And this leaves a nice conundrum: Either we had an "apeman" who had a bigger brain than Einstein and we really can't be certain that he wasn't brighter than Einstein; or we do have Neanderthal in our blood and we have to explain how it is that the evolutionary movement has been from a larger brain to a smaller.


I have neglected Goedel. I had intended to examine his concept of man, in his perception, moving toward the godlike through the inevitable force of a progressive evolution. I guess I just find that concept difficult.

One note, for those entertained by numbers:

Lucy is generally considered our oldest hominid ancestor, at 3.5 million years; about 60lbs, brain 450cc. Making brain/body proportionate to the modern woman at 120lbs, that would make her cranial capacity 900cc, or 450 less than the present-day female. That means that since Lucy the modern brain has evolved in size at the rate of .085cc / 1000 yrs.

If we take Cro Magnon 1 as representative of his type and physically about the same size as modern man and existing as an identifiable type yet as recently as 10,000 years ago, then that means that in 10,000 years our brains have gone from 1600cc to 1350cc, or 250cc lost or 25cc lost per thousand years. That means that in 50 to 60 thousand years we'll have a brain the size of a chipmunk's.

Note: This was a hard post to write. I did a great deal of reading but it's in an area where I have no background and so found it very hard to determine fact. It is not my imagination that many Darwinian believers find this materiel embarrassing and so misstate it or ignore it. However there are straightforward sources, and so I am now pretty sure of the general tenor of fact:
--It was a surprise to me to find that Neanderthal walked upright.
--It was a surprise to discover that he not only did not have a near ape-proportioned brain but in fact had a brain larger than our own.
--I had accepted that he was exterminated by Cro Magnon, now I find that a conjecture.
--I do think that either the large brain passing from the evolutionary tree; or the large brain becoming small, both not to be expected, are challenges to public evolutionary assumptions that publicly have to be addressed.
--And I do believe that if belief in inevitable evolutionary mental progress is to be intellectually credible as a creed, then these are serious objections against that presumption of inevitability and have to be addressed. Goedel can't simply claim "insight" or "intuition" or some mystical awareness of some apriori truth. He has to have an argument.
--In terms of my own creed these are all no more than matters of curiosity.

Alito: 10 - 8, & Counting

Alito will be passed out of the Judiciary Committee on a party line vote. Republicans, in shaming the Democrats, are saying this is a bad precedent. In fact it is a good precedent, Republicans are finally voting politics, just like the Democrats, who said (from Fox) that "...they had no intention of voting for the 3rd Circuit Court judge, whom they described repeatedly as beholden to presidential power and against abortion rights."

The Supreme Court is a legislative body. The party in power has no choice but to put in its people. It would be better if the Court were a court but it's not. To the victor goes the spoils, we need our own hacks.

Alito is not a hack, he's a jurist with a limited view of the courts proper power. This is called "judicial restraint". I like it, but the only real restraint we need is a congress and an executive that ignores the court. Properly, the court is a final arbiter of a specific case judged on the narrowest of grounds with the least possible penumbra of emanation of precedent. The only reason we need a Supreme Court is because we need a last court. A case has to stop somewhere, but then that should be that. --It's true precedent happens, but it should be rare and limited and safe. The very idea that we discuss precedent as though it's some grand pronouncement turns my stomach. To my idea it's a violation of the very concept of democratic government.

However, we do have a supreme court with grand power, so you do the best you can by trying to confirm justices who personally have a more proper concept of their limited role. Alito seems as good as you're gong to get, so: Will the Democrats let this go through without a filibuster?

Presently the idea is a non-filibuster filibuster. They'll talk and talk and talk. The idea is to smear Alito, see if they can get public support, and watch to see if any Republicans quake. If they see a shiver they'll do a filibuster and they'll expect to win. So...

Bush will continue to make public pronouncements on one thing or another. This will draw all the demon-hate to himself and keep it off Alito. That in itself may get him confirmed, Alito will not be successfully demonized, the Democrats will not muster public support.

But if somehow there is a filibuster, possibly just because the Democrats are so desperate...? Always there's the question of Republican guts: Do they have any? One thing I do know. If there is a filibuster and Frist doesn't immediately pull the nuclear trigger the base will be enraged. And the base, having some feelings on this matter, and having already gotten rid of Harriet, now very will knows its power. It's this new power of rage that may give the Senate Republicans their own taste for a fight...and this might make my fear of a filibuster just silliness on my part.

Note: That Democrats intend to use Alito's decisions as a political issue underscores their sense of the Court as a political institution; it also indicates their present sense of weakness regarding the possibility of a successful filibuster.

Superduper Bowl

Super Bowl. Seattle or Pittsburgh? I can't knowledgeably compare personnel. I expect the conventional wisdom would be that whoever gets to the quarterback will win. I don't think either team is going to get to the quarter back particularly well, and that's because I see both teams as psychologically solid. Neither is going to collapse, both believe they belong there, both will play near their peak, it will be the hardest fought Super Bowl ever.

Sam Alitio? This is less certain because the teams are less certain. I'm a little more certain about the 12th man. I think the 12th man wants him confirmed.

Of course, each team has its supporters but I think this time the stadium is Republican, and I think this is the first time the Republicans believe they belong here, and are ready to win, even if they have to bite and claw to do it.

This is uncertain. The Democrats have enough votes for a filibuster. The Republicans have enough votes for the nuclear option. Which has the most guts? Always it's been the Democrats. Has it changed?

This is a very big fight. I am absolutely certain the Democrats will threaten filibuster. But nobody starts a fight they know they can't win. They'll threaten, if they see any Republican quaking, they'll filibuster, and they will believe they will win. This is the way of Washington: if it's guts, the Democrats win. Republicans got no guts.

But I'm not sure this time. They've already gotten Roberts. That helps. They got rid of Harriet. That helps. And no one got to Alito. That helps, and it would be enough to make a man mad if they now tried to get to him through the filibuster...

It does seem to me, just in terms of psychological dynamics, that Republicans might finally be getting a little fed up. Political calculations aren't everything (though I see those calculations tipping the Republican way). Sometimes a little contempt for your opponent might be all you need to get your back up enough to really stomp him good, and I think that time might (finally) be now.

Super Bowl: Seattle 20 -- Pittsburgh 17.

Superduper Bowl:
Filibuster, Nuclear Option, Confirmation: Alito 57 -- Teddy...kerplunk.

Note: This call is not an analysis, it's my felt sense of where we are, my "political instinct". I can't believe the Democrats won't filibuster because I can't believe they yet believe they can lose; and I believe they will lose because I can't believe the Republicans aren't finally fed up with their foot stomping nonsense. Or rather, I think the Republicans may finally recognize that the Democrat's "power" is just foot stomping. Whatever, it's going to be fun. (I note too, that I seem to have referenced two rather different kinds of stomping).

What's God Like?

(While this is just an email I've decided to include it as a post because next week I'm going to do some entries on evolution)


Dear J,

I don't know how serious you are about pursuing this question but if you are I'll reiterate my main point: If you want to understand these things you can't do it on your own, you have to read books. I would suggest anything by GK. Chesterton. He was Catholic, exceptionally well read, very bright, and a lot of fun. The first thing you should do is expose yourself to the quality of mind of the men who have thought about these matters.

I will mention one concept: The Christian God reaches out to His people because He desires that they should worship Him. He is a judgmental God but a loving God. He does not desire His people's damnation but their salvation. He desires to gather his children to Him and so constantly is present to them; in their conscience, in their hope, in their despair, in their constant consciousness of Him . There is no man who does not know God because the Christian God never departs the mind of man, this is an ever present invitation to salvation. But he has given man free will. Man can chose to accept that invitation or not. This is his given nobility, Man can pridefully chose his own destruction. But God stands always in welcome, His house and His arms open. --Normally this concept is expressed more succinctly: "Knock, and ye shall enter."

And if rather than considering these matters as a personal quest and desiring instead just knowledge, you still have to read books.

The concept of other "major" religions I consider trivial.


I am presently concerning myself with questions about evolution. K has the concept that in time man will evolve to the point that a new perceptive capacity will develop. It's his contention that the laws of logic and order that we're able to perceive are not the full explanation of how the world works. He believes that if at some point we do develop this new perceptive capacity, then we will see true physics and true logic, and the unsolvable problems and the mystery of meanings will disappear. I think he's nuts that it's going to happen through evolution and I know it's not going to happen for me, but I do consider the concept interesting and do rather believe it.

As part of looking up the various speculations on our evolutionary future I've discovered that both Neanderthal and Cro Magnon had larger brain capacity than modern man. Neanderthal was slightly larger than Cro Magnon (I don't have the number handy); Cro Magnon was 1600cc. The world average for modern man is 1350cc.

This is kind of fun. I've been to dozens of "science" web sites. The Darwinians handle this embarrassment in differing ways. Most simply ignore the numbers and assert brain size evolution has been constant since Lucy up to the present. Some simply lie, and assert Neanderthal was 1350cc "the same as modern man". Some, in very learned papers, argue the early measurements were wrong; some say it doesn't matter anyway, brain organization is what determines intelligence, not size.

I don't much care, but to see the embarrassment is fun. This is a "blip" in the argument, it's not so aesthetic when the theory has to explain a reversion. Of course the theory can explain it because it in fact explains nothing, but it loses some of the compelling force of inevitability when it has to explain how an apeman had a larger brain than Einstein.

No News Is BIG News

The extraordinary news so far this week is No News Alito. I find this stunning.

Today the Supreme Court passed on the New Hampshire parental notification law, kicking it back down to the lower court. I expect they did that because if they had heard the case the result would have been an evenly divided court and so the decision would have been "illegitimate" however it went because the swing vote would have been O'Connor and she's no longer properly a justice in that she'll be replaced in two weeks.

This is a swing vote case and the swing vote is Alito. What a beautiful opportunity for the left: In Sam Alito's America Young Women Will Be Beaten By Their Fathers. Should be the headline in every paper... Not a thing.

My on my how the left has withered.

I continue to believe that's because they're the only group ever --certainly in my lifetime-- who've come to explain the order of nature by demonology: And Bush spoke, and the Rains came and the Winds swirled and Lo, there was Katrina. And Gitmo and Torture and Spying and Lying. And the Demon did it all.

But as I've noted, there's a self-limiting psychology to demonology: Since a Demon explains all things you can only have one demon at a time. We are after all a monotheistic society; one God, one Demon, take your pick. I suppose you could have both at once (I doubt it), but you definitely can't have two of one at the same time. One Demon, that's it.

The problem is, when it comes to the Supreme Court, the only way a minority can defeat an otherwise qualified nominee is by establishing that he's a demon; but by the one demon rule you can't do that when you've got Bush not Bork. (Bork anyway was pre demonology-as-theism).

There is one other thing, the fatigue aspect. Demonization, since it is irrational, does require repetition: Abu Gharib, Abu Gharib, Abu Gharib, Abu Gharib, sense conflated with assertion until panties over the head becomes torture. The same would have to be done to Alito and it is this kind of thing that I think Americans have come to find tiring, for the simple reason that it is.

--Just checked ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, Fox, and Drudge. Not one word on Sam. I do see that the National Enquirer reports that Senator Ted Kennedy had a love child shortly after Chapauquidick. My how the world is upside-topsy.

I do believe this is a watershed week for our present politics. I just find it hard to believe that the Democrats are going out with hardly a whimper. At some point they've at least got to be offensive.

(One note: I have heard it argued that Justice Kennedy may become the new swing vote, the argument being that there's a great appeal in power and so the unoccupied fulcrum is tempting).

Insanity Happens

I believe there is such a thing as insanity.

When I left here for my "weekend" I left for four days. Thursday I got about a half hour's news, Friday an hour with Brett Hume, Saturday and Sunday nothing. Monday I went to the net to get caught up, first to Drudge, then Fox. Where was Sam? By golly I thought I'd been gone four days but I'd slept four years. He was no where. Clearly he hadn't made it, somebody else was on the court, and I probably didn't even own my own home any more. I read other stuff, then in the evening I saw it, the headline: Committee Delays Vote Until the 24th.

Well, it was good to find I hadn't slept four years, I had been feeling a little disoriented. But where was the headline: Alito Aborts Coke Bottle. That, or something similar had to be somewhere, I'd been expecting it all day. They had to have something on this guy by now (never mind if it was true or not). But nothing. All I saw was a one week delay, something automatic within Senate rules even if requested by only one senator...

So who's nuts?

The thing is, we'd been expecting a big fight. With Roberts (a stealth nominee, by-the-way, who had no judicial paper trail, having been a judge only two years and never having made a conservative public statement in his entire life) with Roberts we had the threat of filibuster, the threat of nuclear option, the gang of 14 taking central power and talking about "extraordinary circumstances..." A pretty hairy time, and this to replace a mild conservative with a mild conservative.

Then we had Harriet, the ultimate under-the-radar stealth candidate --with no experience whatsoever-- and so presumeably confirmable because a unknown. After a conservative uproar we did get Alito, and then there was going to be a Big Fight. The Swing Vote! No conservative could be allowed to replace Sandra Day, it would upset the balance of the court...

What did we get? If you don't follow the blogs that follow this sort of thing there was hardly enough to keep you awake. To be exciting there has to be threat, you have to fear your guy is gong to lose. It just never happened.

So what is it the Dems have up their sleeves?

Whatever, I just do not see it and this induces disorientation. It brings up the concept of insanity. Who's insane?

I hear it said: The Democrats knew all along they couldn't block Alito, they were just going through the motions to appease their kook nut base, their money source.

I don't believe that for a moment. If they lose the court they lose they're liberal agenda. This is a big fight, this is a battle of immense importance... And there's been no battle. And it's not that they need merit or "ammunition" to win their kind of battle, they just need power...

And so I return to my basic concept. I believe there is such a thing as insanity, and in this case I mean a particular kind of mass delusional hysteria, which is the idea that the Democrats do have power, that they are this country's rule and law, and that they must merely assert their righteous will and the public will follow...

The public didn't follow.

What I think we may be witnessing is the unexpected decompression of this delusion. They have asserted their will, the public has not followed and seeing that it occurs to certain queasy Republicans that it may be acceptable that they not follow either, and you know what happens when the bubble no longer encases the mind...? People suddenly see that the Dems, at best, only have 44 votes, and that's not 51.

I'm thinking this may be what's happened. It's happened probably because the media is out to lunch and nobody much cares anymore what they report. They fuss and the Democrats fuss but the public has placed them all together in the quiet room and hopes they'll get better and wishes them well. And so finally it's recognized that the Democrats are no longer the ruling party.

It's taken awhile, but I see a new national gestalt: The Democrats no longer rule the world.

We'll know in two weeks. If Alito is confirmed as passively as now seems probable the Democrats are no longer philosopher kings, they're a mere opposition minority.

Opps

Read a bit, just to check on what the world was doing. The big story is Alito and the only important matter is whether he's going to be confirmed or not and I saw no opinion fearful that he would not garner a majority and no opinion more than speculative that it might come down to filibuster and the nuclear option. The general sense is that the nuclear option is firmly available and thus a filibuster's unlikely and the Democrats probably wouldn't try it anyway because they're just not able to paint Alito as scary enough to get public support.

I think it's true that he isn't scary enough. I haven't heard him speak (since I never have the sound on the tube) but I have watched him and I have read his words and he just comes across as a pleasant cerebral nerd. That just isn't going to draw up the recessive fears of evil necessary for demonization.

I would like to think that Americans have grown tired of such tactics but I'm sure they haven't. A demon is an explanation and it's deep and instinctively human. But this guy just don't cut it as Dracula.

And Bush is being very intelligent in this respect. He understands that while you can dislike many people at one time you can only have one demon. That's because the demon expresses the irrational and the irrational is formless and can be given form and contained and handled only through the singularity of one image and that image is Bush.

So he's out and about making speeches about Iraq and criticizing his critics. Dirty dog. Those Democrats that need hate and fear directed toward Alito if there's to be any chance of defeating him instead find Bush just hogging up all that hate and fear and my it sure takes the wind out of their sails. All the hatred-demon focus is on Bush and the would be demon Alito remains a pleasant harmless nerd. Smart guy, that Bush fellow...


Pleasant day yesterday. There sure are a lot of things that are fun if you stay away from politics.

I'm thinking I might make Opps --that is, Obligatory Partisan Political Screed-- a weekly part of my blog. You gotta do some politics to be a blogger (but you can't do much if you want to have a mind). So that might be my pattern. If I'm exercised about something I'll write, if I happen to have an insight (insights do happen) I'll write; otherwise perhaps just a once a week entry.

There is a substantial difference between reading politics and writing about the stuff. It is necessary to read to know ones nation and with reading there's some muse. But writing becomes a tedium. Advocacy positions tend to be pretty automatic and actual insight pretty rare. It would not be bad to add my voice to my side, it would be modest but it would be honorable, but it would be d-u-l-l. There would be no intellectual entertainment.

So, to restate: I think politics will be occasional. Insights will be put down should they happen; my foes will be smitten, should I get excited (that's kind of fun, actually); and once a week there will be Opps, my chance to put my foot in just to maintain my credentials as a fair, moderate, balanced, objective, right-wing Republican.

Of Fruit Flies and God

Now that I'm on my "scientists are jerks" kick I might as well reply to a sentence in my friend K's email that I last time neglected. He said not only that he found the hypothesis that humans are continuing to evolve mentally to be a "fructifying belief", he stated as well:

"...there is an idea that many people are attracted to, that in some areas of knowledge we have reached a pinnacle beyond which we will never be able to go.... I agree with that up to a point...Probably you can see where I am going?"

Yes. At least I have my guess. As the mind evolves in time the great mysteries in life, the "unsolved mysteries" will be understood by the superior being; thus this belief in continued mental evolution expresses an aspiration toward understanding, a love of wisdom.

Okay, but Darwin ain't going to make it happen.

I think it's important to distinguish between what has happened historically, which certainly does seem to be a movement toward ever more complex and admirable life forms, and what is promised by Darwinian theory. This theory has one mechanism: chance fortuitous mutation preserved through natural selection. That's it. The genius of the idea is natural selection, and lots a lots a time. Before the mystical conception of natural selection no one could have looked about the complex world around them and said without being silly that this all happened by chance. But with "natural selection" and immense time you have respectability. Another friend once explained it: Either God did it or he didn't; if you don't want to believe in God, he didn't, and you believe in Darwin. That's true. Darwinism is theology.

But this silly idea supposedly is testable, that's what makes it "science", and "respectable".

So let's conduct a test.

This weekend, as I was sitting across from my ma watching her be cross and loony, I happened to read an interesting statement:

"Scientists have been experimenting with fruit flies for a hundred years...."

This is interesting. The fruit fly has a life cycle of 14 days. That means that in one year 26 generations are produced.

Eighty years ago it was discovered that if they're bombarded by x-rays, random genetic mutations occur at 150 times the normal rate.

Evolutionary theory states that all mutation is random. Most would be harmful, some would be fortuitous.

A human generation can be taken to be 25 years.

From this it's possible to do some math. 20 x 26 = 520 generations produced the first 20 years under stress conditions meant to parallel the stress presumed in natural selection.

In the eighty years after the beginning of x-ray bombardment the numbers would be 80 x 26 x150 = the number of random genetic mutations that would occur naturally in 312,000 generations of fruit flies under normal conditions.

Adding the two numbers together you get 312,520 generations. If you presume that more than one lab has been doing this, perhaps 1000 worldwide, each its own separate "eco system", you get 312,520,000 generations produced under stress conditions meant to mimic those of natural selection. If you multiply by the term of human generation --25 years-- you get 7,813,000,000 years.

My, that's more than 50,000.

Nearly eight billion years. This is the number of years in equivalent human terms during which natural selection as prescribed by Darwinian theory has been carefully observed by scientists under laboratory conditions, and in all that time not one species variation had occurred that did not revert to type in a matter of months. In other words, in over seven billion years of Darwinian evolution fruit flies haven't changed, haven't developed the capacity to contemplate God, and are, as a matter of fact, fruit flies.

Now of course, I suppose if you merely want to put in 50,000 years just to get to the point where humans can do large primes in there head without computers, well, I guess that aspiration is more modest.

I find Darwinism no different from the atomism of Democratus. In each case it's a materialism: if you want to deny the spiritual world you find a way. With Democratus it was very small particles, infinitely small but not infinitely divisible. They couldn't be infinitely divisible because that would mean spirit, but they had to be infinitely small so that they couldn't be observed and the theory couldn't be challenged. For Darwinism the similarity is Time, nearly infinite amounts of Time, simply so that the theory can't be tested. Democritus used atoms to explain consciousness. We know a lot about atoms now, they don't explain consciousness. Darwin uses time and natural selection to explain creation. This doesn't explain creation, it does state a belief. This can be a belief of choice, but it's not science.

Incidentally, while I believe "scientists are jerks", I don't believe honest men doing science are jerks. They're rather admirable in fact.

(Note: I see a fairly severe error in my logic. It only takes one fruit fly to get the ball rolling, one fortuitous fruit fly mutation. In the eco system of the world there are billions upon trillions of fruit flies; in the eco system of the labs only tens of thousands per lab. That cuts down on the number of fruit flies potentially mutant, and so I suppose cuts down on the effective number of years that this Darwinian test has been made, (though not on the number of generations). And I would note that certainly more fruit flies have been tested than ever there were Mammoths, for example, and yet in just a few hundred thousand years a number species of that hairy creature developed and went extinct. It seems some little change should have happened is such a little creature as the fruit fly. Or perhaps the most interesting thing is the reversion to type? --Will have to take my own critique under advisement.

"Snuppy's a Clone!" Who Says?

I went to Secondhand Smoke a little bit ago. This is my blog of reference now for following the Woo-suk Hwang fraud. It's written by Wesly J. Smith, an apparently very bright guy and a man who seems to have values similar to my own, but in his last post he disappoints me slightly. He writes:

So, Hwang has apparently never cloned any human embryos nor created cloned embryonic stem cells. But he did clone Snuppy the dog.

Does the modifier "apparently" also reference the second sentence: "But he did clone Snuppy the dog." I hope so. Seoul National University asserts that the DNA match between the donnor, Tai, the three year old Afgan, and Snuppy, indicate that Snuppy is a somatic clone. Maybe. We are dealing with fraud. Fraud can be clever. A simple match of blood type, in effect a paternity test, hardly seems a level of skepticism appropriate to a man like Hwang. There's more than one way to get an identical DNA. I would like to know, for example, when it was that Hwang aquired Tai, I would like to see some documentation.

The official investigative summary is here (linked by Smith). I sent him this comment:

"But he did clone Snuppy the dog." Who says? Hwang said he'd cloned a human embryo and extracted stem cells. Hwang said he'd cloned and created eleven patient-specific stem-cell lines. Oh yeah Oh yeah Oh yeah. South Korea University says "Snuppy is a clone" and you say "Oh yeah!" Oh yeah? These are the same guys who allowed Hwang to flourish in the first place, and who still have a hundred technicians they have to pay with state grant money. --It is not insignificant that an adult and a puppy have identical DNA. As an assertion made by a gentleman this would indicate one was a clone. But I note that a successful con depends on the artist being considered a gentleman. These men are gentlemen? I know I'm an extraordinarily extreme and tasteless fellow, but I presume self-interest and dishonesty. I presume fraud, and fraud is both clever and bold. "Snuppy is a clone." It's reported absolutely everywhere as fact. Are you going to send them your own money?

What I Know About Stem Cells, by Mouse

From the egg comes the human. From one cell, 200 trillion (give or take). Wow! That egg is something else. Scientists inform us that it is "totipotent", or as might otherwise be expressed: "An egg is an egg is an egg."

Some days into its development a blastocyst forms and within its core are stem cells --12 or a 100, I don't know how many-- and from these apparently undifferentiated cells comes the human and so scientists inform us these cells are "pluripotent", from 12 to a trillion. Wow! Them cells is something and scientists sure do have a way with words, and so you can take any one of those 12 cells and plop it into a heart and get a muscle...

Am I missing something here? The statement normally goes: "These cells are pluripotent and have the ability to become any cell in the body...?" Now I know I'm missing something. I see no evidence that any embryonic stem cell ever becomes any adult cell, I see no evidence that an embryonic stem cell ever becomes anything other than the next cell down the line within the course of natural development. Untold thousands of divisions occur, presumably millions of bits of information are exchanged between one cell and another, and within the context of this sequence the human is formed. Pretty impressive. It's called nature. It's complex.

Restated: There's no evidence that the embryonic stem cell ever becomes anything other than the next cell down the line; there's no evidence the embryonic stem cell can ever become a heart muscle; there's no evidence that outside of the natural course of development the embryonic stem cell can ever become anything other than another stem cell. This doesn't seem a promising area of research.

Adult stem cells are a different matter. In the first place, they exist in the adult, they're done being "the cell before the next cell"; and they presumably have a function, since they're there. And it seems that the body (I don't know how) occasionally calls on them and finds them useful. So the theory behind this kind of research is: If you can find the right cells (they are differentiated, though not visibly), massively increase their numbers, then insert them in the right place, well then, you have assisted nature, which is what medicine is all about, and you may get a good result.

Maybe. It seems daunting to me but at least there's reason within the presumption. But the reason behind the presumption in embryonic stem cell research to my mind doesn't exist. That a trillion comes from 12 does not seem reasoning to me at all --12 before a trilion therefore from 12 a heart muscle-- this seems pushing tautology a bit far. --There does seem to be some hope that the early stem cell is a chameleon and will become whatever cell it is placed next to... in which case I suppose every fetus should be a ten pound bag of stem cells...? Which is rather what you do get with stem cells in a petrii dish.

I don't know. I don't see the logic. I do see the emotion. It's just very exciting to be messing around with the creation of human life. --So sayeth Mouse.

Put Me Down For Fraud

Snuppy's a puppy. Just want to take my stand, stick my neck out, go on record, put my reputation on the line. How daring! Hwang, Woo-suk, cheats! (Notice how discreetly I avoid the obvious alliteration), but Snuppy is not a clone but probably an embryonic split. Who knows? When "science" becomes simply assertion, Hwange, Woo-suk, could have done just about anything. Anyway, I await with pleasurable anticipation the announcement next week (or some time soon) that Snuppy, the world's first cloned dog, isn't.

Nothing against Snuppy, I just don't like cloners, and this is something that I think might hurt them and that's EXCELLENT.

I regard this whole excited hysteria about the promise of embryonic stemcell research to be something new in science and bad. It certainly is bad. I regard it as Frankenstein Hucksterism. I don't believe these guys are concerned at all with therapy or medicine, I think they just want to clone themselves a human --some people are turned on by that-- and get themselves fame and a lot of grant money while they're at it.

So, to have one of them exposed as such a splendid fraud, is good. Hwang, Woo-suk, Sacked. (Note, while an alliteration, this is still discreet).

It does seem to me that those working in adult stem cell research are concerned with therapy and are concerned with medicine and are true scientists. --This has to be a short post because I'm about to head down for my four day "weekend". Perhaps when I get back I'll put down some of my layman's speculations on how stem cells actually work, but just for now I do want to note a guy I've just discovered: Wesley J. Smith. He's following this closely, he's very good. His blog is Secondhand Smoke; he also writes for The Weekly Standard.

New Year New Life

Lost my notebook a week back. This is the first one I've lost through stupidity in all the years I've been keeping them. I did at one time lose two through theft, and in my middle twenties I went through a period when I just threw them away after I was done, saying that I meant them only to be a means to sharpen observation and clarify thought and that I didn't want to get into the position of considering them literary work, while my literary work was still to be done. That was a sane enough orientation, but I remember feeling that it was a loss, and I remember saying? "Well, after all, it doesn't take much space to store something that has, after all, taken-up several hundred hours of concentration." And since then I've saved them all. Until this last loss. --I can't remember what was in it but I do know I had detailed observations of ma in her decline, and my emotions as I was forced to watch and interact. That's gone, and won't be repeated.

Anyway, I feel a loss, and that's led to an odd and surprising but strong sensation that I have to put some of my "significant" writing somewhere else and just now that seems to mean the blog.

This will mean a different kind of blog. I can't put in the purely personal stuff but I can certainly put in more than just politics. I've always felt the blog would be more than just politics, but it's hard to know what to include because I don't consider any of my thoughts important: There's no thought I've ever had that somebody else hasn't had first. But there is "significance".

There are just things in life that matter. I think about them, other people think about them, therefore they're worthy of careful expression. If I carefully and accurately express something I've thought about there will be communication because other people will have thought about it as well and will recognize what is said. And in communication there's development and there's energy. I read men who know more than I, but not every man knows more than I, and not on every issue, and I know that I often know more than the man I'm reading, yet the reading can be valuable: I get what I can.

So this would be the nature of my own writing, to express as clearly and as well as I can (and this to my benefit), with the recognition that to the right reader there will be benefit as well. And if exchange and debate does occur, then how fortunate! There will be a sharing and a contesting, and that's how all men develop.

So for the time being this is my judgment: If I think it's important I'll put it down, because it is important. In the sense that human matters are important what I carefully state is important, even as I know there are other men who could state the same matter with more force.

So I escape the paralysis of humility. Humility is good, but too much of it can be a drag.

But this does mean that my blog is hodgepodge. Oh well, for a while it's okay. I do have to start posting again.

Which leads naturally to New Year's Resolutions:

• To eat less
• To drink less coffee
• To drink more water
• To smoke less

This is the same list I made last year. I did well on three out of the four, but that smoking one was a bugger. I'll add one additional:

• To post more often

With my new, softer standards that shouldn't be difficult. The only standard remaining is that within my capacities my writing must still be clear, must still be accurate. --(I rather like this new standard, I must say; "just politics" really poops me out.)

And so I start my new inclusiveness by including an email (of which I now presume there will be two versions) on a matter both of entertainment and anger.


Dear K, (K stands for: Kind of a decent guy but confused.)

Pleased to get your email, it may have partially cleared up a mystification.

I've said I don't understand how you can find it meaningful that in 50,000 years men might have evolved to a higher capacity for concentration. So what?! Not only is there nothing in evolutionary theory that suggests it's going to happen but, my God, it's 50,000 years away; how can it possibly personally matter! I said: "This is pure belief, it's not science," and I wrote:

A pure belief I have, one to match yours and which I utterly can not prove, is that in time man will be resurrected in both body and soul. True, it won't happen for a while, in my individual case certainly not until after I'm dead, and perhaps not for a billion years, but still it's a meaningful belief and makes sense because it makes my present life mean something. It's a fructifying belief, because it gives energy to my struggle.

To which you replied:

To me the hypothesis that humans are continuing to evolve mentally is also a "fructifying belief"...

And then at that moment from out of somewhere it popped into my mind: "He believes in the western world's conception of the Inevitability of Progress, it's just that he's misapplied it from societal struggle to evolution!"

This was an insight. What does it mean?

I start at some disadvantage here because I'm not big into this particular belief either.

• I know that individuals who struggle to get better do.
• I know that small social groups who believe in the amelioration of suffering to some degree succeed in that amelioration.
• I know that nations that struggle towards values I respect have a better chance of getting somewhere close than nations that don't so struggle or struggle towards values I despise.
• I know that the belief you can get there has an element in it of "self fulfilling prophesy" in that it energizes...
• And I know that none of this psychological common sense explains the belief in the inevitability of progress. Somehow this belief is teleological and religious: Simply having the belief makes a man larger and better, never mind whatever might be it's pragmatic benefit in present life.

And here, my insights, such as they are, end; because it's just not much a part of my personality. But I'm not going to knock it. It does seem to work, it may even be true. I am glad the West has it, and I note that Islam, except in more secularized areas, doesn't; and I do believe the West has done extraordinary things in the last 25 hundred years. I note specifically wealth, ease, and freedom; and there certainly have been extraordinary achievments of intellect and culture. Progress is good. But what in the world does that have to do with Darwinian Evolution?

All I can say is that in this case a particular religiosity has evoluted to the Darwinian Conception. (This sounds vaguely theological).

But I still don't intuitively grasp it.

I'll go back to my formulae: This is a belief through which by the simple act of believing I am made a larger and a better man.

Okay. In 50,000 years evoluted man is going to look back on me and consider me a Chimpanzee and that makes me a better and larger man...?

I still find this hard to grasp, intuitionally, I mean. In 50,000 years I'll be a monkey, and that makes me better...

I suppose it could be some very great humility, this belief, (certainly something beyond anything I've got); a very great love that takes joy in the vision of a future species superior to the inelegance of present self; this self, after-all, but a momentary way-station along the emergent path to evolutionary perfection; this detritus, this self, not even archeology anymore but reconstructed fossil, remembered in study and on occasion, nostalgically, as an image of the fertile rankness of being in creation, the misshapen evolutionary promise of the primitive. --Could be true. And if believing that gives any one of my friends a sense of power and meaning in this present life, why... Shucks.

Incidentally, I lost my notebook by placing it on the top of the trunk of my car and driving away. 50,000 years from now that won't happen.